alt Hacker NewsOkay, I Ctrl+F'ed for "evil" and found... nobody calling anyone else evil (actions, not people, were described as evil by one commenter--the rest were discussing ethics in the abstract, not describing anyone or any action as evil).
But let me present a possibility: what if one side really is doing evil things? If you were transported to literal Nazi Germany or the Stalinist USSR, where millions of people were being murdered by one party, would it be "tribalism" to call that party's actions evil? Or would it be an accurate description of murdering millions of people?
Obviously we aren't at the point of "murdering millions of people" in the US yet, but I suspect a lot of this "enlightened centrism" which presents both sides as somehow just equally valid viewpoints would happily go all the way to watching millions get murdered and still not be willing to call evil by its name.
> Okay, I Ctrl+F'ed for "evil" and found... nobody calling anyone else evil (actions, not people, were described as evil by one commenter--the rest were discussing ethics in the abstract, not describing anyone or any action as evil).
I was mainly referring to dialogs like the one below. Not quite abstract.
> But let me present a possibility: what if one side really is doing evil things? If you were transported to literal Nazi Germany or the Stalinist USSR, where millions of people were being murdered by one party, would it be "tribalism" to call that party's actions evil?Amazing example. If you got magically transported to the "literal Nazi Germany" you would discover that the popular opinion at the time was to call "evil" the communists and the jews. If you spend a long time calling someone "evil" you gradually stop seeing them as people. This is how later on you don't notice when they're relocated into ditches and furnaces. Inhumane treatment doesn't raise the alarm when applied to non-humans. Check for instance what this SS veteran has to say [1].
Tribalism is not whether you're allowed or not to call people evil. Tribalism is calling people evil not because they did something evil, but because they belong to the wrong group or sympathize with it.
The original post does not advocate for "enlightened centrism", furthermore centrists are as prone to tribalism as anybody else. Applying blanket judgement is a very natural thing to do because it saves a hell lot of time and energy. Why argue about all the topics, why argue about all the individuals when you can just divide people in tribes and decide who's evil at the tribe level. Everyone does it to some extent. However if you overdo it, you may indeed find yourself in Nazi Germany.
[1] https://youtu.be/G6lN_VVaqdA?t=2811