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Comment by mikece | Hacker News Reader

"And so self-censorship has become the norm."

This might be the most ironic and most dangerous effect of this "right think" regime: that the free expression and exchange of ideas is thwarted in advance because one doesn't want to deal with drama, fight, or insults that come with saying something not in lock-step with the prevailing group-think. This blunts the curiosity of the intellect and silences all true disciples of knowledge and science if what they say -- even if they have the math to prove their point -- contradicts the currently popular "common truth."

For this to be happening at what was THE preeminent example of American freedom of the press is chilling... and Orwellian.

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You can see this directly on Reddit, or even here, thanks to the downvote button. It doesn't matter how right you may be, how many sources you may have, if it angers a sufficient people to lead to your post being downvoted, no one will be able to read it.

And though the points are made up, it's always annoying to look at a post you spent half an hour typing and researching just to have it get down to -6 with no further comments.

So you're against people expressing their opinions in response to your own?

I think the OP argued pretty explicitly that a well researched comment, that violates the orthodoxy, is down-voted until it is removed from public discussion.

I'm not sure how you can come to the conclusion that he's "against others expressing their opinions".

The opinion that someone isn't worth listening to and choosing not to amplify their words is an opinion like any other.

The whole cancel culture thing stems from people who believe that they don't just have freedom of speech, but rather the right to force others to listen.

If a community dislikes what you say and chooses to make that content less visible in response, that's perfectly reasonable. You are not being censored, you are being rejected.

Downvoting is an expression of opinion. Opinions aren't owed platforms and never have been. Are all magazines anti-free speech because they don't publish everyone?

And besides, "well-researched" is highly subjective in the best of cases, and in ones like this is usually not accurate in any sense.

For better or worse, the up/downvote buttons are used to express an opinion -- that is the primary purpose.

The problem is that any crowdsourced curation feature uses significant downvotes as a signal for spam or content which otherwise violates the site policies.

The poster stated nothing of the sort.

You're conflating "expressing opinions" (by clicking a button) with: making it less likely for the poster's expression to ever be seen.

Are all opinions entitled to a private platform? Expressing disagreement via mechanisms a platform provides is, indeed, expressing an opinion.

What all this concern trolling really sounds like isn't an actual defense of values of free speech, but rather sheltering someone from the speech of others.

> Are all opinions entitled to a private platform? Expressing disagreement via mechanisms a platform provides is, indeed, expressing an opinion.

You seem to be of the opinion that the downvotes are more important than the comment they are downvoting: They are not. They are at best, equivalent, and deserve no more special recognition than the comment itself; yet the fact that a comment gets buried as a result, gives those downvotes a weight greater than that of the subject comment.

Because if that weren't the case, you'd recognize that those downvotes are ALSO apparently entitled to a private platform.

If it's good for one, it is good for both, and it is equivalent to argue that the downvotes aren't entitled to a platform either, and you're left at square one, without a meaningful conclusion.

Maybe, just maybe, that isn't a useful approach to take.

You just gotta know your audience. Everyone has the fantasy of turning hearts and minds to your point of view with your words but eventually you come to the realization it’s just not worth the effort.

I agree, though if there weren't downvotes, I'd probably still make the attempt. But with downvotes, it's just made so abundantly clear that people just don't care, why should I waste my effort so that I can be downvoted into oblivion where no one can read my post?

That's not the issue imo, the issue is how many intelligent comments we miss because someone with insight to add figures it's not worth it and doesn't share it in the first place.

I have learned not to use reddit for discussion or to express opinions contrary to the American mainstream. It won't get you anywhere as you simply won't be heard. You best find another place to do so - where, I don't know yet. Maybe Aether...

> This might be the most ironic and most dangerous effect of this "right think" regime:

How it is ironic? It's the explicit intention.

Bingo. Twitter is a platform for intimidation.

> that the free expression and exchange of ideas is thwarted in advance because one doesn't want to deal with drama, fight, or insults that come with saying something not in lock-step with the prevailing group-think

So are you suggesting that people not express their opinions? It sounds like you want exactly what she's complaining about.

Oh, please. If you say dumb or offensive stuff, people are going to react. It's not the "right think regime" — it's people disagreeing, often with some extra acid if you're a high profile New York Times opinion columnist and readers don't feel you deserve that kind of an international platform for your words.

