The hypocrisy of a lot of civility is obvious.
Political civility is gaslighting.

However,that said,political groups and so called "rebels" will only use this article as an excuse to be dicks.

Sure, let's see how political or philosophical discourse occurs without civility. Mods, do we have the green light here to drop civility? Streetlight, you have an idea here - do you want to try it out?

Seems to me a gigantic category error, confusing some with all. It also is evidence of an inability to understand language at any other than its bluntest level. Every instance of the word "civility" in the referenced link should be introduced by the word "some." And when all is meant, then "all."

I think of civility as akin to table manners.

Ah, just waiting to scratch a particular itch are you? In any case, your response misses the point. What's central here - and I should have made this more explicit - is the asymmetry between the exercise of power (to take some totally random examples of indisputable evil: the genocidal state of Israel and the war criminality of Donald Rumsfeld and most of America's political leadership) and the politics of discourse around these kind of topics. When for instance, someone points out that Israel is an apartheid state that regularly murders Palestinians and steals their land, or that Donald Rumsfeld is an architect of mass murder, and the response is: "why can't you be civil about these things?", well, the response has missed the point. To use the author's words, it "enforces a false equation between incivility and violence that works to mask everyday violence as a civic norm". You and I on the other hand, are nobodies. There's no asymmetry of power here. And if your takeaway from the OP is "oh boy I get to be a meanie", then you have not read the OP with any care.

A good opportunity for clarification though, so I thank you for that.

well, the response has missed the point. — StreetlightX

The responses "misses the point" only if the person agrees with you in regard to your last points -- the points you made about Israel and Rumsfeld. If I fully agreed with you there I wouldn't be condemning you for incivility I'd say you were just stating a fact.

I know from a psychological standpoint that it makes no sense to engage an opponent who's not going to be civil. I'm not going to waste my time.

The responses "misses the point" only if the person agrees with you in regard to your last points - — BitconnectCarlos

How so? A disagreement would normally occasion an attempt to refute the claim. Whether or not you agree or disagree is irrelevant to, well, the irrelevancy of tone policing.

But, if you'd rather not waste time, then thanks for your posts they have been wonderful :)

When for instance, someone points out that Israel is an apartheid state that regularly murders Palestinians and steals their land, or that Donald Rumsfeld is an architect of mass murder, and the response is: "why can't you be civil about these things?", — StreetlightX

Not cherrypicking, but wanted to follow up on this. I’ve never heard anyone respond with a demand for civility or niceness to those points, usually its an uncivil response in return.
Who says that?

Not cherrypicking, but wanted to follow up on this. I’ve never heard anyone respond with a demand for civility or niceness to those points, usually its an uncivil response in return.
Who says that? — DingoJones

My thoughts as well. Nobody asks for civility. Civility is a matter of natural selection.

How so? A disagreement would normally occasion an attempt to refute the claim. Whether or not you agree or disagree is irrelevant to, well, the irrelevancy of tone policing. — StreetlightX

Refuting the claim would be very cumbersome and we wouldn't even be able to make it through the claim. For example, let's start with your first example: "Israel is an apartheid state that regularly murders Palestinians and steals their land" if I were to seriously try to engage this I would stop you at the word "apartheid" and we would begin a detail comparison of both the apartheid system in South Africa and the current state of racial affairs in Israel. You and I also just disagree on what being a racist means.

Whether or not you agree or disagree is irrelevant to, well, the irrelevancy of tone policing. — StreetlightX

I do not agree with this.

"Israel is an apartheid state that regularly murders Palestinians and steals their land"

If you are correct, this is a very important fact and you're doing good by trying to spread it. If this is incorrect then it's very defamatory.

But, if you'd rather not waste time, then thanks for your posts they have been wonderful — StreetlightX

Are you being serious right now? :chin:

Well people ask for civility but in my experience not in topics like that.
What do you mean by natural selection?

What do you mean by natural selection? — DingoJones

People try to remain civil to preserve the foundation and utility of speech. Where a lack of civility rules, it's just a verbal cesspool.

So people who can't manage civility deselect themselves from serious proceedings.

Makes sense.

They are just random examples. But it's undoubtable that civility politics is a thing, that, when faced with expressions of incivility motivated by, say, gross injustice - no matter how cogent the point - there are certain people whose immediate priority always goes to dismissing said expressions because of the mode of expression and not the substance of the claim.

I would stop you at the word "apartheid" and we would begin a detail comparison of both the apartheid system in South Africa and the current state of racial affairs in Israel. — BitconnectCarlos

You would indeed find out that Israel is far worse than anything remotely achieved by apartheid South Africa, as reported by Nelson Mandela's grandson, say. But that's neither here nor there. Just a random example. The point is that when dealing with such claims, the immediate pearl clutching involved in an appeal to civility is a power play through and through - one that aims to disable political claims by diverting the issues into personal or psychological ones. Which, happily, you did not do in your response to my genocidal Israel example.

