What are we discussing really? — Tzeentch

Basic principles of morality. — baker

Are we, though?

Then what moral actors' actions are we discussing here? Putin's? Biden's? Those of every individual engaged in the war?

That either sounds like it would be overly simplistic or unimaginably complicated.

Inflation is nothing other than an increase in the total amount of currency, thereby reducing the value of each individual unit of currency.

The only places where currency is created legally is in the printing presses of central banks.

When there is out-of-control inflation, it is because central banks are printing too much money.

Why are they printing too much currency? Because it's an easy, short-term way for governments to get more money to spend on all its hobby projects, and it makes the public carry the cost (inflation is literally a hidden tax).

The solution is lower government spending (after all much of this money printing is the result of the government wanting to spend more than it earns!), and much, much stricter control on government and the central banks, which are currently intermingled to the point that central banks can no longer perform their role as safeguard.

Besides this, the public needs to understand that there is no such thing as free money, and they need to stop demanding it from their governments through the voting process, because this is part of what incentivizes governments to make unaffordable, unrealistic promises that can only be fulfilled through printing money.

But not moral. — schopenhauer1

Just like preaching against procreating —> species extinction (auto-genocide). — 180 Proof

Without getting into desirability, mankind going extinct as a result of individuals' voluntary choice not to procreate is not immoral.

My point is these are all very different questions to ask, the possible answers to which are all being hopelessly conflated.

We can't have a debate if one person is discussing ethics, another is discussing law and yet another is discussing practical steps to get out of this mess, and each engages with each other's arguments from entirely different view points.

Lumping everything together into one abomination of anger in text certainly isn't helping to turn these discussions into something productive.

This discussion needs some direction.

What are we discussing really?

Who are the 'good guys' and who are the 'bad guys'?

What international law says about this?

What the best courses of action are for both sides?

What are the most likely outcomes?

Ethical principles?

This thread is an unconstructive mess.

Russia is simply redistributing wealth through force according to its ideas of what belongs to whom.

Given this forum's political leanings one might expect a lot more understanding for this course of action.

If we presuppose that hypocrisy (expressing beliefs, but not enacting them, implying underlying motives) is an ethical fallacy, "an eye for an eye" and "the ends justify the means" are ethical fallacies.

That might sound fairly basic, but these concepts are regularly used under pretenses of morality.

You seem to be arguing that because I disagree with Nazism then when I claim that someone should be fired for being a Nazi then I am claiming that someone should be fired because I disagree with them. — Michael

And isn't that exactly what's happening? You disagree with someone's views and therefore seek to get them fired?

Seems like a perfectly sound depiction of what you told me.

I don't understand this. Gender identity is an identity, and so the reality of their gender is their identity. — Michael

I am not looking to get into a discussion about transgenderism.

My point is that expressing a view about the nature of reality is not an insult, even if someone is insulted by it. You have views on a subject, and someone else may have a different view. If the discussion alone is reason to take offense then one is perhaps too fragile and should think twice before partaking in public discourse.

And this is where we disagree. I don't think liberalism requires that morally reprehensible speech be tolerated. As I alluded to before, one can be a liberal in one area but not another. I'm a liberal with respect to marriage if I support interracial and same-sex marriage. I'm a liberal with respect to drugs if I support drug legalisation. I'm a liberal with respect to the market economy if I oppose regulations. I don't see a problem with someone referring to themselves as a liberal if they are a liberal in many areas, even if they're not a liberal in one or two others. — Michael

Freedom of speech is a liberal pillar, and a fundamental human right as enshrined in article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, stating:

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

A liberal that's against freedom of speech is basically missing the entire point. We could have a page-long discussion about why freedom of speech is fundamental - the whole idea that free exchange of ideas counteracts extremism, etc. but I don't think more discussion would get us much further.

I thank you for the discussion as it was heated but fair. :pray:

I'll read your response if you choose to reply.

