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I think maybe the article goes too far, perhaps begging the question. It is one thing to say that people have unreconcilable beliefs, ones that cause insult or
by projektfu 2y ago
I think maybe the article goes too far, perhaps begging the question. It is one thing to say that people have unreconcilable beliefs, ones that cause insult or injury as a result of that conflict. It is harder to put them in categories and say that "fascism" is forcing a belief on other people out of a desire to reduce harm and "rakishness" is acting consistent with another set of beliefs that does not find harm in that behavior. I don't know of a philosophically acceptable definition of rakishness, but Fascism has several definitions by both proponents and detractors. Proponents would say that it has an element of blotting out weak, foreign things and promoting strong, native things. Detractors would say that it is whatever is needed to get people to fear and hate an outgroup. Umberto Eco's definition of "ur-Fascism" proposed a framework of features that go together but not necessarily found in every Fascist belief system. I like that definition because it doesn't require people to explicitly call their movement Fascist and it presents the beliefs/behavior as something more innate to the human experience and not a product of modernity.
The dilution of the word Fascist to mean someone who would censor you for some reason, has been bad for discussions of Fascism and its ilk. Now the word seems to include the person who asks you to show them respect by using their correct name or pronouncing it correctly, as well as the person who would execute you for writing "sick" literature that contradicts a fascist belief system, somehow equating the two.
Are there rakes in the world? Do some people think they are not rakes, while other people think they are? Probably. But maybe it is better to try to agree on what is really going on in real discussions, rather than hypotheticals about candies.
- john-radio 2y ago> But maybe it is better to try to agree on what is really going on in real discussions, rather than hypotheticals about candies. I don't think this is going to blow your mind or anything, but the candy discussion in this essay wasn't actually hypothetical at all. The tic tacs are fetuses and the "fascists" are forced birther conservatives. You might disagree that it's reasonable to call a forced birther a fascist - to call them that certainly seems a bit imprecise to me - but I'm not sure what you're driving at beyond that (valid) semantic point. Begging what question?
- projektfu 2y agoI have never heard of a fetus being called a tic-tac, but maybe that is the slang in your area.
- sdwr 2y agoThe article "pinned" two opposite categories, and built a hypothetical world where everyone falls into a category but is ignorant of the categories' existence. You could just as easily "pin" the categories: - people who believe disagreements are based on firm moral underpinnings - people who take advantage of the first group and be no less wrong
- ToucanLoucan 2y agoI think the glaring omission in the article is “are the tic tacs sentient?” Because that ultimately does decide the question, whether our hypothetical fascist accepts the answer or not. If indeed as that other commenter stated, tic tacs are a stand in for fetuses, then they are categorically not sentient. The vast, vast, vast majority of abortions occur before the fetus is even large enough to constitute a notable amount of tissue death, in comparison to something like biting a piece of your lip off. Brain activity is a null issue, there’s no brain yet. But of course a core tenet of fascism is the rejection of intellectualism, so this will be unappealing. However fascists frequently have that niggling problem where reality keeps proving their bullshit to be… well, bullshit. Which is why to the majority of properly thinking people it’s a ridiculous system of thought and governance.
- projektfu 2y agoI think that reduction works for tic tacs but perhaps not for fetuses/embryos/fertilized eggs. I can say that I agree with the statement, "embryos are not sentient", but I cannot speak to whether the "fascist" believes that the sentience of the embryo is the important part. Even if it were, our concept of sentience will probably be self-serving, based on our stake in the discussion. The 13-week compromise was unsatisfying for many people. A 20-week compromise would satisfy some people more and others less. At some point the fetus must acquire sentience, if you believe it didn't have it at one point and you believe that a baby does, so the discussion may be a matter of what point you define it. To say that it is imbued with sentience at birth is merely to choose a convenient point that is unlikely to be true in fact. In which case, to not set a limit on abortion means that you do not really care about sentient beings at all, if you were saying that sentience was the important thing to you. Oops, now it will become a discussion of the rights of one being over the rights of another, and we are all fascists now.