5 ms·

I’m willing to take the chance with slightly eager censorship than rampant fascism. It’s a literal no brainer and it’s disingenuous for you to ignore that.

• swivelmaster 4y ago
  Yes, exactly, thank you. Framing every mention of the paradox of intolerance as some kind of slippery slope to totalitarianism isn't constructive or realistic, and basically misses the point of it being called a paradox in the first place.
• jimlongton 4y ago
  > rampant fascism Honest question - do Americans really believe fascism is increasing? By most (all?) metrics Western societies are radically more tolerant on racial, LGBT and religious issues than even 2 decades ago.
  • swivelmaster 4y ago
    This isn't the only way to measure it, and IMO not appropriate right now. The real problem is the balance of political opinion taken as a whole; The percentage of the population that holds what one might call far-right fascist views seem to be higher than it's been in the last 50 years if you assume that voters' views are more or less aligned with the politicians they vote for. Assuming that just because Things Are Okay Now that there's no problem is exactly how we got Trump elected in 2016, and why Italy, Brazil, and the Philippines have all elected far-right or outright fascist leaders since then as well. Also consider that Republicans have been perfecting a legal minority rule for decades via gerrymandering, court-packing, closing polling locations, enacting (unnecessarily) stricter voting requirements, and focusing on winning states with disproportionate federal representation by population count, and are now proposing state-wide abortion bans, taking over school boards to ban books and alter health and science curricula, and more. This is all to say that even though the majority of Americans ARE far more tolerant than they were before, the fascists or fascist-adjacent contingent have been not only been growing, but have been amassing power at a rate disproportionate to their size.
    • soundnote 4y ago
      • swivelmaster 4y ago
        • soundnote 4y ago
          [flagged]
          • swivelmaster 4y ago
    • _-david-_ 4y ago
      The fact you think half of the things you listed Republicans are doing are either fascist or fascist adjacent shows why this is such a bad idea. Most of those things are things every ruling party does or aren't fascist. Not to mention, just calling Brazil, Italy and whoever else potentially fascist is ridiculous. Fascism has no meaning anymore because people like you. If you want to actually fight against fascism don't call everybody fascists.
      • swivelmaster 4y ago
        • _-david-_ 4y ago
          Seeing how you support suppressing speech it seems like you are a big fan of Nazism. It's pretty transparent, though. See how stupid that is instead of just asking my views? You know what they say about assuming...
      • bergenty 4y ago
  • bergenty 4y ago
    Absolutely. Elimination of voter rights laws, gerrymandering, rejection of election results, advocacy of violence, tacit support for hate groups, support of authoritarian leaders etc. is happening at a large scale and is devolving quickly.
  • nathanaldensr 4y ago
    If by "Americans" you mean "the vocal extreme minority on certain social media sites," then yes.
  • Kye 4y ago
    It's the reaction in reactionary. That increasing tolerance is why they're getting louder, angrier, and more violent.
• inawarminister 4y ago
  What kind of fascism? The one where corporations run rampant in alliance with the state? Why, sounds like what's going on here.
  • bergenty 4y ago
    No just regular right wing fascism with majority rule and violence and disenfranchisement of minorities.
    • inawarminister 4y ago
      I see, compared to left wing fascism with majority rule of violence and disenfranchisement of class minorities. Thank you, I will update my fascism definition card.
      • swivelmaster 4y ago
        Class minorities? You mean the super rich?
        • inawarminister 4y ago
          Not just the super rich as Pol Pot and Lenin showed...
• nathanaldensr 4y ago
  Nice false dichotomy.