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Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

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Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#451

Post by krrrh »

gnopgnip wrote: post #298
yellowapple wrote: post #4

It's weird that these books got pulled from circulation in the first place; the offensiveness is relatively mild (especially for the time), and quite a few of these have historical and literary significance (including the very first children's book published under the "Dr. Seuss" pen name). eBay deciding unilaterally that people can't buy or sell already-printed copies is just icing on the weirdness cake. This is the…

Ebay didn't decide it unilaterally, it is in conjunction with the Dr. Seuss estate and Dr. Seuss Enterprises LP

I really miss the anti-copyright radicalism that used to suffuse hacker culture in the early naughts. The Seuss estate should have the same power to limit publication of these books as Shakespeare’s heirs would have to stop publication of the Merchant of Venice.

And if that sounds like it’s going to far can they at least have no say in the right to resale?

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#452

Post by bromuro »

dmix wrote: post #259
supernova87a wrote: post #55

Now this part is getting a little too carried away. It is one thing for libraries and bookstores to decide not to offer for borrowing or sale things that they disagree with. It is another (and overstepping imo) for Ebay to restrict individual people from selling to others goods that are not illegal or in violation of their other practical rules (no selling jewelry, monetary equivalents, etc). This falls into the cate…

And you get downvoted on HN for even mentioning “slippery slope”.

i wish we could keep “comments about downvotes” out of HN. Reddit is a better place to dramatize these things.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#453

Post by arduanika »

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #62

About 5 years ago a friend of mine was saying, "yeah, it's bad at the universities but it doesn't affect the real world." Pretty funny how quickly things accelerated. I'd like to get off this ride.

> this ride

Oh the places we'll go.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#454

Post by [deleted] »

userbinator wrote: post #321
supernova87a wrote: post #55

Now this part is getting a little too carried away. It is one thing for libraries and bookstores to decide not to offer for borrowing or sale things that they disagree with. It is another (and overstepping imo) for Ebay to restrict individual people from selling to others goods that are not illegal or in violation of their other practical rules (no selling jewelry, monetary equivalents, etc). This falls into the cate…

The most disturbing thing about this phenomenon is its encouragement to essentially attempt to destroy and rewrite history. I am more offended by that than anything else. The past may not have been very nice to certain groups, but it is what it is --- a historical artifact to learn from and remember. The other comments here comparing it to the Cultural Revolution are very relevant.

[deleted]

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#455

Post by themolecularman »

vmception wrote: post #304
nph5667 wrote: post #29

What bothers me is the speed with which this process - "accused -> convinced -> executed" happens. We are not discussing things anymore. Today, you could tweet any accusations, and, no matter how ridiculous they look at first, it will lead to a race of who is taking them most seriously. Something definitely is broken. Look at what happened to the "okay". 4chan forced that meme 5 years ago in what they thought is a mi…

Yeah I was sad about that guy at a theme park that got fired for making an OK sign in a family's photo. Its like everyone forgot about the circle game, "the game", and went straight for white supremacy racist. I wanted to write in or call in, but it was too late. This one is crazy, but I have my own causes and that ain't one of them! I find it peculiar and I'm aware "they are coming for the trade unionists next" but…

> I find it peculiar and I'm aware "they are coming for the trade unionists next" but I think I can navigate this reality and stay out of the re-education camps.

How? I think they'll get to you next. As commenters above pointed out, there is a "long march" through institutions before it starts trickling down.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#456

Post by krrrh »

mc32 wrote: post #324
ggggtez wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the vague impression that Dr. Seuss' estate asked eBay to do this, but maybe we'll never know.

Imagine if Kanye or the estate of Biggie Smalls or Pat Benatar, Springsteen or whoever said, eh, you know I denounce my music. I take it back. Stop playing it. Take it off the radio, internet, boot sales, flea markets, used music stores... Is that reasonable?

