I also think that saying "Donald Trump is racist!" can be productive,fwiw.

Political correctness started on the left, but it seems to have dug its claws into both sides now.

There's also this weird SMP like obsession that every poster and every post must be treated with equal respect and zero context. Like bahbahmickey's 100th link to chain mail quality site or wil's 10th vile and bigoted treatise must be treated the same as the person who presents a well thought out post that you disagree with must be treated the same as a new poster who just "randomly" found the politics forum on a poker site and mashes out poorly spelled thinly veiled racism.

Those all get treated differently by regs on this board and it flummoxes them, just zero social awareness.

This is the thing that pisses me off about NPR. They have excellent reporting, call it like it is. But Republicans could be raping babies on Route 92, and they would just report it in that inoffensive, singsong voice they love to use for everything. "Democrats object to these actions, calling them inhumane. The time is six o'clock." ~smooth piano riff~

Lol, we still have nothing substantial to discuss, because you have not identified anything to discuss. Just making broad statements with no evidence of my "racist intentions" doesn't leave anything for me to dispute.


Nobody is arguing not to call out racism. Just that to have productive discussions sticking to calling out ideas and actions not personal attacks is better. Again, why is there a first rule in here?
You've become confused. I'm just pointing out there have been many posters who have called me racist in here, and there was absolutely nothing productive about it. Nothing to dispute, just pure personal attack allowed in a safe space built for people who enjoy personally attacking whoever they dislike. It doesn't bother me much anymore, but I can still argue the hypocracy of it all and how it makes productive conversations with the people we need to convince mostly fruitless.

FoldN I think that was a typo, they called you rapist not racist

What do you think they were trying to produce, and what should they have been aiming for instead?

I agree.

Haha, nice twist. But what you're admitting is that you find it productive to run off people you disagree with on racism. You should really listen to that Glenn Greenwald podcast.

I didn't require he be banned or run a off, just that he be removed as an official representative of this forum. That is not censorship.

I didn't say that was censorship, but you have told me before you prefer that racists shut up, and by purposefully enforcing the rules unequally as you admit, you have built a space where everyone you disagree with on issues of race, many who may be racist, many who are not, are not subject to the same rules as others you do agree with.

This naturally, over time, thins the degree of alternate thoughts and ideas, and you're left with a large majority of illiberal like-minded people who agree on certain truths that cannot be seriously questioned. It's much like a religious belief. A bubble. A safe space. I would expect an illiberal right-wing racist website to operate in a similar manner, only they would punish thought crimes by allowing personal attacks on anti-racists, maybe outlawing ONLY attacks using racist, sexist, etc.

If you listen to the fire.org podcasts, they discuss this sort of pius certainty found on all extremes where it just seems natural to exclude those with unpopular opinions or attempt to drive them off.

Man, eventually he'll have to take a break to eat dinner.

So if you can't call someone a racist and you can't call out speech as racist what are we to do when racists spout there ****? I'll admit I've been trained to ignore most of SMP posts but I would have thought they would have said what happens under their new rule.

As an aside, it's very amusing when SMP proposes new rules for forums they aren't wanted in.

Calling out an idea, statement or arguments as racist is not a personal attack, why is that hard to get? The rule could easily be enforced equally and everyone could still say racist to their heart's content.

OK, I'll bite. What are these 'certain truths that cannot be seriously questioned'? Let's do it! Let's finally have an "important" 'intellectual' productive discussion here...

I think you appeared to exaggerate. Calling people names can be very counter-productive while still resulting in some productive discussion and some very productive discussions, so wookie can point out he has managed some. It's also a bit more complex than that because as a means to provoke a debate it can be effective.

Rather than considering the problem as about personal attacks it may be more of a problem of personal animosity. Moderating personal attack then being a mechanism to try to prevent the animosity dominating the discussion/forum. Some may think animosity is a good thing which is where I disagree and would argue that it departs from mainstream liberalism.

Yeh, but what about the flip-side. We can't have a productive discussion if the usual suspects can just go ahead and derail the conversation with their Tone Policing even when peeps use the "That's R-word" formulation instead of the "You're a R-word" formulation.

How come you always play up one side of the problem, and always ignore the exact flip side of the same damn problem ??

Calling someone who says racists things a racist isn't either. But I'm still not clear how the dialog would go.

Bruce says Mexicans are Cockroaches
Poster A says Bruce is a racist and is banned
Poster B says what Bruce said is racist and is banned
Poster C says Mexicans aren't cockroaches, they are people and isn't banned?

That seems to be encouraging racist comments.

What? For the third time, I said you don't have racist intentions. I didn't figure that was something you would want to dispute?

Your entire response seems to be based on having twice misread what I wrote.

Hah, last time I tried that with you, you called for my head under some specious claim that the ACLU agreed with you, or that I couldn't comment that they clearly didn't because they aren't here or some argle bargle, even after I had spent a day showing you where they don't agree with you. I'll take a rain check on starting another discussion with you. Feel free to reread my posts and links if you want to learn why you're position is a threat to free speech. Start by figuring out how ludicrous an idea it is to believe the free speech advocates at FIRE are astroturfers.

Sorry, I meant "attitudes." You haven't given me anything to dispute on why you think I have racist attitudes.

What? I explained exactly what I meant.

I know what you mean, but it's pure conjecture with no evidence. As far as I can tell, you think my wanting the rules enforced equally is a racist attitude arguing for the civil rights of freedom of speech, the press? something else? What am I disputing to prove my innocence here, sir?

I'm about to open a bottle of champagne, make dinner, and binge watch Netflix. I'll attempt to clarify it for you later

Sounds good. I've got GOT to watch. I'm going to attempt the same. Everyone stop asking stupid questions for awhile.

Err no, you still haven't followed that conversation.



So that all was, amazingly enough, an actual productive and 'intellectual' discussion. That's what you've been looking here for... isn't it ??

Anyways... we Politard regs like to tease you SMP refugees about the odious BruceZ and his mental meltdown. But seriously, this whole Team #N playbook long predates that fiasco. There's always these mysterious "important" discussions, there's always these certain truths that cannot be seriously discussed. But... it always seems to remain a mystery, because... well reasons I guess, like someone 100 posts ago used the R-word, so zip-it-up, no can do.

OK, what if I promise not to be part of this "important" 'intellectual' productive discussion... I'll promise to not be a part, if you'd only spit out WTF these certain truths might happen to be... what can't be seriously discussed here in Alta Politardia? My curryosity is killing me