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Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

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Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#421

Post by kofejnik »

pron wrote: post #388
xaa wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All you say is true, as I understand it, but there are two problems: First, social scientists are overwhelmingly liberal. Normally, I don't have a problem with an appeal to "academic circles" as I'm in them. But this is a legitimate reason, I think, for conservatives to be skeptical of the motivations and reasoning here in such a politically-fraught topic. Secondly, redefining words with existing meanings is a bad id…

> this is a legitimate reason, I think, for conservatives to be skeptical of the motivations and reasoning here in such a politically-fraught topic. It is a legitimate reason to be skeptical, but not a very interesting starting point for a discussion if one side isn't even interested in rigorously studying the subject at all. There's a vast knowledge gap between the two sides. > Secondly, redefining words with existi…

Calling something 'academic' and/or 'feminist' does not give it any additional validity

> trying to understand the more well-researched point of view

Sokal affair demonstrated full rigor of humanities 'research' quite well, I believe

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#422

Post by wu-ikkyu »

glenndebacker wrote: post #381

The problem is that it's a counterproductive move. In Belgium / Flanders we had an extreme far right political party called the Flemish Block. Af first the media gave them no air time, they weren't invited to political debates, they filtered them out like they didn't exist. The political parties created a cordon sanitaire, somekind of agreement to never create a government with that party involved. The result? The bi…

>The only way you can defeat those ideas is not by taking away their voice, but to let them speak.

>We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

-Dr. King, Letter From a Birmingham Jail

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#423

Post by kofejnik »

pron wrote: post #412
794CD01 wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which doesn't discredit the equivalence, it discredits social scientists, since any layman can look at the two statements and see that they are facially the same.

And the layman would be wrong, because to judge the significance of a statement -- in sociology as in math -- context is crucial.

So now we have a privileged caste of self-appointed social 'scientists' who get to decide what constitutes racism and who gets their life ruined.

this is gold, seriously

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#424

Post by norea-armozel »

Personally, I'm glad Twitter is cleaning up these jerks but they seem to be focusing on the most visible aspects of Twitter and ignoring the rest. It's easy to nuke an account like Milo's but it's another to nuke an account of a small time user (200 followers and the like). It's these folks who pose the biggest problem IMO because they're the ones most likely to act in a manner that is abusive on the site (barring Milo himself who seems to think he's above the ToS of any site).

So, it's basically a whitewashing act to ensure they look like they're solving a problem of abuse but in practice they ignore the 99% of abuse that actually goes on. They think if they hit that 1% the 99% will get in line. But I think the Twitter devs don't understand that they don't care. It's not as if their lives depend on Twitter. They'll just laugh and make alt accounts to continue the cycle over and over. Twitter needs a complete redesign for the abuse to be minimized or otherwise eliminated. And it wouldn't even need banning involved at least in my opinion. In some ways, I think Google had it right with G+ because it was easier to filter out people on circles than anything else. Too bad Twitter is so popular.

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#425

Post by filoeleven »

paulddraper wrote: post #116
leereeves wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like the left seriously damaged their ability to fight racist ideas when they abandoned the idea of equality. Now, the left calls colorblindness and "all lives matter" racist. (Remember when Martin O'Malley was destroyed for saying that?) They create advantageous standards based on race, and even exclusive positions for non-white applicants. (For example, at the BBC.) And I too doubt they would object to "dedi…

> when they abandoned the idea of equality They still champion equality. Unfortunately, it's now the equality of outcome, rather than equality of opportunity.

Equality of opportunity cannot be pursued or achieved if it ignores the fact that the starting conditions are not the same for everybody. This is what the left is trying to address.