I disagree. Saying you agree with free speech, such as the Harper's Letter which is about as milquetoast and generic as it gets, is viciously attacked on the left for being racist, anti-trans, the authors are scum, anyone who signs it should be fired, and on and on.

As a testament to the existence of cancel culture and the stifling of any opinion against the party line in the progressive media, I can't think of a more obvious example.

I remember when people used to proudly say, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it". This is not the norm for progressive thinking in 2020.

First, I think you're lumping "the left" together and assuming "the left" believes whatever the most extreme "left" tweets say.

Second, Bari Weiss can write whatever she wants. Totally her right. She's got a website there in the link! She can continue to reach a global audience. Does the NYTimes need to promote her? No, that's not a right I'm willing to die for.

Third, why on earth is Bari Weiss' opinion more sacrosanct than mine? If she says something I consider offensive, I might say I think it's offensive. If she says something dumb, I might say I think it's dumb. If she says something astute, I might say I think it's astute. She has a HUGE megaphone, so of course lots of people will respond to her. That's not "cancel culture." That's a side effect of having a huge megaphone. With great power comes great responsibility, etc.

Fourth, when I hear people complain about "going against the progressive party line" or whatever, I generally hear people wanting to be some flavor of racist, sexist, transphobic, or just asshole-ish without consequence. Oftentimes people in marginalized group react in a way that feels extra venomous to those of us not in those groups because they can feel their lives are constantly hindered and harmed by the sorts of thoughts that other people can just toss out and then walk away from. If this happens, I might suggest listening to the free speech from those people and trying to understand rather than writing screeds against "cancel culture" or whining about how you, as a very well-publicized and probably quite wealthy writer having your rights squashed. And that's why the Harper's Letter was annoying.

> Fourth, when I hear people complain about "going against the progressive party line" or whatever, I generally hear people wanting to be some flavor of racist, sexist, transphobic, or just asshole-ish without consequence.

I hear this all the time, but it seems so disingenuous. There are so many national examples that no reasonable person could consider to be any of the above:

* A hispanic man was fired for accidentally making the "ok" symbol

* A data scientist was canned for citing a prominent black academic's research about the efficacy of nonviolent protest

* A journalist was forced to issue an apology for interviewing a black man who was happy about BLM but wished there was more attention on issues of violence in his community

Frothing racists indeed.

In light of cases like this, I don't know how anyone can think that cancel culture is just "punching up" or "criticizing people" or "going for people who want to use hate speech".

Did any of them sign that Harper's Letter?

And did I say "frothing racists?"

Also, yeah, out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made. People get things wrong sometimes. It sucks and we should use our freedom of speech to help correct those errors, not argue that freedom of speech should be shut down.

> Also, yeah, out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made. People get things wrong sometimes. It sucks and we should use our freedom of speech to help correct those errors, not argue that freedom of speech should be shut down.

There's a difference in my opinion between harassment and free speech. Notably, if you're trying to punish, threaten, or coerce someone, you fall outside of the bounds of "criticism". This may not be the legal definition, but I can't see any other definition that would be consistent with free speech ideals.

Further, because it's perhaps too difficult to legally litigate this kind of harassment, we could also approach the problem by making it more difficult for employers to terminate employees, thereby neutering the mobs (they can "speak" all they want but they can't persecute).

Those are three anecdotes, and at least two of them are not as stark as described. The data scientist's timing was bad and his prior relationship with several stakeholders was already on the rocks. There are rumors that the worker who had no idea what the connotations of the ok symbol are has been re-hired. This is hardly anything compared to the armies of celebrities who signed the Harper's letter and are mostly complaining that they can no longer express their opinions without being criticized.

The difficulty here is that several things are happening at once. There is a problem with groupthink at some institutions, but there are also people who are trying to suppress legitimate criticism.

They are indeed anecdotes, as are the Harper’s letter signatories and many, many others. Anyway, the issue for the Nth time is not about “criticism” but “harassment”. It’s not a good faith argument to conflate these things when it has been stated over and over that this is about people targeting individuals’ employment status. This isn’t “criticism”.

