The wicked nature of pseudo-woke mob

[TheMeInTeam]

You're stating that compelling is taking place, but you're not showing that compelling is taking place. Or if what this is constitutes compelling for you, then a whole load of things are compelling such that it isn't exceptional.

"Do/say X or you can't work or live a normal life" is coercion that gets you close enough.

In many cases, the wokesters are not actually "consumers" of the thing being cancelled/targeted. But yes, companies listening to them is a problem too. We can probably circumvent a lot of this problem by not leaving the levers of control in the hands of monopolies (by % control) that want to control the narrative, because then you have functional market forces that will (over time) punish poor practices by business by allowing other businesses to replace them. Not...just as an example...shut down an alternative speech platform because it's saying the wrong things, and stalling the breach of contract long enough to remove them as a competing factor.

 

[Berzerker]

And what use would that be to anyone?

that would lead to a perverse bizarro world where the threat of making a mistake cancels never forget by achieving with self censorship what denialism cant.

 

[Senethro]

"Do/say X or you can't work or live a normal life" is coercion that gets you close enough.

Who is coercing who in this manner? Employers to employees?

In many cases, the wokesters are not actually "consumers" of the thing being cancelled/targeted. But yes, companies listening to them is a problem too.

So what though? Do you want special protections for things against being cancelled? Do you want special curbs against "wokesters"? Or do you just want to complain that these particular boycotts/political speech are bad?

We can probably circumvent a lot of this problem by not leaving the levers of control in the hands of monopolies (by % control) that want to control the narrative, because then you have functional market forces that will (over time) punish poor practices by business by allowing other businesses to replace them.

Ignoring your assumption that good practices are profitable practices and vice versa (lead in petrol lol), you seem to be generally confused about whether you're placing the blame on wokesters, the employers, those holding the "levers of control" (whatever those are), special protected classes of people etc

Not...just as an example...shut down an alternative speech platform because it's saying the wrong things, and stalling the breach of contract long enough to remove them as a competing factor.

I mean, I wholly disagree with you in general principles here, because I think communication platforms are approaching public utility status, so therefore I think they should be brought into public ownership and access for citizens guaranteed.

But leaving aside that belief, just how do you think commercial entities should be compelled to maintain relations with those who they'd rather disassociate from, in a manner that is not breach of contract?

 

[Samson]

I mean, I wholly disagree with you in general principles here, because I think communication platforms are approaching public utility status, so therefore I think they should be brought into public ownership and access for citizens guaranteed.

By communication platforms do you mean ISP's, web hosts (AWS etc.), fecesbook, spotify or CFC?

I have said elsewhere, I think what the state should do is enforce interoperability. You should not need to be on fecesbook to communicate with someone on fecesbook any more than you need to have a BT phone to communicate with someone on BT.

 

[Anysense]

You're stating that compelling is taking place, but you're not showing that compelling is taking place. Or if what this is constitutes compelling for you, then a whole load of things are compelling such that it isn't exceptional.

Using scary words such as Compel and Wrong-Think don't make a thing you just don't like bad. Why isn't this just consumers affecting the market that blah blah blah is totally cool when you like the outcome.

This thread actually started with one particular case of compelling. Forcing someone to do something is not a very good idea in general and for many reasons. I'm not sure what can be unclear here, 'follow us or you will pay' is blatant coercion I'd think.

 

[Samson]

This thread actually started with one particular case of compelling. Forcing someone to do something is not a very good idea in general and for many reasons. I'm not sure what can be unclear here, 'follow us or you will pay' is blatant coercion I'd think.

By that standard just about any employment is coercion, and a lot of contracts. I would not argue that the wage employment economic model with homelessness and poverty as the payment for not playing is pretty coercive, but we are kind of stuck with it ATM.

 

[red_elk]

By that standard just about any employment is coercion, and a lot of contracts.

You can leave employer if he is forcing you to do something you are not comfortable with.

 

[Senethro]

This thread actually started with one particular case of compelling. Forcing someone to do something is not a very good idea in general and for many reasons. I'm not sure what can be unclear here, 'follow us or you will pay' is blatant coercion I'd think.

What compulsion is being used? How is this compulsion unusual or worse than a typical interaction?

 

[Samson]

You can leave employer if he is forcing you to do something you are not comfortable with.

Whoopi Goldberg can leave her network if she is not comfortable with them.

 

[Senethro]

By communication platforms do you mean ISP's, web hosts (AWS etc.), fecesbook, spotify or CFC?

I have said elsewhere, I think what the state should do is enforce interoperability. You should not need to be on fecesbook to communicate with someone on fecesbook any more than you need to have a BT phone to communicate with someone on BT.

Sorry, I missed this earlier. I meant ISP and telecomms. We're now at the point where you need an internet capable phone to get housing or jobs.

Funnily enough, I was surprised earlier this year when changing phone company at how easy it was, due to a legal mandate that they do all the switching for me and can't drag their feet, complain or bombard me with paperwork about it. Its not quite interoperability but its something.

 

[Samson]

Sorry, I missed this earlier. I meant ISP and telecomms. We're now at the point where you need an internet capable phone to get housing or jobs.

Funnily enough, I was surprised earlier this year when changing phone company at how easy it was, due to a legal mandate that they do all the switching for me and can't drag their feet, complain or bombard me with paperwork about it. Its not quite interoperability but its something.

