All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[shooshoomanjoe]

I was not referring to the pandemic response but other matters in his presidency, funding the border protection for one. His Presidency ran for four years not one.

Did you really think Mexico would pay for his wall?

[Mister Mets]

Why must such beliefs be couched in skepticism when "Trump was a terrible president" is not? To call something speculative and opinion not is not more or less rooted in observed understanding.

I am trying to figure out what other people want, so this isn't necessarily about my own views.

There can be an argument that things that are obviously opinions do not need to be couched in skepticism, and that these are distinct from statements of fact.

A complicating factor is that there are some things that seem like they should be couched in skepticism that have been proven.

For example, LBJ won his first Senate race with the help of election fraud. Robert Caro got documentation from the last surviving official involved in the race.

https://archives.cjr.org/fiftieth_an.../caros_way.php

I'll note there are still some uncertainties (How much did LBJ know? Did his political opponent also cheat?) but it has been established that fraud helped a future Senate Majority Leader and President win a statewide race

It's helpful for discussions if facts that may seem controversial but are well-supported are treated differently from speculation.

It would be quite difficult to expect moderators to parse these differences.

When the riots erupted in Washington D.C. following the assasination of MLK, the police and the national guard set up machine gun nests in the D.C.

but there were no machine gun nests in the D.C. on Jan. 6 when the insurrectionists stormed the Capital.

Among other things, there are different understandings of best practices in 2021 than there were in 1968.

The things that separate the examples you're giving and that we know Trump & Co. plotted Capitol attack can be summed up in a few words...

Evidence. Facts. Critical thinking to draw conclusions from those two things.

Who gets to make the distinction?

[Mister Mets]

At the risk of evoking Godwin's law:
Would denying the Holocaust be ok?

That is not just banned on most forums and social media. It's actually illegal in my country.
And the reason it is illegal is because it is a lie that is repeated to further the cause of fascism, and in my country we have seen how lies of that kind can lead to actual fascism.

And #30, we do not care if you repeat the lie in a large newspaper or standing on a soap box in a park. It's a dangerous lie, whether it convinces one person or one million. Lies that have been PROVEN to get people to act violently, to kill, to try to end democracy... They should not be allowed on a message board that took the relatable decision not to allow discussion of Comicsg**te.

A private organization like CBR can certainly have a ban on Holocaust denialism.

Making it illegal would be quite problematic as that power can set a precedent and be abused.

"conspiracy theory" is often shorthand for "disproven" or "baseless" conspiracy theory.

That is not the way you are using it.
Just to make that clear.

One of the reasons conspiracy theories are pernicious is that it can be difficult to prove a negative. How would one prove that the royal family didn't kill Princess Diana, or that Nike didn't pressure a sick Ronaldo to play in the 1998 world cup? Sometimes we have sufficient evidence to disprove a theory (Paul McCartney making music as a public figure counters the idea that he died in 1966), or it's built on something ridiculous and unproven (we would need to establish that aliens are real as the first step of understanding they run governments) but that isn't always the case.

I'll note that there are times left-wingers on the board have referred to conspiracy theories that were disproven or baseless. The justice department investigation indicated no evidence Mike Brown was trying to surrender when he was shot. Brett Kavanaugh did not run parties in Suburban Maryland in the 1980s in which multiple young women were habitually gang-raped.

I can understand a policy on banning discussion of disproven or baseless theories, although it can be hard for specialists to make that distinction, much less volunteer hobbyists.

[CaptainEurope]

A private organization like CBR can certainly have a ban on Holocaust denialism.

Making it illegal would be quite problematic as that power can set a precedent and be abused.

One of the reasons conspiracy theories are pernicious is that it can be difficult to prove a negative. How would one prove that the royal family didn't kill Princess Diana, or that Nike didn't pressure a sick Ronaldo to play in the 1998 world cup? Sometimes we have sufficient evidence to disprove a theory (Paul McCartney making music as a public figure counters the idea that he died in 1966), or it's built on something ridiculous and unproven (we would need to establish that aliens are real as the first step of understanding they run governments) but that isn't always the case.

I'll note that there are times left-wingers on the board have referred to conspiracy theories that were disproven or baseless. The justice department investigation indicated no evidence Mike Brown was trying to surrender when he was shot. Brett Kavanaugh did not run parties in Suburban Maryland in the 1980s in which multiple young women were habitually gang-raped.

I can understand a policy on banning discussion of disproven or baseless theories, although it can be hard for specialists to make that distinction, much less volunteer hobbyists.

There is a very good chance that those things you dismiss as conspiracy theories on this thread will be proven true by the Jan 6 commission of legal proceedings resulting from it.
But good job on that strawman. It works so well I have not seen any crows on this thread in hours.

[Tami]

Fact is stranger than fiction. Liberals/Democrats/The Left rarely waste their time on creating Conspiracy theories about The Right/Conservatives/Republicans/Far-Right because they are doing a great job of making the bizarre all to real all on their own.

It's not that The Left are 'Pure of Heart', it's just that when the barrel is already filled to the brim, what sense does it make to add a few more drops? Besides, there is too much work to do to try and keep the US from falling apart.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Fact is stranger than fiction. Liberals/Democrats/The Left rarely waste their time on creating Conspiracy theories about The Right/Conservatives/Republicans/Far-Right because they are doing a great job of making the bizarre all to real all on their own.

