Funny thing is, the leftists under discussion here usually do NOT trust in any way, shape, or form the current power structure of police, courts, or government. I guess it’s a nothing left to lose thing, seeing has how many also believe that the American government and police already round up and jail people purely for political belief reasons.
Yeah, anyone saying they have nothing left to lose in the USA who isn’t already in prison or dying on the street could use a hefty dose of perspective. This was literally Trump’s pitch to black America - “What do you have to lose?” - and it turns out, the answer is “quite a bit”. These people are really dumb, and we need to find some way to disabuse them of their notions before they force us all to find out just how much we have left to lose. 
I agree that advocating violence (obviously including genocide most of all) crosses a line. But were the organizers of this rally guilty of that? What individuals at the rally said once it occurred is beside the point. The ACLU went to court to defend the right of the organizers to hold the rally in the first place, so the only germane point is what *they *have advocated. Then if people show up and have signs or chants advocating violence, these same organizers would I think need to disavow those calls for violence before being granted a permit the next time. But they can’t be held accountable for what every individual at their rallies says or does, even if they are not sanctioning it. (Think how fast this could torpedo groups like BLM.)
Did I say I thought anti-racism was winning, in America?
I have thought closely about it. I’ve also related to my real-life experiences, which is why I know that slippery slope arguments are bunk - I have actual experience of both oppresive regimes where the government really censors expression (Saudi, Apartheid SA) and ones where only hate speech is constrained (Europe, modernSA) and the two are qualitatively vastly different.
Also, if absolute free speech is so much better at protecting minorities over places with hate speech laws, the situation for minorities in America would be vastly better than in Europe, but it really isn’t.
Go fuck a cactus. I’ve actually lived under real government censorship, can you say the same, shitstain?
That’s not much of an argument. Are you really suggesting that the only variable in a country as large as the US or a group of nations as large as the EU with regards to minority life is speech laws? Lol. It’s such a silly strawman that it’s not even worth responding to.
And now that this thread is in the pit, for no good reason I may add, look at who the first person to seriously degrade the conversation is. Perhaps you are correct. Perhaps free speech is too much for the average person.
Yeah, you’ve said the opposite. And as I pointed out at length, you’re just wrong. Your exceedingly facile evidence does not really support your claim once you dig into it. By virtually any metric, bona fide white supremacism just isn’t very popular any more, and it’s been gradually shrinking and getting smaller since the 60s. To the degree it’s possible to win, anti-racism has been winning. We haven’t gotten rid of the last of the hardline racists, and there may in fact have been some step backwards in the past 10 years, but not far, and not by much. Again, I challenge - Breitbart is one of the most pro-racist mainstream outlets here. What would happen if they came out and said, “We support white supremacy”? Would they keep their advertisers? Would they keep their audience? Would they even keep their staff? We’re winning this fight. Let’s not kneecap ourselves.
No, where did I say anything about only variable? I’m just saying the supposed superiority of absolute free speech isn’t reflected in the results obtained.
It had been in the Pit for a while before I posted anything pejorative. And that would be after Shodan’s piss-poor attempt at satire and Clothy characterising people as “twits”, so yeah, go ride a fucking train on the same cactus BPC is dry-humping.
Well, you went on at length, that’s true at any rate. Not so much on that last bit, though…
Huh, an article from 2016? How utterly fucking irrelevant to 2017, when misogynist racists run your fucking government…
Riiight, because entire societies change on a dime, in the span of one year. Mmmmkay then.
That’s kind of my point, actually. A society where anti-racism has racism on the ropes doesn’t elect a Trump or let Nazis beat black people up unpunished.
You wouldn’t think so, would you? But I do think there’s a bit of a “last gasp” backlash tendency of reactionary-attitude people to dig in their heels and start being loud and overt and blatant about their opinions right around the point that their world-view has faded significantly enough that they feel outnumbered and regarded as outdated, but not so significantly that they don’t run into like-minded people with whom they can reminisce resentfully about the “good old days”.
