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He Infiltrated a Notorious White Nationalist Group. Now, He’s Being Sued for Exposing Them
(www.rollingstone.com)
this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2023
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politics
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I mean, I hate white nationalism just as much as the next guy. But if you go around making it illegal to be anonymous or part of a particular group, whether they're considered terrorist or otherwise, that's bad. It gives the next party in power precedent to make being part of your group illegal. That's why freedom of speech is so important.
I think associating with a group that believes in the creation of an ethnostate should remain legal so that associating with a group that believes in the dismantling of capitalism remains legal.
The paradox of tolerance is real, and not all things are equal.
If you allow a group that wants to murder to organize, they will eventually murder.
Banning genocide enthusiast groups doesn't mean you also have to ban bird watchers.
I agree, but given that police have tried to charge Cop City protesters with terrorism we need to be really careful and scrutinize any new laws designed to stop these groups and how it may be intentionally or unintentionally harmful to littigamate activism and protest.
That's a reasonable point.
Writing good laws is difficult.
Can we learn to discern between legitimate uses of a term and illegitimate ones? Can we accept it's okay to call hate groups terrorists while their protesters are not? Can we accept reality for what it is?
We can. Our justice system and politics on the other hand seems hell bent not to.
This is why I'm generally very cautious about suggesting new laws to limit behaviour, and am more supportive of private action (e.g., companies firing Nazis rather than criminalizing being a Nazi). People that are left of center tend to forget that people that are right of center are often able to use the exact same laws written by those on the left to suppress progressive views.
All of this ends up being a double-edged sword. You need to think of every possible way that a law could be misapplied, or can unintentionally cause harm, before moving forward. Because someone is going to intentionally misapply it for personal or political advantage.
No it's not. The whole point of the tolerance nonsense is to silence racists while allowing minority groups to thrive. There's nothing hypocritical about it and the fact that people think there is indicates a flaw in their thinking, not tolerance.
It's not about what groups you ban in the beginning. It's about the groups they'll ban when your particular party is out of power.
I already know my politics will make me a target under fascism. It's one of the reasons I'm so adamantly against it. It's not just repugnant; I'm also the enemy. I say fight them hard because wresting control back from them will be far more difficult because of what they will do to entrench themselves if they gain power.
The paradox of tolerance is based on some schmo's personal article. It's not backed up by any research, historical analysis, or anything other than the fact that it kinda feels good to think about because it gives us an excuse to other a group, ignoring that someone else will eventually other us. It's literally only in the zeitgeist because it's attractive, not because it's right.
I'm okay with othering the people that want to literally kill me, my family, and my friends.
People do this thing where they're like "if we refuse to accept their mass murder plans, someone might refuse to accept our bird watching plans!" That's stupid. We're humans not badly written computers.
To be othered, you have to be an ethnic group or a legitimate political group. So you're implying fascism and Nazis are a legitimate political or ethnic group when you complain about being "othered".
They are legitimately identified as a political group because they aim to have a say in politics. This can be true without their beliefs having any legitimacy.
That doesn't make them a legitimate political group, either. By that logic, the Taliban and ISIS would be legitimate political groups, and they're not. They're considered terrorist groups and so are these fucking white nationalists.
This isn't hard. Common sense exists.
I think both can be true. They are political groups who advocate and practice terrorism.
Yeah, I used to be a "free speech absolutist" too. Used to harp on about how important it is that we allow all views to be spread, regardless of how disgusting it might be... Then I grew up and realized how harmful that idea is to society.
Slippery slope fallacy isn't enough to convince me that having laws similar to Germany is going to lead to oppression or something. These ideologies have no place in modern society, and they should be given no quarter.
These people use your ideal of free speech absolutism against you, and until we realize there needs to be limits, we will never progress as a society because all of our time, focus, and resources will need to be on fighting this shit over and over and over.
I thought "clear and present danger" took care of this sort of thing.
Not sure where I fall in this conversation, but, imo all hate speech is a clear and present danger. Every time you preach hate, even if you don't have a specific immediate call to action, you are speaking to people that will take it as a call to action. I think the clear and present danger idea is really giving human beings far too much credit. Normalizing hate makes assholes think they have the support of their peers, which leads to bad things, every time. In that sense hate speech is violence. Try being on the receiving end of hate speech and you will understand just how clear and present the danger really is.
My single-sentence comment seems to have caused me to be misunderstood.
I'm wondering, why is the "clear and present danger" doctrine NOT being used to shut these racists down? Because from my perspective, racist hate speech is clearly dangerous.
Because,as we've seen in this thread, other people are easily manipulated.
I'm not a free speech absolutist.
A free speech absolutist would say libel should be legal, and I'd disagree. There are certain things the government can do to ensure a person's right to free speech doesn't infringe upon anothers right to health, happiness, etc, and I think that's okay, but that people really need to be wary of such things so that power doesn't get too concentrated. But I wouldn't say I'm an absolutist.
Im just saying you shouldn't make it illegal to be a part of a particular group, because then the next party in power will have precedent to make it illegal to be a part of a different group.
Yeah it hard to xonvuce people that speach beeds limits. All ither rights do.
You make a good point but whar do we do about these white nationalist and fascist?
Agreed. The first Gay and Lesbian liberation groups people operated with aliases because infiltration could mean their persecution under the law. To fight an unjust rule of law anonymity to a degree is needed to shield the just. That someone unjust can utilize that same shield is an unfortunate consequence.
The difference is if people still think your version of justice is deplorable when you come out from behind the shield then the consequences are yours to reap. In this instance it's not a matter of people wanting to be able to love each other publicly and get married it's people wanting to crush people beneath a boot so the issue is a little less gray. Caveat emptor.
The nuance in this discussion has me both-sidesing pretty hard. I'm gonna have to put some deliberate thought into where I land on this.
So long as the group explicitly says they do not condone violence and they want to achieve their goals through purely peaceful means. If they want to deport everyone who "isn't them" to establish an ethnostate, that's one thing. But killing everyone who isn't them to create an ethnostate is very different and crosses the line.
The same would go for dismantling capitalism. Winning elections and passing laws to achieve that is very different from a violent overthrow of the government.
Why the fuck would wanting an ethnostate magically become okay simply by wanting it done through peaceful means?
The abortion bans were imposed through "peaceful means".
Peaceful does not mean good.
Also countries can and do ban hate groups while allowing other speech. It is possible to have your cake and eat it too. It is possible to define something by observation alone.
I never said it was good. Just that if we're going to be cautious and not outright ban it, then we will need to draw the line at violence.
No, this is still a problem. The Long Shadow podcast did a great job of explaining how groups like the KKK and The Order have decentralized. Everyone knows that their message is a call to action to be taken on by individuals who they can then publicly denounce to say not like that. But they want it exactly like that. People like Timmy McVeinycock understand this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Berg https://open.spotify.com/show/70a5obPALvMVMPSzxYelik https://podcasts.apple.com/za/podcast/long-shadow/id1577471264
Mmm, fair enough. I guess this is a strain of enlightened centrism thinking. Maybe the best standard is the same for porn -- you know it when you see it. And when your see it, you don't buy any bullshit. You throw the book at them.
Even if the group calls for violence, it should be legal to be a part of that group. If I am subscribed to a YouTuber who calls for violence on people, and those subscribers commit violence upon those people, and I am sitting at home eating Cheetos, it is not justice for me to be charged for being part of that group.
The caller of violence should be charged, the co-conspirators, inciters, and the actors -- but not me, because I was eating Cheetos on my couch.
No, calling for violence is generally accepted to be unprotected speech.
As it should be