Quote from Negator_402 »You need to learn to write without personal attacks or invectives. Your voice is so weak.
No, the 4th Amendment applies to government search and seizure. However, absent a burden of proof, the public opinion pillory becomes a witch hunt. Gee, did we ever have a history of people being black-balled due to empty allegations on a sensitive subject? Oh yes, the MCCARTHY ERA!
I ask you, on the topic of harassment: who marches in our streets and claims to punch people who are "Nazis"? Is it the "Alt-Right?" No sir, its the Alt-Left. There is no "Punch A Communist" or "Punch A Mujahideen" movement in the US, is there?
It's funny, because your posts include plenty of personal attacks directed at other posters, which I have avoided. Why are you so triggered by this?
By the way, there IS proof, which is why the offending video got taken down by Youtube for violating ToS.
Dude, the inflation rate is DOWN this year. This is understandable if you know anything about how inflation actually works, because when the economy loses money inflation goes down. The stimulus checks were a drop in the bucket and did little to counteract the severe downward pressures on inflation. That doesn't mean that the prices of certain products that are experiencing bottlenecks haven't gone up, but they haven't gone up do to inflation (the relative devaluation of currency over time as the amount of currency grows) but due to scarcity and the resultant price gouging. Many things that add to costs have gone down, such as the price of fuel which reduces the price of shipping, raw materials as producers of those materials are forced to sell for less money as demand plummets, etc. There's no evidence that magic, or the sort of products lgs' sell, are being impacted by scarcity pricing. Neither are rents going to go up as much as they usually do, because landlords face the problem of finding tenants to fill the space at a time when tenants are having trouble paying. Landlords have an incentive to wave rent and write it off as a loss rather than leave the store empty and still not get rent, because they at least keep a tenant that has proved reliable until the pandemic.
This is going to be a hard year and many stores will go under, but it won't be THE END. Also keep in mind that COVID is a perfect storm virus that can be spread easily, is hard to contain, and is dangerous enough to matter. Something like SARS1 or MERS doesn't spread as easily, is quickly noticed and easy to track, and can thus be contained without these kind of measures despite both being far more deadly. These kinds of diseases aren't the new normal, COVID-19 is best though of as a century disease, the sort of thing that will show up about once every hundred years. Medical advances mean any given disease is less likely to be a century disease (flu used to be a great candidate but our knowledge of it and ability to quickly develop targeted vaccines means that even a flu like the Spanish flu is unlikely to rise to the level of COVID-19), but increased exposure to animal sources means our exposure to new diseases has increased and spread is easier due to globalization, so things sort of even out.
I mean, the cards still exist, he already got paid, why can't you run them? They aren't themselves offensive. He's just not going to get any future work.
I don't like this current culture of division. Healing is in order, I hope I haven't harmed with my words here. Can we at least find that common ground of "agreeing to disagree"? [/quote]
Here's the problem with that sentiment when applied to this situation: what Theresa was doing was actively feeding a culture of division. There is no middle ground on anti semitism. There is no middle ground on bigotry. There is no middle ground on people like Alex Jones. You either support that crap, or you don't. Wizards even tried to find a "middle ground", it would have started commissioning her again if she just stopped publicly supporting that crap. She couldn't. She continued to support some of the most extreme voices out there.
An open, diverse, and tolerant society where it is possible to agree to disagree without hating each other for it can not afford to tolerate the kind of crap she was, and is, supporting, because that crap is directly opposed to an open, diverse, and tolerant society where we can agree to disagree. Healing cannot happen while those views are accepted and tolerated, because those people will continue to sabotage any attempt at healing. Because healing is not what they want. They want division. They want those they disagree with silenced. They want groups of people harmed. They don't want a plurality of viewpoints to exist, they want only their viewpoint to dominate.
