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Let's say, for the sake of argument, that all the people doing the canceling are right and all the people being canceled are wrong. Cancel culture will make ra

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that all the people doing the canceling are right and all the people being canceled are wrong. Cancel culture will make racism and sexism worse. Even the most well-intentioned will fail to learn when they are afraid of expressing the wrong answer. Try to teach someone mathematics where every time they get the wrong answer, they get shocked. Not a good learning environment. And that's exactly what we have now. Repeat a few buzzwords and you are safe. But when problems manifest in a new way, you won't be able to understand or correct them because you don't really understand. Being wrong is part of the path to being right. If you are cancelled for being wrong, you'll never be right. You'll just have to be quiet.

kingsuper20 5y ago
>Cancel culture will make racism and sexism worse. I completely agree with that. Just to keep an eye on matters, and you never know how you need to set up your life going forward, lately I've made an attempt to eavesdrop on snatches of private conversations. I'm blown away by how radicalized people are becoming, and not in a way that progressives would like. Formerly, these people were essentially indifferent. Now, not so much.
- mrbadideas 5y ago
  Yes 10000x.
- potatoineyes 5y ago
  I don't literally think all liberal fundamentalists or lgbt people, for example, should die, but I do think organising around that as a heuristic principle for action would be better for the future, myself and for society. This is a direct result of having previvous liberal adjacent beliefs eroded and destroyed by constantly being around people who believe them, being 3xpos3d to the arguments for them, the data for them, etc - none of it is convincing to me at all and I am shocked how I took it all on faith as a child and teen. Contact with liberal and liberal adjacent groups has also shown me in personal experience that the stereotypes are often true, and they are truely awful vile hateful people if they do not think you are one of them. I would not be able to, on moral grounds, oppose large swathes of my country being literally exterminated because I no longer have any faith that they are not an existential threat. I really don't know how to fix this situation.
  - skrebbel 5y ago
    If you really can't find reasonable people who identify as liberal then I fear the problem is with you. Not everybody who's somewhat left leaning is also a woke fundamentalist. I mean, you're talking casually about mass murdering gay people, how can you be surprised that some people feel threatened by that?
    - dang 5y ago
      "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - skrebbel 5y ago
        Good one, thanks. It conflicts a bit with the "assume good faith" guideline and sometimes I find it hard to figure which side should win. (Note: in hindsight of course a comment that suggests mass murdering people is a troll post and not written in good faith, I'm not sure what I was thinking. I'm not debating that, just saying that it's hard and appreciate the nudges)
tasty_freeze 5y ago
> Try to teach someone mathematics where every time they get the wrong answer, they get shocked. Not a good learning environment. The problem with the analogy is that the underlying assumption is that the people learning math want to know the truth and are acting in good faith even when they get the wrong answer. On the other hand, there are people, powerful people, who push ideas that don't care about the truth. Here is a specific example. As the Republican nominee in 2016, Donald Trump tweeted that 81% of white murder victims were killed by black people. This is *wildly* wrong. When he was corrected, he didn't send out a correction, he didn't even remove the old tweet. The point is he was sending a message to his target audience that made them feel a certain way, and that was his goal ... not communicating the truth. https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/nov/23/donald-trump/trump-tweet-blacks-white-homicide-victims/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/nov/23/donald-tru...
- btilly 5y ago
  Yes. The scariest thing about Trump is not that he lied like crazy. It is that he really had an audience, and that audience is reasonably close to half the country. If you're a progressive, it is worth spending some time thinking about how to reach out to and get support from that half of the country. Because attempting to govern without them is a guaranteed disaster.
  - rootusrootus 5y ago
    That ship has sailed. The progressives have been playing the strategy 'if we just follow the rules of the game, eventually they will play along'. But the populists completely threw out the rulebook a number of years ago, they no longer want to play the same game. And now there is a new breed of younger progressives coming into power who recognize that and also want to throw out the rulebook. Interesting times coming.
    - btilly 5y ago
      Yes, and if you read https://www.amazon.com/How-Democracies-Die-Steven-Levitsky/dp/1524762938 https://www.amazon.com/How-Democracies-Die-Steven-Levitsky/d... you'll realize that once democratic norms have broken down on both sides of the aisle, the next thing that happens is the replacement of democracy by a totalitarian state.
