Certain topics should not be allowed on sciforums

[wynn]

I am from Europe. I have a very judgmental attitude about a lot of things. Guess what? I'm right, too.

I guess that's what's called "self-confidence."

By "judgmental and simplistic" do you mean too anti-Nazi? What grey area are you dipping your toe in, if I may ask?

Were the Nazis humans?

We all know that Holocaust denial isn't typically rooted in principled skepticism, but in craven anti-semitism.

Actually, it seems that it is principally rooted in the desire to see the Nazis as humans, as opposed to seeing them as something other than humans.

How the expression of that desire then develops, is another matter.

Wynn is famous for reflexively taking the side of the underdog, with no consideration of merit. She should join a debate society where this type of argument for the sake of argument is not only welcomed but required. It doesn't go over so well on SciForums where it merely confuses people.

I general, I agree with Chomsky's stance in the Faurisson affair.
Supporting freedom of speech brings with it the burden for allowing controversial views to be expressed.

If the powers that be don't actually want free speech, then why do they publicly claim they do?

 

[wynn]

I don't know. But not being brave enough seems more likely to me than having been hit by a car.

It remains that you accused him of lack of bravery, in no uncertain terms.

When there are literally thousands or millions of independent accounts that all support one version of events, then opting to believe a conspiracy theory instead seems perverse to me.

That assumes that a person can choose to believe something.

As I am sure you know, psychologists and cognitive scientists in general would have quite a few things to say about whether humans can choose what to believe or not.

That's wrong thinking. People should expect some discrepancy between different sources. Human memory is imperfect. We should always expect a small amount of fraud or exaggeration among thousands of witnesses. What people ought to do is to look at the big picture. In fact, it is only by focussing on minutiae and ignoring most of the wider context that holocaust deniers can even start to sound plausible.

To me, the actual big picture is to address questions such as
What do people hope to accomplish by learning about wars and discussing them?

And there seems to be no agreement on what that goal is. Some say that to promote one view of the war (namely, the winner's view) will ensure that the war will not happen again.
But there seems to be no conclusive evidence as to whether this actually works, or whether it is even counterproductive.

If you're not supporting steampunk and his holocaust denial, why introduce the concept of alternative theories of truth and similar distractions? It looks to me like you're trying very hard to excuse steampunk's denial.

Just testing the waters.

As Fraggle said:

She should join a debate society where this type of argument for the sake of argument is not only welcomed but required. It doesn't go over so well on SciForums where it merely confuses people.

I changed my mind on that one, as is clear in the post. In this case, we are dealing with a repeat offender on sciforums, and one who ought to have learned his lesson from previous bans. Therefore, I decided not to stretch things out with this one and give him an opportunity to try to make a case that I know he could not make anyway. Instead, I decided to skip straight to a ban.

Have you ever considered taking a lesson from Gustav, though?

 

[Tiassa]

A Third Option

It remains that you accused him of lack of bravery, in no uncertain terms.

A lack of bravery would have precedent; see his performance in the Formal Debate proposal.

Hit by a car? That would be new. Unfortunate, yes, but new. He has already run from his own argument once, which is probably why people presume that he is simply avoiding the issue now.

I'll add a third option: He's simply embarrassed.

We all try weird stunts from time to time. If my entire life was recorded, people could certainly find instances of me defending female genital mutilation, or trying to split the hair between "black" and "nigger", advocating vendetta, and other such episodes I would be embarrassed to revisit.

Let us presume, for the sake of argument, that our absent neighbor is not fundamentally anti-Semitic. Rather, let us speculate that his pursuit of the argument sprung from notions of questioning the status quo and challenging standing presuppositions. Further, let us speculate for this illustration that there is some degree of ego involved.

There was a time when I would have sided with Lord Acton, who sided in his writings with the Confederacy. It's not that I ever approved of slavery, but, rather, that I was exploring the issue of states' rights in that consideration. I am certainly glad I figured out certain issues about boundaries of rights before I ever publicly humiliated myself making the point.

