Obvious as it may sound, people with authoritarian beliefs hiding behind free speech actually consider it as a weakness akin empathy. It allows losers like them to amplify their reach despite not being in power. They abandon their “free speech absolutist” postures the moment they think they are in power.

  • @Wilco@lemm.ee
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    67 days ago

    Yes, this is absolutely true. The evidence is clear when you consider how Twitter is going and with the censorship mentality spreading to other media, like the Reddit bans.

  • @Amandine@lemmy.ca
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    57 days ago

    This video is an oldie but a goodie, and deserves a listen for its analysis of fascist dialogue and how to talk to and about these assholes. A lot of us haven’t engaged with this sphere for a long time and this is a good primer on pushing back.

    Every single thing a fascist (unless to a fellow fascist) is designed to throw good people off the stink of their despicable beliefs.

    https://youtu.be/Sx4BVGPkdzk

  • @Zink@programming.dev
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    57 days ago

    It’s important for everybody to not just assume the people on your own team, or the people that look like you, are being truthful and arguing in good faith.

    That goes for everybody, but it seems pretty consistent that you need to me more wary of it as you move towards the conservative end of the scale. And conveniently for those politicians, the citizens on that end of the scale are the worst at cutting through the BS. Arguably that’s what landed them there in the first place!

  • @OrloNorppa@sopuli.xyz
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    1558 days ago

    It’s insane to me that somehow free speech has been successfully twisted into a dog whistle to basically just spread disinformation, actively call for extermination of minority groups and openly attack and threaten other people. That shit is not free speech those are malicious actions - and they should absolutely not be tolerated under some vague guise of free speech.

    • @technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      7 days ago

      There’s never been any actual free speech. There was never free speech for slaves, etc. We’re literally barred for saying the state should be overthrown which is probably the most important thing that anybody could say. Legally money is speech and corporations are people. Regular people can say whatever but capital has a nonstop bullhorn into our homes, tvs, radios…

      It’s a completely meaningless concept.

    • @rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      398 days ago

      Precisely. That’s why the most important mantra we can recite is “this is not normal”. No matter how normalized it gets, fascism is not normal.

      • @melpomenesclevage@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        108 days ago

        the conflation of ‘normal’ with ‘okay’ is sickening to me. unfortunately, this is normal now.

        and that should set off fucking air raid sirens in every single person’s head.

    • @yesman@lemmy.world
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      288 days ago

      If you pay attention to the reactionaries, they always steal ideas from the left. Fake news, media bias? That’s Noam Chomsky. Incels stole the idea of critical examination of gender from feminists. Racists are banning books on the theory that they target people based on their race.

      That’s why they’re called reactionaries. They cannot organize and ideology or a movement except as an opposition to the left dragging society forward. And like anyone motivated by spite and envy, they study us closely.

      • @CK07@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        It is always a little sad and funny to me when they essentially put on a suit made of the hollowed-out skin of a leftist concept. They heard people say “we want to see more women in electoral politics” and so they started running the Sarah Palins and Marjorie Taylor Greenes of the world. The point of the ask isn’t just to have women - it’s to have people who will use their experiences of marginalization to empathize with voters and with other marginalized people, to build coalitions. Not because we wanna see tits on CSPAN.

    • @wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      108 days ago

      Which is intensely frustrating for people who actually care about free speech. Can’t talk about it without setting off everyone’s “that guy is probably a nazi” alarms.

      It’s absolutely an intentional trap to attempt to get people to support moves against free speech by tainting the concept through negative association.

      We shouldn’t tolerate hate speech. But I’m concerned about where we end up in a few decades if the concept of free speech keeps the current connotations.

      And people might consider even this comment as sealioning or something.

      Meanwhile we have people unironically using phrases like unalive and censoring swear words in screenshots so they don’t trip the automated content filters on mainstream social media. That should be more concerning than people seem to take it. People joke about “literally 1984”, but unalive is blatant newspeak.

