> On Jan 6, 2016, at 3:28 AM, Rowan Collins <rowan.coll...@gmail.com> wrote: > > On 6 January 2016 02:13:53 GMT, "Paul M. Jones" <pmjone...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >> >> When speech-policing is proposed without irony, and welcomed with >> applause, I respond correctly: with scorn and contempt, as is deserved. > > You state this like some kind of self-evident truth. Understand that not > everybody agrees with you, and scorn is not generally something that wins > people round to your argument.
If a code of conduct so broad and invasive that it seeks deal with such crimes as the “thoughtless use of pronouns” and “culturally insensitive names” isn’t speech-policing, what is? >> >> The "real and legitimate issues" can be addressed without >> one, perhaps with the "conflict resolution" document you referenced. It >> is orders of magnitude more reasonable > > Ah, some constructive suggestions. More of this please. You may not see much of Paul’s engagement in this discussion as constructive, but I would disagree, and it doesn’t look like I’m alone. Many codes of conduct are written by well-intentioned people unskilled in legislation and enforced by tribunals unskilled in investigation and adjudication. Pair that up with the sort of person who earnestly believes they are making the world a better place by controlling what others say and how they say it, who deems any opinion they don’t like “dangerous" and any pushback they receive “harassment"—those sorts of people do exist, and they readily abuse extrajudicial systems—and you’ve got the recipe for gross injustice levied against people with an unpopular opinion. This does not require knowingly bad actors. Everyone involved would be not just cleared but congratulated by their own consciouses for doing what is Right and Good. When the creation of such a machine for injustice is formally recommended and begins to receive rubber-stamp approval, I’d hope someone would stand up and speak against it. Leaders in the civil rights movement in the United States could have been accused of using extreme or hyperbolic language too, but that is no argument against the rightness of their position. And on a related note, let’s not forget that complete opposition to a proposal is still meaningful feedback. > >> and observably less fascist > > And, we're immediately back to the unnecessarily combative language. Calling > the proposal "fascist" and "horrific" is really unnecessary, and just > undermines your position by making you seem like an extremist rather than a > concerned party with a contribution to make. Who gets to determine that the manner of expressing an opinion is unnecessary? While “fascism” has certainly become a general pejorative, it does have an actual meaning. According to the founder, Benito Mussolini[1]: "The Fascist conception of the State is all-embracing; outside of it no human or spiritual values can exist, much less have value. Thus understood, Fascism is totalitarian, and the Fascist State—a synthesis and a unit inclusive of all values—interprets, develops, and potentiates the whole life of a people.” And later: “The state is the guarantor of security both internal and external, but it is also the custodian and transmitter of the spirit of the people.” Knowing Paul to some degree, I doubt he’s merely using “fascism” as a general, inflammatory descriptor. Make no mistake, a project is not the same thing as a political nation-state. Still, the Contributor Covenant that was put forward as the original CoC does have some fascistic tendencies, including the fact that it reaches outside the scope of the project and into the way a person speaks or behaves on their own time, and it uses the project maintainer’s own understanding of the project’s ethical values as a basis for determining bad behavior. Everything in the project, nothing outside the project… [1] http://www.pauladaunt.com/books/Banned%20books%20and%20conspiracy%20theories/The%20Doctrine%20of%20Fascism%20-%20by%20Benito%20Mussolini%20%28Printed%201933%29.pdf Kevin Smith http://gohearsay.com