The fact that it hasn’t stifled prominent, powerful people such as the Harper’s signatories is not evidence that cancel culture doesn’t exist or that it is a weak force; it means that less powerful people are effectively suppressed. You don’t hear about what you don’t hear about. Survivorship bias.

> If she says something I consider offensive, I might say I think it's offensive. If she says something dumb, I might say I think it's dumb.

Respectfully, I think you're missing the point. She works at a journalistic outlet that claims to be neutral and factual. When her peers demean her openly within the company for "writing about the Jews" (because she supports Israel), that shows that NYT is no longer operating like a legitimate news house. After all, their employees feel a freedom and psychological safety in openly harassing peers for their ideas and political views. The comments here are not asking to insulate Bari Weiss's ideas from intellectual critique or from public criticism. They are against biases in journalism, the censorship of ideas, and ideological bullying/discrimination in the workplace.

The problem is that words like "transphobic" have a wide range of meanings, and are purposely vague to dismiss anyone who doesn't pass an arbitrary purity test. There are very few people who wish violence (physical harm) against trans people. But there are lots of people, who very reasonably, think trans women shouldn't compete in women's sports and that trans women are not women. The attempts to censor or deplatform THOSE discussions are exactly the type of hate speech mission creep that characterizes "cancel culture".

But I don't think anybody did get fired? Who of the signees of the Harpers letter is actually being hurt? Even if they _were_ fired, why is that bad? Most of the people who signed that letter are professional writers in some form or another, and their job is to write stuff that people want to read. If people don't want to read it anymore because they write dumb stuff or sign their name to stupid letters, how is that anymore an issue of free speech than if I got fired for writing buggy code or insistently arguing that we should be coding everything in Perl 4?

You can say all kinds of dumb shit and sign your name to stupid letters and other people get to call for you to be fired, and maybe you will be! Even after that, you can continue saying dumb shit and signing your name to stupid letters, and I can go write buggy Perl 4 code, and nobody can stop us! Your dumb letters might not get published in national magazines and I probably won't get paid much for my code but in neither case is this a violation of our free speech rights.

Lots of people are offended every day and they don't coalesce into slanderous mobs who demand the offender's termination. Further, these largely ignored offenses are generally much more overt than "accidentally making an 'ok' sign", "interviewing a black man who wishes there was more focus on violence in his community", "citing a prominent black researcher", "opening an Asian restaurant", "wearing a Chinese-inspired prom dress", "whatever the Covington Catholic students did to piss of the national media and their legions", etc. Moreover, I strongly suspect that the offended are largely progressives and not the minority groups on whose behalf they claim to take offense. This seems like a pretty novel phenomenon, isolated to one more-or-less distinct group (notable exceptions include Kaepernick or Dixie Chicks circa 2005, but these are anomalies and also "punching up" and not downward or laterally).

"coalesce into slanderous mobs"

Now, of course "the mob" can get things wrong. We see it all the time — and it's not a progressive or "cancel culture" thing specifically. It's just a side effect of these very rapid and short-burst communication platforms that many people use these days. And I'd frankly argue that the fact that bad information is so easy spread has been used to very harmful effect not by progressives but by people like Donald Trump who require these sorts of misinformation campaigns to stay afloat politically.

Maybe you disagree with that last point.

Regardless, if you dislike hate-filled mobs reacting to bad information, then you have to admit that some sort of content control has to be applied by social media platforms themselves. Or else it will continue to happen.

That said, the other part of this is that it's very easy for a large group of people to be informed of and react against something which they perceive to be harmful. Progressives — even cis white male progressives — have every right to be offended and to express their opinions against something they perceive as harmful. I imagine if you're on the receiving end of this then, yeah, it can feel like a coordinated mob and I have no doubt that it can be downright traumatizing. But that doesn't mean it's wrong or that you've been "cancelled." It is, again, a side effect of how our social media is currently designed and I'll be honest that I don't know what the solution is. But high profile writers with huge megaphones need to be aware that people have the ability to read, share, and react to what they write. And even low-level racism, sexism, etc which they maybe could get away with in the past will now be scrutinized. But that's a good thing, because we as a culture need to be scrutinizing how certain beliefs cause people real harm.

> Now, of course "the mob" can get things wrong. We see it all the time — and it's not a progressive or "cancel culture" thing specifically. It's just a side effect of these very rapid and short-burst communication platforms that many people use these days.