      • @floofloof@lemmy.ca
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        8 days ago

        This is what the fascists do: hijacking legitimate terms of discourse and abusing them so they become meaningless. It’s a deliberate strategy to subvert their opponents’ ability to talk about the issue by poisoning the terminology. See also what they’ve done with “fake news”, “critical race theory” and “DEI”.

      • @melpomenesclevage@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        38 days ago

        yeah, I can’t say ‘libertarian communist’ or people will be like ‘do you mean ephebophile communist? how does that even work?’.

        they have to steal our names for shit, because they always do horrible shit under their own.

  • @Hubi@feddit.org
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    8 days ago

    When our opponents say: “Yes, we used to grant you freedom of opinion”, yes. You did, that is no reason why we should do the same to you! Your stupidity need not be contagious to us! [Laughter.] That you have given this to us - that is proof of how stupid you are! [Laughter.]

    • Joseph Goebbels
    • @rustyfish@lemmy.world
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      8 days ago

      Goebbels must have felt really clever when he killed his children and wife. Right Goebbels?

      Goebbels? (Gore)

      Oh.

      • Higgs boson
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        58 days ago

        Reported for untagged gore. Blocked for being a shitbag troll.

        • FartsWithAnAccentM
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          398 days ago

          Mod here: Nah, that stays up.

          You just sear that image into your brain and think about it every time you hear the word Nazi, remember what they did to human beings (even their own).

          If you haven’t seen them, look up pictures of the holocaust because those horrors should never be forgotten.

          • @rustyfish@lemmy.world
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            158 days ago

            To be fair, the gore part I kinda understand. How do I tag a comment with gore? I mean he could have told me himself but he was so scared of what I might reply, he blocked me.

            • snooggums
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              8 days ago

              Hide it as a spoiler that is titled what it is and that it has gore.

              deep fried goebbels (gore)

              Pretend there was gore here

                • @melpomenesclevage@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                  8 days ago

                  but also, and im not a mod of anything and this would probably get you banned a lot of places:

                  nazi shit needs to be shown for what it is. no more looking away. a century of looking away and pretending it couldn’t happen here, that it wasn’t happening here, that it was just about ‘ethics in games journalism’ or whatever bullshit is what got us here. show that shit.

                  if we keep looking away, we will keep letting it happen. I would rather see a few old photos of gore a bunch of times than have to smell them, or risk being them, every time I go outside. a state of affairs which we are perilously fucking close to.

                  edit: so please; post more gore. you might just be saving lives!

          • Higgs boson
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            8 days ago

            Fuck you. This shit is traumatic for me. had family members murdered by the actual Nazis. Blocked you and this shithole community.

            • FartsWithAnAccentM
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              148 days ago

              Yes, the holocaust was an extremely traumatic event, that’s the whole point.

              I’m not whitewashing history for you, sorry.

              • @notsoshaihulud@lemmy.worldOP
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                78 days ago

                I would have reported the pic for gore, but I think hiding it under spoiler is fair game. What humanity should have learned from this story is that just because ideologies that consider fairness or empathy a weakness might appear viable and effective to grab power quickly, we have plenty of gory evidence that they do lead to the annihilation of millions, including those initially benefiting from them.

                • FartsWithAnAccentM
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                  58 days ago

                  A spoiler would be OK by me, but I would still encourage everyone to look at what they did if they have not seen it. Visit a holocaust museum even. Frankly, I don’t know that everyone understands, there are an increasing number of people who downplay or outright deny the horrors of World War II and everything that led to it.

            • @DogEarBookmark@reddthat.com
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              68 days ago

              Sorry to hear about your family.

              If the world is going to blatantly ignore history, then the atrocities should become more abundantly available as a reminder. Censoring history is re-writing it.

            • @melpomenesclevage@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              58 days ago

              hey, yeah, so, my people were also slaughtered by the nazis. some of the first, actually. and again by reaganites. I have watched loved ones die slowly and horribly with my own eyes in non-nazi-related deaths. like actually seen smelled touched it, not just heard stories from grandma.

              and I would rather see this shit if it reminds people the stakes of current politics. also, that’s a nazi in the pic, it just happens it also got kiled because of nazi shit.

