Oh, the bigots! OH MY GOOOOOOOD THE BIGOOOOOTS, Heaven curse the bigots! They're invading our spaces, corrupting our children's minds! A Senate Select Committee on Bigotry is now a national imperative. The bar for non-bigotry must be raised CONTINUALLY higher: society cannot afford anything less! And the purge must be comprehensive. Our communities MUST be kept linguistically pure. Associations must be kept PRISTINE AT ALL TIMES. Suspect the poster above you? Suspect your brother or sister? Report and unfollow and block at every opportunity! Trust-n-safety them out of existence! Interpretation is vacillation!
There is no volume level below 100 when condemning the awful terrible ungood bigot!
Hypothetically there could be bigots you could have a rational debate with, but they tend to not remain bigots for long.
I knew one. Nazi-tatted dude. White separatist (he was careful in specifying separatist, not supremacist). He believed racial conflict was inevitable (not a full on race war just ongoing low scale conflict) and he'd decided he's white, he's gonna be on the white side of the conflict. He was moderately respectful of other races as long as they didn't come into what he considered white territory.
Aka the bigot to UwU pipeline.
To everyone pearl clutching in response to this correct meme with one of the following phrases:
-
"That's how you create an echo chamber"
-
"paradox of intolerance doesn't say how to fight fascism"
-
"This is about silencing opposing thought"
I would like to take this moment to remind you that the paradox of intolerance isn't about exiling those who disagree on economic policy; it's about recognizing and directly opposing those who are trying to harm or disadvantage others and doing so in a meaningful way that will actually change the outcome. You can't debate Hitler out of doing a genocide, but you could have jailed him before he gained power.
Being too spineless to call out and fight intolerance enables fascism. The longer you live wrapped up in your civility politics, the overtones window shifts further right, and it strengthens the fascist support. It happened in pre-WW2 Germany, and it's being repeated in dozens of countries worldwide. If you feel the urge to block me, go ahead...
...but know that this is your fault
The paradox of intolerance is not a paradox. Tolerance is a social contract, folks who demand us tolerate intolerance are violating the social contract and should be ignored.
I'd argue it's not a paradox because it relies on two different definitions of tolerance.
- Tolerance 1: Intolerant opinions should be allowed to exist without criminal punishment.
- Tolerance 2: Everyone should treat intolerant opinions like other opinions for the purposes of platforming, how you feel about the speaker, etc.
Tolerance 1 is basically the kind of free speech principles adopted by most democratic societies and is probably necessary for such societies to remain free. Tolerance 2 is just silly. If you're in a forum specifically for debating deplorable opinions, fine. But there's no reason that a politics forum needs to cater to deplorable opinions.
You all should see the shit going on in a post about Gisèle Pelicot where they are literally saying that the tiny fraction of women who commit sexual assault is an excuse for decrying the (absolutely understandably angry) women holding signs that say "NOT ALL MEN BUT ALWAYS A MAN".
I really fucking despise these false equivalencies.
I mean...it's literally not always a man. I get the point but that's a terrible slogan.
-
But I like seeing the rational debate!
So I can practice spotting fallacies and facepalm when people completely miss the point and counter with something that might be logically sound but is practically terrible.
There's no reasoning with dishonest bad faith actors
You can't debate someone that isn't arguing in good faith, and these people never ever are. Yeet and move on, save your energy for the people that have just been mislead by the altright and may actually change their opinions.
All you can do is force them to face their convictions. What happens after that is up to them. Just do what Tim Walz did to JD Vance when he asked about the election results, and bluntly ask the root question.
“Do you think migrants are less important than citizens? What about men vs. women? Or gay people vs. straight people? Or trans people vs. cisgender people?”
“Do you think that the government should force people to follow your religion? If the government picked a different religion than yours, would you just agree to follow it?”
Not a paradox. Tolerance is a social contract and need not be given to those who don't tolerate others.
The paradox of intolerance demonstrates how fascism comes to power, not how to stop it.
Found the apologist.
"Faschisten hören niemals auf, Faschisten zu sein
Man diskutiert mit ihnen nicht, hat die Geschichte gezeigt"
"Fascists won't ever stop being fascists. You don't argue with them, history has shown that"
Wenn du friedlich gegen die Gewalt nicht ankommen kannst, ist das letzte Mittel das uns allen bleibt Militanz
Why does everybody online insist on misusing "centrist" and "moderate" when they're talking about spineless, bitch-ass accomplices? An actual centrist in America in 2024 would be very progressive relative to most of the country. It's a good place to be.