I’d agree it was “last gasp” stuff if it was just a small marginalized group, but with the level of reactionary response, and the amount of power wielded, I’m more inclined to see full-on “counter-revolution” than “last gasp” - especially on women’s rights. The abortion situation is decidedly heading backwards in the US (that’s from 2016 - ironic, I know, except that there’s been steady worsening since then).
Err… That was written after the election, and refers explicitly to the election’s results, as well as long-term societal trends. Not that it matters, because you’re completely ignoring everything about it, so why the fuck am I even bothering. Yes, we elected a shitbag. This happens sometimes. There’s a lot of reasons why Trump shouldn’t have that job, but he does. It doesn’t mean that suddenly, 40 years of progress are deleted in the blink of an eye. It doesn’t mean the country has become more overtly racist. It doesn’t mean that racism has come back into vogue, or that being an open white supremacist won’t get you thrown out of most positions of any import.
Most Trump voters reject that Trump is racist or misogynistic. That makes them stupid, not racist or misogynistic. Again, a similar thought experiment to the one in Breitbart. Let’s say that on Friday, Jeff Session goes on live television and announces his allegiance to the KKK and the doctrine of white supremacy. Do you think he’ll still be part of Trump’s administration on Monday? Do you think more than a tiny fraction of the country will support him? Do you think that even Trump’s base would be happy with that? Remember, among the politically motivated, a veneer of deniability, however thin, goes a long way.
You continue to fail to define your (vague, broad, motte-and-bailey’d, mindkilling) terms, making it quite hard to figure out what the fuck you’re talking about or address your arguments with anything resembling charity. That said, at this point you can either try to actually address my points, or I’m about done trying.
Your first argument is facile and does not consider what actually happened. Trump is not some bona fide white supremacist letting it all hang out. He’s more than a little racist, but someone looking for plausible deniability is going to find it. And because he’s the republican candidate and his opponent is the great satan to republicans, he stands a good chance of winning no matter what.
Your second argument is just wrong. Two of the six men involved in the beating have already been identified and arrested, and the hard part is not “getting the arrest”, it’s “figuring out who they are”. The guy who murdered a counterprotester with a car? Charged with murder.
This is stupid.
But not the very open clearly racist events of 2017…
Arrested =/= punished.
And no, I don’t think stupidity is an excuse for ignoring racism and misogyny. It just makes them stupid racist misogynists.
BPC: Do you believe that there is currently a serious systemic problem with racism in American society (serious enough for some to feel justified in feeling existentially threatened)? If so, do you consider this a different or separate issue/problem than whatever you think of as “white supremacy”?
Note: See sedition laws.
It’s not so stupid, though, when you consider that the Attorney General of the United States has already found himself at the center of controversy when it comes to allegations of racism. This attorney general has already effectively rolled back rights for the transgendered and efforts to confront police brutality, and if that wasn’t enough, we have a president who speaks at rallies and actually encourages the rough treatment of detained suspects – not convicted criminals but suspects. This administration is already making plans to double down on efforts to enforce drug laws more strictly and incarcerate people for longer periods of time, and seems intent on using private prisons to bring it into effect. And I think we know which people are going to be disproportionately impacted by these decisions.
We’re not talking hypotheticals. Speech doesn’t have to reference genocide for it to be dangerous. We live in a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society, and over time, we’ve decided that one of our core principles post-1865 is that all people should be treated equally under the law. Ideas that challenge this assumption are corrosive to the fabric of our society in ways that other forms of offensive speech are not. Hate speech has the power to destabilize, as we’ve already seen in Portland and Charlottesville. What if future rallies end up even deadlier than the events we’ve already observed? Other multi-ethnic societies have found ways to strike a balance between the right to say controversial things and speech that is hostile to a group of people. What’s holding us back is our belief in the sanctity of a document written in 1787 by white slave-owning men living in a completely different world.
No, actually, it’s not. It’s very concrete evidence that the speech on question is not pure expression but rather an act of intimidation and a threat of imminent violence.
The ACLU could make a very principled stand by saying that if you want us to defend you, your public speech must be unaccompanied by weapons or other physically threatening implements.
You’re hopeless. Moving on to literally anyone else…