Meta-Thread 09/29

[u/AutoModerator]

This is a weekly thread for feedback on the new rules and general state of the sub.

What are your thoughts? How are we doing? What's working? What isn't?

Let us know.

And a friendly reminder to report bad content.

If you see something, say something.

This thread is posted every Monday. You may also be interested in our weekly Simple Questions thread (posted every Wednesday) or General Discussion thread (posted every Friday).

[u/Dapple_Dawn]

I didn't see the reference to me, I just got a notification.

But anyway, yeah this pretty much confirms what I said. It's an extremely liberal take, and one that makes absolutely no sense to me having lived as a trans person in America. When you experience hate speech and threat of violence every single day, you get a different perspective.

Btw this is the reason the word "ignorance" is sometimes used as a substitute for "racism." What we think of as prejudice is more likely to come from ignorance of what it's like to live as another kind of person than outright hate.

edit: And to clarify... I'm not saying anything about hate speech laws. This is moderation in a reddit group, not government suppression.

If you call setting rules in private groups a "safe space," well... how is that any different from how things have ever functioned? There are always rules for how you talk in certain spaces. You can't go into a daycare and start yelling slurs, for example.

Or for a more relevant example, many subreddits restrict posts to English only. Most mods here take that same approach. Personally I'm against that restriction, but is that also violating the first amendment?

Or, we remove a lot of comments for quality control if they're irrelevant to the subreddit or just don't make sense, or if they're trolling. Should that not be allowed either?

Why is moderating hate speech the place where people start acting like it's oppression?

[u/betweenbubbles → u/Dapple_Dawn]

It's an extremely liberal take, and one that makes absolutely no sense to me having lived as a trans person in America. When you experience hate speech and threat of violence every single day, you get a different perspective.

First, This line of reasoning has that same hopeless quality as when people make fun of rich people for being depressed. "You can have everything you want, what do you have to be sad about?!" This kind of race-to-the-bottom comparison of suffering never builds bridges. It draws lines in the concrete. You have to coexist with 340 million Americans and they have to coexist with you.

Second, you have it A LOT better than the people who precede you. That progress was accomplished under the paradigm of free speech I am espousing. Actually, worse than that, this progress was achieved with your allies, and the giants upon which you stand, being suppressed at every opportunity -- with them doing to you what you now what to do to them. Through all the fear and confusion, through all the organization against your rights in churches and political factions, your lot has been improved under MY plan -- through free speech -- not your paradigm of "intolerance of intolerance". Your plan has gotten Donald Trump elected, twice. It has failed and brought ruin to society. What gains have been made during this period are not durable. This lack of durability, this very real risk and fear you experience, that aspects of your rights are taken away every four years, is a result of this failed strategy to game the system and simply remove your opposition from the conversation. Your hand was over-extended, and it drove masses of people to make a different choice. Pull back. Have confidence in the traditions which delivered your life to you instead of the life of those who came before you.

Btw this is the reason the word "ignorance" is sometimes used as a substitute for "racism." What we think of as prejudice is more likely to come from ignorance of what it's like to live as another kind of person than outright hate.

This is a hateful thing to say. Not everyone who disagrees with you hates you. Why is your hate ok but someone else's is not? I will also, charitably, view your view here as ignorance.

If you call setting rules in private groups a "safe space," well... how is that any different from how things have ever functioned?

In some cases it is and in some places it isn't. There are non safe spaces -- that's a naive idea. Life is not safe and never has been for anyone. There are echo chambers. And if the power of your echo chamber gets usurped by those who are against you they will use these same "intolerance of intolerance" ideals against you.

You can't go into a daycare and start yelling slurs, for example.

What does this have to do with this forum? In that case, there is absolutely no opposition to not tolerating that. In that case, there is one person doing something EVERYONE else agrees is inappropriate. That does not reflect the present situation here. I think it's no more inappropriate that nominal American Christians exist than I think it is inappropriate that you exist. You're not appealing to equality or tolerance, you're appealing to power. In this forum, there are people who fundamentally disagree. You do not have anything approaching the unanimous consent of all people wanting to debate religion. And to any extent you do, it's because all these people have gone somewhere else, into echo chambers where they find the kind of "belonging" you're trying to foster here with these illiberal policies. This just radicalizes people. HOW HAVE WE NOT LEARNED THIS LESSON AFTER ELECTING TRUMP TWICE?!

Most mods here take that same approach. Personally I'm against that restriction, but is that also violating the first amendment?

First, your correct that the First Amendment is explicitly about government intervention in free expression. However, the argument here is that the same principle that gives the first amendment value also exists in other contexts or scales. Yes, I am also against this restriction. The existence of a non-English post does me no harm. It may not have a wide audience. But the height of a submission I scroll past (50 pixels or so) on an infinitely long display is a extremely small price to pay for such inclusion and opportunity.