By this third option, Steampunk isn't specifically anti-Semitic. Rather, he just missed an important point in his cynicism, and is now thoroughly embarrassed after having inspired such widespread and powerful condemnation.

And, as such, he has no real idea how to present himself respectably in our company at present.

Should that be the case, yeah, I would probably be taking some time to myself, as well.

 

[wynn]

And, as such, he has no real idea how to present himself respectably in our company at present.

Or perhaps he just doesn't care about earning approval from Sciforums members.
At this point, we can only speculate about his intentions.

 

[quadraphonics]

Actually, it seems that it is principally rooted in the desire to see the Nazis as humans, as opposed to seeing them as something other than humans.

I see absolutely no reason whatsoever that "seeing the Nazis as humans" requires one to extend undue skepticism to well-established, thoroughly-corroborated history of their deeds. And you've presented no such reasoning, just a naked assertion. Color me unimpressed. They were evil humans who did evil things - that you are here denying - and that is exactly why they are so reviled, and make such an important moral example for other humans.

Heck, the point is exactly that not only were they human, they were advanced, civilized Westerners with a high standard of living. The point is exactly that such provides no exemption from the most depraved of systemic, national crimes, and so constant wariness is indicated.

I general, I agree with Chomsky's stance in the Faurisson affair.
Supporting freedom of speech brings with it the burden for allowing controversial views to be expressed.

Don't get me wrong: I think you should be perfectly free to advance specious, disgusting apologies for the outrageous crimes of the Nazis. And the rest of us should be free to mercilessly hound you into silence and shame in response to that. That's how free speech works, and the argument for extending it even to clearly odious speech is exactly that the people can repudiate it more soundly and robustly than a government decree ever could.

 

[Asguard]

Well he wasn't hit by a car do its either him sulking at not getting his own way or as Tiassa said

 

[GeoffP]

I guess that's what's called "self-confidence."

I prefer "moral rectitude". I seem to recall some speeches that a fat man in a bowler hat gave; it would be a shame to think that nothing had really been learned from the deaths of sixty million people or more.

Were the Nazis humans?

I certainly think they were members of Homo sapiens sapiens, surely. I'm not sure what that has to do with my perspective, but I look forward to my imminent peripherally-guessed-at instruction.

 

[Trippy]

He seems to have blown a gasket:

James has locked the thread because he doesn't want to debate. He made a claim the gassings where state sanctioned and now he's to cowardly to stand by that point. He has looked for every reason not to debate. I'm the one who has had to compromise several time to lower the criteria. I've also been banned several times for ridiculous reasons, although people here have been allowed to insult and indirectly make physical threats to me. Jame didn't even leave the debate open for someone else to challenge. What a fucking coward.

Yes I'm finished with Sci-forums. I'm enjoying the sun reading the millennium edition of Hitler's War. Wow! Primary sources, not historical incest and cannibalization! I used to not really give a shit about WW2, thanks for making me wonder why people are so emotional about the bullshit claims of the Holocaust. Several Jews agree with me also. So fuck off everyone. I'll waste no more time with you here.

Sci-Forums notifications are now spam so I don't know this places exists now.

Source

The thread locked by James as the Proposal thread, because it appeared that the conditions of the debate had been agreed to.
The Discussion Thread and the Debate Thread are both still open, so what is to be made of this statement?

 

[Bells]

Come stay in Europe for a few years and you'll see for yourself what the situation is.
Here, things are not so black-and-white.

"Things are not so black-and-white" that over 11 million people were killed by the Nazi's?

While the evidence may be the same - the documents, artifacts, testimonies ... - people interpret them in different ways.

History textbooks for schools are rewritten significantly every couple of decades.
You should see what WWII commemorations look like, and how they change over the years.
You should see how people interact who were on opposing sides in the the war. How their children interact.

On national televisions, they have various documentaries from the world wars - American documentaries about WWII, German documentaries about WWII, French, British, Russian, Czech, Italian etc. documentaries about WWII. You might be surprised of the range of the views presented there.

And yet, one thing remained constant. That the Nazi's slaughtered 11 million people and it came to be known as the Holocaust.

