I am deeply incentivized to broaden the definition of lib to satisfy my ever growing sadistic hunger. Fear my gluttonous wrath! I will never confront my troubled past! You cannot make me!

t34 I WILL NAME YOU FOR THE LIB YOU ARE t34

  • 420blazeit69 [he/him]
    ·
    8 months ago

    We do need to be more thoughtful about it. The point isn't to bully people, the point is to change people's minds. To the extent bullying helps with that, we should do it, but we are sometimes more interested in doing epic dunks than we are in persuading anyone.

    • Sickos [they/them, it/its]
      ·
      8 months ago

      Bullying is not a joke. We joke about it, but it is a strategy. The key thing about it is that most internet bullying is done not to try to change the mind of the target, but to engage an audience and let those who disagree with a statement but don't have the confidence or knowledge to engage know that someone is on their side.

      Additionally, there's the aspect of "is the bullying really bad when it's in response to an evil society?" Mark Twain put it better:

      There were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.

      And, lastly, here is a good writeup from a while back: TastySnack on bullying

      Oh, meant to respond to Pluto, oops.

      • Frank [he/him, he/him]
        ·
        8 months ago

        Word. It's so important to remember that you should be thinking about educating and changing minds in the unseen audience, not just or even primarily the person you're debating/arguing/cussing out.

        A lot of the "bullying", if it's working at all, is saying to the audience "no, this lib really is a monster normalizing monstrous things and you don't have to accept this behavior as normal or civil. You can and should loudly and violently reject these norms, and you're not alone in doing so."

    • Sons_of_Ferrix
      ·
      8 months ago

      he point isn't to bully people, the point is to change people's minds.

      Trying to change someone's mind often just feels like bullying anyway, really a lot of people perceive any feedback besides being jerked off as bullying. Debates, especially online ones, actually suck for convincing anyone of anything. Being a bit caustic to someone who's being a smug debate pervert at least gets them to fuck off.

      • 420blazeit69 [he/him]
        ·
        8 months ago

        Changing minds is tough, but people do it every day. Some of the impulse to bully seems like "I'm getting frustrated at this tough task so I'm going to lash out and then justify it later as actually good."

        Not saying that bullying has no place at all, just that we can't lose sight of what we're actually trying to do.

        Debates, especially online ones, actually suck for convincing anyone of anything.

        The internet is the most powerful propaganda/communication tool in existence. Millions of people have been politically radicalized through it in the last decade alone. People just rarely say they were convinced during a conversation (or they marinate on it and the mind change comes later), and the lurkers who get their minds changed don't comment because they're lurkers.