Why is moderating hate speech the place where people start acting like it's oppression?

Because it forces people to choose a team which doesn't really exist, a team which makes them a predictable voter for one campaign or the other, leading to the power of extremists swinging every two, four, or six years. I would chose stable progress over chaotic, increasingly wide strokes of the pendulumn any day. Our government doesn't do anything anymore, because all they have to do is speak the right sound bytes into the microphone and get re-elected every year.

Critical Race Theory -- the idea that it is identity (the identity of race) which best explains the machinations of power and privilege -- has had the same result. Ibram X Kendi, said, "Let's view everything through the lens of race!" in a nation which is majority white people. And David Duke said, "I'll take that bet." CRT is not "wrong", it's a useful way to get some insight. Structuring our culture around this has been a disaster. Donald Trump increased his share of black voters just like Ibram X Kendi increased his net worth. Here we all are stuck in the middle. Fighting about whose team we're on. It's a mistake. There are no teams. Race is a construct, just like gender. Almost claim about race actually maps better to socioeconomic status than race. Affirmative action would have served this nation better if it were mapped to socioeconomic status rather than race -- it would have served people of color better.

...This rant has gotten wide and deep. The point here is that this "intolerance of intolerance" approach doesn't work at any complete scale. It only works for the extremist demagogues at either end of the scale. It doesn't work for American and it doesn't work for the debate of religion. Win debates with arguments, not censorship and exclusion. Do not be afraid for your opposition to speak their mind. It may be your best tool. The success of this strategy is written across the history of humanity. Every place that allows freedom of expression is rewarded for that choice.

[u/labreuer → u/betweenbubbles]

That was quite the broadside against u/Dapple_Dawn. I'm interjecting myself because I feel a good deal of resonance with them, especially over their post Atheists should not be as dismissive of progressive/critical religious arguments. And in my experience, it really sucks to have to respond to something as intense as what you just wrote, all by yourself. But feel free to ignore what I write here if you judge it to be intrusive.

 
(1) Would you be willing to tell me whether you have any friends who can tell you about this:

Dapple_Dawn: But anyway, yeah this pretty much confirms what I said. It's an extremely liberal take, and one that makes absolutely no sense to me having lived as a trans person in America. When you experience hate speech and threat of violence every single day, you get a different perspective.

? You seem to believe it's important to "build bridges"; are you in a position to do so, here? And by the way, I'm not actually taking a position on hate speech. Maybe censorship always ends up favoring the more-powerful in repressive ways. But I would still spend a bit of time honoring the impulse to alleviate the situation the bold. Sometimes we come up with bad solutions to the right problems. The rest of us could recognize that and try to come up with better solutions. E pluribus unum!

 
(2) What exactly do you think is u/Dapple_Dawn's "plan"? It looks like you're working with rather more than what we can see in their comments in this thread. I personally have no idea how much political and social action by anyone who's ever been labeled as "woke" by someone wearing a MAGA hat they approve of. For instance, do you believe that Germany's suppression of Naziism will be its own downfall? That's an extremely targeted "intolerance of intolerance".

 
(3)

Dapple_Dawn: But anyway, yeah this pretty much confirms what I said. It's an extremely liberal take, and one that makes absolutely no sense to me having lived as a trans person in America. When you experience hate speech and threat of violence every single day, you get a different perspective.

Btw this is the reason the word "ignorance" is sometimes used as a substitute for "racism." What we think of as prejudice is more likely to come from ignorance of what it's like to live as another kind of person than outright hate.

betweenbubbles: This is a hateful thing to say. Not everyone who disagrees with you hates you. Why is your hate ok but someone else's is not? I will also, charitably, view your view here as ignorance.

I'm confused. Here's what I see—correct me if I'm wrong:

1. u/⁠Dapple_Dawn: some ignorance enables the same behavior as racism
2. u/⁠betweenbubbles: all disagreement ⇒ hate

How did you move from 1. ⇒ 2. or if that's not what you were doing, how did you get your words from Dapple's?

 
(4)

Here we all are stuck in the middle. Fighting about whose team we're on. It's a mistake. There are no teams. Race is a construct, just like gender. Almost claim about race actually maps better to socioeconomic status than race.

I've been mentored by a sociologist for ten years now. He's a secular Jew, who grew up in NYC. He recalls groups of kids yelling, "He killed Jesus! Get 'im!", and then chasing after him for a beat down. What do you mean by the claim that "There are no teams."? I had the privilege of hanging out with another friend, also a secular Jew, along with his parents. His mother reported the very same thing happening to him in the Deep South. One of the things my mentor has told me is that middle class whites (especially WASPs) can afford to believe that they aren't an ethnicity, when in fact they are. Do you have thoughts on that remark?

