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modo_mariotoday at 10:36 AM1 replyview on HN

If you have a set of opinions and people who vehemently oppose them start pushing a bandwagon where they twist your words to make them sound more extreme and typify them with the worst descriptors they can think of (nazi, antivaxer, etc) , spread all this around and then call for boycots of you and anyone that associates with you what would you call that?

I disagree with some of his views but can see it across the board. One doesn't have to agree with him or others to take note and this doesn't affect only some well known rich people. It's far more pervasive and from my perspective it is pushing self-censorship and conformity under a pervasive reputation economy. That is social cooling and it's often done purposefully.

Once one of your oppinions sticks out and bumps into this wall it becomes very easy to see how often it actually applies. How falling too much out of line on one front creates all kinds of connected assumptions about anything else you might say. From there it is easily visible how it pushes a lot of people to political fringes (helped by the social media bubbles) and has other consequences.


Replies

croontoday at 12:40 PM

> If you have a set of opinions and people who vehemently oppose them start pushing a bandwagon where they twist your words to make them sound more extreme and typify them with the worst descriptors they can think of (nazi, antivaxer, etc) , spread all this around and then call for boycots of you and anyone that associates with you what would you call that?

I can't argue on specifics because you only mention a "set of opinions", but have you entertained the idea that some opinions held by someone who doesn't necessarily identify as bigoted/hateful/illwilling can still be weaponized as such?

How do you view the electorate of 1930s Germany? Personally I think very few of them were racists or fascists, but yet their votes were what led to "Nazi Germany". I believe you when you say you're unfairly labeled, and I also believe many more are. I however simultaneously believe that good people fall in with propaganda by piecemeal, that lead to much worse, and that "woke" people are rightfully upset by this.