Racism in player profiles

[Dano Seale]

17 minutes ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

The whole "Freedom of Speech" thing is not what many think it is.

Yup!...But it was the "many" I was reffering to worldwide, who see it as a personal and social right!  So many people throw out the "you can't tell me I can't say that. Haven't you heard of "freedom of speech"?" defence/attack.....Sure we have, but if you want to take it that way then it should be done fairly. Someone says "black lives matter!" then someone says "no they don't", or "I believe in gay rights"....."well I don't!".....that person shouldn't be stoned to death as a "racist and homophobic pig!" They're just expressing their own personal opinions on the subjects. If the first person (and the multitudes that follow) says ".....ok, fair enough"....THEN you have a balanced "freedom of speech"! 

Everyone also has the right to their own opinion.
 

[Amina Sopwith]

2 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

Someone says "black lives matter!" then someone says "no they don't", or "I believe in gay rights"....."well I don't!".....that person shouldn't be stoned to death as a "racist and homophobic pig!" 
 

Well they shouldn't be stoned for it, but they certainly are a racist and homophobic pig and people should be allowed to say that too.

[Dano Seale]

26 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

but they certainly are a racist and homophobic pig and people should be allowed to say that too.

Of course, it's their choice. 

[Amina Sopwith]

2 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

Of course, it's their choice. 

To be honest, if a person actually said that black lives don't matter, that's clearly hate speech and could be construed as inciting racial hatred and violence, which is illegal in the UK at least. I suppose someone could make a philosophical argument about why it's important but I really wouldn't give a monkey's if that person goes to prison and I wouldn't campaign for their release. 

[Rhun DeCuir]

1 hour ago, Dano Seale said:

Yup!...But it was the "many" I was reffering to worldwide, who see it as a personal and social right!  So many people throw out the "you can't tell me I can't say that. Haven't you heard of "freedom of speech"?" defence/attack.....Sure we have, but if you want to take it that way then it should be done fairly. Someone says "black lives matter!" then someone says "no they don't", or "I believe in gay rights"....."well I don't!".....that person shouldn't be stoned to death as a "racist and homophobic pig!" They're just expressing their own personal opinions on the subjects. If the first person (and the multitudes that follow) says ".....ok, fair enough"....THEN you have a balanced "freedom of speech"! 

Everyone also has the right to their own opinion.
 

Along with that right comes the responsibility of accepting the consequences of that speech.  No one has the right to say whatever hateful thing they want without facing backlash.

[Beth Macbain]

2 hours ago, Dano Seale said:

that person shouldn't be stoned to death as a "racist and homophobic pig!"

Literally no one is stoning anyone. We're choosing not to buy their crap. HUGE difference.

[Evah Baxton]

Is there any kind of stipulation in the UK's hate speech law that allows the people to stand up and say "you've gone too far" without being punished?

Can the government add words and terms to the law without a vote?
(I will, of course, look into these myself unless someone has a quick answer 😁)

If there is a voting requirement, what happens if the UK becomes majority Latter Day Saint and the hate speech law is used to prevent speaking ill of Joseph Smith? (😆) Is it even possible, or is there a good solid separation of church and state in the UK? That separation is thin in the US right now...

My concern with hate speech law (with any law that deems words and phrases illegal) has always been that it would be used for power and control in a future after we are all gone.

I have never questioned it's good intent.

Edited May 28, 2020 by Evah Baxton

[Amina Sopwith]

I'm not a lawyer or legal expert but this is my understanding. It's illegal to incite racial hatred or violence, certainly in a public place. A private conversation between two individuals at someone's house is unlikely to qualify unless they actually are conspiring to bring harm to Jews or black people or whatever, and then it's a different crime. Two people in a private residence talking about how much they hate Jews aren't committing a crime, but if they take it to Speakers' Corner then yes, they can expect to get their collars felt. I'm quite happy with this.

Racism is insidious. The thought process behind it is rarely as facile as "I hate x people, I think they should all die". Even if it is, very few people are quite so stupid as to put it that way. I am really not worried about some kind of blanket gag over everyone if we explicitly outlaw the exceptionally simplistic and hateful stuff that nobody is actually saying anyway. The Daily Mail, for example, can't come right out and say that Meghan Markle isn't fit to join the royals because she's mixed race, but it can make various references to her mother being "straight outta Compton", emphasising the crime rate there and comparing this to "leafy Kensington suburbs", or it can make lingering reference to her "exotic DNA" against "thin blue Windsor blood" and remind us of how pale-skinned and fair haired the princes are. And, of course, it can constantly run stories that present her in the worst possible light while brown-tonguing the Duchess of Cambridge as an icon of grace and the "Jewel of the East" after a trip to Asia. (Now, at least. I remember when she was Waity Katy and they were sneering at her because her mother was once a cabin crew member and her family runs a party supplies business. No, I don't know what the problem is with either of those things. I guess new money? You know, that they earned themselves like some scummy low lives? I don't know.)

