[tremon]

> It's almost as if rightist politics were some kind of cooties

Rightist politics may not be, but rightist rhetoric surely is. Consider GW Bush' statement "if you're not with us, you're against us" (or the 2025 equivalent "either you support genocide, or you're an antisemite"): where is the room for intellectual engagement in statements such as these?

Your suggested "intellectual engagement" with absolute positions such as these serves absolutely no other purpose than to lend them an air of legitimacy. There absolutely exist rationales that do not deserve to be "heard" or "considered".

Or put another way:

  "Let's meet in the middle", says the unjust man.
  You take a step forward; the unjust man takes a step back.
  "Let's meet in the middle", says the unjust man.

[account42]

The irony is palpable.

[tremon]

It's amazing isn't it, how a single thought-terminating cliché can so easily inspire others?

[int_19h]

> Consider GW Bush' statement "if you're not with us, you're against us" (or the 2025 equivalent "either you support genocide, or you're an antisemite"): where is the room for intellectual engagement in statements such as these?

Why are you considering them, then?

> There absolutely exist rationales that do not deserve to be "heard" or "considered".

How do you know which ones are those if you never hear or consider them?

The practical application of the principle that you espouse is that someone has to intellectually engage with these things, and then decide on behalf of the rest of us proles whether we should be "allowed to lend them the air of legitimacy" or not.

To that I say: there's no socialism without freedom, and there's no freedom in general without freedom to think for yourself and make your own judgments. Any ideology that purports to restrict that is inherently authoritarian, whether on the left or on the right, and should be fought tooth and nail.