If you say "we have the right to say what we like" should I interpret that as "we have the right to do whatever I believe we should be able to do?" — Michael

I'm not sure what you're getting at.

It's not me saying you should have a right to freedom of speech. It's mankind as a whole deciding that freedom of speech belongs to a list of things governments should uphold in order to guarantee a baseline of humanity.

In that list are also things like "legitimate governments shall not commit genocides", and that should probably tell you something.

So why would someone saying "transgender men aren't men" be considered a civil way of expressing one's belief when it purposefully insults transgender men? — Michael

Because it's not an insult, regardless of how one may interpret it.

Saying the world is round may offend a flat earther. It doesn't make it an insult.

I guess for transgenderism specifically it's unfortunate their stake in reality is so closely related to their identity, to the point of which any discussion about that reality becomes an insult to them.

So you're saying that I shouldn't lobby a business to convince them to fire their employee for being a racist? That my free speech is morally reprehensible? I don't quite understand how you balance this apparent contradiction in your position. — Michael

People may use their freedom to do things I find morally reprehensible.

And I'm fine with that, assuming it doesn't infringe upon the freedoms of others or break the law.

That's the essence of liberalism you see.

There's a meaningful difference between "people who promote Nazi ideology should be fired" and "people who disagree with me should be fired". — Michael

What are nazis other than individuals whose views you strongly disagree with?

Assuming everyone in the example of moving within the bounds of the law I disagree there's a meaningful difference, if there's even a difference at all other than your subjective judgement about what are acceptable thoughts to have and views to hold.

Again, I disagree that individuals are able to make such distinctions to the extent that they should be given power over other people's fundamental rights.

Expressing one's beliefs in a "civil manner" is about more than just tone but also about content. — Michael

I disagree.

Civil means in a non-disruptive way, so as a part of a normal discussion. And I believe in such a setting every idea should be able to be discussed, no matter how reprehensible I may find it.

Telling my boss calmly and with a smile that I think he's a "fucking nigger" doesn't make me civil, ... — Michael

Why would purposefully insulting someone be considered a civil way to express one's beliefs?

So what exact examples do you have in mind? — Michael

If one holds the political opinion that some views should not be able to be freely expressed, one desires for their government to enforce limitation on freedom of speech, which means it has to threaten people into not expressing those views. That's how governments function.

One expresses this desire by voting, activism, etc.

However much one may be convinced of the soundness of their views, it doesn't change the nature of how governments function and how one attempts to use it to impose those views on others.

Because boycotting some business and posting condemnations on Twitter because their CEO is a racist (which is the sort of thing that happens nowadays) isn't the same as wanting the government to force people to behave a certain way. — Michael

No, in a sense it's way worse, because you're going out of your way to try and exact revenge and punishment upon people for behaviors that are perfectly legal, even enshrined as fundamental rights in the constitution and human rights legislation.

I think that's morally reprehensible.

If you were to try and enact your changes by means of the democratic process, at least it would have some semblance of legitimacy.

EDIT: Discrimination by this hypothetical CEO would be against the law, at which point one only needs to provide evidence for this crime for the system to do its job and uphold the law.

Well I never expressed that idea so I don't understand the relevance of this comment. — Michael

You did.

Didn't you want to lobby against people who have neonazi thoughts in their head to get them fired from their jobs?

That's actually even worse, since it implies the law isn't enough to exact the type of revenge you're after.

They don't have to. — Michael

Sorry, unrestricted freedom of speech. — Michael

If one is so afraid of words that one believes speech should be restricted according to one's fancies, one is, again, not a liberal.

And before you come with caricatures about yelling fire in a theatre: freedom of speech is about being able to express one's genuinely held beliefs in a civil manner, and I believe there should be no restriction on that, nor that any individual is able to impose reasonable restrictions on that.

don't know what you mean by "imposing a view on everyone else through government force" ... — Michael

Political opinions are opinions about what one believes governments should force other people to do.

When you say "I believe xyz" in relation to a political opinion, what you're saying is "I want my government to force people to act more in accordance to xyz".

