> Do you really think that's what people are complaining about here? Not the professors being fired, the well known economists being forced to resign? There was a professor who lost his status running a residence hall because he was on the legal defense team for someone despicable.
So the only actual example I was able to google here was the last one: and I have to say, is that it? A guy wasn’t asked back as a dorm administrator once he joined Harvey Weinstein’s legal team? That’s the “cancel culture” you’re talking about, in contrast to one of the most brutal and grotesque onslaught of police brutality in the west in recent memory?
Like you realise the protests were sparked off by a murder, right?
This is what I mean when I say it’s ridiculous. The Harvard guy didn’t even lose his job, for goodness’ sake.
> Everything the protestors are doing has probably set us back a decade.
Where did I defend or endorse the actions of protestors?
My point is simply that it’s ridiculous to think the main authoritarian crisis in the US right now is “cancel culture” when it is literally in the midst of a brutal police crackdown against protestors.
Also I’m sorry but it’s hard to take you seriously with regards to police violence when you didn’t mention a single thing the police did wrong in your list of grievances, but you’re happy to talk about the protestors.
> every major spike in crime due to police being defunded instead of retrained
This is not a view supported by the evidence.
> We have a legal and social framework for affecting longterm change and it works much better than arson.
The US has more prisoners per capita than any society at any point in history in the world. The police are armed and violent. And those systems which apparently work so well have been in place throughout all this. But maybe you should tell me more about how these systems work so well.
Also I’m continually amazed that Americans forget their proud history of violent protest so quickly. It always seems like protest against injustice was fine in some unspecified “past” but of course all of that Is behind us now and The best we can do is vote (vote for the party at least partly responsible for the state of the police today, by the way).
Wow, that was so nice of the police to let him lie down when he asked.
Then to thoughtfully apply a knee to his neck to prevent him from flying up into the sky if gravitational attraction were to suddenly reverse, so very helpful and just! And they kept at it for almost 9 minutes, such dedication to helping the public, wow.
> Like you realise the protests were sparked off by a murder, right?
And since then they've resulted in 17 deaths. Tit for tat? Were those 17 people guilty in that murder? Yes that initial act was wrong and we should address that, vandalizing businesses and setting federal property on fire has nothing to do with that original offense.
> it’s ridiculous to think the main authoritarian crisis in the US right now
You keep asserting this. You don't show evidence for this. What's the authoritarian crisis? That cops have qualified immunity? That's not new. Is it that you think poorly of the president? I think poorly of him too but he's not Mussolini.
You can't vaguely claim there's something wrong with a system and use that as an excuse for violence and destruction - especially when the violence and destruction isn't even targeted at the people you're accusing.
> you didn’t mention a single thing the police did wrong in your list of grievances
No I didn't because it's not relevant. You're creating a strawman when the reality of the situation is complicated. This isn't cops versus protesters and attempts to cast it as a binary problem is partisanship. If you're interested in solving problems instead of stirring up anger then your interest should be in understanding the problem and not polarizing sides.
> The US has more prisoners per capita than any society at any point in history in the world
That has nothing to do with this topic. Like, I agree that's a problem and we should address that by considering how we treat low level drug offenses, but it has nothing to do with police brutality and cancel culture.
> The police are armed and violent.
Police brutality has decreased mindbogglingly since the 1960s. Yes the police have more gear and we can talk about why it makes sense to do things like remove camo from their inventory and the pros/cons of using APCs, but that has nothing to do with canceling people and ruining their careers.
> But maybe you should tell me more about how these systems work so well
Violence is not something to be proud of. A violent victory for one person is a funeral for another. Violence is against justice and it deprives the accused of reasonable and rational defense.
You talk so much against authoritarianism, but violence is the fundamental tool of it. Courts and ballot boxes are the tools of democracy.
Wait---are you seriously not going to count the people the police have killed? What is wrong with you?
Regardless, my point was not that the protests are justified (although of course they are: for someone who claims to work in "police reform" all you have been doing is defending the police and demonising protestors), but that to not identify the militarised police force brutalising protestors as a more important sign of authoritarianism than "cancel culture" is ridiculous.
That's why I mentioned the protests were started by a murder. Because when you claim cancel culture is this huge problem, and mention a Harvard professor not having one of his duties renewed, I think it's relevant to show how grotesquely out of proportion it is with the George Floyd protests.
> You keep asserting this. You don't show evidence for this.
I'm sorry: in what capacity have you been "working for police reform"?
I'm really getting the feeling that that is an extremely inaccurate description of your job.
I haven't shown evidence for the police brutality in the US because I assumed you were aware of it.
Are you not? Do you not understand that police officers murdering peaceful protestors is an authoritarian crisis?
> If you're interested in solving problems instead of stirring up anger then your interest should be in understanding the problem and not polarizing sides.