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#426

Post by sounds »

StavrosK wrote: post #392
throwanem wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about postmenopausal women, a point raised elsewhere in this discussion? What about men and women who simply aren't fertile, for whatever reason? What about families in places where births aren't registered? Such places still exist. What about the death of a couple's only child? Is the marriage thereby annulled? What effect has all this on divorce? "Creepy edge cases." And I can't see how maintaining all this ad…

> What about postmenopausal women, a point raised elsewhere in this discussion? What about them? By your logic, won't be able to get married, unless they adopt, since they can't have kids, it's clear-cut. > What about men and women who simply aren't fertile, for whatever reason? Same, no marriage, unless they adopt. > What about families in places where births aren't registered? Such places still exist. Can't get mar…

It usually isn't necessary to claim "my solution is clearly superior."

Civil discourse usually ends by presenting your clearly superior points and letting the weight of their clear superiority carry the day.

Questioning what the real reason for [him] being against homosexual marriage is an "Ad hominem fallacy".

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#427

Post by JoeAltmaier »

StavrosK wrote: post #391
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah its a knee-jerk reaction and sad. The more accurate slogan would be "Black Lives Also Matter" but that isn't as effective. I think we all really understand that's what "Black Lives Matter" means. The real question is, why the strong counter-reaction? Why the sophistry around the slogan? What is that covering for?

I don't live in the US, so I'm out of that particular loop, but I was talking to an american friend of mine about police shootings and he told me about BLM, and I said "but it seems to me that the issue isn't that the police shouldn't be killing black people, it's that the police shouldn't be killing anyone !". It seems that the argument has been framed around black people's mistreatment in general, which is fair eno…

Only if you don't know the stories. Its famous that white serial killers are treated better in some circumstances, than black people selling cigarettes on a street corner. One gets taken to McDonalds on the way to jail; the other strangled and killed.

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#428

Post by woodman »

ejstronge wrote: post #284
woodman wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ... in game theory when the other side always defects. Consider the conservative position, and what strategy would work for conserving what is important to them. Any sort of compromise is a long term losing strategy, so of course they'll block progressive moves if they're capable. I'm not aware of any real trade ever being offered, something like: we want full on no joke equality of outcome for every flavor of the…

The human waste metaphor raises an interesting question - what do you think the role of elected officials in a representative democracy is? I would also add that the media-portrayal of conservative perspectives if in multiple instances further to the right than that of the electorate. I'm happy to go into examples if you care (one example would be people wanting healthcare before the ACA became associated with the 'e…

The role of the elected is to carry out the will of the governed except in cases where it is the will of a tyrannical majority. I think that has been demonstrated to not work, unless your measure of success is counted by generations and not years.

I don't agree with you on the media-portrayal point, because I think your premise is way off. There is no unified conservative perspective in the way that there is with progressives. This last election has made it very clear that the old conservative guard, the ones most similar to progressives, who called for universal healthcare before Obama, are in a minority position.

I'm not likely to be the one you want to discuss this with though, as I'm an anarchist.

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#429

Post by gaius »

RileyKyeden wrote: post #406
gaius wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your link says that if a person feels more aggrieved (shorter) they should be allowed to be more racist (get a bigger box). That's not OK.

It's odd that you focus on race when it's not even remotely the focus of the article.

It's odd that you didn't read the comment I replied to, which does.

Re: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

#430

Post by woodman »

icanhackit wrote: post #105
grzm wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, and in some cases you're likely right. In others, might it not be people who consider themselves right (and not extreme) but no longer feel the Republicans (the traditional right) truly represent them? As an aside, there are likely plenty of people on the left that feel similarly.

might it not be people who consider themselves right (and not extreme) but no longer feel the Republicans (the traditional right) truly represent them? The far-left/left/center-left etc and right side counterparts are defined by policy and ideology, so whether they feel the GOP was in touch doesn't really make a difference. You wouldn't call the Republicans "right" if they started handing out generous welfare package…

> You wouldn't call the Republicans "right" if they started handing out generous welfare packages to the masses.

Like their pre-Obama universal healthcare proposals? The one dimensional political spectrum, with n-right vs n-left, doesn't work at all.

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