Despite what people with a persecution complex like mystic may assert, this isn't about Democrats vs republicans. There's plenty of room at the party of ideas for conservatives and republicans, and to equate bigotry and the most extreme far right voices with republicans, as mystic did, is slanderous to republicans. Alex Jones does draw some of the most extreme republicans, but also many libertarians and even some extreme leftists. There are leftist anti semites. Ice Cube is rightly getting crapped on for his bizarre anti semitism (though I still haven't figured out what that ******* black cube is supposed to mean). There's also a difference between being transphobic and not being pro trans. Not wanting to have sex with a trans woman isn't transphobic, believing that your birth sex is your gender isn't transphobic, repeatedly declaring that trans women aren't women and it's all mental illness IS. The difference there is it goes beyond your personal beliefs into attacking trans people. Criticism of Israel for it's policies isn't anti semitism, criticism of Israel based on anti Jewish sentiment or stereotypes is, like the tweet from Cynthia McKinney (a former liberal Democrat btw who rightly has been shunned within the party for anti semitism, before becoming a green and then most recently a libertarian) that Theresa like was doing. Louis Farrakhan is guy that does a lot of good work in the black community, but he's a raging antisemite that is as vile as anything on the right in that regard, so when a Democrat occasionally rubs elbows with him due to his work in the black community they rightly catch heat for ignoring his hatred of Jews. Its usually republicans who point that out, and the absolutely should.
Cool slippery slope fallacy bro, you spent a lot of words to end up saying nothing of worth.
When all you have are what ifs, your argument sucks. What if wizards cuts ties with an artist for having nude photos? Well, a reasonable person would say let's have that discussion IF it happens. An unreasonable person, or a person arguing in bad faith, would want to have that discussion when it hasn't yet happened, in order to avoid actually discussing the topic at hand.
Also it's not a disagreement over politics here, it's promoting bigotry, and endorsing conspiracy theorists who are actively slandering real people.
Again, it really boils down to having the mental capacity to differentiate between what's a reasonable scenario and what isn't. Some people, like you apparently, either cannot do this or find it easier for their arguments if they pretend like such discernment is impossible. It's actually something that most people can do. A reasonable can pretty easily discern a difference between buying into conspiracy theories that don't have much real world impact (like those surrounding the JFK assassination or Roswell or AREA 51), and conspiracy theories that deal with ongoing things and have tangible real world impact, such Alex Jones Sandy Hook conspiracies, which are libelous and which lead to the harassment of grieving families. You may think that the latter is harmless, but the law would disagree with you as the chubby conman has had to pay lots of money after it was found to be libel and promoting harassment. Reasonable people would also draw a distinction between both of those kinds of conspiracy theories and the kind that are designed to promote hatred of a group, especially since the latter have time and again led to atrocities against the groups they target.
You can make this argument about pretty much everything you listed. No, liking Kevin Spacey movies isn't going to get anyone fired. That is such an unreasonable idea that if it ever did happen, the pushback would be so immense that the company would have to reverse course. Even bringing that up as a poor attempt at reductio ad absurdum is just sad. Acting like Kevin Spacey, though, will get your ass fired, and rightly so.
Getting fired for nude photos? This one actually happens sometimes, and typically is met with severe pushback that leads to the decision being reversed. Turns out that when you fire someone for something unreasonable and it becomes public knowledge it's super bad publicity and that same "mob" that so many posters are crying about jump on the company and pressure them to give the person their job back. Now, if you're fired because you are actively doing porn, thats more likely to stick, because its often going to violate a few clauses in your contract. For an artist, if you get let go because you drew some porn years ago, thats going to draw backlash, but if you get let go because you are drawing porn under you real name while under contract to produce art for a company that wants to promote a family friendly image, people are generally going to see that as reasonable. Although Phil Foglio was able to do his thing without getting nicked (until his art style fell out of favor).
I could go on and address every inane what if you posted, but that would be beating a dead horse. The reason the slipper slope fallacy is so stupid is that people are actually pretty good at determining where they would draw the line. The reason it has emotional resonance is because it allows the person making the fallacy to present ideas the other person would find objectionable, but that's also why the slippery slope is a fallacy, because people will find those things objectionable anyway. As long as people are able to draw the line, they will. That's why authoritarian regimes first focus on removing the ability for their citizens to draw the line, so that when they get to the crap their citizens object to they don't have any recourse.