This isn’t even that theoretical. Born again Christian Kanye has expressed regret for some of his older secular music. A lot of Kanye fans live in fear of him suddenly deleting his back catalogue from the streaming services. If the major resellers of physical media start respecting the wishes of rights holders then we’ve really swung the pendulum too far away from open culture and the public domain.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#457

Post by King-Aaron »

supernova87a wrote: post #55

Now this part is getting a little too carried away. It is one thing for libraries and bookstores to decide not to offer for borrowing or sale things that they disagree with. It is another (and overstepping imo) for Ebay to restrict individual people from selling to others goods that are not illegal or in violation of their other practical rules (no selling jewelry, monetary equivalents, etc). This falls into the cate…

Lets be fair, "If I ran the zoo" is pretty blatantly racist.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#458

Post by carapace »

cyounkins wrote: post #71
nph5667 wrote: post #29

What bothers me is the speed with which this process - "accused -> convinced -> executed" happens. We are not discussing things anymore. Today, you could tweet any accusations, and, no matter how ridiculous they look at first, it will lead to a race of who is taking them most seriously. Something definitely is broken. Look at what happened to the "okay". 4chan forced that meme 5 years ago in what they thought is a mi…

I'm a little confused. Are you actually referring to the word "okay"? What is CNL?

https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/okay-h...

> In 2017, the “okay” hand gesture acquired a new and different significance thanks to a hoax by members of the website 4chan to falsely promote the gesture as a hate symbol, claiming that the gesture represented the letters “wp,” for “white power.” The “okay” gesture hoax was merely the latest in a series of similar 4chan hoaxes using various innocuous symbols; in each case, the hoaxers hoped that the media and liberals would overreact by condemning a common image as white supremacist.

> In the case of the “okay” gesture, the hoax was so successful the symbol became a popular trolling tactic on the part of right-leaning individuals, who would often post photos to social media of themselves posing while making the “okay” gesture.

> Ironically, some white supremacists themselves soon also participated in such trolling tactics, lending an actual credence to those who labeled the trolling gesture as racist in nature. By 2019, at least some white supremacists seem to have abandoned the ironic or satiric intent behind the original trolling campaign and used the symbol as a sincere expression of white supremacy, such as when Australian white supremacist Brenton Tarrant flashed the symbol during a March 2019 courtroom appearance soon after his arrest for allegedly murdering 50 people in a shooting spree at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.

> The overwhelming usage of the “okay” hand gesture today is still its traditional purpose as a gesture signifying assent or approval. As a result, someone who uses the symbol cannot be assumed to be using the symbol in either a trolling or, especially, white supremacist context unless other contextual evidence exists to support the contention. Since 2017, many people have been falsely accused of being racist or white supremacist for using the “okay” gesture in its traditional and innocuous sense.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#459

Post by kleer001 »

john_moscow wrote: post #297

I think, the social mechanics of this process is very simple. Ability to tell others what to do is called power. Some people are more power-hungry than others, so they seek ways to assert themselves over others. That's a perfectly normal human thing to do. What matters is the way you would achieve power in a society. Getting power through building up your name as a notable researcher or author is one thing. Playing f…

> Entire fucking history of USSR is littered with different power-hungry people using noble goals to chop their competitors' heads off.

Which is where I'm pretty sure the memetic tools came from to capture and wield this power over people. Where exactly? Marxism. Not it in and of its self, but along with the French Post structuralists a universal solvent of philosophy has been weaponized and let loose (and encouraged to grow) in North America... and sadly seeded to the rest of the world.

To me this looks like the end game of a small but clever team of cold war era Soviets. 1970's USA was in no way prepared to fight an idea war.

Though the country that launched it is no more, the fall out will, I fear, kill us all. How? These power game playing people will continue to ascend until they get to the top. Then, there, they will implement absurdist anti-sense anti-science policy. When? Two more generations tops. Let's say 2060, that's a nice round number, and we'll see wide spread famine and a new kind of gulag in North America.

But that's worst case scenario. Maybe it'll all fade away? I hope so. Previous washes of political correctness have come and gone. And, like I love to tell myself, from Obama's lips 'Reality has a way of asserting itself'. And these bizarre, predictable power games are tethered from reality.

Re: Dr. Seuss books deemed offensive will be delisted from eBay

#460

Post by kube-system »

major505 wrote: post #96

I don't know any culture that banned books independent of their content that people didn't regret in the future. A few months ago I was reading about schools banning the book "To Kill a Mockingbird" because it contains basically the "n" word. I'm not american, and and havent read that book. I watched the movie, through, and it seemed to me to be a very anti racism message. I think instead of banning, schools should w…

There are also places in the US where schools require that book to be read.
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