Can this be outlawed? Well, no. And it's not. But I really don't buy this idea that by forbidding the Mail from saying outright that Meghan is too black to be worthy of royal life, we are somehow gagging forces for good and repressing freedom. Minority people didn't exactly do better in the days when it was acceptable to incite hatred against them, and today's racism isn't that simplistic anyway. I simply do not believe that we are repressing freedom by enabling black, Jewish, gay, trans or whatever people to be able to go about their daily lives without being confronted by overt and naked calls for their persecution. The idea is nonsensical to me.

As for political correctness, I've worked in mega-PC environments and I've never heard any of these stupid terms that got made up to try to discredit the idea that we shouldn't talk about people as though they're scum. No, you don't have to say "vertically challenged" or "horizontally empowered" or whatever. How ridiculous. I've never heard any such bollocks anywhere except from the mouth of a bigot. (Although actually I think they're talking out of their bums when they pull this nonsense? Certainly that's where they keep their heads.) You are asked to use terms such as "people with dementia", "wheelchair user" and "with a learning disability". I bet most people can't even think what terms those are intended to replace, so absolutely normal and sensible are these ones. 

 

Edited May 28, 2020 by Amina Sopwith

[Dano Seale]

2 hours ago, Rhun DeCuir said:

Along with that right comes the responsibility of accepting the consequences of that speech.  No one has the right to say whatever hateful thing they want without facing backlash.

Who decides what the consequences are, what's hateful and what's good or bad "backlash"?  If the "gay rights" person decides the "I don't" is hateful and punches them in the mouth as a consequence, everyone cheers! If the "I don't" person does this, they're castigated (putting it mildly)! 
All I'm saying is that if people want to scream "muh freedom of speech!" in the sense of everyone being able to say wtf they like, whenever, (in it's unofficial state of only applying to Governments) then it needs to be fairly a balanced freedom and they shouldn't complain or castigate someone who disagrees with them and shouts "My freedom of speech too!"
 

 

42 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

It's illegal to incite racial hatred or violence, certainly in a public place.

And that seems to work differently too, depending which side you happen to be on!
 

 

2 hours ago, Beth Macbain said:

Literally no one is stoning anyone. We're choosing not to buy their crap. HUGE difference.

Wasn't meaning here Beth sorry. Meant in RL or elsewhere online. Should have made that clearer.

[Amina Sopwith]

9 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

54 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

 It's illegal to incite racial hatred or violence, certainly in a public place. 

And that seems to work differently too, depending which side you happen to be on! 

I don't follow what you're saying here. Can you elaborate? 

[Beth Macbain]

14 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

Wasn't meaning here Beth sorry. Meant in RL or elsewhere online. Should have made that clearer.

No one can be stoned online... no, wait... people absolutely can be stoned, but they can't get stoned? Or they can get stoned but not be stoned? 

Anyway, no one is doing it in real life, either, as far as I know. 

It also reminds me that reading the Lottery in school gave me nightmares. It still freaks me out just thinking about it. I hated that story. 

Damn it, Dano.

...crosses Dano back off the list...

[Scylla Rhiadra]

1 hour ago, Amina Sopwith said:

Can this be outlawed? Well, no. And it's not. But I really don't buy this idea that by forbidding the Mail from saying outright that Meghan is too black to be worthy of royal life, we are somehow gagging forces for good and repressing freedom. Minority people didn't exactly do better in the days when it was acceptable to incite hatred against them, and today's racism isn't that simplistic anyway. I simply do not believe that we are repressing freedom by enabling black, Jewish, gay, trans or whatever people to be able to go about their daily lives without being confronted by overt and naked calls for their persecution. The idea is nonsensical to me.

Pulled from a lengthy and entirely sensible post, all of which is gold . . . but this is especially good.

Thank you Amina.

[Amina Sopwith]

Just now, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Pulled from a lengthy and entirely sensible post, all of which is gold . . . but this is especially good.

Thank you Amina.

