Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times • Hacker News Board

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#601

Post by mbrodersen » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 1:35 AM UTC

otterley wrote: post #545

krageon wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They accomplish it because the folks around them are normal human beings that don't completely fly off the handle when something they don't like is said by someone else. You talk about it, rib back or leave. It's not rocket science.

That's possible, but a more likely explanation is that most people know better than to make inappropriate jokes about their colleagues. In my 30-year-long career, the number of people I've observed making such jokes is far outweighed by the number of people who maintain a professional demeanor.

Let me give you an example: Let’s say (for arguments sake) that I got upset reading your comment. Following your logic it is now your fault that I am upset. So you need to change your behaviour until I am no longer upset. Can you see how impractical/impossible that is? Any opinion you have might upset somebody. So the only way to not upset anybody is to stay silent.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#602

Post by otterley » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 3:21 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #600

otterley wrote: post #552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a straw man. I've never been talking about the people who aren't bothered by the jokes in question here because they're not personally carrying the baggage I'm referring to. I've talking about the people who are . Those people exist and are numerous , and they seek out and appreciate the allies they have on their side.

> I've never been talking about the people who aren't bothered by the jokes in question here because they're not personally carrying the baggage I'm referring to. I've talking about the people who are. Those people exist and are numerous It’s impossible to talk about these groups separately because our norms and policies around race have costs and benefits which must be balanced across all the minorities who will be…

I urge you to get out from behind your desk and actually talk to people who are adversely impacted by people's poor behavior on a day-to-day basis. (This will help you determine who these "unspecified" people are for yourself.) Even though you are "brown” it doesn't grant you license to make excuses for jerks.

Others can argue "we don't need your help," and that's fine, but at this point in time, given where we are today as a society, and the damage I see done to people on a frequent basis, I'd rather err on the side of helping in a constructive way, how the impacted people ask us to, and advocating for people to be respectful. Call people like me "paternalistic" and "othering" if you must; it's just a rhetorical smear as far as I'm concerned. Highfalutin' characterizations add as little to this conversation as simpler-sounding ones.

> we can’t just adopt the most extreme standards in deference to unspecified “numerous” people carrying unspecified “baggage.”

There's nothing extreme whatsoever about adopting a professional demeanor. You are arguing against a position I do not hold. Again, I beg you, check your straw men at the door, and stick to the subject.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#603

Post by noduerme » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 7:43 AM UTC

cgrealy wrote: post #183

noduerme wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one thing that's remained constant from times when civil rights activists were imprisoned for "offending" people to now when right wingers are canceled for offending people seems to be that the bulk of the population is incapable of, or unwilling to, set the principle of speech over their own feelings about that speech. I think it's because most people just can't imagine themselves being on the wrong end of a cen…

> narrowing of speech will come for those who believe themselves immune. True, but on other hand, history has shown us the Paradox of Tolerance. "Liberals" have learned this lesson. When I was growing up, people who I would consider socially liberal generally supported the "I disagree with what you say, but will defend your right to say it" position. These days, the same people are less confident. I'm one of them. I…

This idea just struck me reading your post, but I think it's something novel. I've read a lot of responses here, and yours encapsulates the argument that speech is subordinate to tolerance better than most. As someone whose immediate family are the only survivors of mass genocide, I'm keenly aware of the dangers of giving intolerance a platform to poison innocent minds, or of tolerating it at all. But not tolerating it, to me, means taking the time to address it rather than attempting to silence it by another act that could be portrayed as intolerant and thus give ammunition to the enemy. So I think it's succinct to say I look at the Overton Window concept like this: Anyone who wants control will try to put the window of debate where they want it, and narrow it as much as possible. The solution is not to move the window but to stand by the value of widening the window and keeping it as wide as possible. The fact that it has shifted in directions some agree with and others disagree with is useless as an argument for restricting or expanding it. Where it is wide and debate flows freely, there will be more tolerance. Where it's narrow - wherever dissenting opinion, even intolerant opinion - is treated as beyond the pale, eventually your own opinion will be treated as beyond the pale, and no one will be left to speak for you. My grandparents were communists and their family was murdered in the Holocaust. To me the primary lesson of the 20th century was that all ideology is a source of horrific torture and murder. Only by absolutely widening that window of speech as much as possible can individuals hope to fight the excesses of whichever ideology happens to be in the middle of the window at the present moment. And living through several fascist-leaning American administrations has made me realize just how temporary the current leftness of that window is, so I really shake my head when I see people of the left attempting to narrow it. I hope that makes sense programmatically, as an algorithm, if not emotionally.

