113. Memetics & Punching Nazis | THUNK 

The highest praise imaginable for this topic. Thank you! :D

Same. I used to say that people using violence against someone for their ideas alone are no better than nazis. Now, I'm not so sure anymore.

First, Nexnaught said "Now, I'm not so sure anymore.", not that violence is always okay. This is not an argument where it's either mass violence or complete peace. You can't directly compare the mob violence at Berkeley with one person punching one other person. The entire argument here is that things aren't black and white. Second, can I have a source for that antifa stat and the election. Did they poll people with the question "are you against facsism?". That seems like an unlikely statistic to know. Third, what does the vote even have to do with this argument? Richard Spencer was not a candidate and he was not punched solely because he was working on advocating for Trump. The election doesn't have any (or a much less significant) place here. If someone is arguing that protesting the election with violence is okay then you can use that against them maybe, but here we do not know the motives of the attacker. He could've been against Trump and took it out on Spencer or he could've hated Spencer because of his views, which seems more likely in this case. It's not even necessary for this argument to rest on the attacker though. This is about it being sometimes acceptable to counter extremely radical view with violence, even if this specific attack was not acceptable.

I think what happens after that is your slippery slope fallacy takes us to punching everybody. I'm saying there is a distinction what happened in that mob and what happened to Spencer. He has been very vocal about his opinion and the person knew exactly what he punched him for, without misunderstanding. The girl did not speak her views and was misunderstood while being caught up in something that got out of control. Obviously punching Hitler would not have done anything, but that is not what I'm arguing here. There are so many factors involved here that it is impossible to argue against this case, especially because it's at a much larger scale of global politics. As I said I'm not saying that it is always okay. This is a very subjective argument and cannot be fully discussed through RU-vid comments.

Thank you very much! Glad you enjoyed it! :)

+jaocheu That's a pretty liberal interpretation of "unrestricted," neh? ;) I agree that context is important - that "free speech area" sign from the National Park Service definitely seems like a good idea.

I'd submit that, if nobody knew who he was or what his ideas were, he wouldn't have been punched in the first place! The whole thing that I'm opposing here is the idea that memes & physical attacks may be cleanly separated - there's a continuum of actions which may result in harm, & propagating harmful ideas is self-evidently on it somewhere (as is politically-motivated violence). Would you claim that people are imprisoned for incitement to violence because no rational arguments against their positions exist?

leaving nazis alone to spread their hate is never a good idea

The ends do not justify the memes.

*laughs in 2021*

You're right, I should have clearly stated that it's not universally accepted. I thought that introduction, critical analysis, & then use of the memetic model as an explanatory tool would detract from the overall point. I'm not sure I follow your assertion about memes being definitionally devoid of teleology - could you unpack that?

By teleology in this context I just mean ends (purposes) not limited to reproductive fitness. Most biologists notoriously reject the role of teleology in biology, and particularly non-reproductive ends. Viewing the exchange of ideas bewteen people interms of reproductive fitness might expkain why some children abhor listening to their parents, but it fails to acknowledge the role ideas have played in art and religion and science to help us explore and understand the world.

I guess I don't get how "memes play a role in these phenomena" is mutually exclusive with "memes compete & prosper based on their fitness." Just as with artificial selection, if a meme's useful to humans, it spreads, no?

THUNK the point is that the "fitness" of ideas is much broader than biological fitness, at least as it is typicalky construed. To put it simply and crudely, not all discourse is about getting laid.

>not all discourse is about getting laid You must not have known me when I was a teenager...

+Koroistro Right on.

Obligatory: MBTI isn't nearly as meaningful as most people think it is. ;) I've never taken the real battery of tests to know my M-B for sure, & I've heard that the online ones don't really count. The most recent ones I remember placed me as borderline INTJ/ISFJ.

Absolutely! Satire/parody can be viewed as a sort of anti-meme; it's totally possible to displace the original semantic content of an idea with a new one, or even an opposite one. (See: literally.)

