I can't remember where I heard this, but someone once said that defending a position by citing free speech is sort of the ultimate concession; you're saying that the most compelling thing you can say for your position is that it's not literally illegal to express.
I totally agree, it's like calling your opponent bot, voids a lot of what you have to say
it's like calling your opponent bot, voids a lot of what you have to say
That's not quite the same. When calling someone a bot, or nazi, or any other group, you are more explicitly saying " I see zero value in arguing with you and expect that you will only be arguing in bad faith, so I am not going to humor you", and also serves as an at least attempted black mark.
It's overall just a tactic to end an argument sucinctly, by trying to say "this argument has run its course, I am cutting it off here"
Every group does it. communists call people libs or nazis, leftists call people tankies or nazis or zionists, liberals call people hippies, nazis, commies, anarchists, etc... and conservatives call people by every word in the book.
Exactly. I’ve often said you’re free to speak, but you’re also free to suffer the consequences of doing so. We don’t have to silently suffer the bullshit coming from everyone else’s mouths.
And you're not necessarily free to speak, depending on what you're saying and where you're saying it. As the comic says, "free speech" refers to consequences from the government, not anyone else.
Reading that post, the OP linked an unsourced Imgur album with blatant lies like "10,000 people were incinerated and hosed down drains" spliced between actual photos of the protest is fucking wild. The 10,000 figure was reported once then immediately retracted, the fact that OP was posting blatant propaganda as fact was conveniently left out as "tankie censorship".
Let's put that into perspective: US intelligence officially puts the number below 900. The OP was saying it's over 10,000. It's an order of magnitude above the 3 letter agencies of the US.
Have you read through the thread? Tons of examples of admin abuse. I fully expect to cop another ban for this comment thread soon.
Also, I would disagree with calling defederation 'censorship'. Nobody was prevented from speaking up. Refusal to engage with somebody you disagree with is not censorship.
It must be cathartic to make cartoons about an argument you want to have where the other person is silenced by your point. Most of the time, the guy on the left in this cartoon would continue to argue and reject everything you say.
As evidence, watch a video of anyone arguing with MTG.
If it were a true conversation then it would have had to have been a 6 square comic strip instead and the last two squares would have been him not shutting up and a thought bubble by the intelligent one thinking he should have just decked the idiot instead of trying to reason with him.
I know lol. The point was that the mods here (maybe including OP?) here don’t seem overly concerned about freedom of speech in general, not just in the specific case in the comic (which I do agree is not really a speech issue). So this comic is a bit of a straw man in that larger context.
i'll never take away your freedom of speech, bigoted guy, i love dunking on idiots
you are just frustrated that you can't say it without any pushback, because your parents didn't love you enough to raise you and teach you emotional regulation (or anything else worthwhile)
I respect the sentiment, but I recently read "Exiting the Vampire Castle" by Mark Fisher and he makes some good points for why callout culture is, shall we say, "less than productive" in some situations.
Really? Are you saying this in reference to the essay of his that starts with:
‘Left-wing’ Twitter can often be a miserable, dispiriting zone. Earlier this year, there were some high-profile twitterstorms, in which particular left-identifying figures were ‘called out’ and condemned. What these figures had said was sometimes objectionable; but nevertheless, the way in which they were personally vilified and hounded left a horrible residue: the stench of bad conscience and witch-hunting moralism.
Because if you are, then I guess you didn't read the article, huh?