All of the "solutions" for how to stop police violence which come from American police amount to (surprisingly) giving the police more money.
Kind of like how all of the "solutions" to gun violence involve giving more people guns (teachers, cops, etc.)
The way to curb police violence is to defund and demilitarise the police. This is what has worked in places outside of the US, and this is the only realistic approach.
This is not evidence for the claim that defunding the police causes a spike in crime.
> That has nothing to do with this topic.
Mass imprisonment is absolutely relevant to the question of the authoritarian nature of the police.
> Violence is not something to be proud of.
You can't think of a single instance of violent protest that you'd be proud of?
> You talk so much against authoritarianism, but violence is the fundamental tool of it.
It's difficult to take you seriously on the issue of police violence when you have yet to even acknowledge the horrific and obvious police brutality during the protests.
Rioters aren't protesters and there is nothing even close to "brutal" happening to the rioters. If anything, the state is showing remarkable restraint. Imagine if this shit was happening in China or Russia.
If you/they get what you want out of all of this, a neo-marxist-anarcho-commune-socialist-green-whatever, no-rules, but lots of rules enforced randomly by the mob, THEN you'll see real brutal-ism like you saw in CHAZ when the 'security' force gunned down two teenagers who were joy riding in a stolen car. The fact that current rioters have no real fear is because they know that the police are extremely restrained in what they do. Getting tear gassed or (rarely) hit with a baton/bean-bag is nothing close to what real brutality is.
Also, the fact that you are not aware of the deep reaches of cancel culture today is because you are aggressively conformist with your peer group so you only get your information from sources that are deeply filtered.
We're not yet living in George Orwell's 1984 either, but just because we don't live in the worst possible timeline with a Ministry of Love doesn't mean we can't criticize or ask for improvement of conditions or policies in society today.
To brush off the actions of the police in the US as "not even close to brutal" and "showing remarkable restraint" is beyond callous and demonstrates some pretty bad faith and a lack of empathy on your part. I will remind you that this started over the murder of a man accused of using a fake $20 bill, and __human lives are more important than property__.
I do not condone police escalation and I agree that we have seen examples of indefensible police behavior. But the fact that the "CHAZ security force" -- ostensibly the good guys who hate police violence -- shot two unarmed black boys within a month of being formed makes me skeptical that protestors actually know how to make policing less violent.
> there is nothing even close to "brutal" happening to the rioters.
If you aren't going to believe me, and if you're not going to believe your eyes with regards to the multiple clear videos of police brutality, then maybe you should listen to the multiple international human rights organisations which have called for an end to the police brutality?
I mean what would even convince you that the police are brutalising protestors? What evidence are you missing? Surely there is just as much evidence for the US brutalising its citizens as there is for China or Russia doing so? (I am not saying the level of brutality is the same, mind you)
To be honest with you it's difficult to have a conversation with someone so out of touch with reality in this way: if you can't see that the US police are brutalising protestors you're maybe too far gone.
> The fact that current rioters have no real fear is because they know that the police are extremely restrained in what they do.
How many people have the police killed since the protests began?
> Getting tear gassed or (rarely) hit with a baton/bean-bag is nothing close to what real brutality is.
You know people were killed by tear gas? You know people lost eyes from rubber bullets?
> Also, the fact that you are not aware of the deep reaches of cancel culture today is because you are aggressively conformist with your peer group so you only get your information from sources that are deeply filtered.
In contrast to you, the well-read worldly individual who gets their news from news.ycombinator.com.
Go on, then: tell me about the horrific cases of cancel culture which I was shielded from in my bubble.
I think it's a strong indicator when someone takes the most absurd or niche demand of a movement of millions of people seeking justice for some of the worst oppression and state violence as a way to dismiss the whole of that movement they're probably not operating in 100% good faith or they're consuming sources that aren't particularly balanced. Or they spend too much time on twitter, I'm definitely guilty of this, but twitter isn't the real world.
For example, I don't particularly care about the master/main debate about Github, it literally does not concern me, I do not care, but if people want it renamed, why not? And if someone thinks that demand (by whom, certainly not the protestors primary concern or probably even in the top 1000) is stupid why does that invalidate an entire movement to seek justice for people suffering horrendous violence?
These supposed cases of cancel culture just show how sad the lives of these supposedly cancelled people are.
In the UK there's supposedly a "trans mafia" intimidating journalists and beloved childrens authors. But there simply isn't, these anti trans obsessives think people commercially boycotting or calling them out are some malevolent oppressor. And they complain about it weekly to their audience of millions in the leading papers and magazines (Bari Weiss wasn't fired, she quit). Meanwhile in the real world trans people suffer huge mental health issues and violence, they literally want it to be easier to be who they are. I find the whole concept mystifying and can't begin to understand what it feels like to be trans. But trans people are telling us.