            • @ChicoSuave@lemmy.world
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              38 days ago

              I had great uncles and an aunt I never got to meet because of Nazis. This picture is soothing, being a reminder of what happens to all Nazis. They all die. Every single one of them is removed before their time. It’s comforting to know that this too shall pass.

        • comfy
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          57 days ago

          Search: goebbels death -> Goebbels Wikipedia article:

          In the mid-afternoon of 30 April, Hitler shot himself. […] On the evening of 1 May, Goebbels arranged for an SS dentist, Helmut Kunz, to inject his six children with morphine so that when they were unconscious, an ampule of a cyanide compound could be then crushed in each of their mouths. […] At around 20:30, Goebbels and [wife] Magda left the bunker and walked up to the garden of the Chancellery, where they killed themselves. There are several different accounts of this event. [I’ve omitted contradictory claims of how they died and were treated after by SS soldiers] The corpses were then doused with petrol, but they were only partially burned and not buried.

          • @Wrufieotnak@feddit.org
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            17 days ago

            Agreed, but that wasn’t what the other comment demanded. If we treat other people like Nazis treat their victims, you are a Nazi yourself.

            That Nazis do not get the benefit of the doubt or a public soapbox or platform is something I agree with and hopefully what the other commentator meant instead of executions and ovens. But it is important to not dehumanise Nazis and not stoop to their level. They are all too human, that is the problem.

        • @PotatoLibre@feddit.it
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          37 days ago

          Read the same story the other day. They missed Hitler’s escalation believing he will never lie to such a point, until he did and then it was too late.

          If someone has a dictatorship as a goal, you can’t just fight under the democratic rules, especially if your system is not bullet proof.

          I’m not saying “grab a gun”, I’m saying there’s not much time to act. Anyway, this gives me some hope:

          https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world

        • comfy
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          True. We should instead just use one bullet for each and be done with them, no point in copying their atrocities.

    • @andros_rex@lemmy.world
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      38 days ago

      Remember that smile gave Moscow Mitch gave when they confirmed Trump’s lame duck Supreme Court nominee, despite rejecting Obama’s?

  • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed
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    758 days ago

    Here is what free speech is:

    Fuck the USA, Fuck Russia, Fuck China, Fuck France, Fuck the UK.

    Here is what free speech is NOT: [Racial Slurs]

    • @technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      Here’s what is not free: Fuck zionism.

      You might lose your job, be kicked out of school, be deported, kidnapped, tortured, genocided, ethnically cleansed, etc… I’m afraid to even say it semi-anonymous on the internet.

    • @Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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      518 days ago

      Honestly, the latter is absolutely free speech. They are 100% free to say that shit if they want. They are not free however from consequences, i.e. getting hit in the mouth, fired from their job, etc.

      • @tenton01@lemm.ee
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        228 days ago

        This is the real takeaway. Freedom of speech is the freedom to say anything. That’s it. You can just say it. It does not protect you from the consequences. It’s an important distinction to make, and I’m glad to see other people making that point.

        • @piecat@lemmy.world
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          258 days ago

          Counterpoint:

          You can say anything in an authoritarian state, the consequences are that you’ll get disappeared in the night.

          • @tenton01@lemm.ee
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            67 days ago

            Your argument is… valid. Everyone, we’ve just established worldwide freedom of speech! Put this in the history books!

      • @drislands@lemmy.world
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        128 days ago

        I guess the primary difference is between legally free speech versus socially free speech. The argument being that the government shouldn’t stop you from slinging slurs, while you have absolutely no right to not be ostracized/shunned/shamed by your fellow man.

        • @segabased@lemmy.zip
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          37 days ago

          I also think while yelling racial slurs should not be illegal, organizing and mobilizing under a racist ideology that promises to eliminate free speech should be criminalized. The tricky part is doing it in a way that won’t be abused ie calling things that aren’t racist and supremacist ideology those things to criminalize them.

          If only there was an art vs porn emergency button encoded into the law. You just know it when you see it and can call things what they are

          • organizing and mobilizing under a racist ideology that promises to eliminate free speech should be criminalized.