Did it on my phone with a cat on my head, too. Thank you.

[Dano Seale]

29 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

I don't follow what you're saying here. Can you elaborate?

I'll try. Hmmm, ok....As a "white" truck driver on timed deliveries, if I get stopped on the "freeway" by a bunch of sat down BLM protestors, I'd be out of my truck dragging them off the road by the ears! Were THEY inciting racial violence by doing that that day? Not a lot seems to have happened to those folk that I know of? Were the people protesting their right to have the confederate flag inciting violence? Or was it the people attacking them and ripping down their flags?
Just seems to me that it's one rule for one and another for others a lot of the time...."not balanced" kinda.

I'm using the US to portray those scenarios because I don't even know what our bunch of lunatics call themselves these days, never mind what they're upto!

[Amina Sopwith]

1 minute ago, Dano Seale said:

I'll try. Hmmm, ok....As a "white" truck driver on timed deliveries, if I get stopped on the "freeway" by a bunch of sat down BLM protestors, I'd be out of my truck dragging them off the road by the ears! Were THEY inciting racial violence by doing that that day? 

What?

[Rhun DeCuir]

1 hour ago, Dano Seale said:

Who decides what the consequences are, what's hateful and what's good or bad "backlash"?  If the "gay rights" person decides the "I don't" is hateful and punches them in the mouth as a consequence, everyone cheers! If the "I don't" person does this, they're castigated (putting it mildly)! 
All I'm saying is that if people want to scream "muh freedom of speech!" in the sense of everyone being able to say wtf they like, whenever, (in it's unofficial state of only applying to Governments) then it needs to be fairly a balanced freedom and they shouldn't complain or castigate someone who disagrees with them and shouts "My freedom of speech too!"

Consequences does not necessarily mean physical violence.  Written or verbal rebuffs, banning, unfriending, reporting (if need be) can all be consequences of unwanted and inappropriate speech.  Social consequences can be far more powerful than physical ones.  

Who decides?  the person who is the target of what is said.  If you were to call me the f-word, it is I, not you, who gets to decide if it was inappropriate.  And if you don't like my response, then tough for you.  You do not have an unrestricted right to be a dirtbag without repercussions.  Deal with it

Also, as has been pointed out many, many times... Freedom of speech only has to do with government interference with what you say.  No individual, company, or private organization owes your speech any deference or respect.  They are free to deny you any platform to say what you want on their property.  Again.. If you don't like that... Tough.  Grow a pair.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

21 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

I'll try. Hmmm, ok....As a "white" truck driver on timed deliveries, if I get stopped on the "freeway" by a bunch of sat down BLM protestors, I'd be out of my truck dragging them off the road by the ears! Were THEY inciting racial violence by doing that that day? Not a lot seems to have happened to those folk that I know of? Were the people protesting their right to have the confederate flag inciting violence? Or was it the people attacking them and ripping down their flags?
Just seems to me that it's one rule for one and another for others a lot of the time...."not balanced" kinda.

I'm using the US to portray those scenarios because I don't even know what our bunch of lunatics call themselves these days, never mind what they're upto!

You keep conflating freedom of expression (as we call it where I am) with physical violence.

No one here is condoning violence, by anyone.

And if I saw you physically assaulting peaceful protesters, however much they were inconveniencing you, I'd frankly want to see you arrested. Just as I would want to see action taken against an antifa protester who was throwing rocks or molotov cocktails.

[Rhun DeCuir]

25 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

I'll try. Hmmm, ok....As a "white" truck driver on timed deliveries, if I get stopped on the "freeway" by a bunch of sat down BLM protestors, I'd be out of my truck dragging them off the road by the ears! Were THEY inciting racial violence by doing that that day? Not a lot seems to have happened to those folk that I know of? Were the people protesting their right to have the confederate flag inciting violence? Or was it the people attacking them and ripping down their flags?
Just seems to me that it's one rule for one and another for others a lot of the time...."not balanced" kinda.

I'm using the US to portray those scenarios because I don't even know what our bunch of lunatics call themselves these days, never mind what they're upto!

As a wise person once told me... "Never assume a person's character at first glance.  Let them speak their true mind first.  That will tell you all you need to know about them."

I think I know all I need to know about you.  Thanks.

[Paul Hexem]

6 hours ago, Amina Sopwith said:

Note from the artist: "I can't remember where I heard this, but someone once said that defending a position by citing free speech is sort of the ultimate concession; you're saying that the most compelling thing you can say for your position is that it's not literally illegal to express."