Oh dude thank you! I was thinking of poetry as one way to do it; especially after reading Langston Hughes' "Kids who die" satire on the oppression of African-Americans in 1938. One line that comes to mind is how the oppressors "Eat blood and gold" as a way of saying they eat on money and the blood of the oppressed.

performative*

1. We punish defamation, malicious falsehood, and incitement to violence with a range of legal responses, including (as stated) jailtime, which entails a use of force. It may be qualitatively different from using force to "kick the shit out of someone," but that seems like a minor quibble. 2. Claiming that one's ideas are explicitly nonviolent doesn't somehow release one from responsibility for violent consequences resulting from those actions, including the potential use of force (see 1). "I'm just swinging my fists here! I don't intend to hit anyone!" isn't a reasonable defense, neh? 3. I didn't advocate for any changes to law, but more directly to your point: the war on terrorism is a clear example of a 100% legal use of lethal force to combat an ideology. It's already legal. Again, the only thing I'm defending here is that "political violence should be avoided at all costs" isn't a tenable position when faced with the reality of how intrusive & damaging memes can be, political or otherwise. If you're OK with someone going to jail for incitement to violence, even if they don't perform any violent acts themselves, you're already on-board with that idea!

(TL;DR: political violence is bad and you still haven't justified it) 1. (a) I dont know about the US but in the UK incitement isnt normally punishable by jail time - none of those are thats why I gave them. The fist two are torts, the theoretical legal response to which is to put the claimant in the position they would have been but if not for the offence against their person. As for the criminal offence of incitement, the normal response would be some combination of fines, community service orders, rehabilitation orders, and/or banning orders (restricting someone from entering a city centre, for example). Bar threats to kill combined with aggressive actions or finding an offensive weapon on their person, jail time is a highly improbable response to incitement. In no example is the propagation of a meme met with physical violence, even if that meme causes specific damage. (Side note, in hindsight "kick the shit out of" was quite aggressive language; I just found the mental image of a Lord Justice (www.thetimes.co.uk/article/judicial-moves-do-new-boys-mean-a-new-era-vht8hp0whc7) physically attacking someone amusing) 1. (b) I would have to disagree with you; the difference between physical assault and imprisonment as a method of punishment isnt a "minor quibble". Physical imprisonment is the restriction of a person's fundamental freedoms awarded to them by society in recognition of their human dignity and innate value as a means of punishment through social ostracisation. It involves the use of force in the NAP sense of you dont have the right to say no, but it is fundamentally different to causing actual bodily harm to someone for the sake of punishment. Would you welcome the return to lashing as a form of criminal punishment, i wonder? 2. Except it does. To say that someone acting violently in the name of an explicitly non-violent ideology is the fault of that ideology completely removes the individual's agency. Ultimately you alone are responsible for your actions. The Dharmic religions actively promote an ideology of ahimsa (non-violence against all living things); would you be so quick to tie violence in the name of Buddhism to Buddhism rather than associating it with the actions of a single deranged lunatic, or are the rules different for ideologies you don't like? Because i suspect they are. 3. 100% use of lethal force to combat an ideology or 100% use of lethal force in self-defence? The coalition forces which invaded Iraq and Afghanistan to combat Al-Qaeda and later Lybia and Syria to fight ISIS are not at war with the political ideology of Islam, or even the political ideology of the Wahhabist and Salafist sects of Islam, they went to war to proactively and retroactively defend themselves against a group of people who explicitly wished to *destroy* the way of life of these countries. Saudi Arabia, despite being the key exporter of Salafism hasnt been the target of Western bombing campaigns. Why? Because the meme isnt what is being attacked through violence its the group using violence justified by that meme.

