Why is the Godwin's Law corollary considered valid in the first place?

Great Debates
1

For reference: Godwin's law - Wikipedia

As far as I can tell, the original Godwin’s Law merely states that the longer a discussion thread goes on, the closer the probability of comparisons to Hitler and Nazis being employed comes to 1. No argument there; for me it’s self-evident. Much like the “infinite monkeys typing for infinite time” scenario.

But there is a corollary to this which seems to be accepted on this and many other boards, which is that the first debater to bring up the comparison to Hitler and Nazis automatically “loses” the argument.

Aside from the very questionable idea that anyone can “win” an Internet debate, the corollary seems to be anti-truth and anti-free speech. For example, aren’t there many situations, people or events which can legitimately be compared to Hitler and the Nazis?

Imagine, for instance, a hypothetical American administration (not Bush, not Obama) which came to power through undemocratic means – say, succession or appointment rather than popular election. This Administration scapegoats a certain segment of the population, certain partisans of the Administration have been caught using the “big lie” technique, the Administration turns the economy over to a business council to run, the rank-and-file supporters of the Administration are known for being physically aggressive to the opposition, and the Administration uses a catastrophic act of sabotage to justify “emergency” legislation which erodes or nullifies many civil liberties. However, there have not been any mass roundups or executions yet – even Nazi Germany took a few years to get around to that. Now, is there some aspect of Nazi Germany that I’m missing here? Is there any reason this hypothetical Administration can’t be compared to early Nazism?

[*Hypothetical!*Not Bush, not Obama! I got seriously disgusted with certain hard-left acquaintances of mine who insisted, “There is no Constitution! We’re living in a Fascist state! GWB is going to cancel the elections and be President forever!!!” Clearly, these Chicken Littles were wrong, as evidenced by the fact that they were even saying those things to me in the first place.]

Back to my point. If I bring up a legitimate comparison between Hitler/Nazism and current events, why do I have to automatically “lose” the thread??? I think the Godwin corollary is just bunk.

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People who think it’s about winning and losing threads don’t understand it in the first place, so there’s no validity to their version. It’s just a remark about a common internet cliche, not a rule about arguments. There are plenty of historical situations that can be likened to Nazi Germany, but it’s true that the comparison is overused.

3

There’s no problem at all if you’re making a reasonable comparison; however, Hitler and the Nazis in general are viewed as archetypes of evil, and thus often invoked to associate an opponents standpoint with ‘evil’ by somehow attributing a similar stance to supporters of Nazism (which is known as a reductio ad Hitlerum). That’s a proper formal fallacy, and in the popular view, invocations of Hitler are more likely to be fallacious than to be legitimate, resulting in the gloss that ‘mentioning Hitler loses the thread’.

4

The reason people say the guy who brings up the Nazis is the loser is because that Nazi comparison is 97.8% likely to be a stupid comparison.

“They’re just like the Nazis” is simply an ad hominem attack in most cases. Bringing up Nazis doesn’t usually clarify the debate, it muddies it and sidetracks it. And often that’s the point, which is why people tend to view it as a loser argument.

Given the thousands of years of human history, and the millions of awful things that have happened during those millennia, aren’t there other things that more closely parallel the issue under discussion? Why not bring up Napoleon, or Julius Caesar, or the Russian Revolution, or the Peloponnesian War, or Oliver Cromwell instead? Why is it that so many situations are more like Nazism than they are like the 30 years war? Nazism is just lazy.

5

Plus, the entirety of Godwin’s law is intended as, y’know, a bit of a joke. It’s meant to be "“funny but true”.

6

Yeah, and you know who else thought comparison to the Nazis was a valid debate technique? Hitler, that’s who. You’re just as bad as they were!

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I think the idea is that as a debate goes on (and probably gets more heated) each side in the debate tries to “out-do” the other until someone pulls out the Nazi trump card. The understanding is that if one needs to pull out the Nazis to “win” a debate then their argument skills (or their opinion) is weak.

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You know who else did ? The Jews. Right until Hitler KILLED THEM !

9

I think you’re taking this Godwin’s Law thing way too seriously. It’s just a joke, dude, but like all good jokes it has some truth to it. Usually when someone starts playing their Nazi/Hitler cards, it’s because that’s all they’ve got left. Thus any substantive debate is over and they “lose”.

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Because the fact is that most of the time when someone brings the Nazis into a “debate,” they think it’s an automatic win because how can you possibly argue about the Nazis? Thus exposing themselves as an idiot. And thereby signalling that in all likelihood, being an idiot, they will inevitably “lose” the argument.

11

I don’t think the accuracy or stupidy of the actual comparisons to hitler or nazis is the most relevent issue when it comes to godwin. While it’s true godwins law is really about the likelyhood of nazi comparisons in long threads, many people see much more signifigance in what happens after the inevitable comparison is made. Meaningful discussion almost always ends immediately. This, I believe, is the basis for people’s intuitive extention of godwins law to equate nazi comparisons with ‘losing’.

If a person knows that making a particular comparison will cause meaningful discussion to end, then choosing to make that comparison (even if the comparison is accurate) can be seen as a conscious choice to stop discussing the issue rationaly.

12

I was all set to make this very point until I saw you had already made it. It’s not so much that the comparison is invalid or might not tell us something useful about the situation that is being compared to the Nazis, it’s that when people hear “Hitler” or “Nazis” their brains tend to shut down (not everyone does this, I’m sure, but it’s common enough to almost inevitably cause problems in internet discussions).

Or at least that’s my take on the issue.