Well...

If "incivility is anger directed at unjust civil ordering" it's difficult to object to incivility, and urge civility, isn't it? On the other hand, if it's merely rudeness, offensiveness or insolence (as "incivility" is typically defined) then the "Eleven Theses" don't seem so compelling.

I wonder if the invocation of Luther is deliberate. If so, let's be thankful there aren't 95 of them in this case.

Let's credit the authors of the piece with knowing how "incivility" is commonly defined, and the understanding that they're engaged in an exercise in rhetoric. In fact, "anger directed at unjust civil ordering" is appropriate. Regardless, though, that isn't to say that "incivility" is, or that "civility" is in some sense protective of or promotes "unjust civil ordering." Incivility, as commonly defined, is (I think) characteristic of many of the right-wing. It's also characteristic of bigots, and those who sexually harass in the workplace, and of other disagreeable folk. It may be that civility is inappropriate in some cases. I think that can be established without redefining words for rhetorical purposes, though.

If we want to address Israel then before we address that we need to address our conflicting conceptions of genocide and racism. I find your conception of genocide too broad. My objection is that, if I remember your definition correctly, it allowed for one to make the jump from 'X [assuming X is the stronger power] implements policies that undermine social institutions of Y [weaker] group' to 'X is essentially committing genocide against Y.' I find this conclusions carries absurd implications.

Many topics in political discourse for the left are of great moral importance and strong emotional views and expression are natural and justified.

The first component I see, of incivility in the left, comes from the circumstances surrounding the moral implications of their claims. Claims of racism, sexism, oppression, inequality, anti-LGBT, corruption and the list goes on. Directed at the system and individuals, for saying, supporting, or even just not doing anything to stop, any of these things. Where it's justified to drop civility because an uncivil response to racism or sexism is justified, one can be forceful without being rude but if there's a time to be rude, it's when one is dealing with things like these. Of course, I don't agree with how someone like you sees these things even remotely, but I'm not in a position to dictate how others feel.

The second component is addressing the system and structure of society and expressing one's discontent with strong language. Criticising capitalism, for example, and the counterarguments of capitalist culture, and risking offending people affected or potentially even implicated with your criticism. And for this one, again, I think it's justified, People are justified in expressing their moral outrage and disapproval in a way that feels natural to them, especially because it's a topic of moral importance. Calls for civility can deny and attempt to invalidate the outrage which is warranted by the nature of the criticism and often of what is being criticised. Calls of civility in this context say that this topic is not a topic where that kind of strong feeling is justified and puts the critic on trial for their (warranted?) anger.

However, civility towards others should be the basis of most people's politics, the recognition that it's guaranteed that people don't think the same should lead people to the conclusion that treating people who think differently from you rudely can only lead to its prevalence in discourse. Rudeness towards others fosters tribalism, close-mindedness, ignorance and activates nearly every psychological barrier to listening to or understanding others. Incivility towards structures needs to be earned and incivility towards people needs to be earned. But again I don't get to dictate for others, when it is or isn't earned.

Since the radical left's ideology based around postmodernism orientates itself around issues to do with race, gender, LGBT, oppression, inequality and so on, every political issue is an issue which warrants outrage and is an issue which can't be compromised on. And so with you and many others, the fair exception for incivility is just the new norm. How you are uncivil is the totality of how you communicate your political ideas.

The issues are always high-stakes and anything less than the strongest criticism for apologists or offenders is an unpleasant compromise. If you truly think someone is defending something you believe that absolutely must be stopped then what kind of speech isn't justified? What if a substantial percentage of people are part of the problem?

There are so many different contexts, and ways of being uncivil, different intentions and what else accompanies it, there's no way to address them all. When I call for civility, it's because I don't think the level of incivility has been earned and that's the issue. I'll treat someone I think of as racist harshly and that's justified but if you call someone racist, I'm unlikely to buy that and when you treat that person bad with aggression. I feel like you're being unreasonable and disruptive, I want that person to be able to have a seat at the table but I wouldn't feel that way about someone I thought was a racist. I wouldn't have asked for civility if I thought they didn't deserve it.

No, no, this is quite off topic. I'm not here to address Israel. I'm just using discourse around its genocide of Palestinians as an example.

Then yeah, your conclusion follows from the logic: If you correctly, 100% understand the reality of the situation and all those stupid wrong people that keep insisting on civility when there's genocide and racism everywhere then they're pieces of shit and they need to shut up and get in line.

But I could do the same right back at you: Every government in the world is committing genocide against its minority populations and you need to STFU and get in line. I better not hear dissent. Burn everything down.