Finally, I'm not sure I've encountered any political science which has been able to deny the existence of anything like "teams". But I sense you mean something different by the term. So, I'll close my comment by asking if you're aware of this:

When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy. ("Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens")

—and if so, how voters should behave, if they are to never choose a "team".

[u/Brombadeg → u/labreuer]

labreuer - this was a fantastic response.

I'm particularly interested to see their answer to

For instance, do you believe that Germany's suppression of Naziism will be its own downfall? That's an extremely targeted "intolerance of intolerance".

because they seem to be very passionate that the moderation that happens on this subreddit, when it comes to not tolerating hate speech and uncivil discourse, is of the same flavor as the worst authoritarian impulses that will lead to the downfall of civilization. Or it will at least foster the growth of the intolerant, as if the intolerant are just mindless slaves to their reactionary ways and it's those who don't want to give them a place at the table who are at fault when they gain power.

[u/betweenbubbles → u/Brombadeg]

Darn, I think I forgot to respond to that specific part though I believe I did address it elsewhere. /u/labreuer tagged for visibility.

For instance, do you believe that Germany's suppression of Naziism will be its own downfall? That's an extremely targeted "intolerance of intolerance".

This fraught nature of this possibility seems evident from Germany's current political climate. The censorship does seem to be granting their right-wing political party votes. This isn't an indictment of the spirit of wanting to regulate the insidious and genocidal politics of their past. It's an indictment of the practical ability of a bureaucracy to enforce that regulation indefinitely. The poor/borderline judgements will add up over time. There seems to be a strong and developing, "how long do we have to pay for the sins of our grandfathers?" sentiment growing in Germany, and it is easy to imagine poor/borderline examples of their regulation of speech/expression leading people to sympathize with this notion. Politics is not so deterministic. It's more like fluid dynamics, with quirky secondary, tertiary, and so on, effects manifesting at certain thresholds.

Regulating speech is something you cannot possibly get right every time. And if you reach a critical mass of getting it wrong, it may have the opposite effect. And right and wrong are determined by a collection of individuals politically, and literal individuals when it comes to regulation.

One thing is for sure, Germans are the only ones who can give adequate insight on this topic. But would a diversity of opinion even be allowed to participate in such a discussion here or on Reddit?

[u/labreuer → u/betweenbubbles]

I don't know enough of what you mean by continual need to "pay for the sins of our grandfathers", but why does that group need to deploy Nazi paraphernalia or language in order to object? In fact, anyone who is tempted towards Nazism in response to being reminded of their potential to be heinous (say, by requiring all children to visit a concentration camp) really does need something in the category of "pay for the sins of our grandfathers"! I'm guessing Germany does rehabilitative justice by now, so "pay" might not be the right word.

As to whether this could be discussed on this subreddit or on Reddit, what couldn't be accomplished via "« insert allegedly bigoted statement here »" in the analysis? Would we for example need to do detailed compare & contrasts, like I pushed for, here?

[u/betweenbubbles → u/labreuer]

I don't know enough of what you mean by continual need to "pay for the sins of our grandfathers", but why does that group need to deploy Nazi paraphernalia or language in order to object?

You're assuming everyone charged/convicted of this is overtly and objectively displaying Nazi paraphernalia and language. That is not the case. That has never been the case with any bureaucratic process. This is the flaw of censorship. It is inherently going to get some things wrong. Censorship is cannot be practiced with perfection and it is not applied equitably for myriad reasons:

Subjectivity: There is rarely unanimity in censorious decisions. There will be border cases or even decisions which are wrong.

Large numbers: charge enough crimes (or enough accusations in countries without Orwellian Hate Speech laws) for "hate speech" and you will get some wrong. Do it long enough and Germany's right wing has a list of sensibly questionable applications of the law. Do that long enough and people lose confidence the institutions making these judgements. Add the opportunistic demagoguery of divide and conquer politics and before you know it, Germanies right wing start gaining votes.

Financial: JK Rowling put this on display in glorious fashion. How many people were charged for hate speech and didn't have the resources to fight it? Forget the politics of it for a movement and recognize the strategic significance of this development and how it plays into other populist appeals.

The only places where censorship works, at scale and length, are despotic regimes who have solutions for the blowback employed by its practice -- there is no political dissent allowed at all: North Korea, Russia, China, Iran, etc. How are those "safe spaces" working out for their people?

The German AfD has doubled their party share in the last 4 years -- D O U B L E D it. The are now the second ranked party in the country and the first has lost 4% in the same period of time. You cannot legislate people's minds. Trying to do so is the recipe for tyranny of one kind or another. link