Edit - because I'm just formulating this. I'd say there's no place the Overton Window can be which is tolerant. Some centers maybe more than others, but actual tolerance only exists where it is wide, and surely wherever it is narrow it will end with suppression of valid dissent.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#604

Post by noduerme » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 7:58 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #209

noduerme wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was, for many of us, our ability to be heard . Our ability to speak was not hindered by fear of having our lives ruined for holding an unpopular opinion or asking an incorrectly phrased question.

The most common battlefield on which these "cancellation" debates happen is people's access to Twitter, a service that did not exist in the 1990s (you could, obviously, get banned off a BBS for any or no reason). You see it in this very thread: people writing appeals to the amount of control tech companies have over speech, and how unprecedented that is.

I consider Twitter just a very successful BBS, and I'm all for them banning the shit out of most of their idiot users. It's ridiculous that people who couldn't figure out how to set up a modem in 1993 now think they have a right to post and be heard as if God stepped down and gave them a megaphone. I don't have any sympathy for their complaints about being banned. What I do have a problem with is services allowing people to be brigaded and have their families and jobs threatened, which as a sysop I would have shut down the brigaders for, not the asshole who wrote the inflammatory thread, even if I disagreed with him.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#605

Post by noduerme » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 8:15 AM UTC

Latty wrote: post #171

noduerme wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one thing that's remained constant from times when civil rights activists were imprisoned for "offending" people to now when right wingers are canceled for offending people seems to be that the bulk of the population is incapable of, or unwilling to, set the principle of speech over their own feelings about that speech. I think it's because most people just can't imagine themselves being on the wrong end of a cen…

You are equating government imprisonment with public cancellation here because they both have a chilling effect, but we very quickly run into the paradox of tolerance: do you restrict the expression of "cancelling" to protect other speech? Those Nazis you use an example of abhorrent speech that must be allowed were calling for communists to be rounded up and killed for their views. Surely that is partaking in cancell…

Who cancels the cancellers of the cancellers? You've hit the nail on the head: Cancellation is not a viable means of stopping criminal calls to violence, and it's pretty much useless as a rhetorical tool. For the former we have a legal system which should be shored up rather than undermined by vigilantism; for the latter we have a democratic political system which, ditto, should be treated with respect rather than undermined by stooping to the same dirty tricks one's political enemies pulled. Which is probably why cancellation usually appears like virtue signalling, since it serves little purpose in either stopping violence or improving the system, let alone convincing anyone but potentially violent imbeciles in one's own camp to holler and mob up on a target of rage for the benefit of whoever controls the mob.

It has nothing to do with justice. No matter how shitty a human the target of it is. It's always just a really transparent attempt for someone to collect "likes".

Who gets "likes" for calling for civil debate rather than attacking the group's enemies?

No one. Anyone who dares to would be cancelled too. That should tell you all you need to know about the nature of intolerance toward intolerance. It's categorically intolerant as well, and it is no longer on the right side of anything.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#606

Post by krageon » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 8:59 AM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #564

krageon wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They accomplish it because the folks around them are normal human beings that don't completely fly off the handle when something they don't like is said by someone else. You talk about it, rib back or leave. It's not rocket science.

I just don't know how you can say things like this when professional environments like Activision-Blizzard exist. You act like it's either "everything we say can be said without any social consequence" or "everyone is offended by everything all the time," when the reality is it's a sliding scale based on context. I have a higher tolerance for things with a small group of friends than I do in the workplace. I will tal…

> I just don't know how you can say things like this when professional environments like Activision-Blizzard exist

You don't agree people should leave Activision-Blizzard? I'm not convinced all the drama actually improved the company, though it was probably very satisfying to see for some folks.