            Who’s the fascist now, huh??? \s

      • @kjetil@lemmy.world
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        98 days ago

        100% this. The freedom to say anything also does not entail the right to be listened to. Nobody is required to platform “undesirable” speech. Getting banned from a platform is a perfectly acceptable consequence.

      • @Realitaetsverlust@lemmy.zip
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        47 days ago

        It depends on the source of the consequences.

        Social consequences? Completely fine, even desirable.

        Legal consequences? This is where trouble starts and freedom of speech is no longer given.

      • Zloubida
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        27 days ago

        I disagree. Free speech should have limits, like every other freedom, because freedoms oppose each others. Insults, defamation, threats, calls for hatred, lies, … shouldn’t be covered by free speech.

        • @Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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          27 days ago

          Like it or not, that’s been the interpretation since the founding of the US. It is not the case in some other countries, but I’m assuming we are talking about the US here. What most people miss is it only restricts the government from punishing your speech, not private entities. Insults, defamation, and lies, are absolutely allowed, but you can be found liable civilly for any damage done by this speech either through punitive damages (lawsuit settlement) or other means, deplatforming, loss of employment, etc.

          threats, calls for hatred, are a bit of a gray area. It depends on the severity of the threat, but true threats can be prosecuted.

          Hate speech is generally allowed, but if it is inciteful enough to be a true threat, it too can be prosecuted.

          If you’d like to read up on true threats, see below:

          https://www.law.georgetown.edu/icap/wp-content/uploads/sites/32/2024/08/True-Threats-Guidance-3.pdf

          • Zloubida
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            57 days ago

            Oh I know more or less how the American law works. But I think it’s a bad one, that’s all.

            I’m French, and in France hate speech is illegal. Negation of crimes against humanity is illegal. Defamation is illegal. And you know what? France is still a free country. Freer even maybe, as our other freedoms and rights (like our rights to live peacefully) are more protected.

      • @VisionScout@lemmy.wtf
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        27 days ago

        They are not free however from consequences, i.e. getting hit in the mouth,

        I would say that this is wrong. If you get hit in the mouth for something you say, than it’s not freedom of speech. It’s the law of the strongest.

        Example: You wouldn’t hit a UFC fighter for something he said to you on a 1 to 1, however you would beat him if you are 10 against him. This is the law of the strongest.

        I don’t believe in absolut free speech. I think that it needs to have limits in it (very well defined limits), and there should be consequences for certain things. And the consequences need to be enforced in a way to counter them, like for example if you say hate crap then you should be forced to contribute to anti-hate orgs.

  • @LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    428 days ago

    Fascism is incompatible with any kind of freedom. Free speech is co-opted by conservatives and fascists so that they can promote bigotry without consequence. There is no reason that members of the KKK should be legally allowed to recruit people. That should be against the law. It should be against the law to promote xenophobia, racism, misogyny, and queerphobia. The only people who benefit from a system where you can espouse those beliefs without legal consequence are bigots and fascists.

    • @melpomenesclevage@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      laws will never protect the people who need it. every community should be on the lookout for this shit. everything should turn against you when you do a fascism. if you want to spread fear of everything as an excuse to murder the weak to make you feel good, there should be no inch of the world where you are safe.

      like, a lot of the nazi shit here in the united states WAS against the law. that didn’t help. just a bunch of wrist slaps.

  • Queen HawlSera
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    367 days ago

    First thing Free Speech Absolutionist Elon did when taking over Twitter was making it so that cisgender is a slur, but the n-word is not

  • Their version of free speech is to prevent you from contradicting the lies they continuously spew and then paint your rebuttal as an attack on their rights to spew them. They’re the victim of leftist propaganda.

    • Hanrahan
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      16 days ago

      Indeed, GAB is a great example, their “freeze peach” or banned :)

        • @gabbath@lemmy.world
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          27 days ago

          No no, we still value free speech, just that yours isn’t really speech, it’s the woke mind virus. And that needs to be eradicated. So, you see, we’re still free speech absolutists!

          This is how they trick people.