• Correct. I am not defending death threats or threats of violence in any way, and I will not allow you to portray me as doing so. Please confine your arguments to forms of speech that do not rise to the level of violent criminality.

        Fascism arises when dissent is silenced. Death threats are not dissent.

        • that’s the thing, we don’t live in a world where death threats and threats of violence are being dealt with in the way you seem to think they are, and community tools like bans are sometimes the only recourse people have that isn’t ruinously expensive, glacially slow, and uncertain to work.

          but sure, lets say we aren’t talking about explicit death threats or threats of violence. instead, they just… post the account information of queer tiktok creators, and spend most of their time calling queer people groomers and pedophiles. its not directly a threat of violence, but every time they post something, the accounts they post get harrassed by tons of anonymous followers, one of them figures out where they live, and then start bombarding a real human person with death threats. everybody doing the death threats is anonymous, there’s no way for the legal system to touch them. what do we do? nothing? or somebody’s whole online presence is talking about the great replacement, how the anglo-saxon race is being exterminated, and somewhere down the line we start seeing mass shooters pop up saying nearly the exact same thing in their manifestos. stochastic terrorism. using speech to motivate anonymous observers to take violent action, without calling for violence explicitly. should nothing be done about that? is that not concerning to you?

          i think you have a very simplistic definition of what fascism is, and what can or cannot be defined as a threat of violence. there is nuance to what should and should not be considered hate speech, and if you’re defending the institution of slavery, implying queer people are groomers, really doing any sort of bigotry, it can meaningfully cause harm to people even if it isn’t in and of itself a threat of violence. what do we do then? either nothing or put them in jail? because i think that having more than one way of mediating and enacting punishment for misbehavior is a good thing. i think that being able to respond proportionately to assholes without waiting for them to reach the threshold of illegality is a more healthy way of maintaining a community than putting a firm barrier between “dissent” and “actual crime”.

          • that’s the thing, we don’t live in a world where death threats

            I am not interested in discussing death threats.

            I will not discuss criminal speech, let alone defend it. I refuse to take the position you are attempting to assign to me. I do not accept your red herring and strawman arguments.

            The overwhelming majority of bans, blocks, and other fascist, silencing behaviors are in response to non-criminal speech. Please confine your arguments to such speech.

              • No, I did not read the rest of it. Again, the premise of your argument was a strawman about death threats, and I refuse to engage with that premise. Demonstrate comprehension of that distinction, or find someone else to argue with.

                • read the rest of it. or don’t, whatever. the majority of the post did conform to your specifications. i object to your framing, i just don’t think its settled ground that these things would be handled appropriately by a court of law, or that they are being handled in the way you have previously described. but i would also just generally recommend reading what somebody says before deciding what their argument is? even if just for curiosity’s sake. that’s a weird way of engaging with somebody.

            • in any case, i think i’m basically done with you. the world isn’t made of neat little blocks you can arrange to your liking. the barrier between criminal and non-criminal speech is socially constructed, and the conduct of individuals doesn’t go from perfectly fine to absolutely unacceptable in an instant. its more nuanced than that, and the way we interact with each other should reflect that nuance. like it or not, we have to be the ones to determine what is and is not a threat, it cannot be deferred to an authority unquestioningly.