> I do NOT want that at work, and I think I am entitled to [...]

That's a valid feeling, but nobody else is obliged to give that to you. You find a company that works for you, or you adapt to the one that you want to work for you. You don't go to war with the culture of a company just because something you feel entitled to isn't yet there.

> I guarantee you I can offend and get a bad reaction out of anyone who says "anything goes."

Yes, and there's nothing wrong with bad reactions. I literally said "you talk about it, rib back or leave". If you are incapable of solving your issues that way and find some sort of middle ground when someone really feels you stepped over the line, I think you have some growing up to do. That said, I recognise it doesn't mesh with a lot of folks' feelings on the matter and that's fine. I can live with that. I hope you can too.

I think it's reasonable to have conversations like these at work. Just like you can have them anywhere else. If conversations about it are had and you have thoughts on whether or not they should be had, you should be heard. Then the other party is free to do with that what they want. That's how life works.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#607

Post by spupe » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 9:50 AM UTC

tootie wrote: post #573

spupe wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Too bad, because he has a great account of how the Russiagate scandal was overblown by the media: https://taibbi.substack.com/p/russiagate-is-wmd-times-a-mill... You could choose to look at it critically and decide for yourself what you believe in. It is a factual, point-by-point destruction of your claim above. Zero percent of it hinges on how perfect Taibbi as a person is, or was 20 years ago. Your ideological puri…

Wow, that has aged poorly. All of the stories he insists should be walked back have been confirmed. Manafort and Flynn were both pardoned by Trump despite definitely having communication with Russian agents and lying about it. Roger Stone was also convicted for his role in coordinating the DNC email release with GRU via WikiLeaks. Russian agents visited Trump Tower to sell the campaign emails. Trump lied about his bu…

> Nothing he references in the MSM reporting was actually incorrect.

You clearly have not read my linked article, as most of your points are covered there. Here is a short collection of paragraphs that might interest other readers of this thread who are more inclined to a honest intellectual debate:

"Even the mistakes caught were astounding. On December 1, 2017, ABC reporter Brian Ross claimed Trump “as a candidate” instructed Michael Flynn to contact Russia. The news caused the Dow to plummet 350 points. The story was retracted almost immediately and Ross was suspended.

Bloomberg reported Mueller subpoenaed Trump’s Deutsche Bank accounts; the subpoenas turned out to be of other individuals’ records. Fortune said C-SPAN was hacked after Russia Today programming briefly interrupted coverage of a Maxine Waters floor address. The New York Times also ran the story, and it’s still up, despite C-SPAN insisting its own “internal routing error” likely caused the feed to appear in place of its own broadcast.

CNN has its own separate sub-list of wrecks. Three of the network’s journalists resigned after a story purporting to tie Trump advisor Anthony Scaramucci to a Russian investment fund was retracted. Four more CNN reporters (Gloria Borger, Eric Lichtblau, Jake Tapper and Brian Rokus) were bylined in a story that claimed Comey was expected to refute Trump’s claims he was told he wasn’t the target of an investigation. Comey blew that one up, too.

In another CNN scoop gone awry, “Email pointed Trump campaign to WikiLeaks documents,” the network’s reporters were off by ten days in a “bombshell” that supposedly proved the Trump campaign had foreknowledge of Wikileaks dumps. “It’s, uh, perhaps not as significant as what we know now,” offered CNN’s Manu Raju in a painful on-air retraction."

