Hey, I’m pretty sure I said that 
Trolling does not require a lack of belief. That’s been shown on this board again and again. White supremacist trolls aren’t somehow not trolling because they sincerely believe in white seupremacism.
I agree! So the question is, how do we determine what’s very far outside those bounds?
Yeah, “trolling” is at its core a delight in pissing people off and stirring shit up. If I go to a rightwing messageboard for the sole purpose of crowing that Trump is the worst president in the history of our nation, my sincere belief that it’s true doesn’t stop my action from being trolling.
At the same time, trolling definitely gets overdiagnosed. But deceit is not its core: delight in riling people up is.
Do you really think that supply side economics debates are in danger of being shut down here? I think that’s a great example of an idea that is probably factually incorrect and probably disfavored and on this board, but you could have a great debate about it.
It’s not offensive, and it’s certainly possible to sincerely believe that it works. I feel like you’re arguing against yourself.
Hey, OP, do you think supply side economics is a viewpoint that will eventually be banned?
I’m not your toy who needs to prove it’s worth as a human.
I am aware of at least one.
Starving Artist was banned for expressing a controversial view, i.e. that contemporary society magnifies the issue of sexual harassment out of proportion.
This was the final straw.
And here’s the post announcing the ban.
SA was far more polite and civil than (at least) 90% of the people he interacted with, and was explicitly banned because his views themselves were judged to be inherently offensive.
There may have been others, but this is one that I recall offhand.
Because I don’t want to be a member of a community that condones hate speech, no matter how polite.
The question wasn’t whether we should (effectively) ban certain speech but whether we tend to. Or at least that’s how I took it.
I don’t think we need (or should) build a list of verboten topics.
This right here. The idea that there’s nothing wrong with denying someone’s basic humanity, because they can just refute the argument, is a pretty shoddy reading of human nature. If that were true, presumably there’d also be nothing wrong with calling for the torture of a specific poster, because there, too, it’d be possible to refute the arguments in favor of said torture.
Your reasoning comes from a position of unexamined privilege, and you fail to recognize that debate can be stifled not only by excluding topics, but also by excluding people from the conversation.
Including or excluding topics.
The default starting point for productive debate is that we can talk about anything, and that the best response to bad ideas is to debunk them with reasoned argument. The best response to bad ideas is good ideas, of course.
But you just stop here.
Including or excluding people.
The most productive and informative debates will take place when a community is inclusive of diversity in people. And by inclusive, I don’t mean made to feel comfortable about our ideas or opinions - quite the reverse, better that we are made to feel uncomfortable about our beliefs, better that we be challenged to justify those beliefs in debate. By inclusive, I mean that we all feel comfortable that we are welcome as people, treated with respect and dignity. [And, as an aside, I’ll note that some people of the left are sloppy with making this distinction clear in the notion of a what a “safe space” should mean. Safe for people, not safe for ideas.]
So the problem that you’re ignoring is where inclusivity of topics and inclusivity of people come into direct opposition. If a thread debating whether black people are subhuman pops up at the top of the “most recent” search 20 times a day, you can’t just dismissively tell black people to ignore the thread, to ignore the fact that this issue is being actively debated in this community, as though it won’t have any impact on how they feel as members of the community. Ultimately, they may just feel so uncomfortable that they simply leave, and their views are excluded from the debate on all issues.
There’s no bright line or absolute standard here. To some degree there’s a benefit in debating and challenging bad ideas. But I think any topic where the fundamental premise of one side of the debate is dehumanizing should come under the strictest scrutiny.
Nice try.
SA was banned for being the leading member of the SDMB He-Man Women Haters Club (i.e.: rampant misogyny).
He’d been thinning his own ice pretty aggressively before then.
One additional difficulty in making a bright line is that as a practical matter whether or not something meets the standard is frequently itself based on the assessments of opponents.