It's good that we're discussing this, because apparently the nature of what government is is not clear.

I was referring to the exchange where you referred to my views as being hypocritical. — Michael

The idea that people should be free only if it suits one's opinions is certainly a hypocritical idea.

Well, there hasn't been another Hitler so maybe it has stopped it. We might not have stamped out Nazi ideology entirely but by censoring and ostracising those who promote it we're making a good effort to push it mostly into the fringe, which is a good thing. — Michael

You give yourself too much credit. I think people looking at history and deciding for themselves that nazism is probably not the road we want to go down did a lot more to ensure nazism moved to the fringes. Ostracising and censorship probably did very little.

What it did do is create the type of climate in which extreme ideologies take root. Perhaps not nazi ideologies, but they weren't the only ones that were problematic.

But such an assumption doesn't then mean that there's never a good reason to restrict freedom. — Michael

True. Yet at the same time a liberal must recognize there are certain rights, such as the right to freedom of speech, that are fundamental, a human right and shouldn't be infringed upon. And that's for several good reasons, one of which being that a climate of ostracization and censorship breeds polarisation and extremism, instead of combatting it.

This is a better account of liberalism than your account that somehow entails that liberals must support unrestricted freedoms. — Michael

I never claimed as much.

But all this is mostly irrelevant. The simple, everyday fact is that "liberal" is the term adopted by those people who support things like interracial and same-sex marriage, transgender rights, legalisation, welfare, universal healthcare, etc. Rather than splitting hairs over the meaning of the term "liberal", why not actually address the merits of the specific policies they either support or oppose? — Michael

Because as I argued before, the term "liberal" was hijacked by unsavory individuals who in fact aren't liberal at all - much the opposite. They behave like little tyrants that believe their view is best and that it should be imposed on every one else through government force. They're the antithesis to liberalism.

Which is why I said "[o]r maybe trying to label me as being any one thing is futile. Better to just address the individual views I hold rather than fit me into a specific box." — Michael

I'm not trying to fit you in a box. We are discussing what liberalism is.

Yes, and trying to prevent things like the resurgence of Nazism is an inevitable interference. — Michael

Imposing one's views on others under the guise of fighting nazis.

Come on.

Even if you genuinely believe that, your choice of censorship and ostracization are extremely poor ones, and haven't done anything to stop it over the course of nearly a century.

Liberalism is a philosophy that starts from a premise that political authority and law must be justified. If citizens are obliged to exercise self-restraint, and especially if they are obliged to defer to someone else’s authority, there must be a reason why. Restrictions on liberty must be justified.

This is about accountability, and that certainly is a part of what liberalism considers legitimate governance.

This description leaves the philosophical fundation of liberalism unaddressed; why must power be kept in check and constantly demanded to account for its actions?

Because man and by extension the governments they control can only make decisions based on highly subejctive, flawed ideas of reality, making man and by extension governments extremely poor arbiters of reasonableness on behalf of others.

Within the ideas of liberalism, government is a necessary evil and not a means to an end.

A liberal understands that when people are free, they will sometimes use that freedom to do things we don't like. And that's the price of freedom. Freedom of speech means sometimes people will have reprehensible ideas. So what? As long as they're not infringing upon people's fundamental rights they can entertain all the ideas they want.

It's kind of obvious that what you're actually doing is being unable to cope with the fact people are having a discussion without you, about topics you find threatening.

No, I want acceptable things to be allowed and unacceptable things to be disallowed. That principle likely drives every political position: liberal, conservative, authoritarian, anti-authoritarian, etc. — Michael

That's not a principle that drives liberalism.

The principle that drives liberalism is the idea that individuals and governments are inherently unfit to be arbiters of what is acceptable and what isn't on the behalf of others. (One needs only a brief glance at human history to see where this idea came from.)

They should therefore be kept from interfering in each other's affairs as much as possible.

In an imperfect world inferference obviously is inevitable sometimes, but if your first instinct is to want to interfere, then you're not a liberal.