The comic specifically calls out apologists. The kind that say "both sides equally bad" when both sides are most assuredly not equally bad. Or that try to suggest there can be anything meaningful gained from discussion with hateful intolerant people. They paint themselves as centrist. It's not really misusing it.
i've actually been thinking this recently. what actually is a centrist? i feel most who claim themselves to be centrist are actually conservatives...
There's an old joke. The parties change but the message stays the same.
A group of Nazis have cornered a group socialists when a centrist comes along. The centrist listens to both sides, how the Nazis want to kill all the socialists and how the socialists don't want to die. Thinking long and hard on it, the centrist says that there's a compromise to be had, just kill half.
They attack centrists to maintain the two party divide. If you don't agree with one side, you are seen as an ally of the other.
I am mostly euro-centrist. In America, I would be far left.
They attack centrists to maintain the two party divide. If you don't agree with one side, you are seen as an ally of the other.
I am mostly euro-centrist. In America, I would be far left.
You should engage them in debate though. The people who need to do so are always such cowards that they'd rather ban and run.
It's easy as fuck to outmaneuver one of those dipshits. And it's funny as fuck when they stomp off mad because you made them look like an idiot.
But it's not a debate. They have no interest in listening to you, any facts you present, nor presenting any disputing facts.
Never wrestle with pigs. You both get dirty and the pig likes it. ― George Bernard Shaw
I'd argue it's better to make fun of the fascists!
But it’s not a debate. They have no interest in listening to you, any facts you present, nor presenting any disputing facts.
the debate is not for them. it is for potential impartial observer who just encountered the problem for the first time and is now forming an opinion.
unfortunately it is really hard, because since the onset of the machine learning generators the pile of crap is literally endless.
But it's not a debate. They have no interest in listening to you,
Adam doesn't debate Bob to convince Bob of Adam's viewpoint. Adam debates Bob to convince their shared audience: Charlie, David, Edward, Frank, George, Harry...
When Bob is ejected from this forum, Charlie, (et al), never hear that debate and are never convinced of Adam's views. They aren't inoculated against Bob's logic. When they come across Bob uncontested in another forum, they may be persuaded; they fall into his echo chamber. When they bring their half-formed ideas back to your forum, they are banned as apologists rather than debated.
Ejecting Bob makes your forum better. Adam debating Bob makes the world better.
Fascism demands a response. When it stands without objection, it grows. We are obligated to respond, less to convince the fascist to change their ways, and more to extend a branch to those passers-by who might get swept away.
Sometimes that responder is me. Sometimes it should be you.
I will say one thing, this thread has let me know which accounts I need to block.
If you would like to be added to the list respond to this comment. My bot will take care of it if you haven't already been added.
Go ahead then. Have a nice life.
Edit: I mean, how are you going to argue against echo chambers, then turn around and hide inside one? Come on, buddy.
So brave 🤡
You do realize this is an argument for an echo chamber right? Banning Centrists and Opposition means you only have Supporters.
Edit: After much consideration you're right most of this thread is getting blocked.
An echo chamber where the barriers are "don't advocate for bigotry" and "don't be a bigot"? Damn. Mighty big echo chamber ya got here. You can fit all sorts of amicable disagreements in here. Hell, you can even fit nearly uncivil ones too! Boy howdy there sure is a lot of space to disagree when the limits are this far out.
That's great if you can trust the moderation/censorship team to use a rational definition of bigotry. But what usually happens is they begin to enforce the standards of an ever-closing Overton window, to the point that mere disagreement with the hive mind is considered bigotry.
The limits of discourse never stay "this far out". Moderation distills this enforced consensus into a weird, unhinged fanaticism, one "deviant" at a time.
I have no respect for the term bigot as I have been called one for being antireligious in a pro-trans thread. But keep pushing a generic narrative that is anti-bigot. I'm sure it will never be used against you. It's not like that's a historic authoritarian tool to shut down critical speech.
Limiting Speech is a peace treaty that should only get invoked when it's broken.
Edit: After much consideration you're right most of this thread is getting blocked.
