You didn't address the question of whether and why something he wrote was ensured (if it was censored). — Bitter Crank

His objection is general and he should have read the guidelines and he's gone anyway. If anyone has a specific issue with something being deleted and tells us what that is, we'll look into it.

The idea that our not allowing morons, Nazis, trolls etc to have free rein to disrupt conversations here, drag them off topic, and spread stupidity and poison all over the place with their 'arguments', is immoral and undermines the forum is incredibly wrong-headed. If you want to foster quality, you need to enforce standards.

It's a moderated forum as almost every other philosophy forum is. You knew that when you signed up. Or should have. But no, that doesn't mean we take sides in debate, it means we moderate according to the guidelines. And there's no reason that both sides of a philosophical debate cannot be carried out without breaching the guidelines. Which guidelines are, in fact, in place to facilitate productive debate. Though maybe you didn't read them or you would likely have noticed the concluding paragraph.

"The above guidelines are in place to help us maintain a high standard of discussion and debate, and they will be enforced. If you feel from the get-go that their very existence impinges on your right to free speech, this is probably not the place for you."

This is ridiculous. — Posty McPostface

If there's one thing you definitely shouldn't get upset about, it's other people's reactions to your suggestion they shouldn't get upset about stuff.



It's probably barbarous not to care about anyone or anything, but I don't think that's the same thing as not getting upset about things. You could not get upset and still care and do something (win-win), and you could also get upset and still do nothing (lose-lose). Being upset or not is not the crucial determinant of morality here.

:100:

...if the US still has some remains of rule of law and a justice state or if it has turned into a banana republic. — ssu

The White House is now releasing doctored videos as a pretext to banning reporters it doesn't like, which is amusingly Banana-Republic like, particularly as it's such an obvious and clumsy attempt at deception.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/11/08/white-house-shares-doctored-video-support-punishment-journalist-jim-acosta/

In the doctored version, it looks like the reporter karate-chops one of Trump's minions. In the real version said minion tries to wrestle his mic off him and he simply struggles to hold on to it. Welcome to the keystone cops' propaganda unit. :D

No, that's not the way it works in a society with norms of communication that are generally accepted and agreed upon. It's about as sensible as saying that the claim that 'this paper stuff I have in my hand is dollars' is purely subjective, or the claim that 'Donald Trump is the President of the United States' is purely subjective.

I guess it's based on the obvious falsity that being offended is always a choice as if if someone came up to you on the street and shouted "get out of my way, you cunt" you could somehow choose not to feel anything at all. As if there isn't a visceral system of physical defense that is triggered by a verbal attack that has real physiological consequences beyond the immediate control of almost every normal human being. As if it's the offended person's fault that they feel offended rather than the offenders because they choose to feel bad. Et voila, a get out of jail free card for racists, sexists, homophobes and miscellaneous verbal abusers everywhere. After all, they are the real victims just exercising their right to free speech while their targets are the real culprits with all this passive-aggressive being offended!

Claiming that you are offended is just a passive-aggressive way of limiting free speech. — Harry Hindu

Claiming that claiming that you are offended is just a passive-aggressive way of limiting free speech is just a passive-aggressive way of defending a bad argument.

"Colored: DATED•OFFENSIVE
a person who is wholly or partly of non-white descent."

Google.

You're allowed to mention the Nazis. You're not allowed to laud them or to be one. Hope the distinction is clear now.

Jeremiah requested he be banned a few months ago on the basis of not being able to control himself. I didn't accede then because I thought he could. As it turned out, I was wrong.

Banned @Jeremiah for disruptive troll-like behaviour.

Tins of canned ham at the border must be shivering in terror.

Not given, but strongly implied. — unenlightened

Yes, making it a poorly put-together question.

Attempts to moderate this discussion into something productive have apparently failed. So, closed.

Can you send that message by PM next time please? Along with my bank account details.

@Jeremiah Stop trolling.
@khaled Please ignore him.

Trump has now condemned the pipe bombs. I doubt that took much moral courage, and I doubt it means much. Being an empty know-nothing full of unfiltered stupidity and a huge platform from which to propagate it to his fanbase of similar ignoramuses who see their own vices magnified and rewarded in him and worship him for that, he will continue to say enough random stuff on every issue to cover just about every base that needs covering. And so on it goes and will go... Meh.

Your error is in assuming that Trump has any moral anything. — tim wood

His lack of morality is nothing new in politics. His open disdain for morality is. At least we all know where he stands. I.e. everywhere and nowhere.

I hate nazi forums. Sorry there's no other word for it. — Limitless Science

Fascist?

This particular case seems an arab's burden. — tim wood

It's not because that implies (despite your protestations to the contrary) that Arabs in general are in some way responsible for the murder, which is absurd. Besides which, Arabs are not even one community in any sense except under a rather arbitrary geographical designation with some cultural commonalities. Like Europeans. So, are all Europeans tainted when the head of one European country orders a murder? Is that my burden being a European? Answer=no.