You seem to be under the impression that Taibbi is some sort of agent working for Trump, because that's what the current zeitgeist is: if someone disagrees with your opinion, they are evil, and likely working for the enemy too. You already relied on your hit piece to try to prove Taibbi was evil, now you are trying to suggest he is a right-wing agent. This is delusional.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#608

Post by smaryjerry » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 12:31 PM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #595

smaryjerry wrote: post #579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are right other conservatives won’t fight against it but it is also only religious conservatives that support it, at least banning abortion per the Texas law. In my own experience in a heavily democrat area, every single democrat I’ve met also support a ban on abortion after a certain period of time and the debate is more over how long or what point after conception until it should be banned.. that point is often…

1) The law compels people to out abortions and circumvents the law of the land - I.e. the SCOTUS ruling - by forcing it into a civil court matter. You seriously don’t see the issue there? How about democrats pass a parallel law where instead of abortions it’s because you used hate speech? How would you feel about that? 2) 6 weeks is not a long time. Plenty of people don’t find out their pregnant until 4-6 weeks, many…

You are arguing against things I am not arguing for and never have. Literally I wrote I also thought 6 weeks was too soon in the post you are responding to and you continue to flame me here. Your hypocrisy is getting upset I called your post a lie, when you were completely factually incorrect, as you admitted, all the while in your first response calling me “blatantly dishonest.” I’m sorry but that is literally you calling me a liar first, and using in your explanation lies, even if by mistake. Now, after you are claiming that I am the one flaming you in your other post and saying you will no longer respond, continue to respond and flame me, do you understand why this conversation is not productive from your end?

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#609

Post by Forgeties79 » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 2:10 PM UTC

smaryjerry wrote: post #608

Forgeties79 wrote: post #595

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) The law compels people to out abortions and circumvents the law of the land - I.e. the SCOTUS ruling - by forcing it into a civil court matter. You seriously don’t see the issue there? How about democrats pass a parallel law where instead of abortions it’s because you used hate speech? How would you feel about that? 2) 6 weeks is not a long time. Plenty of people don’t find out their pregnant until 4-6 weeks, many…

You are arguing against things I am not arguing for and never have. Literally I wrote I also thought 6 weeks was too soon in the post you are responding to and you continue to flame me here. Your hypocrisy is getting upset I called your post a lie, when you were completely factually incorrect, as you admitted, all the while in your first response calling me “blatantly dishonest.” I’m sorry but that is literally you c…

1) Relax. I wasn’t aware you were the same person. It’s not a big deal.

2) you wrote “you still get 6 weeks,” as if that’s adequate.

I’m sorry you think your brand of conservative politics is the party line, because frankly it isn’t and even you - who I disagree with - deserve to be represented by a party that shares your values. The GOP is the anti-abortion party. They will continue claw back any and every part of a woman’s right to choose until Roe v. Wade is functionally overturned, as they have done for decades. Whether or not that is the majority opinion is irrelevant because they are doing it anyway and your denial of that reality doesn’t make it go away. Much like most Americans don’t want weed illegal anymore but neither party seems interested in making a move at the federal level despite the public mandate.

Re: Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times

#610

Post by ashtonkem » Thu, Mar 24, 2022, 2:28 PM UTC

jimbokun wrote: post #565

long_time_gone wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate the followup. > Al and Tipper Gore were roundly mocked for the record rating system they championed. Which has a direct mirror in the mocking of Republicans who are currently trying to ban books and ideas (CRT) they don't like. A lot of your idea rests on the concept of "culturally influential people" pushing these actions. Again, I don't see the evidence of that, seems like a boogeyman. > R rated movies…

The link to R rated movie statistics shows a steady drop in marketshare, excluding a weird blip in 2020. Probably an artifact of Covid? Trump is the chief catalyst of Cancel Culture, in my opinion. His violation of every norm of decency and blatant cruelty created a backlash and a desire for retaliation for anyone seen to be in the same camp as Trump.

The drop in R rated movie share in the box office is almost certainly a result of streaming, not a change in cultural taboos. The linked chart only includes people who paid money specifically to watch a movie in a theater, and does not include movies watched on Netflix or Hulu.

> created a backlash and a desire for retaliation for anyone seen to be in the same camp as Trump.

Trump also demanded basically anyone who was ever insufficiently nice to him get fired. If anyone was for “cancel culture” it would be him. But like everything else in his life, he wasn’t very good at affecting those changes.