crocktucker 5y ago
> Being wrong is part of the path to being right. If you are cancelled for being wrong, you'll never be right. You'll just have to be quiet. Well put.
pstuart 5y ago
> Being wrong is part of the path to being right Only if one is willing to acknowledge being wrong. I'm not seeing that here.
- AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
  Well, even for absolute uncontroversial truths - such is how to take a derivative of the function - it may take years to explain what, why and how. But for way more complicated social issues people are supposed to turn their opinion around on the spot after a couple of comments.
  - pstuart 5y ago
    And your point? Just let people dribble out their mistakes without correction?
    - AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
      My point is: keep trying. Love thy enemy. Imagine your mom is racist. Will you go to each and every house on her street telling everyone not to talk to this racist bitch who is not willing to admit she's wrong? Or you will spend time after time after time leaving no avenue unexplored trying to see what is she coming from and why is she wrong?
      - pstuart 5y ago
        False dichotomy. Option 3: she's a horrible person and will never change, so remove her from your life. Pity, isn't it? It's not a bad idea to give it a try but it's important to recognize a lost cause when that is the case.
        AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
        Horrible people do exist. But but no means they constitute half of the country.
AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
Even more interesting exercise. Let's assume - for the sake of the argument - scientists have managed to scientifically prove some unpopular theory. Pick your favorite one: working women do not benefit the society, some races are smarter on average than others or - god forbid - vaccines cause autism. What's next? What are we going to do with these results? P. S. And for those looking to reply "this cannot happen because it can never happen" - remember, this is just a mental exercise. (EDIT) > What are we going to do with these results? Okay, now I know. We'll just downvote them.
- dale_glass 5y ago
  Those are impossible because such questions can't be scientifically asked in the first place. Like, what does "benefit society" even mean? By what parameter? You can definitely make a scientific conclusion of the order of "religious conservatives really hate it when women work", but... duh? I can agree with that and not care one bit. Second one, impossible because there's no such thing as race scientifically, in the sense the common person uses that word. You could make such a conclusion about groups with particular genetics, but you can't tell those by eyesight.
  - AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
    > Like, what does "benefit society" even mean? Oh, this one is easy. Imagine we managed to create a good enough model of the society. Kinda similar to what engineers use to design bridges or combustion chambers. Then we create a target function - minimize the number people below poverty level, minimize the weighted number of crimes, maximize productive life longevity - and so on. All good things. We run it and the model tells us: (1) mandate every woman have three kids by age of thirty (2) promote currently elected president to the king and make it a lifetime hereditary post and (3) make sure everyone goes to the church every Sunday (4) sell Alaska to China. We shrug, check things here and there - and no, there's no mistake, the solution is stable and whatever we thought were unresolvable problems of monarchy actually do have simple solutions which noone thought about before. So, what's next?
    - 5y ago
michaelmrose 5y ago
People are expected to learn not to be racists and sexists growing up. Those who don't learn then are rarely reformable but at least they can learn to be silent.
- nradov 5y ago
  Daryl Davis has been successful in teaching adult KKK members to stop being racists. https://www.npr.org/2017/08/20/544861933/how-one-man-convinced-200-ku-klux-klan-members-to-give-up-their-robes https://www.npr.org/2017/08/20/544861933/how-one-man-convinc...
- potatoineyes 5y ago
  No, this is wrong. I leart the exact opposite as an adult. Grew up and didn't even need to be told bot to be racist sexist, etc. I just assumed it as the default norm. As an adult I examined the evidence available to me, and eas exposed to liberal sided arguements against these things. Over and over and over again. This convinced me that being racist, sexist, etc was actually factually correct, and in my, and societies best long term interest (excluding those people in the wrong groups of course). It's exposure to people who think like you that went a long way towards persuading me of this.
babesh 5y ago
That isn’t the big issue. The big issue is that people think/act like they are always right. That is a close minded attitude that doesn’t lead to learning. Furthermore people are actually acting tribally. They cancel people on the other side for the same behavior that they are ignoring from people on their side.

