[cal5k]

It actually makes me incredibly optimistic about the future of humanity to know that such people exist. It's important to fight for the rights of all - you never know when your cause or beliefs will be in the crosshairs instead of a group as obviously vile as neo-nazis.

[ebola1717]

I'm pretty sure to fight for people's rights, you have to fight against nazis. At least that's what all my history books told me we did in world war 2.

[UnpossibleJim]

as unfortunate as it may be, you not only have to fight against the nazis ideals, but also for their right to hold them and speak them in a public forum, like any other citizen. That's from the history books about the country's founding.

[ebola1717]

Nope. Nazi speech is banned in Germany cause they learned their lesson.

[e9]

We all know Nazi are bad, no one in their right mind will deny it. But the way they are currently handled through violence and censorship is not right and downright illegal. You are feeding their anger instead of squashing their ideas. We are American citizens and should respect each others right for free speech and engage in civil debate over ideas we disagree. If we resolve to silencing and violence without debate how are we better? Have you talked to any Nazi? Are you sure they know history and what Nazi stands for? etc etc etc I personally haven't met one ever but when I do I won't punch them with a fist but punch them with debate.

[liberte82]

Nazis don't have ideas. They will jump from truth to lies as it suits them to win an argument. They do not live in the world of civil debate. Think of them as trolls from before trolls were a thing. They are not an ideology, they are a hate movement. Silencing them does not make their hate grow, they are already fundamentally about hate. They are a passion, not an ideology. Tell me what is the tax policy of a fascist? They have none, save that of whichever system they hijack en route to their only real mission, which is the elimination and persecution of their perceived enemies. We fought the worst war the world has ever seen to stop them because once they got rolling, they had to keep growing to survive. That's the nature of hate. They certainly weren't going to be stopped by debate.

From Sartre: "The anti-Semite has chosen hate because hate is a faith; at the outset he has chosen to devaluate words and reasons. How entirely at ease he feels as a result. How futile and frivolous discussions about the rights of the Jew appear to him. He has pleased himself on other ground from the beginning. If out of courtesy he consents for a moment to defend his point of view, he lends himself but does not give himself. He tries simply to project his intuitive certainty onto the plane of discourse. Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past. It is not that they are afraid of being convinced. They fear only to appear ridiculous or to prejudice by their embarrassment their hope of winning over some third person to their side."

It seems that America is going to insist on finding out what fascism is really about the hard way.

[axedwool]

So in your estimation, Nazi hate is so powerful that even the example of World War 2 and seventy years of progress in racial equality was not enough to inoculate the vast majority of the people of the United States against it -- but passing a law against saying it in public will?

[e9]

so do you recommend banning all hate movements? As article points out "Those on the left face calls to characterize the Black Lives Matter movement as a hate group." Where do you draw the line?

[liberte82]

Note: wow I got brigaded. From highly upvoted to negative in the space of an hour.

[anigbrowl]

First, it's not illegal - although it does raise interesting questions of where public space ends and private property begins.

If we resolve to silencing and violence without debate how are we better? Have you talked to any Nazi? Are you sure they know history and what Nazi stands for? etc etc etc I personally haven't met one ever but when I do I won't punch them with a fist but punch them with debate.

And what will you do if they respond by punching you with a fist? I have talked to a lot of nazis, and listened to them, and have been doing so a very long time. Individual people can abandon the nazi ideology; according to people in the deradicalization movement, the most likely triggers for doing so are the birth of a child (more so if a daughter), or receiving kindness/compassion from someone who is normally a target of theirs.

But the nazi ideology is explicitly predicated on the idea of violent struggle for dominance rather than peaceful cooperation, in contrast to most others. Those who adhere to that ideology and call for the subjugation of other races, genocide, or war are not engaged in debate; they are issuing threats.

[UnpossibleJim]

I thought we were talking about America, here. I might have been mistaken. Nazi speech, as well as a great number of things are illegal in Germany that aren't in America. We have completely different foinding documents, government policies and laws.

[ameister14]

Interestingly enough, Germany has a Nazi party and they have a seat in the European parliament.