I feel like I could make the case for this one under your definition of genocide.

I agree with the OP I was just trying to take the discussion a little further.

Some highlights:

[*] "Civility discourse enforces a false equation between incivility and violence that works to mask everyday violence as a civic norm. The violence that is polite is thrice as damaging as the direct attack because it gaslights as it wounds".
[*] "Calls for civility seek to evade our calls for change. The accusation of incivility is a technique of depoliticization aimed at undoing collectivity... When they tell us to be more civil, we need to go bigger, ask for more, come back harder".
[*] "Civility is a political aesthetic that obscures its politicity by asserting that it is “only” an aesthetic or a style. It is thus an aesthetic that is served by the assertion that aesthetics and politics are separate realms". — StreetlightX

One can be aggressive toward powers that be while being fully civil (reasonable and not rude). Tree huggers and water protectors, as only two examples, do it all the time. Aggression and civility are not mutually exclusive, especially when the aggression is defensive. Where propaganda enters is when tree huggers and water protectors are deemed uncivil strictly on grounds that they violate the prevailing status quo.

And that leads us to deeming war-mongers civil and pacifists uncivil. Only here do your three highlights begin to make sense.

The movements started by Gandhi or MLK, both of which violated the prevailing authoritarian norms of the day, would have gone nowhere in the absence of their civility.

If "incivility is anger directed at unjust civil ordering" it's difficult to object to incivility, and urge civility, isn't it? On the other hand, if it's merely rudeness, offensiveness or insolence (as "incivility" is typically defined) then the "Eleven Theses" don't seem so compelling. — Ciceronianus the White

I think the text perhaps suffers from not differentiating between different aspects of civility. The historical connection between the rules of "civil discourse" and the maintenance of structures of power seems clear to me. The English language remains a particularly striking example of this. But non-adherence to the rules of civility as established by the privileged is indeed frequently used as a method to minimise the influence of the marginalized.

Yet any kind of conversation does need some standard of civility to allow ideas to be exchanged effectively. Perhaps we need to distinguish between the ad-hoc civility of a conversation and cultural standards of civility?

However, civility towards others should be the basis of most people's politics, the recognition that it's guaranteed that people don't think the same should lead people to the conclusion that treating people who think differently from you rudely can only lead to its prevalence in discourse. Rudeness towards others fosters tribalism, close-mindedness, ignorance and activates nearly every psychological barrier to listening to or understanding others. Incivility towards structures needs to be earned and incivility towards people needs to be earned. But again I don't get to dictate for others, when it is or isn't earned. — Judaka

Perhaps we could call this "emotional civility", based on the respect for others as humans, rather than the performative civility of not using certain words etc.

Dismissing content of what others say in favour of dismissal is a pretty common human tendency, especially in politics. What you said in the OP seems like an example of that but nothing particularly insightful. What an I missing?

The Elves are very civil!

That is, civility isn't some 'neutral' position that merely concerns 'style' while the substance of political argument is elsewhere. Rather, the demand for civility is political from the get-go: it says, only these claims are worth entertaining, while these others are not. Couple this with the fact that 'civility' is always the privilege of those who are not affected by issues - or at least are comfortable with them - it basically puts the ball in their court and keeps it there. — StreetlightX

I think this is really wrong-headed. When I say "hello" to someone on the street, when I open the door for someone, when I speak calmly about important issues, when I say "thank you" when I buy something, I am setting the stage. I am expressing my understanding that we are all here together as a community and that I intend to treat others with respect. It's an act of recognition.

Is courtesy often used hypocritically or cynically as a rhetorical weapon? Yes, of course. Is it ever ok to raise your voice and yell out your anger? Yes, of course it is.

the war criminality of Donald Rumsfeld and most of America's political leadership) — StreetlightX

Criticizing the words and actions of Donald Rumsfeld and recognizing the consequences of those actions is not the same thing as gloating over his death. The problem with hatred, anger, and vitriol is that, in most cases, it doesn't lead to the best solution to the problem at hand. You see that now in the US. The hatred and resentment have taken over and become more important than the issues that generated them.

There are so many different contexts, and ways of being uncivil, different intentions and what else accompanies it, there's no way to address them all. — Judaka

Your post makes a good case.

"liberals individuate; radicals collectivize" — StreetlightX

I would like to point to two types of ‘radicalized’ or collectivized thinking. The first hews closer to Marx than to Foucault and even maintains remnants of Christian moralism. It does so by seeing power as held by certain collectives. Foucault, instead, sees only differentials of force that flow though , form and reform subjectiviities as a social process, but are never merely possessed by individuals or collectives. Why is this difference important for the political understanding of incivility? I think the Marxist-inspired radicalism relies on a blameful finger-pointing moralism. If power can be invested i. groups , then those groups can be seems morally culpable band treated as such. This is the condemnation and accusation that those accused of injustice perceive as incivility.