This I will not disagree with. We kind of used to own it, in that all the actual kit is owned by BT, which was public owned. We could just renationalise that and provide internet connectivity for everyone. This would be a great leveling up move.

 

[MaryKB]

Internet access is as necessary today as electricity. I totally agree it should be a utility (and I believe Barack Obama said likewise)

And especially the pandemic showed how necessary it is for public education. Children without high-speed internet are at a major disadvantage.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Ignoring your assumption that good practices are profitable practices and vice versa (lead in petrol lol), you seem to be generally confused about whether you're placing the blame on wokesters, the employers, those holding the "levers of control"

Since I actually didn't construct this properly earlier, I will clarify:

• Engaging in cancel culture is cretin behavior/doing harm while believing the opposite. I hold that behavior in disdain, but do not contend they are doing anything illegal.
• Companies listening to woke behavior are doing something unethical, and sometimes illegal (depending on the nature of the employment contract, if any).
• This issue is most magnified where companies hold monopoly behavior & engage in anti-competitive practices to avoid that changing.
  • Law has not kept up with anti-competitive practices, particularly in the case of big tech, but also in general.
• In constraining the existence of alternative employers, the leverage woke companies have over their employees is unusual.

The ways to address this:

• In public opinion, push back against/shame people engaging in cancel culture.
• Break up monopolies that actively hinder this process. Not because they hinder this process per se', but because they are monopolies.
• Celebrity figures like Goldberg and Rogan need to stop apologizing. It is rarely sincere, rarely results in any lighter treatment, doesn't appease the woke mob, and depending on the nature of the apology alienates fans. Stop apologizing to these people.

Most of this is not a matter for law, but for pushback as a society. But monopoly "platform" abuse via one of the most common ways to communicate has distorted the marketplace of ideas and allowed an extremist portion of society to have undue influence for no reason. Should resolve itself if we break up big tech, which is more overdue than the phone company situation decades ago.

Whoopi Goldberg can leave her network if she is not comfortable with them.

She could probably sue them too, for defamation. Not a good move if you want to keep that employer, but if they have previously operated under the "skin color = race" paradigm, they'd be hard pressed to demonstrate what she said that was "wrong" based on the company's own broad conduct.

 

[Samson]

She could probably sue them too, for defamation.

What do you think would count as defamation? This whole at will employment seems pretty broken to me, but I have not heard about defamation claims around it.

 

[NovaKart]

I don’t think she’s have grounds to stand on there. Was she really accused of anything? It seems like they just said she has to reflect on her actions or something.

It is funny how Whoopi has this habit of defending celebrities no matter what and that’s brought her a lot of criticism like defending Mel Gibson and I think she defended Cosby for a long time until that just became impossible unless you’re someone like Phylicia Rashad.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Regarding the claim by Whoopi that has occasioned all of this discussion, by coincidence, I just picked up Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises" (1926) and on the first page is this:

Robert Cohn was a member, through his father, of one of the richest Jewish families in New York, and through his mother of one of the oldest. At the military school where he prepped for Princeton, and played a very good end on the football team, no one had made him race-conscious. No one had ever made him feel he was a Jew, and hence any different from anybody else, until he went to Princeton.

The off-hand nature of the phrase "race-conscious" here suggests to me that, in the decades prior to the Holocaust, it was routine to regard Jews as being of a different race.

 

[Farm Boy]

Hemingway...

 

[bernie14]

It really comes down to what we mean by race. It is defiantly an issue that we do much more medical research on white people than other ethnicities, which mean we are better at treating white people. Here is an example of GWAS studies, there are many other similar graphs I could have chosen. However is this race? Does it fully capture what race means in a modern socialogical context? That is the question, and I would say no.

of course not and that is quite clearly referred to in the link provided. Thing is, that @Lexicus is making a faulty (I'd add dangerous) generalization. There are genetic differences between population groups. This has been proven scientifically and is even obvious to small children. As I understand it, the basic question for biology is; "are these differences heritable? environmental? magic? I can see were the "categorization" has gone wrong, associating social and cultural differences to genetics (let alone differences, but this superiority/inferiority BS) but that does not make the genetics wrong. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that @Lexicus is defining "race" and "racist" as the same thing.

...There are genetic differences between individuals and populations. Framing this as "genetic differences between racial groups" is stupid, racist, and factually wrong.

But this is an illustration of exactly what I'm talking about. The false folk perception of race is deep-seated enough that even medical doctors who should know better are stuck in it.

when it comes to biology, i'll side with the geneticist rather than your polysci professor.

 

[Gori the Grey]

when it comes to biology, i'll side with the geneticist rather than your polysci professor.

Good news for you, in that case. The American Society of Human Genetics flatly says "Genetics demonstrates that humans cannot be divided into biologically distinct subcategories"

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6218810/

 

[Senethro]

of course not and that is quite clearly referred to in the link provided. Thing is, that @Lexicus is making a faulty (I'd add dangerous) generalization. There are genetic differences between population groups. This has been proven scientifically and is even obvious to small children. As I understand it, the basic question for biology is; "are these differences heritable? environmental? magic? I can see were the "categorization" has gone wrong, associating social and cultural differences to genetics (let alone differences, but this superiority/inferiority BS) but that does not make the genetics wrong. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that @Lexicus is defining "race" and "racist" as the same thing.


when it comes to biology, i'll side with the geneticist rather than your polysci professor.

It ain't saying what you think chief. It can't even tell you how many of these supposed races exist.