Yes, yes. You keep saying. Too bad, you had so much good content to share 😢 we'll all be missing out for sure once you block us all.
Centrist policies aren't the issue. It's the apologists for intolerant bigots that paint themselves centrists. All apologists for bigots are bad, and almost all of them paint themselves centrist. But not all centrists are bigot apologists.
The fastest way to an echo chamber is to ignore everyone who disagrees with you.
You should be intelligent enough and convicted in your understanding of any point you argue strongly, that you will be able to identify an irrational or false argument.
Otherwise when someone you disagree with has a good point that improves your view point, you will miss it.
Take the show always sunny in philadelphia. The characters are all examples of absolutely terrible people. We use their idiocy, bigotry, racism and general prejudice to further confirm our beliefs and views on any topic.
It is healthy to listen to bad takes.
You should be intelligent enough and convicted in your understanding of any point you argue strongly, that you will be able to identify an irrational or false argument.
yeah, no.
"identifying irrational and false argument" takes time and we have only limited amount of it here on earth. also, once you have identified irrational and false argument, there is no need to do it over and over again. we are under no obligation to sort through a pile of crap just to show we are the better people (whatever that phrase means for anyone)
and i say that as someone who was recently banned for "trolling" by some kid on a power trip to protect his cult from my arguments, so i should have understanding for your line of reasoning, but i don't.
as always in life, it is a matter of degree and it can be relative (which is the phrase that irself can be used to excuse almost anything, 😂)
The fastest way to an echo chamber is to ignore everyone who disagrees with you.
This isn't about the entire set of people who disagree.
It is a waste of time to engage some kinds of people. They are not acting in good faith.
There's a Sartre quote about it
Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.
Found another one of them.
Just in case it's not clear, there are indeed people with ideas so toxic and so dangerous they need to be removed. Otherwise they will ruin it for everyone. When you tolerate the intolerant, tolerance is eventually seized and destroyed by the intolerant.
This isn't a case of disagreeing, this is by far the most common misrepresentation that centrist apologists use to try and vilify the banning and ostracizing of bigots and harmful ideology. There is no comparison to disagreeing about flavors of ice cream, to not wanting someone who hates trans people in your community where trans people hang out. Any attempt to do so is a bad faith comparison, because they are not equivalent.
The line is where their words cross over from speech to violence. When they call for eliminating people from society, you can remove them by the same methods they advocate.
"Toxic and dangerous" are relative terms. When the moderation team closes the Overton window enough that Chocolate ice cream qualifies as "toxic", the only dissent you can still have is between natural and artificial vanilla flavoring.
there are indeed people with ideas so toxic and so dangerous they need to be removed.
Probably. But the argument is about who gets to decide who they, not whether they exist.
Nazis are identified by their affiliation with the Nazi party. People you think are Nazis are identified by your opinion of them and absolutely nothing more.
If you could provide an objective definition of these 'apologists', we might have something to discuss, but clearly there can be no such definition, these are not facts like the shape of the earth or the speed of light.
We (almost) all agree that some levels of intolerance should not be tolerated, what we disagree on is which opinions confer such a status on someone.
How do you know what a toxic idea is if you never hear one. It is helpful to know what is wrong when trying to determine what is right.
I never said let people with bad takes in. I said hear them and disagree with them. Having such terrible takes in the air is a great way to strengthen your position when you are able to point out the absurdity of the bad argument.
If we close ourselves off to all the arguments we dont like then we run the risk of becoming so entrenched in our own opinion being the only right one that we never let anyone tell us we are wrong.
Finding the right path is a group effort, and it takes good and bad views to get there.
Just look at your agument, its so matter of fact. It feels like you have determined the correct position so all other views are wrong. The opening sentence "found another one" is enough to see this. You arent right automatically because you have had enough people agree with you. Especially whn you reject any opposing or even slightly different view point.
Honestly if you start to suck like the bigots, it's no surprise you would start to claim that anyone who points that out is a "centrist" bigot too to be yeeted away.
Sometimes I feel like people who want to fight bitotry have become cartoons doint a black and white evil vs good. Nope sorry. The world is not so clear cut. It's a mess. And the word "centrist" can now also be used for censorship. Congratulations. You suck just as much as the bigots now. Hope it "helped" to adopt their tactics! 🤣
Much better to spread the accepted hate than to be rational.