It's not that The Left are 'Pure of Heart', it's just that when the barrel is already filled to the brim, what sense does it make to add a few more drops? Besides, there is too much work to do to try and keep the US from falling apart.

Seriously.

If Trump were a fictional villain, no one would have found him believable

[thwhtGuardian]

A private organization like CBR can certainly have a ban on Holocaust denialism.

Making it illegal would be quite problematic as that power can set a precedent and be abused.

One of the reasons conspiracy theories are pernicious is that it can be difficult to prove a negative. How would one prove that the royal family didn't kill Princess Diana, or that Nike didn't pressure a sick Ronaldo to play in the 1998 world cup? Sometimes we have sufficient evidence to disprove a theory (Paul McCartney making music as a public figure counters the idea that he died in 1966), or it's built on something ridiculous and unproven (we would need to establish that aliens are real as the first step of understanding they run governments) but that isn't always the case.

I'll note that there are times left-wingers on the board have referred to conspiracy theories that were disproven or baseless. The justice department investigation indicated no evidence Mike Brown was trying to surrender when he was shot. Brett Kavanaugh did not run parties in Suburban Maryland in the 1980s in which multiple young women were habitually gang-raped.

I can understand a policy on banning discussion of disproven or baseless theories, although it can be hard for specialists to make that distinction, much less volunteer hobbyists.

Germany has had laws banning Holocaust denial for a couple decades now...where's the abuse? Surely it would have happened already?

[CaptainEurope]

Germany has had laws banning Holocaust denial for a couple decades now...where's the abuse? Surely it would have happened already?

Basically since a couple of years after WW II, when the allies let us have our own government and constitution again.

[thwhtGuardian]

Basically since a couple of years after WW II, when the allies let us have our own government and constitution again.

So lots of abuse right? All kinds of good people repressed?

[Mister Mets]

Germany has had laws banning Holocaust denial for a couple decades now...where's the abuse? Surely it would have happened already?

First, there was plenty of abuse of free speech in East Germany.

However, there is a specific historical context to bans on Holocaust denialism in Germany, coming from the policy of Denazification in the aftermath of World War 2.

It's a different situation to create that kind of ban in the United States right now. Creating an exception to Freedom of Speech does allow people you don't like to create similar exceptions going forward.

* Edit- There were some ridiculous legal decisions.

The video game Wolfenstein was banned in Germany for twenty years because it includes Nazi imagery. It is a first person shooter in which Nazis are shot.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2018/...n-video-games/

The laws have also been used to prosecute anti-fascists who used Nazi imagery in ways that were directed against national-socialist endeavors. The courts eventually ruled in favor of the anti-fascists but it took a few years.

There have been weird stories that don't involve Naxi imagery. A comedian was prosecuted for mocking the President of Turkey.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...ish-president/

Because of America's robust freedom of speech, should Trump win again, we'll have a lot to worry about, but at least he and his next Attorney General won't have this tool to go after critics.

[Jack Dracula]

Why must such beliefs be couched in skepticism when "Trump was a terrible president" is not? To call something speculative and opinion not is not more or less rooted in observed understanding.

Because objectively, from every reasonable viewpoint he was a pretty terrible President.

Persecutions and purges all begin to look alike in an intolerant society.

Maybe to someone without a moral compass.

[Kirby101]

First, there was plenty of abuse of free speech in East Germany.

Why I agree it is problematic here in the US because of the First Amendment, this is just a ludicrous statement by you Mets, you know they mean West and the current Germany.

[4saken1]

I started to say that comparing conspiracy theories from the left and the right was a false equivalency, but then remembered how the fringe left is very similar to the right wrt to their ability to believe conspiracy theories about Democrats. For the most part, though, conspiracy theories that are believed in Democratic circles seem to be fewer and farther between than those believed by Republicans. It also seems like lower percentages of Democrats believe these concoctions than Republicans tend to. There are a few exceptions, however. The belief that Bush had something to do with the 9/11 attack comes to mind.

[CaptainEurope]

First, there was plenty of abuse of free speech in East Germany.

Also in the American Confederacy.

[thwhtGuardian]

First, there was plenty of abuse of free speech in East Germany.

However, there is a specific historical context to bans on Holocaust denialism in Germany, coming from the policy of Denazification in the aftermath of World War 2.

It's a different situation to create that kind of ban in the United States right now. Creating an exception to Freedom of Speech does allow people you don't like to create similar exceptions going forward.

* Edit- There were some ridiculous legal decisions.

The video game Wolfenstein was banned in Germany for twenty years because it includes Nazi imagery. It is a first person shooter in which Nazis are shot.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2018/...n-video-games/

The laws have also been used to prosecute anti-fascists who used Nazi imagery in ways that were directed against national-socialist endeavors. The courts eventually ruled in favor of the anti-fascists but it took a few years.

There have been weird stories that don't involve Naxi imagery. A comedian was prosecuted for mocking the President of Turkey.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...ish-president/

Because of America's robust freedom of speech, should Trump win again, we'll have a lot to worry about, but at least he and his next Attorney General won't have this tool to go after critics.

East Germany?

Did it hurt to stretch that far?

Come on man, why not just say that your statement was wrong? That there hasn't been rampant misuse and repression of the people of Germany over banning the ability to publicly deny the Holocaust existed?

While it's true that I don't see similar bans being enacted here in the states any time soon, to pretend it hasn't worked elsewhere is just dishonest.