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And yet another instance of Godwin's law being invoked. What do Nazis have to do with this topic? None. Please don't post this type of comment in the future.

by aac 13y ago

stcredzero 13y ago
What do Nazis have to do with this topic? Eugenics. Sloppy reasoning using evolution. Please don't post this type of comment in the future. As far as I can tell, you didn't have the background to know what the gp commenter was saying, so you counterfactually knee-jerked a reaction amounting to censorship. It would be nice if we could rationally talk about the Nazi regime in a historical and cultural context. It's especially instructive, as they sincerely believed they were "the good guys." What was the most used word referencing an emotion at the Nuremberg Rally the year Leni Riefenstahl filmed Triumph of the Will? "Love." The Nazis thought they were the good guys, and they were able to convince enough of an entire country to achieve a totalitarian state. What they did afterwards was truly horrible -- which is a glaring indication that we have lots of valuable stuff to learn about how human beings can go horribly wrong by thinking about what happened. Godwin's law is an anti-rational knee jerk. The person who originally introduced me to this idea? (Not in specific reference to Godwin's law, but generally.) A young jewish woman I had fallen in love with. Chew on that.
- selmnoo 13y ago
  Great comment, interesting perspective I've not heard before. Thanks for writing.
- defen 13y ago
  > Godwin's law is an anti-rational knee jerk. (Off-topic) Actually, I think parent poster and you misunderstand Godwin's law. Godwin's law is just the empirical observation that, as an Internet thread grows longer, the probability of someone making a Nazi reference approaches unity. It's a "law" in the same way that Moore's Law is one. It's not (originally) intended to be a way to shut down discussion. There's nothing special about the Nazis in this regard - there is a tendency toward a "race to the bottom" when constructing analogies, and it just so happens that in our culture they're considered the worst thing that ever happened. If the Nazis never existed Godwin's Law would have referenced something else - slavery, some other genocide, etc.
  - andrewflnr 13y ago
    Maybe this is a different law, but I thought Godwin's law was more along the lines of "whoever first makes a comparison to hitler automatically loses the argument".

And yet another instance of Godwin's law being invoked. What do Nazis have to do with this topic? None. Please don't post this type of comment in the future.

by aac 13y ago

And yet another instance of Godwin's law being invoked. What do Nazis have to do with this topic? None. Please don't post this type of comment in the future.

stcredzero 13y ago

What do Nazis have to do with this topic? Eugenics. Sloppy reasoning using evolution. Please don't post this type of comment in the future. As far as I can tell, you didn't have the background to know what the gp commenter was saying, so you counterfactually knee-jerked a reaction amounting to censorship. It would be nice if we could rationally talk about the Nazi regime in a historical and cultural context. It's especially instructive, as they sincerely believed they were "the good guys." What was the most used word referencing an emotion at the Nuremberg Rally the year Leni Riefenstahl filmed Triumph of the Will? "Love." The Nazis thought they were the good guys, and they were able to convince enough of an entire country to achieve a totalitarian state. What they did afterwards was truly horrible -- which is a glaring indication that we have lots of valuable stuff to learn about how human beings can go horribly wrong by thinking about what happened. Godwin's law is an anti-rational knee jerk. The person who originally introduced me to this idea? (Not in specific reference to Godwin's law, but generally.) A young jewish woman I had fallen in love with. Chew on that.

selmnoo 13y ago
Great comment, interesting perspective I've not heard before. Thanks for writing.
defen 13y ago
> Godwin's law is an anti-rational knee jerk. (Off-topic) Actually, I think parent poster and you misunderstand Godwin's law. Godwin's law is just the empirical observation that, as an Internet thread grows longer, the probability of someone making a Nazi reference approaches unity. It's a "law" in the same way that Moore's Law is one. It's not (originally) intended to be a way to shut down discussion. There's nothing special about the Nazis in this regard - there is a tendency toward a "race to the bottom" when constructing analogies, and it just so happens that in our culture they're considered the worst thing that ever happened. If the Nazis never existed Godwin's Law would have referenced something else - slavery, some other genocide, etc.
- andrewflnr 13y ago
  Maybe this is a different law, but I thought Godwin's law was more along the lines of "whoever first makes a comparison to hitler automatically loses the argument".