this post was submitted on 24 May 2025
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With what you said 1. Someone doesn't have to be a good person, or be right, to coexist. Sitting at the same table as Pol Pot or Hitler isn't enabling them.
Unfortunately this is incorrect as far as these ideologies go. They're fundamentally incompatible with the principles of a free democratic society and so cannot be tolerated by anyone who claims to uphold the values of a free democratic society. If claim to uphold those values, and you're sitting at the table with those people: No you fucking don't. "Good person" and "correct" do not enter the equation at any point.
Democracy is essentially always incompatible with a free society in the first place. Eating dinner with a Nazi isn't helping Nazis seize power. You've probably met genuine sociopaths, people who want to kill or severely harm others. Should you pre-judge them? Is that actually useful for anything?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Q5DoYyV5RU
I know someone online who privately admitted to me to being a pedophile, and is very suicidal. They claim to have never victimized anyone, just thought about it. It makes me very uncomfortable. But I also think if I bluntly said that it would make them more self-destructive, feeling more isolated, and feeling more like they shouldn't be honest. I think that would lead to them being more likely to victimize someone. This isn't just a utilitarian calculus though, I genuinely do not want them to suffer. Even though they have disgusting thoughts that could manifest in the suffering of others. What would you do?
These things are not comparable. This person you spoke to has urges, not beliefs. He clearly doesn't believe it's right to want to fuck kids. Nazism is a personal political view, and that view includes the belief that I don't have the right to exist. That the people I love don't have a right to exist. That is not an exaggeration, that is a fact, and you have to accede it as reasonable to work with someone who believes it. I do not, never have and never will, and I'm sick and tired of people pretending like a Nazi will just up and abandon the monstrous core principles of their entire platform. You will never budge them, they will only drag you down to their level if you try. Other opinions are fine; Nazis are not.
Political beliefs do not exist in a vacuum. Imo they always come from emotion and urges to some extent. Even the most reasoned utilitarian views- and especially Nazism.
Alarmingly I don't really know. Or if they just say that.
Yes the view is wrong and bad. No one here is arguing with that.
No you do not.
Many won't. I guess the core of the disagreement is really "you have to accede it as reasonable to work with someone who believes it." which I don't agree with at all. Everyone I interact with and care about has beliefs I consider unreasonable and unethical to some extent, most not to the degree of Nazis- but some approaching it.
Yes, that is the core of the disagreement. You can always find someone to work with who doesn't believe those things; otherwise you have to say "they're fine except for this". But they're not fine except for that when "that" is "I don't believe autistic people should exist so we should kill them all". I guess to put it in an easy to digest sentence: Believing Nazi things is what makes someone a Nazi.
If someone comes around, then great. But we cannot allow "eh" to be the response to "those people who have done nothing wrong should die". That's your response when you work with Nazis, whether you'll admit it to yourself or not. Because you will excuse that core tenet of their views, and I don't think that's reasonable.
The social contract has rules that say we can't kill each other. Nazism does not respect that, so adherents of Nazism do not respect that, so they do not adhere to the social contract, thus they are not covered by it.
At the end of the day bud you're here saying it's okay to work with Nazis. It isn't, period dot and end of story. Fix your ethics.
Yes this is something we agree on.
The response isn't "eh". The response is disagreement. The response is also that its not my right or duty to police their beliefs. When they start manifesting the harm they believe in is when you should act. I can be friends with a murderer, who believes in, supports, and commits murder. I won't enable them to murder. In fact I will disenable them. And I would kill them before allowing them to murder. That doesn't stop me from associating with them outside of that.
I absolutely hate the term social contract. But yes I agree killing people is very bad. And I think its good to kill someone to stop them killing others. But I also think that saying you want to kill others and believe in an ideology that advocate it is very different from acting on it. Most people support killing people that I don't support killing. Like I don't want to speak for you, but you seem to support killing someone I don't support killing. But given that you're on here you haven't acted on it.
No, anything less than "that's fucked up and fuck you for as long as you believe that" isn't disagreement, it's disinterest. You're looking at views as just abstract paintings someone hangs on their wall; they're not, a person's views inform the way they act. Most beliefs you're absolutely fine to say "no I don't like that one" and not look at it, but keep hanging out at the house.
The painting in this case is the gas chambers, it's the people making lists of of other people for Nazis to kill, it's the public beatings and total lack of freedom and justice for all. It's not a painting of those things, these beliefs are those things. It's not abstract at all, and it's not compatible with how free and open cultures work at a fundamental level.
Why? It accurately describes what society is.
Yep, exactly. And that's exactly thing. And when they act is when I act.
And those are all actions that I will fight against. Being a Nazi it of itself is not an action, and doesn't necessitate those actions. I already talked about actions, you just ignored that paragraph other than the first two sentences.
Because a contract is a real thing in which explicitly defined parties of adults voluntarily consent to explicitly defined terms. The "social contract" is none of those things.
It sure is enabling my right to think you're enabling them. Unless you leave the table once you know who you're sitting with, I'm judging you. Hard.
What if you're sitting at the table with them, Nuremberg style?
Then you'd be on trial for crimes against humanity.
... i meant on the other side of the table?
If you sit with someone, and they say "death to all Jews", and you DON'T immediately argue or leave - you are accepting their beliefs as valid.
No you're not. That's just fundamentally untrue. You're accepting their beliefs if you repeat after them.
No, that's agreeing.
Then you accept the beliefs of Nazis by your definition. After all, you haven't killed any yet.
That's not my definition. That's you trying to deflect.
No, i neither argue with them of GTFO, like I said.
I do argue with Nazis. Why do you continue to let them exist.
That's me saying you have a different definition to accept from me. I consider accepting a belief to be believing the belief is acceptable and sane. I do not accept nazism.
Why are you arguing with me, then, when all I said was that you shouldn't accept being in the presence of their beliefs? Based on your most recent comments you seem to agree... so what are we doing here? And why are you trying to catch me in some gotcha based on a statement I never made?
And no, accepting a belief means not challenging it, implicitly treating it as normal.
Okay, so you agree you can accept a person as a human and a friend without accepting their beliefs? Because that's what I'm saying
I wouldn't really agree with that only because its just not your job. You don't have a responsibility with burdening yourself with constantly correcting others.
Misleading question. If their "differing belief" is that God created the Earth, or that crystals have healing magic, then whatever. They can be kooky if they want. If their "differing belief" is that only whites deserve to live, they can get fucked.
What a deliciously convenient excuse for not challenging your nazi friends. "It's not my job!!"
It's also "not your job" to queue properly, to put shopping trolleys back in the corral, or to obey traffic laws. You do it anyway, though, because it is the right thing to do. I don't have to be employed for every little thing i do.
But hey, let's try your logic: it is not my job to ensure that every little racist feels accepted and understood. It's not my responsibility to coddle Nazis.
Well it is your responsibility in some ways to not intentionally mistreat others. But I agree your job isn't to talk to racists. I never tried to tell you it was. I did tell you someone can talk to racists without being a racist themselves though.
If you don't challenge their racism, you're just accepting it.
We already talked about this