An example of the non-moralizing radical alternative that comes to mind is Ken Gergen’s socialconstructivist approach.

In 1999 he penned an article about identity politics:.

“By and large identity politics has depended on a rhetoric of blame, the illocutionary effects of which are designed to chastise the target (for being unjust, prejudiced, inhumane, selfish, oppressive, and/or violent). In western culture we essentially inherit two conversational responses to such forms of chastisement - incorporation or antagonism. The incorporative mode ("Yes, now I see the error of my ways") requires an extended forestructure of understandings (i.e. a history which legitimates the critic's authority and judgment, and which renders the target of critique answerable). However, because in the case of identity politics, there is no preestablished context to situate the target in just these ways, the invited response to critique is more typically one of hostility, defense and counter-charge.

In its critical moment, social constructionism is a means of bracketing or suspending any pronouncement of the real, the reasonable, or the right. In its generative moment, constructionism offers an orientation toward creating new futures, an impetus to societal transformation. Constructionist thought militates against the claims to ethical foundations implicit in much identity politics - that higher ground from which others can so confidently be condemned as inhumane, self-serving, prejudiced, and unjust. Constructionist thought painfully reminds us that we have no transcendent rationale upon which to rest such accusations, and that our sense of moral indignation is itself a product of historically and culturally situated traditions. And the constructionist intones, is it not possible that those we excoriate are but living also within traditions that are, for them, suffused with a sense of ethical primacy? As we find, then, social constructionism is a two edged sword in the political arena, potentially as damaging to the wielding hand as to the opposition.”(Social Construction and the Transformation of Identity Politics)

“For are we not all, in a Bakhtinian sense, akin to polyphonic novels, speaking in multiple voices, reflecting multiple traditions? If we inherit a pluralism of moral intelligibilities, on what grounds could we select among them - save from the standpoint of yet another inherited intelligibility? And, finally, if moral deliberation is inherently cultural, then in what sense are we justified in holding individuals responsible for the humane society? Isn't individual blame thus a mystification of our condition of interdependence?

“If we do envision the impulse toward action as a byproduct of relational engagement, we may also refigure the institutions of blame and responsibility. For if we hold single individuals responsible for their actions, we again position ourselves symbolically as God - here the supreme judge of good and evil. And in our godlike form, we effectively deny our participation in the culture, treating ourselves as the overseeing eye, suspended above the acts of mortals. In contrast, if we envision action as a relational outcome, our sensibilities are horizontally recast. Specifically, a stance of relational responsibility is invited, one in which we approach heinous and egregious action with a curiosity of context. That is, we broaden the network of participation, to consider how the relationships in which the erring individual was involved (personal, mediated, and environmental) have brought about such an end. And, as we broaden the relational context so as to include multiple others, so should we consider their relationships and how they impinge on the actions in question. And if our concern is sufficiently great, we may eventually reach the point in which we realize our own complicity in the action. Blame and responsibility are thus distributed within the community, and indeed the culture. We are all invited thereby to join together in actions that would establish more promising future. (Here, for example, we might consider our own participation in the problem of drugs, rape, homicide, and joblessness).”(Relational Humanism)

The historical connection between the rules of "civil discourse" and the maintenance of structures of power seems clear to me. The English language remains a particularly striking example of this. But non-adherence to the rules of civility as established by the privileged is indeed frequently used as a method to minimise the influence of the marginalized. — Echarmion

I'm not certain what you mean by "civil discourse." Certainly words used, accent, the use of slang, are taken by some as determinative of status. That may be particularly the case with the English language (or at least the English); I don't know. Napoleon famously called Talleyrand "shit in a silk stocking" (in French, presumably) and was thought by Talleyrand to have bad manners ("A pity so great a man should have such bad manners" or words to that effect).

Do the rules of "civil discourse" prohibit the use of insults? If so, how does that "minimise the influence of the marginalized"?

Interesting response. I generally work not to intentionally insult people or be hectoring in any discussion. Dialogues don't work when they get abusive or uncivil and there is nothing more boring than the ritual of combative internecine tribalism. I won't interact with people who are repeatedly abusive. Mainly because there is enough grandstanding and name-calling in the world already without adding to it. Privately I may call someone a duplicitous cunt or a carpetbagging pissant, but that's just for my own amusement.

Civility, wooo-ooooo! If civility is bad, what? Shall we have no more civility? The first thing we do, let's kill all the civilians!?

Shall we require of all of our public figures that henceforth they no longer be civil? No more civility; we can't have any civility here. And shall we practice in private what we urge in public? Not keep but rather cut out a civil tongue? Take to carrying with us stones, bats, clubs, knives, guns to our social or work encounters?

What kind of nonsense is this thread?