5 ms·

> How can words affect your rights as a person? Remember the holocaust

by glouwbug 6y ago

totony 6y ago
>Remember the holocaust I'd posit the words weren't the things affecting people, but whatever actions they took
- watwut 6y ago
  By the time holocaust was going on, it was too late.
  - totony 6y ago
    Are you saying without free speech it wouldn't have happened?
    - dlisboa 6y ago
      Nazism doesn't exist without propaganda, and the Nazi propaganda is something people defend to this day as free speech. The dissemination of genocidal ideas and the inhumanity of the Jews to the masses laid the groundwork. A lot of people on the "free speech at all costs" side defend that there is no problem with that, we have to accept them as equals and fight them in the battleground of ideas, as if they played by the same rules and we just have to make good arguments against genocide in order to convince them. So, that kind of free speech definitely drove a movement of people towards radicalism. The alternative is believing that millions of regular Germans had a little homicidal maniac inside of them just waiting to get out, and that Goebbles really had no part in getting them to hate so viciously. You can either: believe people are inherently evil and will support genocide at the first opportunity; or people can be influenced by pointed words from a group intent on manipulating them.
      - totony 6y ago
        >You can either: believe people are inherently evil and will support genocide at the first opportunity; or people can be influenced by pointed words from a group intent on manipulating them. It is also possible this was a prevailing thought, or that the environment was encouraging of such thoughts, in that nation at that time; that something caused division, and that the nazi used this as a way to assert power and spearhead their ideology. To think people can just tell you to participate in a genocide and everyone will follow is not recognizing the agency of human beings. The WW2 was a dramatic period that had a lot of factors, but having restrictions on free speech is unlikely to be one that would or even did matter much. Edit: plus, the restrictions on free speech are executed and decided by the oligarchy, and when the nazism was its most vicious it had little reason to restrict that kind of speech. The idea that free speech restriction help in preventing propaganda is wrong; it prevents only some subset of propaganda which does not further the elite, which imo is worse than not restricting it at all. And even then, free speech restrictions cannot stop the spread of ideas and prejudice, whatever they are.
        joepie91_ 6y ago
        > It is also possible this was a prevailing thought, or that the environment was encouraging of such thoughts, in that nation at that time; that something caused division, and that the nazi used this as a way to assert power and spearhead their ideology. Doesn't this exactly confirm the original claim that words do lead to actions and therefore affect people's rights?
        totony 6y ago
        Words have the potential to affect action, that is their main purpose. But actions are not caused by words but influenced by them, which imo is a big difference
    - brazzy 6y ago
      "We enter the Reichstag to arm ourselves with democracy’s weapons. If democracy is foolish enough to give us free railway passes and salaries, that is its problem... We are coming neither as friends or neutrals. We come as enemies! As the wolf attacks the sheep, so come we." -- Joseph Goebbels, 1928
    - watwut 6y ago
      There is no honest way to get from the exchange above to your comment. In any case, it would not happened without people would defend them each time they could, who would made up what may opponents said just to make opponents sound bad, who pretended that nazi are not danger, that nazi are just little misguided young men meaning well or just trolls.

> How can words affect your rights as a person? Remember the holocaust

totony 6y ago

>Remember the holocaust I'd posit the words weren't the things affecting people, but whatever actions they took

watwut 6y ago
By the time holocaust was going on, it was too late.
- totony 6y ago
  Are you saying without free speech it wouldn't have happened?
  - dlisboa 6y ago
    Nazism doesn't exist without propaganda, and the Nazi propaganda is something people defend to this day as free speech. The dissemination of genocidal ideas and the inhumanity of the Jews to the masses laid the groundwork. A lot of people on the "free speech at all costs" side defend that there is no problem with that, we have to accept them as equals and fight them in the battleground of ideas, as if they played by the same rules and we just have to make good arguments against genocide in order to convince them. So, that kind of free speech definitely drove a movement of people towards radicalism. The alternative is believing that millions of regular Germans had a little homicidal maniac inside of them just waiting to get out, and that Goebbles really had no part in getting them to hate so viciously. You can either: believe people are inherently evil and will support genocide at the first opportunity; or people can be influenced by pointed words from a group intent on manipulating them.
    - totony 6y ago
      >You can either: believe people are inherently evil and will support genocide at the first opportunity; or people can be influenced by pointed words from a group intent on manipulating them. It is also possible this was a prevailing thought, or that the environment was encouraging of such thoughts, in that nation at that time; that something caused division, and that the nazi used this as a way to assert power and spearhead their ideology. To think people can just tell you to participate in a genocide and everyone will follow is not recognizing the agency of human beings. The WW2 was a dramatic period that had a lot of factors, but having restrictions on free speech is unlikely to be one that would or even did matter much. Edit: plus, the restrictions on free speech are executed and decided by the oligarchy, and when the nazism was its most vicious it had little reason to restrict that kind of speech. The idea that free speech restriction help in preventing propaganda is wrong; it prevents only some subset of propaganda which does not further the elite, which imo is worse than not restricting it at all. And even then, free speech restrictions cannot stop the spread of ideas and prejudice, whatever they are.
      - joepie91_ 6y ago
        > It is also possible this was a prevailing thought, or that the environment was encouraging of such thoughts, in that nation at that time; that something caused division, and that the nazi used this as a way to assert power and spearhead their ideology. Doesn't this exactly confirm the original claim that words do lead to actions and therefore affect people's rights?
        totony 6y ago
        Words have the potential to affect action, that is their main purpose. But actions are not caused by words but influenced by them, which imo is a big difference
  - brazzy 6y ago
    "We enter the Reichstag to arm ourselves with democracy’s weapons. If democracy is foolish enough to give us free railway passes and salaries, that is its problem... We are coming neither as friends or neutrals. We come as enemies! As the wolf attacks the sheep, so come we." -- Joseph Goebbels, 1928
  - watwut 6y ago
    There is no honest way to get from the exchange above to your comment. In any case, it would not happened without people would defend them each time they could, who would made up what may opponents said just to make opponents sound bad, who pretended that nazi are not danger, that nazi are just little misguided young men meaning well or just trolls.