Do you respect the people that are politically opposite of you?

[tathra]

Interesting. How about the use of the word facist to describe trumpsters because, as you said (and i paraphrase) if you support a facist you are a facist. In this case, i can assume facist must be a term of endearment? ☺

I've already explained that in other threads in here. Definitions are why. When a word's definition describes something you use that word to describe it. Trump checks off 13 out of 14 of the 14 defining characteristics of fascism as well as the definition of the word, thus he is a fascist by definition, and his supporters believe in or sympathize with him, the fascist, and his fascist policies, thus they are also fascists by definition. qed.

http://www.rense.com/general37/fascism.htm

https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=fascism

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/fascist

 

[Morninggloryseed]

Well, seems kinda rigid, no? That line of thinking. Oh well. Cant please everyone.

 

[Escher's Waterfall]

Depends on the person.

 

[tathra]

Well, seems kinda rigid, no? That line of thinking. Oh well. Cant please everyone.

That's just how words work.

 

[Morninggloryseed]

Right. ?

 

[Morninggloryseed]

So in dismissing All supporters as "facists" do you still respect them or do dismiss them all as the scum they are?

 

[swilow]

I think its a stretch to call all trumpites fascists. A lot of his supporters voted fir him despite not agreeing with the totality of his worldview. Perhaps they thought it was actually a reality tv show.

His views are syncretic and populist. Looks like people still like the most fervent chest beaters.

Tathra, those links look like the thing ill wanna read when I'm sober. Thanks.

 

[drug_mentor]

i thought of several valid reasons to vote for Trump

Trump checks off 13 out of 14 of the 14 defining characteristics of fascism as well as the definition of the word, thus he is a fascist by definition, and his supporters believe in or sympathize with him, the fascist, and his fascist policies, thus they are also fascists by definition. qed.

Your reasoning doesn't seem consistent. You can think of valid reasons for voting for Trump, but anybody who voted for Trump (I take having voted for Trump to be a sufficient condition of supporting Trump) is a fascist? It seems to me that both of these statements can't be true, unless you are willing to concede that there are valid reasons for supporting fascism, something which it seems to me you would vehemently disagree with (though maybe I am wrong there). It seems to me you have admitted that people can have valid (i.e. not fascist) reasons for supporting Trump, since there are plenty of single issue voters, it looks like your supposed proof that all Trump supporters are fascists fails.

Just so you don't go labeling me a fascist too, I am on the far left and I strongly oppose Trump and his policies, I just think your reasoning here is demonstrably flawed.

Also, your second source for the definition of fascism says:

A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.

That provides four conditions, of which Trump meets two. He was democratically elected and has not engaged in violent suppression of the opposition, unless you count locking up a small amount of violent protesters on his Inauguration day. I think that's a stretch, there has been plenty of unsuppressed vocal opposition to Trump. It looks like you have cherry picked a particular definition to make a point.

Which of the 14 points in your first linked definition do you think Trump doesn't meet? I think a few of them are debatable, at least insofar as Trump's meeting those criteria represents policy continuity with the previous few administrations. It is also worth pointing out that this 14 point definition is one put forth by Umberto Eco in a 1995 essay and it is not universally accepted.

Since you like sources so much, here is an article, from a left leaning source, in which five experts on history and political theory say why Donald Trump is not a fascist. The word fascist is not as unproblematic as your appeals to vague and/or controversial definitions suggests, and it is not at all clear that Donald Trump, or the majority of his supporters, can properly be called fascist. Let me reiterate, I have no sympathies, political or otherwise, to either Donald Trump or his supporters, but I do find your repeated charges of fascism to be both ill considered and problematic.

I really think the avalanche of hyperbolic, divisive, and histrionic rhetoric coming from elements of the left since Trump got elected is counterproductive. Trump and many of his supporters are ridiculous enough, we don't have to resort to exaggeration and name calling to call out the bullshit which presently abounds.

 

[Cream Gravy?]

Perhaps they thought it was actually a reality tv show.

Wait, it isn't?

 

[neversickanymore]

@ op yeah, kinda like i respect random dogs i give some brief love to.. cant be against people for being challenged.. right?

 

[tathra]

So in dismissing All supporters as "facists" do you still respect them or do dismiss them all as the scum they are?

Its not a dismissal, its just informing them what they're position actually is in reality. As stated before, I'll respect anyone who is rational and interested in debate instead of tribalism.

