RE: Tolerance for Dissent on Extropians
From: Joe Dees (joedees@addall.com)
Date: Sun Aug 05 2001 - 02:13:40 MDT
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> "Lee Corbin" <lcorbin@tsoft.com> <extropians@extropy.org> RE: Tolerance for Dissent on ExtropiansDate: Sat, 4 Aug 2001 20:46:20 -0700
>Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org
>
>Joe Dees writes
>
>> [Lee wrote]
>>> In most cases that I've seen, those pile-on "attacks" have
>>> merely been *many* people expressing their take.
>>
>> And you don't think these people talk to each other, and
>> each cheer what the others write, and egg each other on?
>
>Yes, they do. So what? You cannot suppose that your own
>ideological allies don't do the same. Moreover, it doesn't
>really matter if they egg each other on or not. What matter
>are the tone of the discussion and the logic of the arguments.
>
When you get sent 1200 emails in the space of three days filled with inane comments and bald insults, they are not playing a quality game, but a quantity game - it's called 'overwhelm'.
>
>>>AND TALK ABOUT TAKING NO PRISONERS. Look at what you wrote, Joe.
>>>Now honestly, do you not perceive that---even in the slightest
>>>way---your criticism could just as easily be directed at your
>>>own post? May we not lower the level of denunciation just a
>>>little *here*---just for a while (I'm not calling for complete
>>>elimination of denunciation, by any means).
>>
>> Of course the level of denunciation was high; I was giving a
>> doppelganger object lesson in what I have been repeatedly
>> dealt; phrases like 'pinko social collectivist hand-wringing
>> bleeding heart commie LIBERAL".
>
>Yes. There has been some of that. But I think damned little;
>though here one's impression would depend heavily on whether
>one was the target. By the way, thanks very much for discussing
>this further without any more name-calling. "Getting even" only
>makes things worse, and accomplishes nothing more than ensuring
>that your ideological adversaries pigeon-hole you.
>
Their nature seems to be to pigeonhole everyone who does not agree with them in every particular as either hopelessly dense, a clueless dupe or a bright but malevolent ringer (see my posts on the structure of extremism, to which they took immediate and vociferous offence, even though they were not named in them). Anything but a person possessing rational reasons for not becoming an acolyte at theri ideological altar. If you were around when this was happening onlist you could not make such a (damned little) statement.
>
>>> Let's count the emotionally loaded words in this. (First, you *were*
>>> warning Eric about the libertarians on this list, I was not in error.)
>
>> Please cite the post in the archives; I honestly don't remember doing so.
>
>A thousand apologies! I cannot figure out why I thought *you*
>wrote it. It was Tiberius Gracchus who wrote it. He send it
>at Sat 8/4/2001 6:46 AM:
>
>"Oh my. The extropians are not gonna like you. They are going
>to call you a troll and a socialist."
>
>No wonder you couldn't remember it!
>
Well, I'm somewhat relieved; I considered that I might have eaten the wqrong hamburger!
>
>>> Okay. 1 - by those trolling 2 - slander 3 - "self-righteous-wing"
>>> (I think that Joe means right-wing).
>>
>> I mean self-righteously right-wing - the secular equivalent of the religious
>> right, and just as absolutist, messianic and condemnatory.
>>
>>> And then there is the statement about his adversaries being (or
>>> projecting) logical incoherence and not being rooted in factual
>>> reality. Your typos would diminish if you became less emotional
>>> in all of this; you are among friends, I assure you.
>>
>> It was no typo;
>
>Yes, it was, I was referring (and I quoted) the following:
>
>> Such sellf-righteous-wing people seem to have a highly developed sense
>> of psychological projection which proves to be rootless with respect to
>> logical coherency or factual reality. I have even been told by one...
>
>:-) So I'm not completely crazy, there are two "l"s there. Small typo, I guess.
>
Oh, THAT typo; I thought you meant a grammer or syntax error.
>
>>> Yes! Good, right! I have seen libertarians do exactly what you
>>> say. They'll effectively dismiss arguments and posters by sentences
>>> containing such terms *without* supplementing those phrases by
>>> rational explanation. But then, on the other hand, some people
>>> write things like "socioculturally ludditic conservatives", etc.
>>> So, you see, it happens from all quarters.
>>
>> I'd have to drop a Spruce Goose load of such denunciations to go to even begin
>> to tilt the balance towards something remotely resembling parity around here.
>
>Well, I've not seen much of it lately. Anyway, name-calling unsupported
>by argument needs to be dropped from everyone's behavior. But again,
>isn't it objectively true that there are quite a number of posters with
>collectivist and socialist leanings? Naturally, one should make clear
>at least in context what one means by such terms; here I mean by
>"collectivist", state-sponsored actions on a large-scale for purposes
>of redistribution of wealth or on-high enforcement of majority-decided
>moral norms of the non-traditional variety (e.g., outlawing some kinds
>of personal freedoms that were, say, usual in America in 1850, e.g.,
>discriminating against whomever you pleased for whatever reason you
>pleased). Same, I think, for "socialist".
>
>Or do you consider those just insult words. For example, calling anyone
>a "fascist" or a "racist" on this list is quite wrong and is name-calling,
>unless you back it up awfully well. This is true because not a soul
>admits to such a description. But if you do as I have done, to wit
>(in reverse) by, e.g., saying that some people have made racist
>statements, then it of course has to be demonstrated by quoting the
>precise source. So do you think that "socialist" and "collectivist"
>as adjectives are often misapplied?
>
I believe that they are the intended moral equivalent, to those who use them, of employing racial and/or ethnic slurs, just as nazi name-calling is.
>
>Lee
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