It’s not common for people to say things like “blacks are subhumans”. What’s far more common is for people to say other things, which their opponents argue amount to effectively saying “blacks are subhumans” (or are “dog whistles” for such positions) and argue for their banning on that basis, even though the holders of those positions never explicitly express the offensive sentiments and may indeed vigorously deny holding such views.
Sorry guys, it’s been a busy morning. Thanks for all the responses. I’ll get to them here:
No, it was a different thread, one I can’t find, but thanks for this cite, I had not seen this before.
Well, I’ll give it a shot. If I’m not mistaken, you’re a man, from your posts (like most Dopers are.) Live Science reports that women now have higher average IQ than men. (I’m not trying to open up a gender debate in ATMB, just saying that it can be politely done.)
I don’t think this would be banned, because supply-side economics isn’t an issue that most people take personally or have any visceral response to. When it comes to more sensitive topics, though, there are a significant number of other views that I think could be banned under the mantra of *“We cannot tolerate intolerance” *or *“We cannot debate or talk if you are oppressing my humanity and denying my right to exist” *(a paraphrase of an oft-quoted quote) or “Hate speech should not be permitted.”
My point isn’t that hate speech is good - it obviously isn’t - my point is that things like “hate speech,” “oppression,” “denying my right to exist” often stretch wider and wider in scope until they are defined as “whatever I don’t want to hear.” You say there are only two genders? Denying my humanity. You say there is a correlation between race and academic attainment? Hate speech. etc. etc.
Explicitly a slippery slope argument. Are you therefore arguing that all hate speech should be permitted?
If not, all you’re stating is the obvious point that there’s never a bright line, it’s always going to be judgment call about what should be excluded as hate speech. It’s always going be a question of the probative value of allowing a bigot to advocate his bad ideas and countering them with good ideas, vs the fact that merely hosting such a debate within this community contributes to making this forum a hostile environment to the targets of that bigotry.
You should take up the supply side thing with UltraVires, since he thinks that’s at risk.
The fact is there are more than two genders, so denying that is actually denying the right to exist for people on this very message board who are not cis-male or cis-female.
As for your other example, it’s a fact that there’s a correlation between race and academic attainment in the US. You could start a thread on that subject right now and we could debate whether it’s higher poverty rates, systemic racism, or some other factor that’s causing it. What would be out of bounds, in my non-moderator opinion, would be using scientific racism to try and show that blacks, for example, are genetically inferior, since that has been roundly debunked already. So, sure, start a thread on that – I’ll argue that it’s racism and you can argue that it’s poverty and we’ll gather our cites. But, if you’re going to argue that Asians are genetically superior than Mediterranean people, I’m not going to engage.
This.
Fuck this shit where debating someone’s equality/humanity is “polite” so long as you don’t use the word “nigger”. This is inherently uncivil.This board is way less tolerant with discussions whether gay people are equal. Having a mod for whom this is not theoretical really helps to moderate that crap. The mods don’t want to acknowledge that topics like these clearly show to minorities and women that not only are they not equal here but they aren’t welcome and they’ll never be viewed as equal.
But it’s a whole lot easier to allow this “discussion” when you don’t belong to those groups. And that starts with allowing “scientific racism” as if it’s anything other than good ol’ racism but dressed up. There sure are a lot of white people for whom the desire to be superior to someone else is real important tho.
But the problem lies with the concrete, not the abstract. One can say “Do not dehumanize anyone here” and that’s a fine-sounding, general concept - but in practical terms, how is it to be enforced?
Take same-sex marriage, for instance. Although one may argue that that ship officially set sail in 2015 when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of SSM nationwide, there are still a great many Americans who oppose same-sex marriage, just like how Roe v Wade didn’t put an end to the pro-life movement. If a Doper argues that same-sex marriage should not be legal, then is he/she “dehumanizing” gay and lesbian people? Many would argue, yes, this is dehumanizing.
Then should the Straight Dope take disciplinary action against any Doper who argues against same-sex marriage? That would be the logical course of action to take.
Hey dude, FYI you’re not fooling anyone just in case you weren’t sure.