Look at your argument in the opposite direction. You asked how far do we go with what's ok to cut ties with an artist over, as a means of trying to show that accepting TN being cut for the stated reasons is unreasonable and will lead to a slippery slope. I can just as easily, and just as foolishly, ask you, who objects to TN being cut adrift by wizards for these reasons, what reasons you WOULD find acceptable to cut ties with an artist over. Sure, endorsing antisemitism is ok by you, but what if she starts marching with a tiki torch shouting "Jews will not replace us"? But that's a dumb argument that should be insulting to you, and I'm not going to seriously engage in it, because I know you'd have an answer on where to draw the line, and simply by having an answer you'd demonstrate the inanity of the fallacy. What you're actual answer is is irrelevant, because that's a matter of opinion that people will disagree on based on their personal tolerance for various behaviors, but having an answer, being able to draw that line, means that you aren't stupid enough to fall to the fallacy you are pushing. Perhaps you think that those you disagree with actually are stupid enough to fall down the slippery slope, or maybe you just haven't given it much thought.
This I agree with. She's a great artist, and the best case scenario is that she comes to her senses, makes amends in some way (hey, she's an artist, she actually has a means to create something beyond a short half apology). She donated art to people who push the anti-Semitic trope ridden Soros conspiracy, she can donate art to a cause that fights against that sort of thing, or auction are to raise money for a charity that supports some of the people she endorsed hatred against. Then she gets a second (really third) chance.
You shout "keep politics out of Magic!" but your sig is all politics. Nice.
First, those "screamers" are customers. Second, for all your (fake) concern about engaging with the argument instead of attacking the person, all you seem to do is attack those you disagree with while ignoring the argument. Why don't you engage with the ideas that the people on twitter are expressing, that Nielsen's views are repugnant and wizards shouldn't employ people who retweet antisemitic rhetoric, instead of just snidely dismissing them with insults. One can only infer that you don't actually care about high minded discourse, you only want to use it in bad faith as a shield for people who express terrible beliefs because you don't want them judged for those beliefs, but are damn fine judging people for their beliefs when you disagree with them.
By the way, I DO enjoy her art a great deal. Her style is superior to the generic cgi sameness that plagues modern magic and her skill is phenomenal. Too bad she went crazy and can't stop endorsing terrible people and antisemitic tweets. I also enjoy: Kevin Spacey's acting, James Woods acting, Mel Gibson's acting, too bad Spacey is rapey, Gibson is a racist ********, and Woods is just such an enormous douche canoe that he kills his own brand for me.
WAAAHH, people disagree with me so I'm oppressed.
No dude, free speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences for your speech. It means that you are free to speak your piece and the government can't stop you or punish you. It does not mean that your employee cannot fire you for violating its policies or saying things that embarrass it, that people can't shun you, that people can't crap on you on the internet for what you say, etc. Of course, because you don't actually give a crap about free speech, this doesn't matter to you. You'd rather paint people who disagree with you as a "screeching mob" to be dismissed and feared, and suggest that their engagement in their own freedom of speech to decry the offensive speech of others, and Wizards freedom of association to distance itself from toxic or controversial artists, should be curtailed to protect people you agree with from any negative consequences from their speech. That's not a defense of free speech, its a wish to help your beliefs dominate the conversation. You don't just want freedom for those you agree with, you want a privileged position for them.
Like screaming mobs?
No. What makes freedom of speech worth a dime is the ability to speak your mind without government interference or oppression. Freedom of speech is curtailed, rather than enhanced, by what you suggest, because freedom of speech DEMANDS that people be allowed to react to speech. Denouncing certain speech, disassociating from people who espouse certain ideas, forming opinions based on speech are essential. Asserting that you should be able to say whatever you want without consequence is the attitude of a petulant child. Nielsen wanted to add to the conversation by retweeting some vulgar crap and endorsing some terrible people. You do that because you want to influence people's opinions. Well, the thing about speech is that you may want it to influence people's opinions in a certain way, but there is no guarantee that it will do so, and it may influence people's opinions in an unintended way. She may have wanted to get people thinking there may be a point Cynthia McKinney's anti-semitic rhetoric when she retweeted her, or to get people who respect her to see Infowars and other nonsense as reasonable sources of information, but instead her exercise in speech just caused people to form the opinion that she's an idiot with reprehensible beliefs, and that they don't want to pay for her art anymore. Oops, she played herself.