Unless of course you are saying that people living in Europe, such as yourself, now doubt that it ever happened?

 

[wynn]

I see absolutely no reason whatsoever that "seeing the Nazis as humans" requires one to extend undue skepticism to well-established, thoroughly-corroborated history of their deeds. And you've presented no such reasoning, just a naked assertion. Color me unimpressed. They were evil humans who did evil things - that you are here denying - and that is exactly why they are so reviled, and make such an important moral example for other humans.

Heck, the point is exactly that not only were they human, they were advanced, civilized Westerners with a high standard of living. The point is exactly that such provides no exemption from the most depraved of systemic, national crimes, and so constant wariness is indicated.


Don't get me wrong: I think you should be perfectly free to advance specious, disgusting apologies for the outrageous crimes of the Nazis. And the rest of us should be free to mercilessly hound you into silence and shame in response to that. That's how free speech works, and the argument for extending it even to clearly odious speech is exactly that the people can repudiate it more soundly and robustly than a government decree ever could.

I reported your post for gross misrepresentation.

It is absolutely beyond me how you can read into my posts that I am a Nazi supporter or a holocaust denier.

It is absolutely beyond me.

 

[wynn]

"Things are not so black-and-white" that over 11 million people were killed by the Nazi's?

And yet, one thing remained constant. That the Nazi's slaughtered 11 million people and it came to be known as the Holocaust.

Unless of course you are saying that people living in Europe, such as yourself, now doubt that it ever happened?

It is hard to explain the European political and historical situation in a mere forum post.

But if you lived here for a few years, you'd see that people have very different ideas esp. about the motivations for what happened, and for how to address what happened, how to talk about it in public and in private. In that sense, things are not so black-and-white.

 

[wynn]

I prefer "moral rectitude". I seem to recall some speeches that a fat man in a bowler hat gave; it would be a shame to think that nothing had really been learned from the deaths of sixty million people or more.

There are many ways to express moral rectitude.

it would be a shame to think that nothing had really been learned from the deaths of sixty million people or more.

We always learn from experience. The only question is, what.

I certainly think they were members of Homo sapiens sapiens, surely. I'm not sure what that has to do with my perspective, but I look forward to my imminent peripherally-guessed-at instruction.

People normally experience anxiety at the thought of war.
But they differ very much in how they try to deal with that anxiety.


In psychoanalytic theories, there is the concept of defence mechanisms to address these ways of dealing with anxiety.

Here's the summary from Wiki:


Level 1 - Pathological

The mechanisms on this level, when predominating, almost always are severely pathological. These six defences, in conjunction, permit one to effectively rearrange external experiences to eliminate the need to cope with reality. The pathological users of these mechanisms frequently appear irrational or insane to others. These are the "psychotic" defences, common in overt psychosis. However, they are found in dreams and throughout childhood as well.

They include:

Delusional Projection: Grossly frank delusions about external reality, usually of a persecutory nature.
Conversion: the expression of an intrapsychic conflict as a physical symptom; some examples include blindness, deafness, paralysis, or numbness. This phenomena is sometimes called hysteria.[14]
Denial: Refusal to accept external reality because it is too threatening; arguing against an anxiety-provoking stimulus by stating it doesn't exist; resolution of emotional conflict and reduction of anxiety by refusing to perceive or consciously acknowledge the more unpleasant aspects of external reality.
Distortion: A gross reshaping of external reality to meet internal needs.
Splitting: A primitive defence. Negative and positive impulses are split off and unintegrated. Fundamental example: An individual views other people as either innately good or innately evil, rather than a whole continuous being.
Extreme projection: The blatant denial of a moral or psychological deficiency, which is perceived as a deficiency in another individual or group.


Level 2 - Immature

These mechanisms are often present in adults. These mechanisms lessen distress and anxiety provoked by threatening people or by uncomfortable reality. Excessive use of such defenses is seen as socially undesirable in that they are immature, difficult to deal with and seriously out of touch with reality. These are the so-called "immature" defences and overuse almost always leads to serious problems in a person's ability to cope effectively. These defences are often seen in major depression and personality disorders.

