[davesmith1983]

Are we? Because articles such as this seem to blame 8chan and 4chan (they never mention the rest of the site which has stuff from /g which is GNU stuff and the transexual and gay communities on there). Back in the 90s they blamed Doom, Heavy metal and Rap music. In the 1950s and 60s they blamed horror / slasher comics.

As for giving them a platform and an audience bringing more followers, firstly this is terminology used for justify soft censorship. Secondly in the UK back in 2010 Nick Griffin (a notorious anti-semite/racist and leader of the BNP) was allowed to speak on Question Time (a very popular show on the BBC). Afterwards we didn't hear from the BNP again because the ideas were exposed for what they were. The BNP party is effectively dead in the UK.

Almost every-time one of these racists are actually spoken to the vast majority of the population reject their message. Every-time it is repressed these ideas resurface because these people create their own echo-chambers and makes these ideas sexy as they are considered taboo.

[spaced-out]

>Almost every-time one of these racists are actually spoken to the vast majority of the population reject their message.

Deplatforming is the population rejecting their message.

[erik_seaberg]

Deplatforming looks a lot like an authoritarian quarantine of a message that is on the verge of spreading. It lends credibility that isn't deserved.

[davesmith1983]

Nope it isn't.

De-platforming happens to more politically moderate such as libertarians and conservatives.

It is normally done by a small number of people with a harassment campaign.

Any sort of soft censorship occurs it gives people an excuse to whine saying they are censored.

[pmyteh]

Nick Griffin's electoral success was not killed by his appearance on Question Time. In fact, a bunch of minority political positions have had a good deal of political oxygen from BBC appearances: I'm thinking mostly of Farage in the dog days of UKIP's popularity and also the Spiked!/Institute of Ideas collective.

Griffin lost largely because there was factional instability in the BNP and then the rise of UKIP stole the non-fascist right-wing to far-right vote.

[davesmith1983]

He got absolutely mullered on Question time so I find that hard to believe.

[pmyteh]

Even so, it's very difficult to kill a political movement by logical debate (or even by making them look silly). I had the misfortune to know Mark Collett (another one of the BNPers) at Leeds University. We managed to stop him making much headway in recruitment etc., but he lived for the publicity. Even when he got thrashed at Union AGMs and the like he'd be busy pitching to his potential support in the audience. Didn't work on most (he lost his votes by a landslide) but he wasn't actually trying to win. And I suspect getting his arguments attacked by a bunch of lefties and Jews didn't harm him much in his constituency, either. After all, it's all a conspiracy to stop him talking, isn't it?

[davesmith1983]

Well with someone such as that you aren't trying to convince him you are trying to convince the audience of your position.