Malcolm GladwellVerified account

Trump wants to regulate Facebook and Google and he wants to restrict news on CNN and MSNBC. The New Yorker crowd wants to banish Bannon. I’m not sure I see the difference.

Trump is the head of state. That’s the difference.

And tonight the rabble is calling for the same type of restrictions. It’s the worst of us. I for one don’t fear the Bannon babble and prefer he be allowed to expose himself as the repulsive man he is.

I’m going to say this one more time and one more time only: there is a big difference between the government removing someone from the stage and a private organization doing so. If you don’t understand that, blame your US history and government teachers.

Our government is of the people and when the people begin calling for limiting ideas the government will not be far behind. Case in point Trump. His calls for restricted speech at CNN and MSNBC and Facebook plays just fine with them.

At this point, I’m going to recommend you filing suit against your teachers. Based on the evidence I’m seeing here, you likely have a case.

Oh you’re right the government is NOT a product of the popular vote. How silly of me to think otherwise. I’ll file that suit ASAP

The 3rd Reich and its founders did not allow a free exchange of ideas. If they had, things might have turned out better for all concerned. Learn the lesson, fight ideas face to face, not by banishment.

Them not giving others a platform wasn’t a main problem. It made it obvious who they were. The problem was giving platform for their ideas everywhere else in 30s. There were fascists in UK, in Poland and other states too.

Every time the Weimar Republic lifted the ban on the Nazis (speaking, demos, uniforms & flags), they received more popular support.

Can you point to actual evidence that Bannon is a white supremacist? I ask respectfully but i am unaware of any. I'm aware of accusations but not evidence. Hitler wrote Mein Kampf. That was evidence. Otherwise this is just a mob lynching some other.

not an argument

Malcom, buddy, I love you more than probably anyone, but this is a really bad take. Giving white supremacy and bigotry and literal hate an even larger platform to air their toxic, dangerous nazisms isn’t an event, it’s called ‘facilitating propaganda’. Don’t be this guy. Please

“Let’s just hear them out, debate their ideas and have a civil discourse” isn’t an option when their ‘ideas’ mean ethnic cleansing, racial discrimination, gender restrictions, genocidal views and bigoted, ignorant hatred — ‘hearing’ those views out only grants them legitimacy.

I'm confused. If you aren't exposed to abhorrent speech, how can you combat it? Is the left arguing we just shouldn't see it at all?

Yes, because to reasonable, humane, intelligent people, those ‘ideas’ have less meaning and legitimacy than the fucking tooth fairy. Decent people don’t have to debate things that have zero merit, you dumb fuck.

I’ve seen you before. Didn’t you star in Fahrenheit 451?

You're so right Alex, this is exactly like Fahrenheit 451. It's impossible to find Steve Bannon's abhorrent ideas anywhere other than the New Yorker festival. Considering you worked in Bush admin when they passed the Patriot Act, I'm sure censorship doesn't really bother you