They include:

Acting out: Direct expression of an unconscious wish or impulse in action, without conscious awareness of the emotion that drives that expressive behaviour.
Fantasy: Tendency to retreat into fantasy in order to resolve inner and outer conflicts.
Idealization: Unconsciously choosing to perceive another individual as having more positive qualities than he or she may actually have.[15]
Passive aggression: Aggression towards others expressed indirectly or passively such as using procrastination.
Projection: Projection is a primitive form of paranoia. Projection also reduces anxiety by allowing the expression of the undesirable impulses or desires without becoming consciously aware of them; attributing one's own unacknowledged unacceptable/unwanted thoughts and emotions to another; includes severe prejudice, severe jealousy, hypervigilance to external danger, and "injustice collecting". It is shifting one's unacceptable thoughts, feelings and impulses within oneself onto someone else, such that those same thoughts, feelings, beliefs and motivations are perceived as being possessed by the other.
Projective identification: The object of projection invokes in that person precisely the thoughts, feelings or behaviours projected.
Somatization: The transformation of negative feelings towards others into negative feelings toward self, pain, illness, and anxiety.


Level 3 - Neurotic

These mechanisms are considered neurotic, but fairly common in adults. Such defences have short-term advantages in coping, but can often cause long-term problems in relationships, work and in enjoying life when used as one's primary style of coping with the world.

They include:

Displacement: Defense mechanism that shifts sexual or aggressive impulses to a more acceptable or less threatening target; redirecting emotion to a safer outlet; separation of emotion from its real object and redirection of the intense emotion toward someone or something that is less offensive or threatening in order to avoid dealing directly with what is frightening or threatening. For example, a mother may yell at her child because she is angry with her husband.
Dissociation: Temporary drastic modification of one's personal identity or character to avoid emotional distress; separation or postponement of a feeling that normally would accompany a situation or thought.
Hypochondriasis: An excessive preoccupation or worry about having a serious illness.
Intellectualization: A form of isolation; concentrating on the intellectual components of a situation so as to distance oneself from the associated anxiety-provoking emotions; separation of emotion from ideas; thinking about wishes in formal, affectively bland terms and not acting on them; avoiding unacceptable emotions by focusing on the intellectual aspects (e.g. isolation, rationalization, ritual, undoing, compensation, magical thinking).
Isolation: Separation of feelings from ideas and events, for example, describing a murder with graphic details with no emotional response.
Rationalization (making excuses): Where a person convinces him or herself that no wrong was done and that all is or was all right through faulty and false reasoning. An indicator of this defence mechanism can be seen socially as the formulation of convenient excuses - making excuses.
Reaction formation: Converting unconscious wishes or impulses that are perceived to be dangerous into their opposites; behaviour that is completely the opposite of what one really wants or feels; taking the opposite belief because the true belief causes anxiety. This defence can work effectively for coping in the short term, but will eventually break down.
Regression: Temporary reversion of the ego to an earlier stage of development rather than handling unacceptable impulses in a more adult way.
Repression: The process of attempting to repel desires towards pleasurable instincts, caused by a threat of suffering if the desire is satisfied; the desire is moved to the unconscious in the attempt to prevent it from entering consciousness;[16] seemingly unexplainable naivety, memory lapse or lack of awareness of one's own situation and condition; the emotion is conscious, but the idea behind it is absent.[citation needed]
Undoing: A person tries to 'undo' an unhealthy, destructive or otherwise threatening thought by engaging in contrary behaviour.
Withdrawal: Withdrawal is a more severe form of defence. It entails removing oneself from events, stimuli, interactions, etc. under the fear of being reminded of painful thoughts and feelings.


Level 4 - Mature

These are commonly found among emotionally healthy adults and are considered mature, even though many have their origins in an immature stage of development. They have been adapted through the years in order to optimize success in life and relationships. The use of these defences enhances pleasure and feelings of control. These defences help us to integrate conflicting emotions and thoughts, whilst still remaining effective. Those who use these mechanisms are usually considered virtuous.

