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Comparing your political opponents with Nazis is a very violent form of public discourse that should be reserved for actual perpetrators of mass atrocities. If
by zeteo 3y ago
Comparing your political opponents with Nazis is a very violent form of public discourse that should be reserved for actual perpetrators of mass atrocities. If people actually believe it, then it makes physical violence against your opponents seem acceptable or even desirable ("punch a Nazi"). Basically, when you're saying someone is a Nazi then it means you want to treat them like the Nazis were treated after WW2. This implies at least removing their political rights, and possibly imprisoning and executing them as well.
- breakingrules 3y ago[dead]
- cubefox 3y agoAdditionally, comparisons are always statements of similarity, and this is a symmetric relation. If someone says group X is similar to the Nazis, then that, in all likelihood, makes X look worse and the Nazis look better. After all, the person is saying the Nazis were similar in badness to group X, and X might not be very bad.
- NoraCodes 3y ago> should be reserved for actual perpetrators of mass atrocities. Ideally, we would prevent such people from perpetrating such atrocities in the first place. The Nazis were Nazis before they killed millions, and they said they would do it before they did. When people, especially politicians, come out and say, "we must eliminate [demographic group]," we need to believe them and understand that genocide is their goal.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- giraffe_lady 3y agoI am pretty sure the people who are making this comparison have the intent of not allowing them to perpetrate mass atrocities. Reserving the comparison only for the successful genocides is maybe rhetorically ideal but missing the point a bit.