"Getting things wrong" is a symptom of social media and misinformation; cancellation and mobbing, however, are almost unique to progressive mobs. There are conservative mobs. E.g., the campaigns against Sarah Jeong, Kaepernick, and the Dixie Chicks [circa 2005]), but these are far fewer and they punch up (and in the case of Jeong, she really should have been terminated based on NYT's own policies and track record irrespective of a mob).

Misinformation is a problem, and Donald Trump wields it to great effect, and I'll happily talk about that in a pertinent thread.

> Regardless, if you dislike hate-filled mobs reacting to bad information, then you have to admit that some sort of content control has to be applied by social media platforms themselves. Or else it will continue to happen.

I certainly think that social media companies should be held to account for the consequences of their curation policies or else they should not curate at all. I don't think they should be allowed to claim to be "dumb pipes" when it suits them even though they're transparently not "dumb pipes".

> Progressives — even cis white male progressives — have every right to be offended and to express their opinions against something they perceive as harmful. I imagine if you're on the receiving end of this then, yeah, it can feel like a coordinated mob and I have no doubt that it can be downright traumatizing. But that doesn't mean it's wrong or that you've been "cancelled."

You're quite right--anyone who argues that cancellation and criticism are equivalent would indeed be mistaken. Cancellation refers to concerted campaigns to harm someone, usually by having them terminated or defaming them. This is harassment, not criticism, even if it's not prosecuted.

> It is, again, a side effect of how our social media is currently designed and I'll be honest that I don't know what the solution is.

Social media certainly plays a role, but if it were the primary driver, we would expect these mobs to be evenly distributed across the ideological matrix.

> And even low-level racism, sexism, etc which they maybe could get away with in the past will now be scrutinized. But that's a good thing, because we as a culture need to be scrutinizing how certain beliefs cause people real harm.

"Scrutinized" is one thing. The problem is that overwhelmingly there is no evidence to support claims of 'racism' whatsoever, and yet the penalties are harsh. There's simply no evidence at all that could acquit you in the court of Twitter. Kafka couldn't write fiction like this.

> But that doesn't mean it's wrong

People aren't just expressing their opinion. Instead a whole bunch of people are engaging in actual illegal harassment, when these mobs start up.

No, I am not talking about criticism. I am talking about the actual harassment that often comes out of these mobs. Harassment such as death threats to you, your friends and your family, and the like, all because someone said something dumb on twitter or whatever.

When we debate cancellation, we're mostly debating other kinds of harassment: doxxing, pressuring one's employer to terminate an employee, and defamation. Specifically, we're talking about harassment campaigns--in other words, large movements that engage in any of these behaviors for the purpose of punishing wrongthink. While these mobs have a few people who make death threats, there aren't usually large enough numbers of these threats to constitute a campaign, and even if there were, I like to think that even cancellation advocates would consider this out-of-bounds of acceptable behavior. The debate mostly revolves around the question of whether these harassment campaigns constitute criticism ("the opponents of cancellation just don't want to be criticized" and all that). Of course, harassment is never criticism, and it's always morally repugnant; however, sometimes harassment is legal either in theory (e.g., afaik there is no legal prohibition against doxing) and other times it's legal in practice (e.g., 'defamation' is illegal in theory but the burden of proof is absurdly high).

From the perspective of free speech ideals, "speech" is the expression of an idea; it may be "persuasion" but not "coercion" or "intimidation". Cancellation is both coercive and intimidating by design and by definition, so it falls outside of the boundaries of 'speech'; however, not everything that violates free speech ideals is illegal to the great glee of free speech opponents.

> When we debate cancellation, we're mostly debating other kinds of harassment:

Sure, but I think it is unfortunately that this is the only thing that people talk about.

The reality is that there is a whole bunch of stuff that is really really bad, such as death threats and the like, that will happen whenever there is a hate mob/harassment campaign that was started against someone.

When people try to defend these kinds of online mobs, they tend to focus more on the grey stuff, and they try to ignore the really bad stuff that happens. It is much easier to defend someone just "criticizing" another, instead of the much worse stuff that I've seen happen.

