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The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

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Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#91

Post by WaxProlix »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #27
glibgil wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's way better to combat "racial purity" ideologies (or any other speech) with more speech, with reason and truth than with violence Do you have any evidence to support this claim?

Gandhi and King. Violence just leads to more violence and hatred.

American textbook whitewashed versions of King and Gandhi, perhaps. It's convenient for the ruling class to have peaceful (and ineffectual) forms of 'resistance' lauded over other means.

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/riot-language-unhear...

https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/mahatmagan100677...

http://www.naturalnews.com/038372_Gandhi_nonviolence_right_t...

etc

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#92

Post by anigbrowl »

pheldagryph wrote: post #74
anigbrowl wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody's asking for validation of the contents of a persons heart. But people are saying that certain speech acts deserve unyielding opposition because they consist of exhortations to violence. Why conflate two different things?

I'm not following your suggestion of conflation. The correct way to read my comment is as a criticism of the clear rhetorical support for violence in its parent. I am full of controversial opinions, I know...

The contents of a persons heart are known only to them and fundamentally unknowable by anyone else barring some scientific breakthrough, so they cannot and should not be subject to sanction. The words that come out of their mouth, on the other hand, are discernable.

You say the correct way to read your comment is as a criticism of the rhetorical support for violence in the parent, but the parent comment in question treats of violent opposition to Nazism, an inherently violent ideology, which you seem to be overlooking.

Allow me to illustrate how this looks from where I'm sitting:

  Abel: Nazism is good! I support putting [people I dislike] into camps and killing them.
  Baker: I find Abel's views repugnant and threatening to me, and if he expresses them in my presence I will punch him.
  Charlie: Baker is terribly violent!
Please explain to me why you find the idea of violent opposition to Nazism 'chilling' but don't have anything to say about Nazism itself. It seems like a strange double standard.

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#93

Post by alva »

anigbrowl wrote: post #80
gavanwoolery wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, also important not to confuse correlation and causation IMHO. Even if we fully mirrored the rise of the Nazi party (in the political sense), it would not necessarily imply that we would mirror their actions (genocide, etc). In situations like this, its important to step back and ask - under what circumstances would the US actually cross the same line that the Nazis did? (And I do not mean anecdotal instances - I…

You're only willing to bet 4 or 8 years out, which is itself worrying. There are certainly people who actively espouse genocidal intentions openly in our body politic, and the connections between them and powerful figures in the administration are not very distant. In situations like this, its important to step back and ask - under what circumstances would the US actually cross the same line that the Nazis did? Have…

> and forcibly move millions of people to the other side of it?Somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 of the population seem heartily in favor of this idea.

Yeah, only a true Nazi would deport millions of people. If someone deports millions of illegal immigrants they must be punched as they are Nazis. Can't believe Obama was a secret Nazi all along :'(, Alex Jones was warning us all along.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/oct/...

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#94

Post by alva »

gavanwoolery wrote: post #20

I find the constant comparison of present-day US to Nazi Germany a bit disrespectful. Not disrespectful of people in the present day (necessarily), but to those who actually survived Nazi Germany. What would you think, if you were a someone who survived a concentration camp, to have people consistently claim that the modern-day US is anywhere near as bad? I understand that the US is far from perfect, but we are also…

When a word is too flimsily used against people, it loses its meaning. This is what happened with calling people racist. It got tossed around inappropriately so much, the public lost their sensitivity to it. People now roll their eyes when someone accuses them so casually of being racist. Therefore we have a new word to level at people, Nazi.

The same thing will happen with calling people "Nazi". Initially people will be scared that they will lose social capital if called a Nazi. Eventually, people will have seen enough obviously non-Nazi folk be called Nazi, that the word will again lost meaning and power.

Nazi will fall faster than other social weapons, simply because it is so ludicrous. When they level that charge are they really suggesting the person follows the National Socialism doctrine? That they advocate for mass genocide? That they follow the numerous ideas of Nazi-ism? They have a strong position on Anschluss? This is bizarre (and amusing) watching from a European perspective.

There is a much more widely held ideology that is closer to what the left perceives the right to hold, but it would Never fly to accuse people of that..

edit: I fully agree with the parent that the term being used in the way it has been is Incredibly insulting to those who suffered under the Nazi regime.

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#95

Post by glibgil »

pheldagryph wrote: post #43
glibgil wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's way better to combat "racial purity" ideologies (or any other speech) with more speech, with reason and truth than with violence Do you have any evidence to support this claim?

One of the most chilling comments I've ever read on this site. How does one provide evidence of the content of their heart?

No, they expressed a sociopolitical theory that honestly sounds ineffective. They can support that theory with evidence if they want to convince at least me

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#96

Post by glibgil »

doctorless wrote: post #26
glibgil wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's way better to combat "racial purity" ideologies (or any other speech) with more speech, with reason and truth than with violence Do you have any evidence to support this claim?

Are you advocating violent suppression of views you dislike? Do you not see an irony there?