Again, no. What you are seeing is literally just the back and forth that occurs in a free society. Taking a controversial position entails risk. That's why when someone takes a controversial stance that is later proven right they are considered brave, because they faced consequences for bucking the system to fight for what's right. When people do the same for obviously terrible ideas that are proven terrible by history, they suffer the same consequences but are never vindicated, and find far fewer people willing to come to their defense because their views are indefensible (and those that do must hide behind generic bromides about free speech because even you can't defend her beliefs).
"And that is a massive problem."
No it isn't. It encourages you to think before you speak, to learn the art of circumspection and to formulate your ideas so that when you do endorse them, you do so in a way to put them in the best possible light, with the best ability to be convincing. For controversial ideas that have merit, this has the idea of strengthening the arguments in support of them by encouraging their proponents to actually put in the work. Thoughtfulness and diligence are virtues, not least when it comes to speech. And it gives a chance for people to actually think about the ideas they want to endorse. When you try to put your ideas in their best light and make the best arguments in support of them, you must look at your own ideas critically, which has the side effect of making people with bad ideas, like antisemitism, interrogate their own ideas and possibly realize that maybe they shouldn't hold them in the first place. Laziness and recklessness invite negative reactions to speech. They harm the cause of noble ideas.
Which is the opposite of how things work in the real world. In the real world, where people smarter than either of us who actually study extremism and terrorism to better understand and prevent it, isolating extremist ideas and driving them underground lessens their spread and lessens the radicalization of those who hold them. In practice, those with extremist ideas will mostly encounter people who disagree with them, and not have their ideas reinforced, and will rarely be pushed to adopt even more radical versions of their beliefs, and are far less likely to engage in terrorism (as terrorism is usually the end result of a long process of radicalization and egging on by other members of an ideological group, even so called "lone wolves"). Allowing radicalism free reign, rather than attempting to isolate it, normalizes the ideas and makes them more acceptable. It also exposes more people to the ideas, growing the number of people who subscribe to the ideas, and allows those people to interact with each other more frequently, allowing them to reinforce their beliefs and encouraging each other to further radicalize, and eventually leads to terror attacks once violence becomes an acceptable means among the group as the most radical members continue to egg each other on. When I speak of groups, I don't mean organizations, but ideological groups. Your assertion is basically the opposite of how radicalization works in the real world, whether we are discussing terrorism or state sponsored extremism like Nazism or Islamism.
The Holocaust didn't happen because Nazis were silenced and they got all pissy in their basements, it happened because antisemitic attitudes weren't crushed in their larval stage in Europe and kept fringe, but were allowed to propagate and become acceptable in polite conversation, to become normalized and accepted as attitudes that reasonable people could hold even among those who disagreed, and once that happened antisemitic conspiracies were able to jump into the political mainstream in Germany, and to then start informing public policy. You don't quash this ***** when they start loading up the trains, you don't do it when they start making people wear patches, you don't even do it when a major political party starts endorsing it, you do it whenever it rears its slimy head.
Which is, frankly, a childish attitude that ignores that the ideas that people like me are choosing to disrespect and refusing to countenance are ideas that explicitly disrespect people. You can't logically argue that we should respect Nielsen for disrespecting Jews and trans people. The reason she's in hot water, the reason she no longer does magic art, is because she endorsed anti trans and antisemitic statements, and endorsed outlets that promote such. You, ironically, want me to be respectful of her but give her a pass to disrespect entire groups of people. That's one of the things that makes antisemitism, transphobia, and other vile ideas fundamentally different from a mere difference of opinion. Once your belief system requires disrespecting the humanity of people, your beliefs are no longer entitled to respect, and you open yourself to earned disrespect. By endorsing such things, you reveal something awful about yourself, and people will judge you based on it. She let the world know a fundamental flaw in her character, because endorsing antisemitism, transphobia, etc reveals a fundamental flaw in your character. People will judge a person based on that, rightly.
