Here's the thing about the bully-bully callout.
Witness sees Dude bullying Guy. Fella comes over and makes Dude stop bullying Guy. "Hey Fella! That's bullying!" cries Witness. But where was that same outrage while Dude was bullying Guy? Why intervene during the second one, but not the first one? The second guy is absolutely wrong and should stop immediately, but you're supposed to negotiate with the first one, and patiently wait (while he continues to bully) till he sees the wrongness of his ways on his own? Why is it that only Dude (the one actual bully) gets direct virtuous action taken on their behalf? Why does Fella get treated like a violent fascist oppressor, yet Dude gets treated like a poor lost and confused soul? Why call out the one, but not the other? Why call out THAT one, but not the other?
"Oh, uh, it's cos it makes the other person a hypocrite! They say bullying is bad, but they're doing it too! Hypocrisy!" While technically correct in the most literal sense, at that point you're being more concerned with one person's consistency of ideology than the actual substance of the matter. You're no longer talking about bullying, just the fact that someone is a hypocrite REGARDING bullying, but apparently not actually opposed to the actual bullying itself.
"Well, you shouldn't just butt into other people's business!" But Witness *did* butt in when Witness decided to rally against Fella. If Witness believes people should stay out of things, Witness should have stayed out of it too, regardless of what happened. Someone else butting in on Dude and Guy was none of Witness's business.
While honey may be better than vinegar when it comes to catching FLIES, the same recipe does not work when it comes to dealing with *trolls*.
As far as "hate speech" goes, there's no shortage of those who think it just means "anything that anyone finds offensive". "Godwin's Law" is convenient to invoke, but only holds water if you conveniently assume that anyone who invokes words like "racist" or "nazi" must still be like 8 years old and simply hurls whatever worst word they know - which is part of the point, to inherently discredit those who use the word simply for using it - Godwin's law tries to make it seem like any use of the words is by childish individuals who use it disingenuously, and flatly denies by proxy any possibility that the recipient of the title might actually deserve it.
Words have power, but words alone can't silence someone. Only actions can do that. If someone were to genuinely just sit there and repeat "you're a racist" over and over, and nothing else, they may not be listening to you, but you're still not being SILENCED. You're just not being LISTENED to. Back to Godwin's Law, since it already implies juvenile behavior on the part of the accuser, it's not hard for the accused to conjure the fantasy of a mob of people blindly joining the chant, "RA-CIST! RA-CIST!" until the accused is violently run out of town, never even given a chance to defend themselves, life in ruins. Everyone totally starts clapping. Slowly, of course.
Despite claims to the contrary, people do usually explain WHY they used the term "racist" or "nazi", it's just that the accused either ignores it entirely, or the defense against the accusation consists of "no i"m not!" and then proceeds to talk about anything else besides the behavior that was mentioned as evidence. It's like casual racism bingo. "should have complied..., don't break the law..., I don't FEEL privileged..., no on one alive has ever owned a slave / been a slave..., some of my best friends are / i'm friends with several..., bUt WhAt AbOuT bLaCk On BlAcK vIoLeNcE!! !"
What people think racism looks like: "Gee, how can I be mean to people who are different than me..."
What racism actually looks like:
People (including trump) make jokes that either imply or directly state stereotypes such as black people are lazy thugs, and mexicans will deal you drugs, poles are stupid, italians greasy, the french surrender all too easy, jamaicans only smoke their pot, and indians rip you off alot, Africa is just huts and sticks, the Japanese have tiny... cars...
All of which are stereotypes, and wrong to use as such. If your sense of humor requires you to say things of that nature in order to generate laughter, I daresay that "comedy" is not the actual objective of the behavior. "But YOU just said them too!" No, I listed some common stereotypes that have been around for at lest as long as I've been alive, under the explicit context that "this is a list of stereotypes that are commonly tossed around, stereotyping is wrong." Just because some people fit a stereotype doesn't mean they all do, or that it's ok to apply it as desired.
And society says it should be ok cos it's just a joke, and anyone who is bothered by these jokes "has no sense of humor", or "takes things too seriously", "triggered", or other such dismissive language.
But "race" jokes and stereotypes about white people are more like, they sure like their mayonnaise, and they can listen to tom jones for days, they're easier to spot at night, and why are they so freaken white, what's up with them and eating kale, how can you tell if they go pale?
Problem is, some people believe stereotypes. They might argue that "stereotypes wouldn't exist if there weren't some truth to them!" failing to realize that most stereotypes exist solely to devalue others, and a lie works better when there's a small shred of truth to it. That's why they "kinda" fit. To get you over the hump of skepticism into the realm of belief. That's why facebook horoscopes are vague AF, universally flattering, and apply to like 9 different signs. Something in there somewhere is bound to sound plausible, which then makes the rest easier to swallow. People will usually go for an easy lie over an ugly truth.
"white people are pale" is not going to do harm to white people if everyone starts believing it. "White people like mayonnaise" isn't going to do much harm is people start believing it. "Black people are lazy" can do a lot of harm if people were to believe it blindly. If you read that and thought to yourself "but some of them are tho...", congratulations, you're slightly racist. Just as society intended.
And heaven forbid you make a joke about how white people can be racist, you'd think someone just ate a live human baby on stage. Gasp and shock! I see non-american comedians joke about american's long standing relationship with slavery, racism, and genocide - but americans, they'd really rather just avoid the whole subject. Of course, that's the *real* reason calling someone a racist "shuts down a conversation" - the person doesn't want to have to confront the possibility that the accuser might actually be right. I know I've caught myself doing racist crap over the years. I still catch myself sometimes.
In dealing with hate speech, part of the problem is, every time you ban one term or symbol, they just switch to another, or co-opt already popular icons that aren't so easy to get rid of. Using popularized imagery also gives them the ability to plead ignorance regarding the nature of the symbolism. Oh my, that's a swastika?! I had no idea! I thought it was just the japanse symbol "Manji"! I wear it for good luck! Back in they day they used to use secret sayings or expressions so a klan member could identify another one covertly without having to go "Hey are you a klan member? Why, I sure am!" where everyone can hear them. If the other person doesn't get it, they can then just play it off as nothing. Similarly, they recently found police disguised as protesters, using colored armbands to identify eachother, causing and inciting destruction. In a really wild coincidence, once it became publicly know that this was happening, the level of destruction being caused magically reduced drastically.
So yes, it is really hard to nail down what is or isn't hate speech. That's intentional, to make it harder to stop it. As long as people can keep beating the drum of "all opinions are exactly equal", they can avoid having to talk about it by simply shrugging and saying "we don't even know what hate speech is, and it probably doesn't even exist." Rattling on about how "if we let this keep happening, it could lead to fascist thought control!", which is a scare tactic, a slippery slope argument, and relies solidly on the ideas that all opinions are exactly equal, all opinions are harmless, hate speech is simply words people don't like to hear, and anyone who talks about it must be a fascist trying to police ideas. And THAT part, along with a flat "no i'm not", and a refusal to further participate, is what *actually* shuts conversations down. You haven't been silenced. You just no longer enjoy participating. It's the debate equivalent of "I don't want to play this game anymore..."
26 Jun 2020, 6:07 am
