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RIP Culture War Thread

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Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#161

Post by sastaha »

mikeash wrote: post #106
komali2 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>is that some people have good faith beliefs, respectfully expressed, that are nevertheless so repugnant to others that you will be tarred for not censoring them. I'm skeptical of this - I've never seen a polite racist argument, for example, or a polite homophobic one. The closest I've seen is a post riddled with condescension - something along the lines of "you don't understand, I'm trying to save your soul from the…

Part of the problem is that too many people think “polite” just means “no profanity or name-calling.” It is impossible to respectfully argue for a racist or homophobic position. The very nature of what you’re arguing for is that some people are inherently less than others, which is the opposite of respect. But if you state such an argument without using naughty words, a lot of people will misinterpret that as respect…

What people consider to be necessary to show "respect" for someone is seen differently by different people. There are a lot of people out there with a sense of entitlement, to money, to jobs, to popularity, and will scream at their "oppression" if it isn't given to them. Take egalitarianism to an extreme and they have a point, if I give a job to person X rather than person Y, am I not saying that person Y is on some level "less than" person X?

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#162

Post by fzeroracer »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #153
fzeroracer wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume you have not read Sarte's comments, then? Whenever you participate in a community you accept that there are going to be individuals controlling the discussion to an extent and cleaning up things that affect the site in a negative way. For example no matter how kindly you might argue or how much data you may provide on how the Jewish people should be eradicated, that sort of comment would get you rapidly flag…

I have read Sarte's comments (at least I think I have - no link, so I'm not sure). Look, I'm glad that racism and genocide are banned on HN, and that I don't have to wade through the garbage. CW wasn't trying to be HN, though. It had moderators, but they had a different set of filters, and they let a lot more through. That was by intent and design. Then some people decided that, because it allowed stuff from the far…

The problem is if you allow those comments, then by extension you do in fact support them. If HN in attempt to be more neutral started allowing think pieces from far-right authors on how bad the Jewish people are, then people would believe HN supports them (and rightfully so) by offering them a platform. This is part of the reason why HN does have banned websites (such as InfoWars) because the information from those sites tends to not only be highly disingenuous but also potentially damaging to the overall community.

Communities have to have a baseline stance of things they don't support, otherwise you can rapidly turn into the flaming heap that is Voat and other various sites. As for the actual data relating to the CW thread, the data only tells us what people self-describe as, not necessarily the frequency of their posts, the content contained within or how closely the poll reflects the actual userbase. This is before going into issues of people potentially gaming the poll and other problems with online polling.

As for the urge to censor viewpoints, that is inherently part of human nature. The internet has only made it easier because the anonymity allows for zero consequence. To fix this problem requires either destroying human nature or tearing apart the internet as you and I know it. There's always going to be a disagreement with how far it should go; some people believe Reddit should've never banned FatPeopleHate. Other people believe Reddit still fosters far too many incredibly vile subcommunities. Everyone has a line eventually. And there's always going to be people that disagree with where the line is drawn.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#163

Post by [deleted] »

kadendogthing wrote: post #145
MFLoon wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear: you're arguing in favor of doxing/no-platforming/otherwise suppressing people who espouse 'ridiculous, harmful, or "bad"' ideas? Leaving aside the issue of pre-judging which ideas fall into that bucket, what about the fallible targeting mechanisms of the mob? Do you think that what happened to the culture war thread was good and justified?

Where does "doxing" come into play? Why did you just whimsically group those together? Feels like a bad faith question.

[deleted]

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#164

Post by mikeash »

sastaha wrote: post #161
mikeash wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the problem is that too many people think “polite” just means “no profanity or name-calling.” It is impossible to respectfully argue for a racist or homophobic position. The very nature of what you’re arguing for is that some people are inherently less than others, which is the opposite of respect. But if you state such an argument without using naughty words, a lot of people will misinterpret that as respect…

What people consider to be necessary to show "respect" for someone is seen differently by different people. There are a lot of people out there with a sense of entitlement, to money, to jobs, to popularity, and will scream at their "oppression" if it isn't given to them. Take egalitarianism to an extreme and they have a point, if I give a job to person X rather than person Y, am I not saying that person Y is on some…

I think that depends heavily on why you chose X over Y.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#165

Post by dvtrn »

chc wrote: post #159
dvtrn wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose that's where I'm going to disagree, the idea that these responses are 'hollow' by daring to ask such a question. Maybe it's because I had the honor of living at a time in the US when certain behaviors were not only deemed socially odious but were codified in law as odious until enough people stood up and asked "who are you to say sending my daughter to a segregated school is odious" or "what is so odious ab…

It's not asking the question that's hollow — it's actually a worthwhile question — it's asking it as a rhetorical question, as those comments do. They are asking it for the specific purpose of not answering it. If they'd actually grappled with the complexity of the question to come up with an answer, I suspect they'd be upvoted.

Can't say I even agree with that.

These questions don't just manifest in a vacuum. And if they are worthwhile asking, then IMO (and stressing IMO) it doesn't matter if they're rhetorical or directly interrogative in delivery or purpose.

Asserting otherwise feels like an excercise in projecting.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#166

Post by yourbandsucks »

kadendogthing wrote: post #78
npsimons wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now you can present almost any idea, no matter how ridiculous, harmful, or "bad" it may be and there will most likely be audience. Like anti-vax, or AGW denialism, or white supremacy, or flat-eartherism, or creationism, or trickle down economics . . . Need I go on?