Its an immature and shallow idea to believe that you can ever separate the speech from the speaker. What we say reveals things about ourselves and our values, which reveals insights into our characters. And judging people by the content of their character is right. Not just a right, but right. It is indeed the only thing by which we have any right to judge a person by, and it is adaptive to do so both as individuals and a society. People should be able to respectfully disagree on most topics, because most of the time a difference of belief doesn't reveal anything bad about either person's character, or at least in most cases there is a benevolent explanation for the belief. A person for higher taxes and an increased safety net reveals that they care about the poor and those in need, while a person who advocates for lower taxes reveals they care about the ability for a person to improve their own lot in life and keep the fruits of their own labor. A person who is against a war reveals they are against the taking of human life and martial aggression, while a person for the war reveals they care about the safety of their nation or the human rights abuses being carried out by the country being invaded. A person for the death penalty reveals that they care about justice and restitution for the victims' families, while a person against the death penalty reveals that they care about innocent people who are executed or that they don't feel it is always abusive for a dispassionate government to kill someone who is already rendered a non threat. Obviously, plenty of controversial topics can and should be discussed respectfully. But certain positions, namely things like antisemitism that dehumanize groups of people, always reveal something rotten about the person who holds them. It might not be a deep rot, and it might be fixable, but its there, and by expressing those beliefs people reveal it to the world.
You see extremists keeping their odious beliefs to themselves as pandering to societies norms. I see allowing extremists to openly spout their garbage without push back as society catering to extremism. The dog wagging the tail is normal, the tail wagging the dog is wrong. What you propose is that society cave to the extremists, that we keep quiet about our own views against them. We've tried that before, the results are always disaster.
And btw, when the "twitter mob" overreaches, it gets smacked down. Plenty of people have been declared "canceled" to no effect because the "cancellation" meets with push back. Usually its over a trivial matter or a grey area (and that's the typical result for trivial matters and grey areas), or something proving false.
You don't know what guilty by association means. Got it.
The other reasonable conclusion is that those who think that he's only half as clever as he thinks he is are being too generous in their assessment by half.
I'm sorry, I couldn't understand that over the blaring sound of your hypocrisy. You are so concerned about an artist not getting paid by a private company to make art for them because she endorsed anti semitic rhetoric, anti trans rhetoric, and supports conspiracy theorists that engage in the same. You turn a blind eye to those things, which actually promote violence and have, in the real world, inspired crimes against vulnerable communities, and instead choose to cry about a person who espouses their views losing support over it. Your priorities are completely twisted.
And no, you aren't taking the high road by suggesting that you just want people to engage with the ideas instead of attacking the person. People are engaging with the ideas, they find them toxic and don't want to support people that espouse those ideas.
Nobody is calling for her to be oppressed by the government for her idiotic beliefs. Wizards has determined that her promotion of such radical ideology does not give with the image they want to project. Wizards customers have determined that they do not want to support such a toxic ideology.
America is a free country, you can say whatever you want, and that means that people can crap on you for saying it. Free speech doesn't mean saying whatever you want without being judged for it. If you say stupid crap, people will think you're stupid, and it's your fault for providing them with the evidence.
She liked and retweeted anti semitic rhetoric. That's not association, it's endorsement. Before you get your panties in a bunch, it's not just right wing antisemites she endorsed, but left wing ones to.
Nice screed, but the guy admitted to being a sexual predator. He didn't let go for his beliefs or opinions, he got let go because he's accused of sexual assault and has both admitted to using his position to coerce people into sex and understanding that it was a supremely *****ty thing to do.
If you think this sort of behavior wouldn't get you fired from your own job, assuming you have a job, you're nuts. Defending this guy and suggesting he should keep getting his art commissioned by wizards is your right, but it's my right to point out how that makes you garbage.
"Anti semitism isn't evil, it's just an opinion you should respect. Not wanting to pay for art by anti semites is evil, only insane people would think that way!"