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His point was that Kristallnacht people thought they are „cancelling“ evil too.

by mantas 3y ago

wvenable 3y ago
So the point is we have to listen to evil because we might be wrong about what is evil? It makes no sense. Especially when we're talking about, in some cases, literal modern Nazis.
- dotnet00 3y ago
  The point is that you are not a reliable judge of what is evil and thus not a reliable judge of what should not be tolerated. Since apparently it still isn't clear to you what they're saying, Nazis, like many other authoritarian regimes, punished criticism of them. That has the exact same logic as yours, they think they're doing the right thing, thus criticizing them is promoting evil and thus should be shut down (another very visible example of this would be the various forms of "hurt sentiments" related issues in various Asian countries). This is why "intolerance of intolerance" is a fallacy. It presumes that those being accused of intolerance are doing it in bad faith rather than out of a genuine belief that they are doing the right thing.
  - wvenable 3y ago
    All "punishments" are not the same. Free speech means that you cannot be punished by the government for your speech. You can't imprisoned or physically harmed. But people equate that with speech without consequence and, even more, that they are entitled to someone else's forum for their speech. In authoritarian regimes we are talking about real criminal-type punishments. You're purposely conflating these ideas together when they are different. If nobody wants to listen to your terrible idea or give you a forum for them then that's their right. If people don't want to associate with you because of what you believe that is their right. If people want to convince others to not give you that forum, that's their free speech. We don't have to give a forum to the very ideas that lead to real punishment of criticism.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - mantas 3y ago
      I think you know jack-shit about totalitarian regimes. For example USSR used a shit-ton of unofficial punishment styles. E.g. small time dissidents would have a hard time getting a job. Employers would be in the know about certain people they should steer away from. But it was illegal to not work in USSR :) So technically nobody was punishing those dissidents. But they had a hard time to make ends meet AND they could be easily sentenced for being unemployed if they started causing trouble. Influential groups of society punishing people for wrongthink is pretty damn close.
      - wvenable 3y ago
        What is protesting then? If I protest against a Nazi speaker at a university, which side of this totalitarianism am I on? Am I the influential group punishing someone for wrongthink? The implication here is yes I am. So apparently a healthy "non-totalitarian" society cannot allow protest...
        mantas 3y ago
        Many (if not 99%) of silenced speakers were not nazis. Unless everything right of X is nazi and everything left is commie. Which is bullshit. The „influential group“ refers to „consequences“ like making people loose their jobs after spamming their employers for controversial (at best) speech. Protest is fine. But preventing speech is fine. Do you want to stay outside of a meeting room with a banner? Cool. Do you want to politely ask uncomfortable questions? Great. Do you want to prevent those people from speaking? That's where it gets bad.
        wvenable 3y ago
        I agree they don't have to Nazis. > Do you want to prevent those people from speaking? Nobody is prevented from speaking. It's never been easier in the history of the world to get your message out. But again, nobody is required to have a forum to speak and I'm not required to give that forum directly or indirectly. I can also use my speech to convince others to not provide that forum. > spamming their employers That's harassment. Harassment is already bad on it's own it doesn't have to be mixed into this. But outside of harassment if an employer doesn't want to associate with someone because of their speech, they're free to do that.

His point was that Kristallnacht people thought they are „cancelling“ evil too.

by mantas 3y ago

His point was that Kristallnacht people thought they are „cancelling“ evil too.

So the point is we have to listen to evil because we might be wrong about what is evil? It makes no sense. Especially when we're talking about, in some cases, literal modern Nazis.

dotnet00 3y ago
The point is that you are not a reliable judge of what is evil and thus not a reliable judge of what should not be tolerated. Since apparently it still isn't clear to you what they're saying, Nazis, like many other authoritarian regimes, punished criticism of them. That has the exact same logic as yours, they think they're doing the right thing, thus criticizing them is promoting evil and thus should be shut down (another very visible example of this would be the various forms of "hurt sentiments" related issues in various Asian countries). This is why "intolerance of intolerance" is a fallacy. It presumes that those being accused of intolerance are doing it in bad faith rather than out of a genuine belief that they are doing the right thing.
- wvenable 3y ago
  All "punishments" are not the same. Free speech means that you cannot be punished by the government for your speech. You can't imprisoned or physically harmed. But people equate that with speech without consequence and, even more, that they are entitled to someone else's forum for their speech. In authoritarian regimes we are talking about real criminal-type punishments. You're purposely conflating these ideas together when they are different. If nobody wants to listen to your terrible idea or give you a forum for them then that's their right. If people don't want to associate with you because of what you believe that is their right. If people want to convince others to not give you that forum, that's their free speech. We don't have to give a forum to the very ideas that lead to real punishment of criticism.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - mantas 3y ago
    I think you know jack-shit about totalitarian regimes. For example USSR used a shit-ton of unofficial punishment styles. E.g. small time dissidents would have a hard time getting a job. Employers would be in the know about certain people they should steer away from. But it was illegal to not work in USSR :) So technically nobody was punishing those dissidents. But they had a hard time to make ends meet AND they could be easily sentenced for being unemployed if they started causing trouble. Influential groups of society punishing people for wrongthink is pretty damn close.
    - wvenable 3y ago
      What is protesting then? If I protest against a Nazi speaker at a university, which side of this totalitarianism am I on? Am I the influential group punishing someone for wrongthink? The implication here is yes I am. So apparently a healthy "non-totalitarian" society cannot allow protest...
      - mantas 3y ago
        Many (if not 99%) of silenced speakers were not nazis. Unless everything right of X is nazi and everything left is commie. Which is bullshit. The „influential group“ refers to „consequences“ like making people loose their jobs after spamming their employers for controversial (at best) speech. Protest is fine. But preventing speech is fine. Do you want to stay outside of a meeting room with a banner? Cool. Do you want to politely ask uncomfortable questions? Great. Do you want to prevent those people from speaking? That's where it gets bad.
        wvenable 3y ago
        I agree they don't have to Nazis. > Do you want to prevent those people from speaking? Nobody is prevented from speaking. It's never been easier in the history of the world to get your message out. But again, nobody is required to have a forum to speak and I'm not required to give that forum directly or indirectly. I can also use my speech to convince others to not provide that forum. > spamming their employers That's harassment. Harassment is already bad on it's own it doesn't have to be mixed into this. But outside of harassment if an employer doesn't want to associate with someone because of their speech, they're free to do that.