Falsehood-based activism

[Canarr]

I took the title for this thread from this article here. Apparently, Alice Dreger is a somewhat controversial figure concerning her views on transsexuality. On a recent talk she held, people protested her appearance - but the base of that protest was, in part, not her actual views, but what people had been told her views were. She talked to them, and was able to clear up at least some of the discrepancies:

All in all, I think the engagement at the Wellesley protest went well, even if it was an ironic lesson in the social construction of identity. A number of students came up to me to say they had really had their minds opened by realizing what they’re told about someone might not at all be true. A few told me they were planning to push back against the problem of what amounts to falsehood-based activism.

Last month, there was a huge issue about an expected article by one Katie Roiphe, about the creator of the "Shitty Media Men" list. Based on the rumor she was planning to doxx the creator, Roiphe was attacked, the publication she worked for was attacked, and any attempts to correct the public view resulted in her being called a liar.

And now the Google Memo Guy, Damore, was invited to speak at a University panel on diversity. While the protests weren't as violent as prior threats had made it seem, there were still some minor disruptions:

A non-student protester then yanked the cables from the sound system and shoved the equipment to the ground, breaking an antenna. She was promptly detained by police. “[Damore’s] a piece of shit!” she screamed as she was issued a citation for criminal mischief in the second degree. “Even the women in there have been brainwashed!” Another protester stated: “Nazis are not welcome in civil society.”

Now, while I would generally support the last sentence there - "Nazis are not welcome in civil society" - I'm fairly certain that Damore isn't actually a Nazi. From all I've read, he doesn't support any kind of White Supremacist views, despite the many claims of him being sexist, racist, or both.

Where does that come from? How can people get so worked up about something that can clearly be proven false with just the slightest bit of due diligence?

[jackfaire]

Where does that come from? How can people get so worked up about something that can clearly be proven false with just the slightest bit of due diligence?

12 years of school.


Oh I have more. See from the earliest ages we are taught "facts" that after 2 seconds of research are false. Wishing to engage in that research the desire to know more all falls under critical thinking.

We expect school children to take every single thing their teachers say as Gospel. They are never taught to question the information they are given. They are taught that Books are sacred holy relics that will never lie to them.

Christopher Columbus was an explorer that discovered the world was round and before that EVERYONE thought the Earth was flat.

This was taught to me as the God's Honest Truth in school.

George Washington cut down a Cherry Tree was taught to me as a historical nugget of information as if it came from his memoirs of growing up.

The problem is most schooling doesn't introduce "critical thinking" until College/University and even then we teach about "appropriate sources" ignoring that "if it seems like bullshit don't assume a credible source isn't bullshit"

"Oh the New York Times said..." retractions exist for a reason.

Our entire society is taught to believe what we're told and to never question it so we have adults who don't think to.

We need to stop teaching children as if they never grow up and become adults. If you don't want to teach the truth about Christopher Columbus because it's brutal all right fine but don't then teach the lie.

[Tanasi]

As I tell my kids and grand-kids there's five sides to every story and all are partially lies.
Believe at your own risk.

[Canarr]

Not sure if that is another case or not. I'm not familiar with this Sargon of Akkad guy; is he actually Alt-Right?

Even if he is: I can't really get behind this no-platforming bullshit. There's just something very wrong with people trying to fight fascism by using fascist methods like violence and silencing opponents.

[Tanasi]

Not sure if that is another case or not. I'm not familiar with this Sargon of Akkad guy; is he actually Alt-Right?

Even if he is: I can't really get behind this no-platforming bullshit. There's just something very wrong with people trying to fight fascism by using fascist methods like violence and silencing opponents.

Sooner or later they'll run into some folks that won't back down to them and things will turn real ugly. Then antifa folks will try to play the victim card.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

The problem with not disallowing certain viewpoints is they are unfortunately deceptively enticing to people who need simple targets and/or explanations. Those who verge on tribalistic tendancies anyway, the problem doubles. It errs towards the fringe. There's a reason the 80's and 90's were largely not turbulent - both far left and far right were kept largely on the fringe. That's not to say the world was sunshine and rainbows, but you didn't really see a whole lot of these overt white supremecists and facists getting the floor.

It's why you can never kill anti-semitism or overt racism. You can only choose what level of visibility you want to give it. Seriously, some people will have (and will always have) shitty lives and they WILL look for a cause. Whether the cause is justified or not is going to be immaterial.

One of the main reasons I think you tend to see disagreement on how you fight certain movements. Certain views you can argue against, but at the same time you're not actually arguing facts - you're arguing people's feelings. As soon as you realize that and you realize a good 80% (made up stat) of people are arguing from a predetermined position, then you really should just be asking what kind of debates deserve the forum.

If everyone thought and reasoned like a debate class, you'd probably see less. Far left and far right are usually extraordinarily easy to debunk on logic or science because they tend to idealize their utopia. The problem is, given the forum they tend to be perpetual engines that go nuts because they FEEL good until real fighting starts.

Applied to the Topic, that's really the thing - Damore, Gamergate, etc. are political targets and the vast minority of people engaging in the discussion have read the sources. I even remember the hubub over Orson Scott Card. I don't blame LGBT activists for hating his stances. But much of the fuel added to discussions about him were patently false and/or omitting other things he said.

[jackfaire]

I even remember the hubub over Orson Scott Card. I don't blame LGBT activists for hating his stances. But much of the fuel added to discussions about him were patently false and/or omitting other things he said.

In the case of people like Orson Scott Card though it goes beyond the exact thing he said. He wrote the Homecoming Saga which in the first few books has a pretty bad treatment of homosexuals. That colors anything he says about homosexuality.

Writers don't always agree with what their characters say but when they publicly express a view point that is in line with what characters they have written say then it's easy to see how one makes the jump from "I just don't think it should be allowed" to "Put them all to death" with the characters they wrote coming to be seen as proxies for their opinions.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

When it comes to Card, I'm not really asking anyone to reexamine their issues with him. It's not my place to tell people their feelings. I'm just stating that while people were attempting to torpedo Enders Game before it came out on film, there was a BS/Truth ratio that had gotten seriously out of whack.

I'd never make the case was secretly Pro-LGBT and people weren't giving him the chance. Just that the idea of "Falsehood-based activism" is actually pretty endemic within social media. Lies and obfuscation of source documents are too fast and too easy to produce and because those lies "feel good" to a person trying to make a point, the spread like wildfire.

Damore (as was said upthread) is an example of a Conservative blowhard that should have kept his social thoughts to himself at work and not made himself an issue. But much of what he said, ISN'T as it was later described.

[mjr]

Damore (as was said upthread) is an example of a Conservative blowhard that should have kept his social thoughts to himself at work and not made himself an issue. But much of what he said, ISN'T as it was later described.

And many people tried to say that from the get-go. But people who didn't read the memo (or its sourcing) had their minds made up already. It's a bad habit people have.