No need. It really says a lot about the linked article in question where the best arguments he had for debate were allowing Nazi view points and pedophiles. He seemed kind of angry at other people for bringing it up as a way to demonstrate what he was doing was wrong but then turned around used those topics as an example of why his moderation and general platform were so great. Guess he can just have it both ways bec…

What did he 'do' specifically?

There was a thread specifically for politics, loosely associated with his name, and he didn't proactively ban enough people who you don't agree with?

(If you read the article, he didn't defend any Nazis. He said that he never saw any specifically Nazi content, yet a bunch of people, yourself now included, accused him of enabling it.)

Tolerance goes for people you disagree with, too. In fact, it's only actually tolerance when it applies to those you disagree with or don't like.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#167

Post by AnimalMuppet »

fzeroracer wrote: post #162
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have read Sarte's comments (at least I think I have - no link, so I'm not sure). Look, I'm glad that racism and genocide are banned on HN, and that I don't have to wade through the garbage. CW wasn't trying to be HN, though. It had moderators, but they had a different set of filters, and they let a lot more through. That was by intent and design. Then some people decided that, because it allowed stuff from the far…

The problem is if you allow those comments, then by extension you do in fact support them. If HN in attempt to be more neutral started allowing think pieces from far-right authors on how bad the Jewish people are, then people would believe HN supports them (and rightfully so) by offering them a platform. This is part of the reason why HN does have banned websites (such as InfoWars) because the information from those…

> The problem is if you allow those comments, then by extension you do in fact support them.

FALSE. But you do in fact support censorship (or at least deplatforming, which I vehemently despise).

Here's what your position is like. Remember that baker in Colorado who wouldn't bake a cake for a gay wedding, because he felt that he would be participating in something he didn't think was morally right? You're agreeing with his position. In fact, his position is less extreme than yours, because he was willing to sell them any cake in the store, but wasn't willing to design a custom cake for them.

Yet I suspect (am I wrong?) that you think that the Colorado baker was in the wrong. But you're using his logic.

Your second and third paragraphs I think I agree with.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#168

Post by belorn »

api wrote: post #102
belorn wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After reading a few of the articles in the new sub, if that is far-right then far-right has a very different definition to the one being popularized. Take this one that has two relative high voted threads and was at the top for a while: https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMotte/comments/at8cuq/the_orches...

[flagged]

The linked article can be summerized into a few word sentence: The p-value of a famous study, cited by researchers and media, is claimed to be 0.33.

I am completely amazed that from there you interpret biological determinism, leading to red pill, leading to nazi worship, and finally landing at the far-right. I guess that answer my question why people think it is far-right, while my own definition of far-right is no where near that.

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#169

Post by fzeroracer »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #167
fzeroracer wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is if you allow those comments, then by extension you do in fact support them. If HN in attempt to be more neutral started allowing think pieces from far-right authors on how bad the Jewish people are, then people would believe HN supports them (and rightfully so) by offering them a platform. This is part of the reason why HN does have banned websites (such as InfoWars) because the information from those…

> The problem is if you allow those comments, then by extension you do in fact support them. FALSE. But you do in fact support censorship (or at least deplatforming, which I vehemently despise). Here's what your position is like. Remember that baker in Colorado who wouldn't bake a cake for a gay wedding, because he felt that he would be participating in something he didn't think was morally right? You're agreeing wit…

You're making a false equivalence here and assuming they're the same and your logic is incredibly irrational here but I'm going to try to address it in the best manner I can:

In the baker case, he decided that he would not support gay people. I believe gay people should be a protected group (as they are not harmful nor do they generally espouse harmful beliefs). You're right in that he felt that he would be supporting gay people, and my point is that he should support gay people, not that through some strange mental gymnastics I believe he's right to not support them (??). This is the reason why protected groups exist because if a person believes 'I refuse to offer service to women because I refuse to support women', we as a society believe that to be a net negative.

This is of course ignoring the context of the situation where we believe in free exercise of religion while also denying a man on death row access to his religion [1], which shows more the hypocrisy of the Supreme Court's decision on the baker case vs the Dunn v Ray case. But that's a whole 'nother can of worms.

Your argument is essentially saying people should have the right to discriminate on the basis of age, religion, gender etc because to not allow so is censorship. People should not be forced into supporting something they disagree with, correct? Which then ties back into my core argument in that everyone has a line; society has reason to try and shift that line (to avoid discrimination) and communities have reasons to draw their own line as well (to signal for causes they support or to limit the scope of discussion).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunn_v._Ray

Re: RIP Culture War Thread

#170

Post by malvosenior »

mikeash wrote: post #155
malvosenior wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people will extend the definition of "racist" to include things they don't like but would not be considered racist by most people. For instance there are still people who think the Covington teens are racist even after the additional footage became available. I've seen plenty of accusations of racism against people who say the teens are innocent.

People will make bad arguments on all sides. This is not a surprise, and is not really related to my point.

> It is impossible to respectfully argue for a racist or homophobic position.

My point is that in 2019 this statement has no meaning because there are wide swaths of the audience (not just fringe elements) that will label nearly everything "racist". The main point of contention in this thread is whether you should ban unpopular opinions or let them stand on their own. Racist comments are and should be unpopular but when the definition racism is widened to include half the population then censoring "racists" and hitting a bunch of false positives becomes much more damaging that not censoring "racists" and letting actual racists expose their own ignorant thinking.

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