They include:

Altruism: Constructive service to others that brings pleasure and personal satisfaction.
Anticipation: Realistic planning for future discomfort.
Humour: Overt expression of ideas and feelings (especially those that are unpleasant to focus on or too terrible to talk about) that gives pleasure to others. The thoughts retain a portion of their innate distress, but they are "skirted round" by witticism, for example Self-deprecation.
Identification: The unconscious modelling of one's self upon another person's character and behaviour.
Introjection: Identifying with some idea or object so deeply that it becomes a part of that person.
Sublimation: Transformation of negative emotions or instincts into positive actions, behaviour, or emotion.
Thought suppression: The conscious process of pushing thoughts into the preconscious; the conscious decision to delay paying attention to an emotion or need in order to cope with the present reality; making it possible to later access uncomfortable or distressing emotions whilst accepting them.




If you look at the interactions at the forums, you can see these mechanisms at work - both in how people try to deal with the anxiety about war, as well as in how people try to deal with eachother's attempts to deal with the anxiety about war.

It can all get quite confusing, and heads roll - but all have in common that they are anxious about war.

 

[GeoffP]

There are many ways to express moral rectitude.

Yes. I quite prefer the one where we remember the lessons of ages past.

We always learn from experience. The only question is, what.

Indeed.

People normally experience anxiety at the thought of war.
But they differ very much in how they try to deal with that anxiety.

Ah. So the war, and its accompanying Holocaust, was anxiety? Self-defense mechanisms? From what, exactly? A good latka? The lessons to which I refer are not excused by anxiety. But what is it you wish to say here? Be forthright.

 

[quadraphonics]

I reported your post for gross misrepresentation.

LOL crybaby much?

It is absolutely beyond me how you can read into my posts that I am a Nazi supporter or a holocaust denier.

It is absolutely beyond me.

That's your problem - nobody else is having much difficulty with it.

 

[quadraphonics]

It is hard to explain the European political and historical situation in a mere forum post.

That sounds like a real lame excuse, on its face.

But regardless, if you aren't even going to try, then you also don't get to hang your argument on such a premise. You're just refusing to engage, asserting superiority, and then waving interlocutors off. It's dishonorable, not to mention unimpressive. Go ahead and cite a book or something, if you can't formulate a forum post that says what you want it to.

But if you lived here for a few years, you'd see that people have very different ideas esp. about the motivations for what happened, and for how to address what happened, how to talk about it in public and in private. In that sense, things are not so black-and-white.

I've spent plenty of time in Europe, and if anything the situation is the opposite of what you describe in my experience. Again, you're speaking from empty assertions of epistemic superiority - this won't impress anyone.

 

[Gustav]

alternately one can imagine a situation where a kid in a public place refers to a gay couple as "faggots" out loud and the parents do not make any attempt to quiet them

i mean that is what polite society expects, right? censure from the parents who are held responsible for their children. if we see instances of bigotry in children, we know that in most cases the parents are responsible or complicit in encouraging these reprehensible patterns of conduct

what are the roles moderators assume on a forum? i say one of them would be very akin to a parent

now consider the turban. an easy target for hate. those that wear the garment are called towelheads by the islamaphobes

then we have jdawg referring to the burka as cloth bag

it is what race baiters do. they pick items/facets of cultures they hate and describe it in derogatory terms.

a burka is a cloth bag only if you want to denigrate.

it is clear that was jdawg's intention. to troll and flame in the most hateful of manners.

bringing this matter up to an administrators attention gets this response.....

I personally have no intention of penalising you.

just the parents in the above outlined scenario are held responsible and complicit in their children's bigotry, their lack of censure taken as an indication of shared and mostly likely, imparted attitudes, i have no choice but to deduce that james holds jdawg's attitude of bigotry towards burka clad women

I'm sure that some would and do take issue with your views about Islam. But you have not been penalised in any way for expressing them, and I personally have no intention of penalising you.

james personally has no problem with that jdawg's instance of hateful bigotry. he personally will not sanction that expression.

clothbag

lets extrapolate in a logical and consistent manner

towelhead
cameljockey
sandnigger

ja
if not the first, then neither for the others
so lets reiterate

excellent
let it be known that james endorses and encourages slurs against muslim women who wear the burka....

the Islam that puts their women in cloth bags

..by allowing that to stand

some administrator, eh folks?

an logical analysis of the rhetoric demands that conclusion
stop the hate, james

 

[Gustav]

Excuse me?