I don't think that someone should be able to distance themselves from the truly horrific stuff that can come out of these kinds of movements. It is much worse than people just be criticize, or whatever. And people need to recognize that those kinds of things happen.

IE, the stuff that happens can often be even worse than the, admittedly still very bad things that you brought up that I agree shouldn't happen either.

And by bringing up the even worse stuff, it gives less room for contrarians to make arguments and claims like "Well, actually, criticism isn't harassment", or "well actually, maybe the person deserved to be the target".

I agree with this to a certain extent, but any side of a large debate is going to have a handful of people who make death threats. I wouldn’t want anyone to think, for example, that criticism of antifa is invalidated or lessened because one or two critics issued threats. If there is evidence that the volume of threats is higher among cancellers than other movements, then that would be good cause for additional criticism IMO.

But everyone should condemn violence and harassment from their own ideological cohort.

Kaepernick and Dixie Chicks are obvious examples of "cancel culture" coming from the right, and many people on the left are more than happy to practice this in the other direction, in spite of recognizing how wrong it was in those cases.

I’ll add some ideas. I hope you can accept them.

I think you and a number of other posters have alluded to or directly referenced a “progressive agenda”. And, others have mentioned attacks on “freedom”.

To me, those are some powerful and emotional phrases. And, they’re also so vague and able to encompass pretty much everything that one doesn’t agree with. To me, as someone with casual knowledge of linguistic manipulation, this seems very suspicious and designed.

Then, there’s the fact that I believe I’m a moderate. I have a subscription to the NYT. I like it. I think the journalism and writing are top notch. I generally skip the opinion page because it’s pretty boring, but when I do read it, I think it’s a often a bit tailored to the most ardent of NYT subscribers.

Because I’m a NYT subscriber, I’m often called a “progressive”, Apparently, because I’m against racism and other forms of individual oppression, I’m also considered a “progressive”. They don’t seem to care if I’m for state’s rights (I’m American) or low taxes or capitalism Or rights to firearms, or anything.

What if you’re being manipulated by a influence operation? Why do I say this? Because I genuinely try to empathize with The people who call me this (on-line, at work, family members, etc.) But, instead of giving me specific details, they just cite things that are completely unrelated to me: Antifa, Soros, Bill Gates, or whatever the buzz is that week. And, eventually they grumble some more about “freedom” and drop it.

So, here’s an opportunity for you. Lay down a believe that’s so controversial, that you think it will be censored and oppressed, and I promise to read it and empathize with your point of view. And, I’m sure others will, too.

There's little evidence this is the case.

This post could be summarized in one sentence: Bari Weiss wanted people fired because they called her names and the NYT refused, so she quit and threatened legal action.

She never said she wanted people fired, but that management should tell employees to not harass other employees with ax emojis in a slack. That seems like a totally reasonable standard to implement.

She never said that "management should tell" employees anything. It's intentionally vague and not at all clear the NYT didn't take that action, if the story is even totally true, and it's just an open-ended legal threat.

I support the Harper's letter and sympathise with many of Weiss' criticisms, but I agree that she flirts with cancel culture territory herself with her language about a hostile work environment. Do you want robust debate or not?

There’s a difference between debate and slandering your coworkers. That would 100% get you fired on the spot if you did it in a slack channel for any company I’ve worked for (bigger companies than the Times).

if represented truthfully, the behavior she described doesn't sound anything like "robust debate" to me.

Yes, that is why the remark about cancel culture is spot-on. Debate centres around opinions which are shared and discussed so as to end up with a winning argument or position. Dialectic centres around people voicing opposing opinions to try to find out the truth. Neither of these two can work when voicing an opinion outside of the Overton window can and often does end up with the person voicing said opinion being silenced or removed. Cancel culture is not about a robust debate, it is about staging a debate where only approved opinions are allowed to be heard.

If that’s what you got out of this, you didn’t read the article.

Also, where do you work that slandering your coworkers and putting axes next to their name wouldn’t get you fired?

You're assuming "both sides" have an equally valid point of view. Tom Cotton's racist op-ed and COVID denialism are two current examples where one side is definitely wrong. Bari believes there shouldn't be consequences for saying dangerously wrong things.

I read the Tom Cotton op-ed and didn't find any racist element to it. It would be interesting to have you highlight which paragraph was racist in your eyes.