kingsuper20 5y ago

>Cancel culture will make racism and sexism worse. I completely agree with that. Just to keep an eye on matters, and you never know how you need to set up your life going forward, lately I've made an attempt to eavesdrop on snatches of private conversations. I'm blown away by how radicalized people are becoming, and not in a way that progressives would like. Formerly, these people were essentially indifferent. Now, not so much.

mrbadideas 5y ago
Yes 10000x.
potatoineyes 5y ago
I don't literally think all liberal fundamentalists or lgbt people, for example, should die, but I do think organising around that as a heuristic principle for action would be better for the future, myself and for society. This is a direct result of having previvous liberal adjacent beliefs eroded and destroyed by constantly being around people who believe them, being 3xpos3d to the arguments for them, the data for them, etc - none of it is convincing to me at all and I am shocked how I took it all on faith as a child and teen. Contact with liberal and liberal adjacent groups has also shown me in personal experience that the stereotypes are often true, and they are truely awful vile hateful people if they do not think you are one of them. I would not be able to, on moral grounds, oppose large swathes of my country being literally exterminated because I no longer have any faith that they are not an existential threat. I really don't know how to fix this situation.
- skrebbel 5y ago
  If you really can't find reasonable people who identify as liberal then I fear the problem is with you. Not everybody who's somewhat left leaning is also a woke fundamentalist. I mean, you're talking casually about mass murdering gay people, how can you be surprised that some people feel threatened by that?
  - dang 5y ago
    "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - skrebbel 5y ago
      Good one, thanks. It conflicts a bit with the "assume good faith" guideline and sometimes I find it hard to figure which side should win. (Note: in hindsight of course a comment that suggests mass murdering people is a troll post and not written in good faith, I'm not sure what I was thinking. I'm not debating that, just saying that it's hard and appreciate the nudges)

tasty_freeze 5y ago

> Try to teach someone mathematics where every time they get the wrong answer, they get shocked. Not a good learning environment. The problem with the analogy is that the underlying assumption is that the people learning math want to know the truth and are acting in good faith even when they get the wrong answer. On the other hand, there are people, powerful people, who push ideas that don't care about the truth. Here is a specific example. As the Republican nominee in 2016, Donald Trump tweeted that 81% of white murder victims were killed by black people. This is *wildly* wrong. When he was corrected, he didn't send out a correction, he didn't even remove the old tweet. The point is he was sending a message to his target audience that made them feel a certain way, and that was his goal ... not communicating the truth. https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/nov/23/donald-trump/trump-tweet-blacks-white-homicide-victims/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/nov/23/donald-tru...

btilly 5y ago
Yes. The scariest thing about Trump is not that he lied like crazy. It is that he really had an audience, and that audience is reasonably close to half the country. If you're a progressive, it is worth spending some time thinking about how to reach out to and get support from that half of the country. Because attempting to govern without them is a guaranteed disaster.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  That ship has sailed. The progressives have been playing the strategy 'if we just follow the rules of the game, eventually they will play along'. But the populists completely threw out the rulebook a number of years ago, they no longer want to play the same game. And now there is a new breed of younger progressives coming into power who recognize that and also want to throw out the rulebook. Interesting times coming.
  - btilly 5y ago
    Yes, and if you read https://www.amazon.com/How-Democracies-Die-Steven-Levitsky/dp/1524762938 https://www.amazon.com/How-Democracies-Die-Steven-Levitsky/d... you'll realize that once democratic norms have broken down on both sides of the aisle, the next thing that happens is the replacement of democracy by a totalitarian state.

crocktucker 5y ago

> Being wrong is part of the path to being right. If you are cancelled for being wrong, you'll never be right. You'll just have to be quiet. Well put.

pstuart 5y ago

> Being wrong is part of the path to being right Only if one is willing to acknowledge being wrong. I'm not seeing that here.

AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
Well, even for absolute uncontroversial truths - such is how to take a derivative of the function - it may take years to explain what, why and how. But for way more complicated social issues people are supposed to turn their opinion around on the spot after a couple of comments.
- pstuart 5y ago
  And your point? Just let people dribble out their mistakes without correction?
  - AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
    My point is: keep trying. Love thy enemy. Imagine your mom is racist. Will you go to each and every house on her street telling everyone not to talk to this racist bitch who is not willing to admit she's wrong? Or you will spend time after time after time leaving no avenue unexplored trying to see what is she coming from and why is she wrong?
    - pstuart 5y ago
      False dichotomy. Option 3: she's a horrible person and will never change, so remove her from your life. Pity, isn't it? It's not a bad idea to give it a try but it's important to recognize a lost cause when that is the case.
      - AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
        Horrible people do exist. But but no means they constitute half of the country.

AlexTWithBeard 5y ago

Even more interesting exercise. Let's assume - for the sake of the argument - scientists have managed to scientifically prove some unpopular theory. Pick your favorite one: working women do not benefit the society, some races are smarter on average than others or - god forbid - vaccines cause autism. What's next? What are we going to do with these results? P. S. And for those looking to reply "this cannot happen because it can never happen" - remember, this is just a mental exercise. (EDIT) > What are we going to do with these results? Okay, now I know. We'll just downvote them.

dale_glass 5y ago
Those are impossible because such questions can't be scientifically asked in the first place. Like, what does "benefit society" even mean? By what parameter? You can definitely make a scientific conclusion of the order of "religious conservatives really hate it when women work", but... duh? I can agree with that and not care one bit. Second one, impossible because there's no such thing as race scientifically, in the sense the common person uses that word. You could make such a conclusion about groups with particular genetics, but you can't tell those by eyesight.
- AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
  > Like, what does "benefit society" even mean? Oh, this one is easy. Imagine we managed to create a good enough model of the society. Kinda similar to what engineers use to design bridges or combustion chambers. Then we create a target function - minimize the number people below poverty level, minimize the weighted number of crimes, maximize productive life longevity - and so on. All good things. We run it and the model tells us: (1) mandate every woman have three kids by age of thirty (2) promote currently elected president to the king and make it a lifetime hereditary post and (3) make sure everyone goes to the church every Sunday (4) sell Alaska to China. We shrug, check things here and there - and no, there's no mistake, the solution is stable and whatever we thought were unresolvable problems of monarchy actually do have simple solutions which noone thought about before. So, what's next?
  - 5y ago

michaelmrose 5y ago

People are expected to learn not to be racists and sexists growing up. Those who don't learn then are rarely reformable but at least they can learn to be silent.

nradov 5y ago
Daryl Davis has been successful in teaching adult KKK members to stop being racists. https://www.npr.org/2017/08/20/544861933/how-one-man-convinced-200-ku-klux-klan-members-to-give-up-their-robes https://www.npr.org/2017/08/20/544861933/how-one-man-convinc...
potatoineyes 5y ago
No, this is wrong. I leart the exact opposite as an adult. Grew up and didn't even need to be told bot to be racist sexist, etc. I just assumed it as the default norm. As an adult I examined the evidence available to me, and eas exposed to liberal sided arguements against these things. Over and over and over again. This convinced me that being racist, sexist, etc was actually factually correct, and in my, and societies best long term interest (excluding those people in the wrong groups of course). It's exposure to people who think like you that went a long way towards persuading me of this.

babesh 5y ago

That isn’t the big issue. The big issue is that people think/act like they are always right. That is a close minded attitude that doesn’t lead to learning. Furthermore people are actually acting tribally. They cancel people on the other side for the same behavior that they are ignoring from people on their side.