Where have I endorsed and encouraged slurs against Muslim women who wear the burka?

Provide the evidence or retract your claim.

----
Edit to add:

On second thoughts, let's just cut to the chase:

Moderator note: Gustav has been banned for 3 days from sciforums for knowingly telling lies and for trolling.

/chuckle

your baser instincts and petty hatred wins out every time, does it not?

/contemptuous

 

[quadraphonics]

I also like the "knowingly" qualifier. Apparently, JamesR can see into Gustav's mind, and directly know his motivations and perceptions. With supernatural abilities like that, it's no wonder he rose to become an all-powerful Administrator! Would that the rest of us possessed the humility to submit to the righteousness of his transhuman insight. Perhaps another ban or two will finally bring us around...

This also explains his hostility to the other posters with psychic powers here: they're a threat to his dominion!

 

[Balerion]

now consider the turban. an easy target for hate. those that wear the garment are called towelheads by the islamaphobes

then we have jdawg referring to the burka as cloth bag

it is what race baiters do. they pick items/facets of cultures they hate and describe it in derogatory terms.

a burka is a cloth bag only if you want to denigrate.

it is clear that was jdawg's intention. to troll and flame in the most hateful of manners.

I have had Gustav on ignore for a while now, and only recently took notice of his one-man campaign to have me booted from the site. I tried not to respond directly to the nonsense, but we're crossing into some dangerous territory now. The accusations of bigotry are absurd, and truly deserve no response, but since no one is stepping in to stop the libel, I am left with no recourse.

Taking offense to my use of the term "cloth bag" is only possible by taking the words out of context. Reading my posts on the subject will make clear that I take issue with the practice of forcing women to dress from head-to-toe in cloth. Yes, I think this is a barbaric practice, and no, I do not think it deserves to be treated with respect. However, I am not denigrating the woman under the cloth. As I make clear in my posts, I understand them to be victims of their culture. I do not think they are lesser beings as Gustav implies, but rather inherently deserving of equal treatment. If both men and women wore the burka, then I would be against it for very different reasons, but it certainly would not then be the tool of oppression that it is in reality.

clothbag

lets extrapolate in a logical and consistent manner

towelhead
cameljockey
sandnigger

I'll set aside this nagging suspicion that you're simply using this as an excuse to throw around terms like that with impunity, and address the point: "Clothbag" does not follow the slurs you list. Those words are pejoratives meant to denigrate people, whereas I was referring to the garment that female citizens are being forced to wear in certain parts of the world. I don't deny that "cloth bag" is a flippant way to describe it, but as I said, something that exists to specifically denigrate and oppress is deserving of no respect.

The salient point here is that not all cultures are equal, not all deserve respect. The FGM community, which has been a topic of intense discussion here recently, is one example of a culture that we recognize cannot hide behind the "diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks" maxim. Neither do I believe the iterations of Islam that force their women to hide themselves from head to toe in cloth can be protected from criticism. I find it disgusting, and I'm immediately suspicious of those who do not.

I know I won't get satisfaction here, but I will ask you anyway to retract your accusation.

 

[Gustav]

Taking offense to my use of the term "cloth bag" is only possible by taking the words out of context.

nothing has been taken out of context
you refer to the burka as a cloth bag
that description is extremely offensive and derogatory towards those clothe themselves in that attire

I don't deny that "cloth bag" is a flippant way to describe it,

sorry fella
flippancy is not a good descriptor of your insensitivity and prejudice

what's next? tents, shrink wrap and body bags?

Neither do I believe the iterations of Islam that force their women to hide themselves from head to toe in cloth can be protected from criticism. I find it disgusting, and I'm immediately suspicious of those who do not.

that is some serious pathology on display. stop the hate