We should call people what they want to be called and make healthcare available to them. It's that simple. Someone is not being oppressed for not using the right pronouns they're being a jackass to vulnerable people and they should literally stop being obsessed with toilets. Life's too short, and if you're a poor African American or a trans person it's a whole lot shorter, on average, and anyone who uses rebranding food packaging to dismiss that truth is telling on themself
So the Rowling example is a good case here. She was defending a woman who was fired for personally, outside of work, saying there should be safe spaces for women off limits to trans people.
You can disagree with the original claim and there's a good debate to be had there.
But firing someone for a private opinion, and not one calling for violence, is not aligned with my values.
Yes, Bari Weiss did resign because she was harassed in her workplace and her employer refused to resolve the situation. It's one thing to disagree with a coworker, it's another to repeatedly harass and demean them. Bullying someone into quitting isn't a definition of Justice that I agree with.
If someone doesn't want to use a "master branch" than more power to them. On the other hand, if you're going to attack and insult me until I follow your request then it's not a request - it's a demand. My response will be to decline following your demand.
Yes, you should address people as they want to be addressed and not be a jerk. Someone not following that behavior.. should still be treated like a human being. You don't get to doxx them and send them death threats because you disagree with their behavior.
I think with the Rowling Forstater case there's a nuance that her contract was not renewed, rather than being drummed out of the office in the middle of the day [0]. When you have a job representing an organisation there are expectations of how you act in your public role in a job and I would fully expect making discriminatory statements to see me not employed at a company if I didn't make an apology for them. I'd also expect making statements that talked down our product, or belittled a colleague, to be a disciplinary matter, we are professionals after all and if you want shoot the breeze with friends and family, twitter probably isn't the forum.
On Bari Weiss I've not really been following it, from a distance it seems like attention seeking. She's a public figure with a huge platform, people used their free speech to call her an idiot (no doubt tipping into abuse as the Internet tends to and that's a moderation issue). But we have a right to call columnists thick as shit. We all have a right of reply, speech is free (though less so in the UK where pretty much anything gets you sued for libel by free speech crusaders like Rowling). Speech isn't free of consequences, it doesn't exist in a vacuum and discriminatory and hostile speech has historically preceded violence against minority groups. As my previous comment getting downvoted shows, being in the outgroup on a forum can suck, but people don't have to uncritically upvote me and give me the warm fuzzies if they disagree.
Edit: typing on a phone so it's hard to do a long form reply. On the master thing, like I say I don't have a strong opinion one way or another, I'm happy for github to change it if only because it's shorter. I don't think it's a particularly valuable cause or hill to die on and I don't know of an instance of the enraged mob tearing down someone for keeping their branches named as master (though again they might use right of reply to call them a prick) but it's symbolic of white Liberal responses to injustice. We're not debating git branch names, except in the navel gazing tech world we inhabit. We're debating there being something like 5 days last year where the US police did not kill one or more people. We've (or rather for US readers, you've) got a president who wants to outlaw bail funds, protest medics, etc. The real cancel culture is the power wielded by states, as pretty much the entire ME for the past however many centuries could attest to or transgender, gay, black soldiers who serve or served the US in uniform, or corporations and lawyers, as blacklisted construction workers or Aaron Schwartz (sp) could tell you.
Discussions about whether we have to give Bari Weiss our eternal gratitude for excreting another column feel deeply unserious when they talk over real problems.
So the only actual example I was able to google here was the last one: and I have to say, is that it? A guy wasn’t asked back as a dorm administrator once he joined Harvey Weinstein’s legal team? That’s the “cancel culture” you’re talking about, in contrast to one of the most brutal and grotesque onslaught of police brutality in the west in recent memory?
Like you realise the protests were sparked off by a murder, right?
This is what I mean when I say it’s ridiculous. The Harvard guy didn’t even lose his job, for goodness’ sake.
> Everything the protestors are doing has probably set us back a decade.
Where did I defend or endorse the actions of protestors? My point is simply that it’s ridiculous to think the main authoritarian crisis in the US right now is “cancel culture” when it is literally in the midst of a brutal police crackdown against protestors.
Also I’m sorry but it’s hard to take you seriously with regards to police violence when you didn’t mention a single thing the police did wrong in your list of grievances, but you’re happy to talk about the protestors.
> every major spike in crime due to police being defunded instead of retrained
This is not a view supported by the evidence.
> We have a legal and social framework for affecting longterm change and it works much better than arson.
The US has more prisoners per capita than any society at any point in history in the world. The police are armed and violent. And those systems which apparently work so well have been in place throughout all this. But maybe you should tell me more about how these systems work so well.
Also I’m continually amazed that Americans forget their proud history of violent protest so quickly. It always seems like protest against injustice was fine in some unspecified “past” but of course all of that Is behind us now and The best we can do is vote (vote for the party at least partly responsible for the state of the police today, by the way).