Did we cancel Kanye? Technically, I think you need to know you are cancelled to be cancelled. Also, I'm not into canceling people. I do not recognize the court's jurisdiction.
To the extent it’s that, I am all for canceling. However it’s been my experience that when a group of people are right about something and are taking action, you find that only about 20% can appropriately communicate that message, and the other 80% are finding their conviction from their peers. When this dynamic gets coopted by evil people, very bad things happen. I know people that suffered in the Cultural Revolution. Part of the fear is legitimately rooted in this. Part is just assholes afraid of being held accountable. Also, I have personal issues such as the nice weekend with my aunt and uncle who are Trumpers. We discussed politics, but it never got ugly, and I love them. I’m all about canceling Trump, but I can love his followers. I need to be careful not to be a hypocrite. I totally agree about free speech in the private sphere. It’s also why I think the Constitutional right is so precious. The ugly thing is that at the core of it, being "cancelled" is just other people not liking you.
I spent some time with Trump family this past weekend, too. We engage but we don't fight, and I don't care about them any less since Trump became president. I think the problem is that people have all sorts of reasons for voting Trump that don't have anything to do with Nazism. The trouble is that they can't be convinced that the white supremacists are a core constituency of his, and that supporting him is supporting them too. But it's just not that important to them, and there's no amount of convincing we can do to change that. But I totally and completely disagree that "canceling" is, at its core, about just not liking someone. It's about thought policing for purity. This type of thought regulation has a long history (goes back at least to a French philosopher whom Marx cited a lot called Helvetius), and the idea is that if you can get people to change their behavior via law (or de facto law, in the case of the Internet), then you can eventually alter their morality. Basically you Stockholm syndrome them into acting a certain way. It's more or less why art and literature were so heavily regulated in the Eastern Bloc. I fundamentally believe that there are not any ideas that are too dangerous to talk about--as ideas in an open marketplace. The Holocaust didn't happen because Mein Kampf got published. It's in print here in the US, and I read it years ago...I still have two little Jewish babies running around my house. This is as close to saying anything controversial as I'll probably say on the internet, because I'm not into Internet fights as a way of life, but the Twitter mobs are playing with fire they don't fundamentally understand. Vote, please. For the love of God vote.Also, I have personal issues such as the nice weekend with my aunt and uncle who are Trumpers. We discussed politics, but it never got ugly, and I love them. I’m all about canceling Trump, but I can love his followers. I need to be careful not to be a hypocrite.
Talk to me or don't, but when you some dumb, meaningless shit like this it's not really a conversation you're trying to have. Since you don't know much of anything about my background, and I know even less about yours, let's try to evaluate each other's words instead of making buzzword value judgments about character. To get back to the conversation: You have it the wrong way around. The ideas that were once too dangerous to talk about were that black people aren't subhuman, not that they are. In fact, there is a really large body of literature from post-Civil War until like the 1930s trying to use data to support that point (and not from backwater Southerners--Harvard was the biggest and worst offender for this type of "research"). It was only when more voices were let in that change started to occur. One thing I agree with you on is that there is never a true marketplace of ideas. That's a fantasy, but it's a good fantasy, not a bad one, and one that we would be wise to try to strive for. In fact, I have it on pretty good authority that's sort of the point of this here website (privileged information, you might even call it). The abject ridiculousness of ideas about, say, genetic inferiority, only get exposed in a world in which alternative narratives are allowed to thrive.this is an opinion that can only come from a place of privilege
"I'm making no judgments about your character. You can't empathize." Reread as many times as you need to figure out why that's wrong. Inherent in your argument is that no one can ever see anything from anyone else's perspective, because someone has always suffered more. It's hyperindividualism to a degree that would make Grover Norquist blush.
I think you misread my meaning. I wasn't moaning about either side or belittling them. I think they are both legit and important. I often see opposing forces as a good thing. It's how nature is stable. I'm glad to see people less repressed, but fearful of the means leading to other ends. I do think that if your side fully won, there would be repression and fear, but it would look different. That said, I don't take issue with your conviction, I don't think it isn't legitimate. Curious, have you read the autobiography of Malcolm X?
I mention the book because it is a candid and compelling account of his journey that was manifest in contradiction but was noble. Malcolm left the world a better place. His views on racial equality evolve, as do his views on gender. The ground moves beneath his feet. His views of women and his participation in the Nation of Islam were both progressive and regressive. Malcolm was at times right and wrong and neither and both, but he had a cause. You cannot define his work by a moment, or a measure. However, if you take him as the sum of his efforts, there is no question that we are better off for him. It is a very human story. I think everyone should read it. I agree with the pace of progress. Those repressions are clear. As an aside, some actualization is complicated, and it becomes difficult to get a social consensus on dignity, especially in matters of religion. I think polygamy is an interesting example. It is illegal, and most Mormons no longer practice it. But is that right? Should consenting adults be able to choose to live in polyamorous union? I think so. But maybe not if as children they have been subjected to religious indoctrination of a patriarchal-style polygamy? But why? Is that denying religious identity and dignity? Are agnostics and atheists in the clear for patriarchal-style polygamy? Should we choose? I don’t want to repress adults that want a certain kind of family, but at the same time, I am worried about why they want it. For some groups, it is not clear when respect and dignity are met for all. Is there a battle won when one man and three women are married? Some people want that. I don’t know. On some matters of repression there should be no debate. But it doesn't mean that all matters repression can be settled by applying a vision of respect and dignity. In some subjective value judgments get entangled.