I'm fond of "I disagree with what you're saying, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."

The moment we start censoring other people, we open the door to being censored ourselves. We should oppose it no matter who's doing the censoring.

The men that wrote the US Bill of Rights were incredibly brilliant people- the rights they enumerated each serve an incredibly important purpose to this day. I point at the current US President as a great example of the need for freedom of speech. Imagine if we didn't have it, with that guy in charge.

[Lyssa Greymoon]

8 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

The men that wrote the US Bill of Rights were incredibly brilliant people- the rights they enumerated each serve an incredibly important purpose to this day. I point at the current US President as a great example of the need for freedom of speech. Imagine if we didn't have it, with that guy in charge.

The big downside being in this bizarro world there are so many people so stupid they’ll believe anything.

[Rhun DeCuir]

6 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

I'm fond of "I disagree with what you're saying, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."

The moment we start censoring other people, we open the door to being censored ourselves. We should oppose it no matter who's doing the censoring.

The men that wrote the US Bill of Rights were incredibly brilliant people- the rights they enumerated each serve an incredibly important purpose to this day. I point at the current US President as a great example of the need for freedom of speech. Imagine if we didn't have it, with that guy in charge.

I do believe that Voltaire meant political discourse, not personal disagreement or insult.  In any case, While I agree with the sentiment, that does not mean that I should be forced to hear  whatever anyone else has to say.  Nor should I be forbidden to answer back.  The 1st Amendment does not bind me as a private citizen.  It only restricts governmental response to speech.

[Lyssa Greymoon]

56 minutes ago, Dano Seale said:

I'll try. Hmmm, ok....As a "white" truck driver on timed deliveries, if I get stopped on the "freeway" by a bunch of sat down BLM protestors, I'd be out of my truck dragging them off the road by the ears!

Try a Xanax and ASMR instead.

[Dano Seale]

52 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

What?

Guess that didn't work then?  Sorry.  I seem to be digging a hole again with folks, so I'll just stop digging.
 

 

38 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

And if I saw you physically assaulting peaceful protesters, however much they were inconveniencing you, I'd frankly want to see you arrested.

That's fair enough....and the BLM folk inciting me into it?  The only point I'm trying to make is that there's rarely any equal balance with a lot of these things.
 

 

41 minutes ago, Rhun DeCuir said:

As a wise person once told me... "Never assume a person's character at first glance.  Let them speak their true mind first.  That will tell you all you need to know about them."

I think I know all I need to know about you.  Thanks.

So, I've been judged and condemned simply because I believe the scales should be equally balanced? ...well, ok, you're welcome I guess! 
 

 

16 minutes ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

Try a Xanax and ASMR instead.

Wouldn't work over the engine noise and my building blood pressure as I look at my watch!  Don't see why I would have to really. They could just protest in the normal way without causing more anger by stopping people getting to or carrying out their work! But yeah, probably the accepted option I guess.

Sorry for late responses. I'm in my fishing game and everytime I tab out to here my bite alarms kick off!  

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Just now, Dano Seale said:

That's fair enough....and the BLM folk inciting me into it?

Nobody can "incite" you into violence, Dano. You have free will! Step back, take deep breaths, and if possible engage civilly.

If you can't control yourself and find yourself compelled to punch someone because they've insulted or taunted you, then you're the one who needs counselling. Oddly enough, I haven't hit anyone for calling me a name since I was about 12. Can't you manage the same?

[Amina Sopwith]

7 hours ago, Dano Seale said:

Guess that didn't work then?  Sorry.  I seem to be digging a hole again with folks, so I'll just stop digging.

No. I literally cannot see what point you're making. You're saying that if you drag a load of Black Lives Matter activists off a road, they're inciting racial hatred? 

8 hours ago, Paul Hexem said:

I'm fond of "I disagree with what you're saying, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."

I have to be careful not to start hating this overused and exploited quotation. I know what it's saying, but it's not censorship or repression to create a world where black, Jewish and gay people can freely go about without incitement to hatred and violence. It's such a studenty position to hold. It's so theoretical and idealistic, and such utter rubbish in actual real life practice. No, you should not be allowed to go into a public place and incite people to racial hatred and violence because of an overly simplistic and absolutist concept. Flaming Nora. 

There's a massive cultural difference between the US and the UK on this, though, and I know there's absolutely nothing to be done about it. Bloody glad I couldn't be identified when I did jury duty, too. 

Edited May 29, 2020 by Amina Sopwith