If you fancy yourself the chosen arbiter of right and wrong, you're not a liberal.

Most of your ideas imply you want to be a proponent to individual freedom and expression. However, when you are met with ideas you don't like, you backpeddle.

"... and freedom for all, but only if I agree with you."

Such is not freedom, and such is not liberalism.

Wanting to prosecute people for thoughts in their head is about as far from liberalism as one can get.

I might believe that interracial and same-sex marriage should be allowed, that transgender people should be able to use the bathroom of their choice, that some drugs like marijuana should be legal to buy, and that we should lobby companies to fire their employees for being neo-Nazis. Am I liberal/anti-authoritarian because of the first few views, or am I a conservative or authoritarian because of the last view? — Michael

You'd be neither. You'd be applying the principles your views are based on inconsistently, you'd be cherry-picking essentially. It'd be confused and hypocritcal.

Introducing dishonesty and more censorship would not strengthen a system. It would weaken it. Didn't we agree earlier that censorship is a sign of weakness, that a set of ideas need to be protected from criticism to avoid falling apart?

I suggest we base our views on ideas that do not need protection from criticism.

A liberal would certainly not choose censorship, since that betrays everything liberalism stands for.

And I don't think conservative and liberal are opposites in the way you suggest. An authoritarian would be opposed to open debate, and that's what modern "liberalism" seems to be turning into.

Oh certainly, but a liberal would do so in open debate.

And it caved in. So at least it needs some way of strengthening to come back to the mainstream and stay there. — M777

Perhaps. But censorship would only facilitate a movement to the opposite extreme.

How so? — Michael

I'm generalizing here, but liberal today is starting to become synonymous with authoritarian collectivism, characterized by a disregard for individual rights and fundamentals such as freedom of speech. For strong governments that are given mandates to decide what is truth and what is "disinformation", etc.

A complete perversion of what liberalism is and the principles it is built upon.

Open discourse has been under pressure for decades, and 'political correctness' (in more honest terms: censorship) is a symptom of that. As such, I would point towards this disturbance of open discourse as being the cause for these problematic ideas going unscrutinized.

It's in such a climate that liberal ideas could be hijacked and perverted into something that's essentially the opposite of liberalism. Things went off the deep end, because no pushback was allowed vis á vis 'political correctness.'

Moved to the Lounge, eh?

What a surprise.

I guess this discussion about totalitarianism cut a little too close to home for the folks that run the show on this forum.

In my opinion, all ideas should be able to be expressed. No matter how bad or repulsive. Of course such ideas will be annihilated, but in open, civilized debate, with reasoned arguments.

Bad ideas that have emotional appeal may hold some sway, but they won't hold up to scrutiny and open discourse will prevent these ideas from ever becoming too extreme.

The idea that people are too stupid to handle free discourse is a dark world view that is pretty much incompatible with free, open society. I would avoid such ideas.

Isn't a healthy state of affairs if people are afraid to be racist, for example, or do you envision the ideal state where you can go up to someone, spout your racism, and expect appreciation for your openness? — Hanover

That's not a healthy state of affairs.

The way to get rid of problematic ideas is to discuss them openly. Thereby its flaws will become apparent. That's the whole point of freedom of speech.

I have no fear that racist ideas will find any traction in open debate. It's in a climate of censorship and polarization where problematic ideas find traction, precisely because the balancing act of open debate is cut off.

Open debate fosters reason and truth, whereas (self-)censorship fosters resentment, further division and hides the problematic ideas manifesting in society.

We should not use the term 'political correctness'. It is a euphemism for censorship and thereby it conceals its true nature.

It's a euphemism designed to protect the fragile views of those who enforce it.

That is the purpose of censorship: not to protect a society from dangerous ideas, but rather to protect dangerous ideas from being scrutinized.

After all, if one is convinced their views are so true and those of the other are so silly, then why fear debate?