Yes, I am procrastinating writing an essay, how did you guess?

tl;dr - Political violence exists on a spectrum of harm that is all bad, and memes are on there too. 1a. I'm not incredibly familiar with UK law, but I think you guys don't have an explicit legal right to free speech in the first place. I think the point is made even if a bobby were to drag someone away from their podium for incitement to violence - that's physical force used to combat ideas. 1b. The line that's most frequently drawn is "physical force," & I think it's the most defensible one; at what point in gently pushing someone over a cliff does it suddenly become OK to retaliate with blows? If someone moves to lock you in a room & leave you to starve to death, are you not justified in punching them? Personally, I wouldn't endorse lashing, but I think that many convicts would opt for 40 lashes & immediate release to continued incarceration - make of that what you will. 2. What makes an ideology non-violent? Is it explicit claims of non-violence? Is a religion "of peace" which includes principles which lead its followers to violence really what it says on the tin? I think this gives too much credit to verbiage & not enough to content. (And yes, I think violence in the name of Buddhism can be tied to Buddhism.) 3. It's the war *on terrorism.* Not on Islam, or on Salafism. Several recruiters & organizers for terrorist organizations have been killed, despite not (definitively) having killed anyone themselves - what's that, if not targeting the ideas motivating terrorist activities?

+Sam What's the essay on??

+Lalo So do you believe that defamation laws are inherently wrong?

+THUNK I've rewatched the video and just realized how complex this issue is. No, no I do not believe that, I now see how misuse of speech and written text can be used to harm the reputation or even physical well-being of others by manipulating the thoughts of people so they take action while you yourself sit back and "enjoy the show". That is usually due to an information asymmetry, namely that in that case people don't know they are being lied to. Same with shouting 'fire' in a crowded theatre. The main problem I have with simply forbidding every opinion wich could be harmful is that it can be very damaging in terms of actually knowing the truth of facts that can or have been misused to do evil. For example, dividing homo sapiens into a couple of subspecies in and of itself is not evil, but atrocities commited in relation to that cannot be justified, accepted nor tolerated in any way. However, to forbid every statement of opinion on this matter which is not mainstreamly accepted on basis that such data can motivate people to use violence is very unhealthy for a scientific pursiut of truth. I for my part wouldn't like to be the one being held responsible for the stupid BS some idiots did in my name. But who gets to check wether someone defames someone else or if he/she acally sais what he/she actually beliefs and can back it up argumentatively? The government? That could backfire very badly.

THUNK Anti-defamation laws prevent people from saying things which are *factually* incorrect in order to harm someone else. If the statement cannot be proven to be both false and willfully false it isn't defamation. These laws have little to do with disagreements of opinion, they are about the facts. As much as I abhor this guy's opinions, they are merely that, opinions. And if we as a society condone violence against people with opinions different from our own, we are tacitly saying that a) we don't feel like we can argue against those opinions with our own and/or b) we believe our opinions are factually correct and will not tolerate dissent against them.

I realize that some of these things get lumped together in common discourse, but "Fighting ideas with physical force is sometimes OK." is not the same as any of the following: "Society should condone violence against people with opinions different from our own." "We cannot argue against those ideas." "We believe our ideas are factually correct." "We will not tolerate dissent against our ideas."

I highly recommend the John Stuart Mill piece linked in the description - that dude knows what he's on about.

Absolutely! I agree that freedom of speech was essential for the rise of abolitionist ideals in the US, & that it's a valuable thing that should be protected! I think the problem isn't that might sometimes makes right in memetic warfare (as is self-evident from history), but that some assert that resorting to physical force is categorically different than spreading harmful ideas - sometimes, ideas call for a physical response.

Might still does make right, though. Or, "right," as I don't believe it is actually correct, but I am using the same phrase you did. Even using the example of black Americans, we had to use the military to get them into schools. This was almost 100 years after abolition, and for that almost 100 years black people were subject to theoretical rights but not practical rights because law enforcement had a pesky habit of deciding that white people killing black people wasn't worth investigating. The Nazis right now do have standing because we hjave a system in which we have allowed their might to push around anyone who isn't them. We allow r terrorism against abortion clinics, police frequently will not investigate crimes against LGBT people (and until recently,m we were a category of crime called "No Humans Involved," or NHI, which as been used as well for people of colour), we justify the shooting of unarmed black people, including those already restrained and in custody. Right now, a good number of Americans are subject to the will of hate through violence. If that's not "might makes right," then what is it?

