> Personally, I am quite glad we don't allow Nazi propaganda to spread as easily as the Americans. We've learned our lesson from history - the Americans are right now in the phase where they discover the consequences of allowing rampant misinformation to manipulate their electorate.
Lol, just what I'd expect from a European. "Oh no, big government please protect me against the scary Nazi misinformation!" As if the U.S. didn't hold true to freedom of speech when the actual Nazis rose to power, and still beat them out in the free marketplace of ideas all the same.
> To quote Goebbels: > > > When our enemies say: well, we gave you the freedom of opinion back then- yeah, you gave it to us, that's in no way evidence that we should return the favor! Your stupidity shall not be contagious! That you granted it to us is evidence of how dumb you are!
So, better to never have freedom of speech at all, than to have it and risk it being diminished some day? This doesn't stop Nazis from taking over the government or the rhetoric from spreading—see AfD's rise in Germany—it just means once they've grappled control of the government, now there's established precedent for them to censor anti-Nazi speech and expression without any sudden changes.
Well, good luck with that. It didn't seem to work out so well the last time you took that approach, but what do I know.
> As if the U.S. didn't hold true to freedom of speech when the actual Nazis rose to power, and still beat them out in the free marketplace of ideas all the same.
They beat them out on the battlefield, at great expense in both resources and human lives. The "free marketplace of ideas" was unable to stop Nazism.
> So, better to never have freedom of speech at all, than to have it and risk it being diminished some day?
What you're referring to has been formulated by Dr. Karl Popper, an Austrian who had to witness the rise of Nazism as the Paradox of Tolerance. To quote:
> Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.
[...]
> We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.
Put differently, tolerance is a social contract: https://conversational-leadership.net/tolerance-is-a-social-...
Popper’s perspective aligns with the view of tolerance as a social contract. The protection of tolerance extends only to those who reciprocate it. When one party breaches this contract by imposing on others’ rights or safety, the injured party is no longer obligated to extend tolerance to the aggressor.
> We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
And who gets to decide who the intolerant parties are in an argument/dispute in order to justify the use of force against them?
The quote you posted literally advocates for censorship, oppression and genocide of the other side, except since it's of those YOU view as being intolerant, so then it's somehow moral and OK for you to do it against them, but you wouldn't agree to that when the other party does it to you when they view you as the intolerant one.
Because that's exactly what the Nazis did when they got into power: they removed the ones who they considered to be intolerant form their perspective, and it's exactly the rhetoric Zionists use to justify genocide in Gaza: they're just removing intolerant people so then it's morally ok.
It is clear you either have no idea what the Nazis did or are purposefully trying to muddy the waters to provide cover for Neonazism.
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When people use critical thought to dissect my comments, I respond in kind. You should try it some time.
Regarding your attempted equation of Nazism and anti-Nazism, a common tactic used by modern day fascists to create a sense of moral ambivalence, here's a simple fact:
The Nazis did not, in fact, persecute people they thought of as intolerant. The Nazis were driven by racial and ethnic hatred - intolerance was a point of pride for them, not something to be fought.
Your behavior suggests either deep ignorance or malicious attempts at distorting the conversation in a right wing extremist way. Either way is not a good look.
> intolerance was a point of pride for them
Literally no party ever, not even the Nazis, Stalinists, Maoists, ever thought "we're the bad intolerant guys and we're proud of it".
On the contrary, they all thought they were on the right side of history and that all the atrocities they were doing, they were the right thing, done for the greater good.
Nazi literally means "national" and "socialist" as in for the country and the working people, both words with good meaning behind them on their own, up until WW2.
>Your behavior suggests either deep ignorance or malicious attempts at distorting the conversation in a right wing extremist way. Either way is not a good look.
What behavior? Correcting your wrong takes with facts and arguments? Every point you brought up here I have disproved with arguments.
You once again are twisting my word and misrepresenting my point.
Never did I say "we're the bad guys and we're proud of it" was their self-identification. They did, however think "we will not tolerate the Jewish threat to our aryan volk" - i.e. an openly pro-intolerance ideology.
I would highly recommend you gain a deeper understanding of issues before making bold proclamations about things you know very little about.
> What behavior? Correcting your wrong takes with facts and arguments? Every point you brought up here I have disproved with arguments.
You do not even engage with my arguments. You try to derail them, by building straw men to then get upset about, as with the example above. It shows either a limited understanding of the matter at hand or a conscious attempt at muddying the waters.
This behavior, too, is well-documented historically.
"Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past." - Jean Paul Sartre.
>They did, however think "we will not tolerate the Jewish threat to our aryan volk" - i.e. an openly pro-intolerance ideology.
I never said the Nazis weren't being intolerant, I just called you out for painting those you don't like as intolerant as the Nazis in order to justify using censorship and state force against them in the name of greater good.
If we're gonna go after people for intolerance I expect a lot more proof of criminal wrongdoing and argumentation than just comparing them to Nazis since you're doing exactly what the Nazis did to justify their intolerance towards the Jews.
>"Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies
Not sure how calling people who disagree with you as antisemites helps in any way since I never said anything in support for the Nazis or against the Jews.
Edit: Answering to your reply from below here to not balloon the thread any further:
>"I did not call you an antisemite, I pointed out a common behavioral pattern of antisemites."
So your argument is: "I'm not calling you an antisemite directly, I'm just using a quote to describe your pattern of behavior as being antisemitic." ? Do you even hear yourself?
Like I said before, you're the one who can't stop using Nazis as boogeymen and Jews as a humans shield in arguments all for the sake of emotional manipulation, then call people antisemitic when they disagree with you.
Once again, you are twisting my words.
I did not call you an antisemite, I quoted Sartre pointing out a common behavioral pattern of antisemites.
That you see yourself reflected in such should give you pause, but is no fault of mine.
He who doesn't learn from history is doomed to repeat it.