Related to this, there is no difference between an 'internal thought police' and censorship. When individuals are stopped from expressing their genuinely held beliefs out of fear of punishment that's successful censorship.

Earlier in this thread this was posted:

They are not internally blocking or hindering their own thought. They are reacting in a socially appropriate way to a situation that that might lead to conflict and trying to decide the best way to handle it. They have been asked a question that is polarizing and divisive and they don't know who their audience is or how their answer might be used for or against them. — Hanover

This describes the climate for open debate in western society today.

The fact that people are afraid to discuss ideas is precisely the problem. It doesn't matter if topics are polarizing and divisive - such topics are actually the most important to discuss, so that people with different views do not move ever away from each other, but remain in dialogue.

And nowadays people have come to fear dialogue. They either fear that it may test their world views, or they fear the reprisals that come from testing someone else's.

That's not a normal state of being. It implies our world views have become too detached from nuance and reality, and we are subconsciously aware of it.

Slavoj Žižek seems to have a better grasp of it, in my inexpert opinion. — praxis

How would you summarize Zizek's views on totalitarianism, and how does it relate to Desmet's ideas?

It's a scary term though, ... — praxis

Certainly.

And whatever impressions about it may linger in our minds, they likely pale in comparison to the horror of the historical reality of it.

What I found particularly interesting about Desmet's theory, is how totalitarianism distinguishes itself from classical dictatorships in that a dictatorship is instated from the top down, by a more or less rational ruler.

Totalitarianism on the other hand springs from the population itself. The population willingly cedes control, willingly gives up its freedom and willingly follows its ideas down into the abyss.

And it's this willingness that I observe in public discourse, and even on this forum. Willingness to ignore human rights, to stigmatize and dehumanize dissenting voices, a desire to see people who think differently suffer, or worse.

It's all very sobering.

Again, I've only heard of anti-vax protests. I haven't heard of vax protests or riots. — praxis

Governments are already flirting with forced vaccination. What do they have left to protest for? Gas chambers and concentration camps? Then again, nothing would surprise me at this point.

It concerns the spread of serious diseases like polio, smallpox, and the like, and you don't expect people to be up in arms about it??? — praxis

Covid does not belong in the same category as polio or smallpox. And even if it did, I would expect people to take fundamental human rights into account no matter what the subject matter is - not for talking of human rights to become taboo. That's already the writing on the wall.

Anyway, getting back to Desmet's totalitarianism, if the country is divided over something like COVID then how can the state be considered to be in complete control, or even directing the narrative? — praxis

People may be divided, but governments (unsurprisingly) have largely chosen the side of force, ergo lockdowns, vaccine mandates, etc.

And it directs the narrative accordingly. News stations which are largely government-controlled provide one-sided information. Unwelcome information is simply suppressed. Perhaps not to the point where it cannot be heard at all, at least not yet, but that's not needed to foster this process of mass formation.

Though, the state is not in complete control. Perhaps the term "totalitarian" suggests as much, but what Desmet is describing is a tendency towards, and not a state of totalitarianism.

Oh. Then that message is about you.

That's not very unusual for any discussion around here, actually. — praxis

Sadly true. Where it differs is when the very same insecurity that moves individuals to behave that way manifests in crowds - mass formation.

With freedom comes responsibility. I'm fond of saying that. — praxis

I'm not looking for a discussion on that.

My point is that making a case for individual rights is by no means an extreme position. So why does it elicit an extreme response?

Because it deviates just slightly from the narrative. Enough to imply that the desired carte blanche on the use of power has moral borders.

And the individuals in the mass are subconsciously aware how their moral borders are fading.
Which they are, as evidenced by reactions like these:

Just as long as you never have contact with other humans. — Jackson

I know that's probably a joke, but such reactions weren't uncommon in the discussions I mentioned earlier. Some people genuinely think things like this.

The subconscious knows; the conscious mind doesn't want to know. An internal bomb that's potentially set off by even the slightest deviation of the narrative. No wonder such people become so volatile.