You claim the Nazis have a system that give them power, those crimes were under Obama, so is Obama a Nazis? But let me get underline fear I have with THUNK, and what I see coming out of the states universities. "Sometimes, ideas call for a physical response." is justifying physical responses against people who don't agree with you. In a free society, you debate with people you disagree with, and in front of a crowd of people the better idea wins. If you lose, maybe your in the wrong. Winner being who sways most the crowd. If Hitter and a moderate debater was on stage, the moderate debater will win. Hitter and the Nazis had a group of people called the Brown shirts or Sturmabteilung go around using violent and intimidation to shut down or in a way "no platform" their enemies. That is a sign of a group that needed violent to win an argument. And its the same bloody tactic I see being used by the so called "anti fascist". This is the formula being used. Justified violent against Nazis, paint you enemies as Nazis, use violent against your enemies. And anyone can be painted as a Nazis, just look at what WJS tried to do to PewDiePie. I'm not a American only an outsider, but I could also say violent is used against people with "Make a american great again" hats. In the Berkeley riot I saw a video of a girl who was talking to an interviewer get pepper sprayed by someone in the crowd, and a man hit over the head repeatedly with a flag pole. I've also seen a man pulled out of his car and attacked. Again at Berkeley I saw a fight break out between anti-trump and trump crowds, and the police did nothing! I also saw a anti-trump protester steal a flag saying "free speech" and burn it. So when I was talking about "Might equal right" I meant in the battle of ideas. Might would be the strong crowd destroy the weaker crowd, instead of a debate where the best idea wins on its own merits.

I said Nazis have standing because of a system that benefits them, I did not say Nazis created the system nor that it was a Nazi system. The followup of "is Obama a Nazi" was already tenuous, because most of what I described wasn't under Obama in the first place, but the link gets worse when you consider what I actually said. Also, while it could be a coincidence that anti-semitic, anti-Muslim, anti-LGBT and anti-POC crimes have been going up under Trump, it is interesting you try and tie these things to Obama. To the contrary, I don't think it's the Nazis who are the real problem. It's a far larger and more dangerous group: what Reverend Martin Luther King called "white moderates." People who would, to paraphrase King, seek to maintain a negative peace. And while your clarification is appreciated, it changes nothing. We live in a society where might does equal right. In a free society, ideas do not win on their own merits because human beings are programmed to win rather than to be correct. This is the reason we have the imbalance we do in the first place: people operate under the idea that the "free market of ideas" will lead to the best and the brightest, but it ends up with the mental equivalent of those cheap DVD players you can buy at Wal-Mart that break in a week. But again, the thrust of the video was that ideas aren't inherently separate from actions (using the example of memetic vehicles), and the actions I described were the result of the ideas you describe. "Debating" the "other side" has led to a position of treating both parties as equal, which you did when you equated systemic violence against minorities to some instances of violence at Trump rallies and someone stealing a flag. Do you really think false equivalence is making the best case? The system in place doesn't favour the best ideas. I mean, unless you think Stormfront being the most popular hit on Holocaust searches until Google stepped in and changed their algorithm promoted the best ideas. Or that anti-vaxxers and climate change denialists get more exposure than scientists in relevant fields who have a better. It has presided over the rise of the alt-right and "alternative facts." It's also why people like me have an average life expectancy of under 30 years. Your ideals benefit hate in a real, practical sense.

"False equivalence" you say? I don't see any different in a black man punching a white man or vice versa. The different I see is people trying to justified one side. BLM movement start in Obama's time as president, so that's why I mention him. He had 8 years do fix the problem you mention, and he failed. You also seem to believe violent against minorities is some how worst than against a majority, another idea I see floated around. Well guest what, Hillary won the popular vote, by definition Trump supporters are the minority. You may ague Trump supporters have more power. Well they don't in California. For the violent against those groups going up after Trump won, I don't know I'd need to see some stats. But I did see allot of crimes that latter turn out to be false. I remember there was a woman who lied about someone pulled of her hijab in a subway. We know its was a lie because she didn't go to the police, she when to the media. And when the police got involved she was forced to come clean. I mention the burning of a flag saying "free speech" because I found it so shocking to see in American, and it shows there really is an anti free speech ideology. Which is what you are arguing. You say by supporting the free market of ideas I support hate, well by supporting a free market of ideas I also support your beliefs and all beliefs, to give them a chance in being heard. You claim it leads to "cheap DVD" ideas. That's is your opinion. In my opinion the only way to find the best ideas. Another idea you mention is that by debating them you some how make them equals. If they draws the same size crowd as you do, they maybe your equal, at least in power. If you want to defeat them, defeat them in a debate. If you attack them with violent, you only empower them as martyrs. If you keep attacking them, they attack back, and that where the might is right comes in. You claim your system favours Nazis over other ideology, I ask "How?".

