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0 pointssomeguydave7y ago0 comments

Oh yeah - the non-American ideal of punching people who disagree with you about foreign policy?

0 comments

    > people who disagree with you about foreign policy

That's what you call them? Well then, who needs police? There's no criminals, just "people who disagree with you over domestic policy" /s

More seriously, the friction here is over which behaviors are beyond the pale. Personally, I would feel uncomfortable describing Nazi sympathizers as holding "different views." It's in the same bucket, for me, as people who torture small animals. That's not just a "different view" to me, it's "beyond the pale."

I would not like to meet someone for whom nothing at all is beyond the pale. Even libertarians will do some hand-waving to support state restrictions on rape, murder, etc. Their hand-waving is not so different from mine regarding free speech.

someguydaveOP7y ago

1. Isn’t viewing someone as “beyond the pale” such that they deserve summary punishment and/or execution dehumanizing? How is that different than the guy who tortured small animals because he views them as objects and not living things?

2. Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves. Consider this video: https://youtu.be/NUqytjlHNIM

uniqueid7y ago

  > Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves.

Somehow I have found myself arguing for violence, which wasn't so much my original intent. I mainly wanted to remind the OP it's an American value to oppose demagogues and authoritarians. The clip I linked is from a film which is one of the best-selling and most critically successful pieces of Americana. My main point isn't that one should go around attacking people, as much as it is that Americans had strong feelings about Nazi sympathizers.

  > Isn’t viewing someone as “beyond the pale” such that they deserve summary punishment and/or execution dehumanizing?

Yes. It's a matter of recursion. The Weimar court that imprisoned Hitler after the Beer Hall Putsch gave him five years. The maximum sentence he was eligible for: life. From what I understand of the history, he charmed the court. If the court had been less tolerant, they would have spared 6 millions Jews, 20 million Russians, and many others.

Everyone on the left quotes Karl Popper these days, but it's worth noting that he only condoned intolerance against the intolerant in cases where it was the last resort. So if there's a movement gaining real popularity that threatens to replace your government with a dictatorship, it's a problem. If it's a few harmless cranks, society can ignore them.

  > How is that different than the guy who tortured small animals because he views them as objects and not living things?

Well, a guy who tortures a bear in the process of preventing it from attacking a campsite... not a big problem. However, I actually was thinking with that example... how much obligation do we have to give a talking stick to a movement that condones torture for fun.

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