It is expressed through rather extreme reactions to views that deviate even slightly from the narrative. Instead of normal discussion, an immediate escalation to personal attacks, accusations, strawmans, and projection.

You should've seen the reactions I got when on this forum I dared to imply that human beings have a right to bodily autonomy, and therefore should be allowed to choose whether to be vaccinated or not.

In a nutshell, an inability to accept anything other than their exact version of the truth.

Vaccination is another one of those great examples where people seem to show radical intolerance for dissent - mass formation at work.

Should probably note that it's no surprise that this question - which is not even the OPs question but just another bit of culture-war trash picked up from elsewhere - asks 'what is a woman?' rather than 'what is a man?' - because this kind of stuff is always just paper-thin misogyny pretending to be just-asking-questions - AKA JAQing off. It's women and their gender who must be policed and shunted into whatever little boxes these people have in mind. Largely because they only want to fuck and fantasize about the Right Kind of Women, so men can be whatever (so long as they keep it to themselves!). These people are afraid - terrified - that their fantasies and hard-ons will be misdirected. And that would be ggaaaaayyyy which is icky. — Streetlight

You got all of that from a single question asked by a hypothetical stranger?

A genius psychologist or...

I don't think it was the antivax side who displayed a stunning intolerance for conflicting views. I think you should rewatch it, and this time the whole thing. It could very well be about you.

I might argue that such desires for totalitarianism might come out of one's weakness. — M777

Well, extreme views are false almost by their definition, so this desire for the use of force to uphold radical ideas is due to the weakness of it - reality itself won't uphold the idea. In fact, reality makes it crumble. The only way such ideas stay afloat is through human ignorance, foolhardiness and brutality - qualities of which there is no shortage within mankind.

What do you think might happen to the west? — M777

Who knows?

Another thing Desmet describes is that this phenomenon of mass formation and totalitarianism (other than classical dictatorships, for example) come from inside the population itself, in other words, we're on a path towards radicalism because people have become more radical, and not only are they fully aware of the dangers, they wish for them, for example censorship, because it protects their radical views. We're in this situation because people want to be in this situation.

Desmet links this to the coldly mechanistic / scientific world view that believes in absolute answers to everything, and that everything, including human interaction, can be understood in simple x + y = z terms - something that in itself sums up the totalitarian way of looking at things. After all, if one believes to have the absolute answer to everything, it is a small step to believe one should allow themselves priviledges over others in order to bend them to this "truth".

Obviously, nothing good can come of this. However, as long as there are people willing and able to speak out this constant pull towards more extremism can be disrupted and hopefully in time some form of balance will be restored.

I'll try to explain in a nutshell one of the ideas in the video in linked that relates to this topic:

Political issues are guided by narratives, and narratives are subjective - containing some forms of truth, and some opinions / untruths.

In a healthy society, proponents of different narratives are in constant communication with each other, so as to find out which parts of each narrative are truths and which parts are not. The result is usually that the sides find each other somewhere in the middle, shedding those parts which are most subjective and/or wrong.

In societies where for some reason or another healthy discourse is not possible (for example, because the political establishment greatly favors one side of the debate), this balancing act cannot take place.

There's nothing that can pull the favored narrative back into reality.

And that's sadly not where it ends. Lies and untruths must grow to keep themselves alive (for every time reality is witnessed to be discordant with the lie, another lie must be constructed to keep the narrative afloat), thus we see the extreme ends of the spectrum growing more and more extreme.

This is why self-censorship is so dangerous - people who genuinely disagree with the narrative are the only ones that can attempt to pull it back towards reality.

It is no surprise then, that the worst political ideologies committed their atrocities only after the opposition was silenced - there was no one left who could pull the ideologically possessed masses back into reality.


I probably did a poor job at conveying the full message of Desmet. I'd recommend watching the video I linked eariler to get a better explanation.

reeeeeeeeeeeeeeee — Streetlight

That is you, in pretty much every thread I find you.

The fragility is overwhelming. — Streetlight

The irony.