+Tiko Nelson Definitely.

It seems that you're lawful good! ;) I would submit that simply because a particular use of force to suppress speech/memes is supported by a government does not make it right or wrong in and of itself - there are examples of both discretionary enforcement & tyrannical restriction. One can certainly suggest that the rule of law is an important value to be upheld on its own merit, but *someone* has to decide what the law ought to be! The power of taboo is certainly part of this discussion. Unfortunately, memetic competition has honed cultures & societies to be very, very good at constructing & maintaining norms in minds - so long as either exists, I think it's pretty inarguable that norms & ideas which contrast with them will inevitably arise. And that's not necessarily a bad thing! For the sake of stability, taboos against murder (for example) are great news! If that's true, the question isn't "how do we destroy taboo," but "what taboos do we want in place?" And I think that taboos against scientifically disproven or historically harmful ideas are probably a good place to start. I mean, you're essentially advocating for a taboo against violence in response to memetic warfare. Do you think that's contradictory?

Perhaps I was just viewing it from a deontological framework rather than a consequentialist framework. That regardless of the merit of removing certain things from society that we deem taboo, the means used to do so must be strictly limited to some acceptable response that we agree upon as a society universally. In this sense the law prevents biases against certain memes that challenge the status quo, bad or good. I stand by my taboo against violence in this regard and suggest instead that fire must be fought with fire. In some sense though it must be felt that the insurrection of harmful memes must be dealt with so that it does not harm the whole (like a tumor in the body). I would still submit that the comparison isn't entirely apt, because unlike a tumor, dissenters can be persuaded or at least ignored, since I imagine few if untouched would actually lead to serious consequences. But as for systemic growth of harmful memes? I would prefer a system that ruled by the common consent of the people, but if the people as a majority attach themselves to ideas too radical to accept, what then? I'm not sure I have an answer, perhaps other than to find a new people.

Great commentary. I certainly share your anxiety about the polarization & taboo-ing of certain political beliefs with material consequences, but IDK about our current situation being a case of "politicians gaining power over what we're allowed to say." I wring my hands a fair amount about false memes that require some threshold value of understanding to debunk with facts (e.g. racism) & needing to re-defeat those memes for every new generation that gets exposed to them, especially in climates favorable to their spread. :-/

​@@THUNKShow Thanks for the reply! That's a fair point. Memes can make it halfway around the world before the facts can get its pants on. But I think censoring bigotry (which every platform unanimously thinks is a good idea) is a horrible idea. "Sunlight is the best disinfectant" - discussion, not censorship, kills bad ideas. Censoring the alt-right gives them a pass to justifiably shout "1984" when they get deplatformed. Also, kids will always be attracted to the forbidden fruit, and at this moment the forbidden fruit is reactionary conservatism, which should be concerning for liberalist thinkers I think! Btw I just found your channel and I've really enjoyed binge-ing the backlog! Keep up the great work!

I thought that the image of Hitler here would have made the point clear: we physically attacked him for his political beliefs & their effects. It's right & necessary to do so sometimes, obviously. I agree that the "Anyone should be able to..." position, as stated, is totally indefensible, but I've heard people legitimately argue against every conceivable consequence I can imagine (including refusing to associate or losing one's job). There are definitely many more defensible viewpoints along the long road to "punch the Nazis," but the idea that using physical force against someone who hasn't used it first is *never* justified because "attacking" is categorically different than "expressing ideas" isn't one of them. (I also think that the First Amendment, as written, isn't anywhere near sufficient to define what sorts of ideas ought to be protected - that's why the SCOTUS has spent the last 230 years qualifying & clarifying it!)

