That first post Bob linked is a great example of what Ibram X. Kendi would call the fallacy that “assimilationist” racism is better than “segregationist” racism. Racists have been arguing for centuries over whether minorities are inherently inferior or only culturally inferior and capable of becoming white-ish with the appropriate education. But things haven’t historically gotten any better for minorities when white public opinion has shifted from one position to the other, and somehow the racists who think minorities are capable of “improvement” never, ever declare that such improvement has in fact occurred and we can take our foot off their necks now. Rather, they say “it’s taking longer than we thought”…and guess who they blame for that?
I think that’s circular logic; nobody who isn’t already a Nazi sympathizer would reach that conclusion. It’s like finding out that the Andromeda Galaxy is a few light-years closer to us than we thought; interesting if you’re into astronomy, but it doesn’t make any real difference to your thinking; the bottom line is still “it’s very, very far away, and anyone who suggests it’s possible for us to travel there is nuts”. If the information he presented is accurate, the Nazis are still very, very evil, and anyone who suggests otherwise is still nuts.
It amounted to saying that they weren’t being sterilized because they were Jews, and was therefore arguing that the sterilization had nothing to do with antisemitism.
And if the information’s wrong, then it’s not giving an accurate picture of historical facts, and would not be intrinsically valuable even in a different context.
ETA:
Not everyone is able to consider the Nazis as an abstract, mildly interesting, astronomical issue that doesn’t affect anybody. And for good reason.
I don’t think it’s fair to say he was arguing that sterilization had nothing to do with antisemitism. But even if we say he was, so what? Would we then conclude that the sterilization policy wasn’t evil? Or that the Nazis weren’t antisemitic? Unless we were already looking for reasons to reach that conclusion, of course we wouldn’t.
And although I don’t like to play the identity card, I’m a Jewish socialist with a Black child. Nazis are not an abstract issue for me. I hate the fuckers with all of my heart, and learning new historical details about the Holocaust is never going to change that.
But there are people looking for reasons to reach that conclusion; and they’re trying – and, judging by the news, in some cases succeeding – to attract additional people whose opinions about Nazis can indeed be made favorable.
I’m not saying Martin Hyde is one of them. I’m saying that he’s providing, or repeating, arguments such people can use; and that the arguments don’t become innocuous just because there are many who they won’t work on, even if the person repeating them is one of the ones they don’t work on.
And I think to some extent this argument has worked on him, not to make him favor Nazis, but in that his wider argument seemed to be that he thought forced sterilizations, including of Native Americans/First Nations people and of Black people, had nothing to do with racism: and that therefore he was claiming that those who were committing and those who were recommending such actions had no racist motives for doing so.
Upthread he said:
For example the white community in Americas has lot to answer for–for example we have benefited from centuries of de jure racial preference in the laws and economy, after that was reformed, we continued to benefit from de facto racial preferences in many of the structures of society (i.e. systemic racism.) Pointing out this burden of the white community is not racist against whites.
Pointing out that people of European ancestry have a moral burden towards Native Americans is not racism. Pointing out that the Japanese have a moral burden over their treatment of other peoples of East Asia in the early 20th century is not racist against the Japanese.
Clearly he is not trying to deny that white supremacy has been a huge part of American history and that structural racism continues to afflict us today. That alone puts him head and shoulders above 99% of the SDMB’s “conservatives”.
I don’t think he made the argument you’re saying he made. He might have said that some portion of the people carrying out these policies sincerely believed that they were working in the best interest of the Natives. But since they didn’t think that THEIR children would be best served by being forcibly removed from their families, that sincere belief would still be incredibly racist.
For what it’s worth, I had some minor quibbles with him about the sterilization of Jews and he was very reasonable about discussing them. I didn’t see him trying to excuse Nazis or diminish the Holocaust, he just seemed genuinely interested in the history and he was providing good information about it. (At least that was what I saw in my interactions, I might have missed something.)
And with that I think I’m bowing out of this thread. I’ve spent way more time and energy sticking up for MH than he deserves already.
I’d agree with this for the most part.
The problem comes if/when anybody picked even a slight nit or offered the least criticism and then he’d be liable to go totally off the rails.
And when somebody acts like a jerk and makes excuses for non-Nazi related genocide, even if he isn’t personally a Nazi or even a Nazi-apologist, it does not make one apt to forgive easily.
Thank you for your service to the board. Also a belated welcome from a long-time though sporatic poster.
Going further than Thing.Fish, I perceive a bright line between Martin Hyde on the one hand and Strmfrnt/QAnon/Paleoconservatism on the the other. I say his thinking generally deserves expression -because it is not especially unusual in the Americas - as well as pushback on this message board. His (mis)perceptions of the scope of genocide are I daresay mainstream and indeed more informed than average. I perceive that the vitriol sent his way is counterproductive, though mockery might be in order.
As an aside, for those interested in a contemporary account of Native Canadians and the trauma they experienced within the residential school system, I’d recommend the graphic novel by Joe Sacco: Paying the Land. (I’ve gotten about half way through it.)
I tried to engage with him without vitriol; but vitriol from him was what I got for my pains.
When the guy to the left you is throwing tomatoes, and the guy to the right of you is throwing bricks, it’s incumbent upon you to acknowledge the general environment if you want to be heard by the target. Or not, if you don’t care. (Also, you might provide an example, if you wish. I don’t consider, “The irony, it burns,” to be a leading example of de-escalation. Then again, I noted elsewhere that I didn’t consider either side of this thread to be covered in glory - I’ll state the obvious (and undermine my advice) and concede that ML was assuredly a jackass here. No worries I suppose: he says he’s muted this thread, not a bad thing for his sanity I say.)
IIRC that came after a significant stretch of my getting snarled at both inside and outside the Pit, though more drastically in the Pit.
I need to do something else for a while, but will try to hunt through both threads for some examples.
Fair enough. Don’t spend too much time on this though - I agree that ML can be testy.
That’s twice, now.
Who exactly is being referred to as ML?
Martin Lied?
It’d be a sophomoric attempt at humor, but that’s what I thought of.
Typo, or rather a thinko. I meant to use Martin Hyde’s initials which are of course MH. Apologies for the confusion. ML doesn’t stand for anything.
Taking a few minutes to look back on the threads, while I still think that I was trying to raise specific points and in at least some cases getting them not answered, but written off, I do see that I was somewhat testy myself.
Much of the reason for that is scattered through the threads, often not in my posts but in others’; which I suppose goes if anything to back your point.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I think “the irony, it burns” or “here we go again” are equivalent to
but I’ll grant I did call one of his arguments “absurd”.
Martin was certainly arguing with a disproportionate intensity, though he was also facing outsized accusations (not from you as far as I can tell). More interesting was his flaming you in MPSIMS, indicating a lack of self discipline that does not bode well for his continued posting at this message board.
All that said, I’ll reiterate that his underlying arguments are not exceptionally right wing; in fact they are rather ordinary (and thinly sourced, though well substantiated). I don’t have a problem with, “The irony it burns” in the pit - though it probably wasn’t best practice. But MH received far more intense vitreol here, which I thought was disproportionate.
(In other news, I had to stop myself from typing the wrong initials again. I honestly don’t know what my problem is.)
In the pit, Martin posts like someone with a short-guy complex, dudes who believe they need to show themselves to be meaner than others, if they don’t want to be picked on. This isn’t intended as psychoanalysis: it’s an analogy/comparison/simile.
It was a bit borderline, as he said that first “you” was a general “you” aimed at the type of argument and apparently the mods felt the same way. I didn’t report it as I thought that might be the claim; but I did think it was at best borderline for MPSIMS.