He wanted the military unleashed on his fellow citizens, a move that would have escalated violence and perhaps led to a spiraling loss of control by both sides.

"Racist" was the least of the concerns.

Apparently it wasn't the least of everyone's concerns, since it was the only thing the original commenter mentioned.

He was calling for military violence against largest peaceful protesters, the one red line that once you cross, there's no going back (Syria, Egypt, etc.)

By printing it, NYT gave it a platform and a tacit approval. Not to mention that it came out later it wasn't even reviewed before published.

Major fuck up by them.

Maybe not racist per se, but Cotton specifically blamed antifa which was a deliberate and calculated lie intended to blame imaginary radical leftists on activities that were mostly being our by garden variety robbers unassociated with any political group. I also think that public sentiment was swayed by cable news coverage that made the looting seem far worse than it was.

"No true Scotsman." Really?

And I'm not sure how bad you think the rioting and looting was, but in Minnesota (mostly Minneapolis) alone, the economic loss is already estimated at $500 million dollars, with over one thousand businesses affected, and many were destroyed. Source: https://emmer.house.gov/_cache/files/b/c/bc0f4be4-4618-4786-...

That's not No True Scotsman. It's fact. The FBI did not pin any illegal activity on antifa. Cotton had absolutely no evidence to back his claim. While I obviously don't know everyone who participated in looting, in NYC where I live the looters were nowhere near the organized protests.

https://www.businessinsider.com/fbi-no-intelligence-antifa-w...

First, reporting a lack of intelligence that directly links those actions to Antifa, especially only a week after the first protest, does not mean there was no direct link. But have a counterpoint, from some people who already had some intelligence: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/law-enfo...

> "U.S. police officials said they are examining both local and out-of-state actors focused on creating damage and inciting violent confrontations with police (and possibly other protesters) in the name of anarchist and antifa causes."

> "They prepared to commit property damage and directed people who were following them that this should be done selectively and only in wealthier areas or at high-end stores run by corporate entities."

> "And they developed a complex network of bicycle scouts to move ahead of demonstrators in different directions of where police were and where police were not for purposes of being able to direct groups from the larger group to places where they could commit acts of vandalism including the torching of police vehicles and Molotov cocktails where they thought officers would not be."

Beyond even Antifa and similar groups, my first point is largely about the statement "garden variety robbers unassociated with any political group."

There have been many protests throughout America's history. Most of them are done peacefully. Clearly most of them do not approach the level of violence and destruction that the recent riots and looting accomplished--riots and looting that coincided with those protests. Are we to believe this is largely coincidence?

The images and videos of the damage and looting that was done are out there. Windows, doors, and even entire buildings destroyed and ransacked, with "F* cops", "F* 12", "ACAB", &c. scrawled on the remains. Smashing, grabbing, chanting, it's all out there. There was obviously a political statement meant by many if not most of those people. This is made even more obvious when there are political groups that make statements such as: "By any means necessary", "No justice, no peace", "Give us what we want or we'll burn down the system", &c.

These are obviously politically-motivated actions. You cannot bear witness to all of the radical statements that have been made, also bear witness to the radical acts carried out and publicly supported, and then say the two are not related.

It was well known that protestors were getting attacked by police and that scouts were keeping an eye on police isn't a bad thing. Nor are medical stations. Police were brutalizing protestors. There's no proof these people were scouting for looters. In fact the article says the looting happened in Soho and the UES where the high end stores were. Protests weren't happenings in those neighborhoods. Graffiti isn't looting.

No one has proven anything criminal was organized and Tom Cotton sure as hell didn't have proof before he called for military intervention against a made up enemy.

> Bari believes there shouldn't be consequences for saying dangerously wrong things.

I believe it's important to discuss who gets to decide what "dangerously wrong" is.

> "both sides"

There's more than two sides here. Classical liberals and centrists who question or disagree with aspects of progressive beliefs are also being threatened with "consequences". That is a problem and it's time for the silent majority to start imposing some "consequences" of their own.

You're assuming a false dichotomy in which one obscurely defined group is subjectively deemed to be marginally better than the other excuses the synergistic absurdity of both

The op-Ed was not remotely racist. Can you support your assertions?

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