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Members of Texas Republican party free to associate with Nazi sympathizers
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 05 Dec 2023
369 points (97.2% liked)
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Perhaps being a member of a group that committed a series of genocides, was a military enemy of the and US, and is grounded in nothing but conspiacism and pseudoscience that had to be stopped by the combined military force of half the western world should be illegal.
The main downside of protecting Nazism is genocide - what's the upside?
Would you defend the rise of ISIS in the US for the same reasons, and if not, why not?
That all groups are equally protected under the law, whether you like them or not. I'm sure AIPAC would love to designate supporting the liberation of Palestine a hate crime. I'm sure that corporate lobbyists would love to designate unions as a violent and disruptive organizations.
If they are committing concrete acts of violence, no. If they rise as a political body, then yes.
Both ISIS and the Nazis have committed a huge amount of violence, yet you defend them - why?
You don't see the issue with comparing two groups whose objective is genocide with two groups with fairly specific goals oriented around freedom, which have committed sporadic violence serving those ends?
For what it's worth, I place Hamas in the Nazi/ISIS bucket for consistent reasons.
I don't have to support a group's actions to still believe they have the same human rights of freedom of speech and thought that others do. There's a reason that human rights apply to everyone, even prisoners. Even monsters. Stripping away fundamental rights from the "right" people is not a moral stance.
I defend their human rights for the same reason I defend yours.
You drew the line at violence, but defend the Nazis and ISIS - What's the bar for unacceptable violence? More than the 17 million people the Nazis killed, obviously, but where is that line?
I don't know what you want from me man. To say nazis are bad? No shit, that's obvious.
You ask where I draw the line. Between actions and ideas. I can't make this any more clear.
Nazi held a sign at a protest? Shitty, but not illegal.
Nazi hurts someone? Illegal.
I don't think there's any doubt the Nazis are bad - which is why they're a good example. When they've had power, they killed millions - the violence has already happened at an incredible scale, but you continue to defend their existence.
Surely you don't propose atomising response to the individual level - that we only react to individual members of openly genocidal groups after they harm/kill someone, otherwise allowing the unhindered operation and growth of those groups?
Protecting openly genocidal groups' speech is akin to protecting individuals' rights to make death threats (even after they've killed a bunch of people) - the speech itself is harmful, intimidating minorities, and it's a strong indicator of upcoming violence that you can prevent instead of waiting for innocent people to get harassed, attacked, and killed. Conversely, there's zero social utility to the hate speech other than identifying genocidal cunts that are probably deserving of some violence, for the betterment of society - the ol' paradox of tolerance.
I do.
Death threats too? Shouting fire in a crowded theater?
Again, this speech reduces freedom, has no meaningful utility, and very directly leads to, encourages, and spreads the violence - with all this in mind, it's unfathomable to me that anyone would defend it.
Outside the disagreement, I'll also say I'm pretty wary of free speech absolutists - I can't speak for you, but they tend to drop their principles the moment someone says something they don't like - see Musk for an example of this.
Criminal threats are typically actionable. They indicate a concrete act is intended.
A famously incorrect example of unprotected speech. It actually is protected speech, it's just a catchy phrase that people never seem to look into beyond a surface level.
Because at least half of the country I live in would love nothing more to apply these same ideas of restricting the flow of ideas and speech to me. To their mind, my liberal lefty atheistic ideals are diametrically opposed to their world view. To their understanding of the world, I'm actively making the world a worse place just by being in it. I have actively benefited from the freedom of thought and speech that I support while growing up in a deep red and deeply religious small town.
What you should be asking yourself is why these abhorrent ideas get any traction at all. The public square should be filled with good ideas. Put your ideas out for how to make society better. Put out your critique and world view. The speech you hate so much should be drowned out by all the good speech. The fact that it's not, and has garnered any sort of appeal points to a failure on society's part, writ large. We have an obligation to push society forward and be proactive in guiding society where we want it to go. Like I said in another comment, the hearts of men can't be legislated away; they have to be won.
We clearly have different philosophies on the value of freedom of thought. I don't think we're going to get anywhere with this.
It's super-weird that you'd defer to what's legal when you're asked if something is moral - particularly when you imply there's a risk legislation will turn against you at some point.
There's a bunch of reasons bad ideas circulate, but they're generally a product of the interests of those with economic/political power. That's a far broader, more difficult issue to solve than the proliferation of genocidal ideologies.
You want this problem solved?
Here's the definition of genocide (the UN one works fine).
Genocidal groups are now outlawed.
As far as organised crime goes, there's not really a higher bar, is there? The likes of BLM that you cited earlier don't meet this bar - not by a long shot.
I'd defend someone who's being arrested for wearing an isis t-shirt
Putting aside the effect of the t-shirt, has that happened (for ISIS or Nazis), or are you making things up to be afraid of?
Both ISIS and Nazis are terror groups whose explicit goal it is to kill large numbers of people. Their very existence is tantamount to a death threat made against Jews, "sexual deviants", "lesser races", the west, socialists, and so on...
Not in the US that I'm aware of. Nazi t-shirts are banned in Australia, and probably several other countries. I wouldnt say I'm afraid of it but I'm not making it up either.
You'll get no argument from me. But wearing a T-shirt or shouting a slogan is a far cry from killing someone. The freedom of speech in the US includes the freedom to hold and express shitty or simply unpopular opinions. It's a necessary evil in order to prevent things like banning legitimate criticism of Israel.
It's in Victoria, not Australia wide (and came in response to a huge amount of Nazi fuckery), but that's beside the point. Even when a Nazi dipshit stood outside a courthouse in Melbourne, next to Tom Sewell, shouted "HEIL HITLER", while doing a Nazi salute (after appearing in court for attacking 6 backpackers), then shouted "Australia for the white man, heil Hitler.", there was zero consequences.
The violence is the ideology. The very simple answer to "This is a slippery slope - where does it stop?" is when it becomes a problem. Protecting genocidal morons is a problem - stopping them is both a moral imperative and social good.