Do the view present an existential threat? I would fight an existential threat

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#97

Post by anigbrowl »

tptacek wrote: post #90
anigbrowl wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thomas I can't help observing that you're completely ignoring my second point about what differentiates anti-fascist activists from anti-abortion activists.

Could you re-state it? You know I'm not inclined to blow you off; you've been on my list of favorite commenters for something like 5 years. I seriously do not see a distinction between the two perspectives, other than that the anti-abortion activists would be employing violence to actually stop what they believe to be real, immediate, kinetic violence. Again, it's not like my argument here is novel. It's the ACLU's a…

Anti-Abortion protesters are appointing themselves as moral guardians of a fetus.

Anti-Nazi protesters are declaring their own selves to feel threatened by Nazism, rather than claiming to be intervening in the defense of someone else.

I don't really care about the ACLU's argument. Things have moved on since 1976 and the scope and intensity of violence perpetrated by white nationalists and similar far-right groups has increased considerably. Also, consider the fact that the ACLU was founded in 1920, but it was not the ACLU that defeated the Nazis in World War 2.

These aren't academic discussions with imaginary Nazis. The people killed by Dylann Roof or Jeremy Christian were real people who really died at the hands of people who really profess support for white supremacist ideologies, to name but two examples.

The mini-riots and street battled in Berkeley might seem comical from afar but having been at several of them I can tell you for a fact that there are people there who show up shouting nazi and white nationalist slogans and threatening or engaging people with weapons.

https://psmag.com/social-justice/the-ku-klux-klan-were-memel...

White nationalism is not some tiny radical fringe. I'd remind you that people like Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller occupy senior roles in the administration of the executive branch and there's abundant evidence of their extremist views.

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#98

Post by colanderman »

lucio wrote: post #18

It's pretty scary how the article goes from killing Nazis is fantastic, to anybody at my right is a Nazi and it's morally ok to punch them. >Too often, when we engage in arguments with extremists who talk of racial purity, we falter to explain our side. Instead, we punch them and tell them “because.” >Nationalism leads to war So if you see somebody waving a flag, you punch them? I don't like the "punch them" rhetoric…

I think you are grossly misinterpreting the sentence you quoted. It isn't advocating anything; it is making an observation. "We punch them" is indicative mood, not subjunctive as you seem to have taken it ("we should punch them").

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#99

Post by anigbrowl »

tptacek wrote: post #79
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People could have said the same about Nazism. Personally I put the anti-abortionists (who directly cause more abortions) in the same category as the guy who turned up at a pizza parlor with a rifle and many low level Nazis. Confused by propaganda into making the situation worse.

All you're saying is that you disagree with them. I do too. What's your point? There are tens of millions of them. To be actively racist is (thank Christ) to marginalize yourself in modern society. But to be pro-life? Sorry, it may not seem that way on a message board, but there's not a lot of stigma to opposing abortion. Meanwhile, there's no evading it. You simply must stipulate that opponents of abortion believe,…

If you believe you have the right to punch Nazis, I don't see how you escape conceding that pro-lifers have the right to punch women walking into abortion clinics.

Nobody can ask the fetus whether it is OK or even agree on whether it has the capacity to experience suffering given that most abortions take place prior to fetal brain development. A fetus, therefore, has no legal agency of its own.

By contrast, someone who advocates punching Nazis does have legal agency, and may be wishing to exercise it on their own behalf rather than on behalf of some third party. This is a fundamentally different situation.

We neatly avoid all of this simply by allowing that while it's important to suppress Nazism (and white supremacy and all that stuff), we're not entitled to use physical violence to do it.

It sounds awfully like you're abrogating people's right of self-defense. How is this 'suppression' to take place when Nazis have a demonstrable track record of being willing to use violence but you deny that option to their opponents under any circumstances? I'm having trouble following your reasoning here.

Re: The Surprising Importance of ‘Wolfenstein: The New Order’

#100

Post by tptacek »

anigbrowl wrote: post #99
tptacek wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All you're saying is that you disagree with them. I do too. What's your point? There are tens of millions of them. To be actively racist is (thank Christ) to marginalize yourself in modern society. But to be pro-life? Sorry, it may not seem that way on a message board, but there's not a lot of stigma to opposing abortion. Meanwhile, there's no evading it. You simply must stipulate that opponents of abortion believe,…

If you believe you have the right to punch Nazis, I don't see how you escape conceding that pro-lifers have the right to punch women walking into abortion clinics. Nobody can ask the fetus whether it is OK or even agree on whether it has the capacity to experience suffering given that most abortions take place prior to fetal brain development. A fetus, therefore, has no legal agency of its own. By contrast, someone w…

I didn't argue that you can't hit someone who is literally about to physically attack you, and neither did the ACLU.

You seem to be arguing that the mere presence of a Nazi marching under a Nazi flag in the public square justifies physical violence. What did the ACLU get wrong about that when they defended the Nazis in Skokie?

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