I don't agree that we attacked Hitler for his beliefs or even for the expression of those beliefs (or even the effects, but more on that below). If we attacked Hitler for his beliefs, then we should attack or imprison people who express the same beliefs as Hitler, but we don't. We agree that certain forms of speech should be illegal, but I don't think we agree on the reason why. I don't think that the reason we should make certain kinds of speech illegal (e.g. incitement to violence) is because of their effects. If the principle were, for instance, "any speech of the form X that is found to have at least Y% probability of leading to violence should be illegal", then that could potentially include drawing cartoons offensive to Islamic fundamentalists. Sometimes when cartoons of Muhammad are drawn, violence follows. So, you could say that the violence is the effect of the speech. That doesn't mean we make the speech illegal. When someone makes a direct incitement to violence, I don't think the reason this should be illegal is because of the effects it is likely to cause. I think it should be illegal because the *very thing* it calls for falls outside the bounds of what you have a right to do. What would be the point of protecting that speech if the action it specifically calls for is outside your rights to carry out? You don't have a right to use violence against people, and you don't have a right to advocate for using violence against someone. If the reason direct incitement were illegal was because of the effects it is likely to cause, then you could easily argue that it should be illegal for someone with lots of supporters to say racist and hateful things toward someone because this is likely to cause their supporters to go attack that person. You could say that certain philosophies or ideologies should be illegal because of the effects they are likely to have on society. (I'm surprised to hear that people would say there should be *no* consequences, even of the social variety, for expressing abhorrent ideas. We agree that's absurd.)

>If we did, then we should attack or imprison people who express the same beliefs as Hitler. The Germans do, & I don't think it's clear that they shouldn't. The legality of these acts is another matter, & I don't think they're necessarily equivalent to their morality. I disagree with you about the law being motivated by something other than outcomes, but that's a whole different can of worms. The SEP page linked in the video description succinctly covers some of the problems with free speech coming in conflict with other rights - I highly recommend it. I think that there's definitely a right to use violence against people if the situation calls for it. We even have legal provisions for "fighting words," which speaks explicitly to the issue at hand. (Whether those provisions are moral or not is, again, debatable.) I've seen people shaming others for defriending people on FB for abhorrent political views. It's a pretty common sentiment, I think.

> I think that there's definitely a right to use violence against people if the situation calls for it. I'm curious, then, what principle you use to determine when violence is called for (I'm assuming you mean state violence, not vigilantism). In my example of someone drawing cartoons that offend religious fundamentalists who then carry out violent attacks in response, should that speech (the cartoon), in your view, be illegal? If the principle is that we focus on the *effects* of the ideas, consider that drawing cartoons might even be a stronger predictor of resulting violence than direct incitement. For example, if I tweet out "someone should kill Bob", you might only predict 0.1% chance that anyone does something violent to Bob, but if I draw an offensive cartoon, you might predict a 90+% chance of subsequent violence. I'm saying the former speech (direct incitement) should be illegal and the latter should be legal because "likely effects of an idea" is not the relevant criterion for legality. Do you disagree? I'm very curious to know which of these two specific actions should be illegal and why.

That's an interesting discrepancy - the phrasing "someone should X" is generally considered to be legal, even for illegal X's. (See: www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/07/secret-service-online-threat-president/399179/ ) I'm a little confused by your cartoon example - the incitement to violence being discussed is violence malevolently directed at some target, not a general manifestation of violence due to some unwise action. (If this were part of the equation, we'd be forced to make tripping on one's own shoelaces illegal, which doesn't make a lot of sense.) Do you have something more realistic? I think that deliberately misleading someone into accidentally killing themselves ("Nope, the gun's not loaded.") should also be illegal, does that help?

gngndthg jyhhf lol, "peaceful ethnic cleansing"? You actually believe that bullshit?

Spencer may or may not be a literal Nazi; that's kind of orthogonal to the question of whether or not punching Nazis for being Nazis can be justified. I apologize if referring to him as such was confusing.