What's even worse was their bombing of a bus full of Yemeni school children (with American bombs). Odd that no-one gave a shit about that. But whatever gets people to wake up to the hideousness of this regime, I'm all for. And yes, this "Arab guest" angle is a perverse way to approach the issue @tim wood. This has nothing to do with Arab culture and nothing to do with being Arabic in general. It was (or at least the evidence strongly points to it being) a purely political act not beyond any brutal regime regardless of origin.

It is clear that the arabs - and given who they are, are until repudiated representative of all arabs - have betrayed themselves in the betrayal of their own customs. — tim wood

This is not about the "Arabs", it's about the Saudi Arabian government. Just as criticism of Israel is not about the "Jews", it's about the Israeli government. Blaming "Arabs" for something that was likely directed by the leadership of one (of many) Arab states and drawing conclusions of hypocrisy with respect to their customs on that basis is a very unfair generalization. It's about as sensible as blaming Irish people for something the Welsh government did because we're all Celts.

It's my time you'd be wasting. Again.

I'm all for that frank. But you're conflating criminal and social penalties. In the case of social penalties, it doesn't pervade or Weinstein would still have his job. That's just reality.

As has just been explained to you frank, this is standard practice in developed countries, not only the US but across the globe. In developing countries, it's much more likely nothing will be done wrt those in positions of power.

In the case where there is a huge weight of likelihood of guilt, especially in a case of sexual assault, the accused should be removed from a position where he or she can repeat the abuse.

But I did not say without qualification or context:

that it's more just to fire accused people than it is to keep them. — frank

And in fact I made that clear when I said:

I don't believe careers should always be ended because of accusations and certainly not without questions being asked. I've stressed that already several times in this thread. — Baden

Do you understand yet frank?

Is this fraud unethical? — Bitter Crank

It's fine to keep publishers on their toes for the sake of academic standards. But the idea that everything written in the field is nonsense because these journals messed up is as silly as their mistake in accepting the bogus articles in the first place.

You either quote where I said that or stop saying I said things I didn't say.

Most Americans approve of Weinstein's firing because of the very high probability he is a sexual abuser/rapist. That's just a fact. And if you can't quote me to support your argument, then yes, you are done.



I think in this case it simply refers to two or more people who disagree with frank.

Where did I say anything about a "mob"? Quote me.

Again, a strawman. I don't believe careers should always be ended because of accusations and certainly not without questions being asked. I've stressed that already several times in this thread. Now try dealing with what I actually said instead of pinning your projections on me.

I dub thee the Forum Moses. Praise be! :pray: :cheer:

If I'm innocent, this scenario describes injustice. — frank

Obviously. And if you're found guilty in a court of something you didn't do, that's an injustice too.

I'm informing you that in my society, though it may happen, it's considered to be wrong. — frank

And I'm informing you that that's an absurd claim. Again, Harvey Weinstein. Who thought it was wrong when he was fired and not presumed innocent? Almost no-one, and rightly so. Of course, if he's innocent, that's unjust, but the huge weight of likelihood of his guilt makes doing nothing the unjust course of action.

I struggle to understand how you could imagine justice has no meaning outside a courtroom. — frank

Strawman. I obviously don't think that. In fact, I think justice has little meaning in a courtroom in a country where the judges are often political partisans as many are in the US.

Are you capable of addressing any of my arguments and explaining why you think I'm wrong?

If the money keeps disappearing from a till only you have access to on your shift, there's unlikely to be a presumption of innocence until you're convicted in a court of law, but much more likely to be a firing that no-one except you will object to. The presumption of innocence applies to criminal penalties not to how we deal with people in terms of hirings, promotions and firings where we apply common-sense probabilities. Again, this is not to argue that Kavanaugh was guilty, but that the (mostly) conservative presumption of innocence spiel re him is just a convenient distraction that is not applied by them in analogous non-partisan contexts.

There's certainly an odd false association of money and status with good character as if those things have any necessary connection at all.

(That doesn't necessarily mean Kavanaugh shouldn't have ultimately got the position, but that the arguments against his being reconsidered for it were often partisan distractions.)

The claim is not that you rushed to judgement on Weinstein but that you made a sensible and uncontroversial judgement (along with just about everyone else) for which conviction in a court of law was not a prerequisite. As Un pointed out, suspicion is enough to justify caution, and the greater the suspicion, the more justified the caution, with cautionary measures justifiably including removal from a position of power or prevention of the attainment of one. Conservative bloviating re Kavanaugh notwithstanding, that's a simple common-sense approach that should be applied to political appointments in a bipartisan manner.

(And before I get strawmanned I don't think the cases are the same in detail, but the principle is.)

Funnily enough, I didn't notice conservatives pulling out the 'innocent until proven guilty', 'let's pretend nothing happened', card wrt Harvey Weinstein. Then again, he was a liberal. The pretence of objectivity here is tiresome.