Your reasoning doesn't seem consistent. You can think of valid reasons for voting for Trump, but anybody who voted for Trump (I take having voted for Trump to be a sufficient condition of supporting Trump) is a fascist?

Voting for what you perceive as the lesser of two evils doesn't necessarily mean you support them. Being a supporter has nothing to do with who you vote for and everything to do with who you actively defend, apologize and make excuses for, and argue in favor of their policies. Don't conflate the two. Also i haven't cherry picked anything, i went with the first thing Google showed me for that set of 14 points and got that definition from somebody else's argument about what fascism is dated from 2013 from some idiot calling the ACA fascism, so it predates trump by a lot and can't have been cherry picked to fit him.

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/14007-no-actually-this-is-what-a-fascist-looks-like /

 

[drug_mentor]

Voting for what you perceive as the lesser of two evils doesn't necessarily mean you support them. Being a supporter has nothing to do with who you vote for and everything to do with who you actively defend, apologize and make excuses for, and argue in favor of their policies. Don't conflate the two. Also i haven't cherry picked anything, i went with the first thing Google showed me for that set of 14 points and got that definition from somebody else's argument about what fascism is dated from 2013 from some idiot calling the ACA fascism, so it predates trump by a lot and can't have been cherry picked to fit him.

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/14007-no-actually-this-is-what-a-fascist-looks-like /

Cherry picking doesn't imply that the definition doesn't predate Trump, I never said the person who coined the definition did it for Trump, in fact I acknowledged it was coined in 1995; none of this precludes you from cherry picking said definition to fit your agenda. The point is that there are many definitions (at least 19 on that page alone) and you selectively picked one which best fits your narrative of Trump being a fascist. You said, and I quote (post #61): "When a word's definition describes something you use that word to describe it", the problem is that the word fascism has so many definitions that you are making a normative judgement about which of these definitions is correct, and then going on to argue as though this is an objective fact. In doing this you are being disingenuous at best, and I think you know it. In fact, I even pointed out that on one of your cited definitions, which you were careful enough not to appeal to directly, it would be a stretch to call Trump a fascist.

If using your democratic right to vote in order to help grant someone political power doesn't qualify as supporting them, I don't know what does. Also, in the quote I used in my previous post you said you thought of "several valid reasons to vote for Trump" (post #59), your use of the plural suggests these reasons cannot be exhausted by the single 'lesser of two evils' reason.

The fact is that you can't make a deductively valid argument that Trump is a fascist without presupposing a controversial value judgement, this puts you on much shakier logical ground than you have suggested, and that is before we even start talking about whether all his supporters are fascists. I have shown that politically and historically educated people can reasonably disagree that Trump is a fascist, but you didn't bother to address this. The strength of your entire argument rests on an imprecise and controversial definition. You have accused others of resorting to ad hominem attacks, but that is exactly what you are doing when you casually throw the term fascist at everyone who supports an arguably non-fascist politician whom you oppose. Your value judgements are not objective facts, you should stop acting like they are and drop the condescension towards those who disagree.

In my view, it is exactly this kind of unreasonable, divisive nonsense that made Trump supporters come out in droves; they are sick of being demonised for their political views. The solution is finding common ground through reasoned debate, not shit slinging. Again, I am no Trump apologist, but when you start moralising political disagreement and use this to endorse violating the rights of those on the other side of the political spectrum (I believe your words in another thread were 'beating fascists is as American as apple pie', or something to that effect), you are making a very pernicious contribution to contemporary political discourse. It doesn't solve anything, in fact it is counter productive.

 

[tathra]

Cherry picking requires a conscious effort of going through and selectively picking one that suits your argument, picking the first thing Google shows therefore cannot be cherry picking. I suppose you wouldn't be satisfied unless i go through every single possible definition and make an argument for every single point of every single possible definition and if even a single one of all of those isn't satisfied then you won't accept it. Talk about unreasonable.

And yes, voting and supporting are two entirely different concepts. Since you're harping on about being absolutely precise and perfect about words with several possible definitions how about you show me where the two are defined the same, preferably using the first definitions Google shows instead of searching through countless ones to try to find one that you can argue proves they're the same (ie, without cherry picking)? You also seem to be making the odd argument that "not everyone agrees he's a fascist, therefore he can't be one", so we'll apply that here too - there is no consensus among everyone even in this little forum that supporting somebody and voting for them are the exact same thing, therefore they can't be the same. You're essentially committing the nirvana fallacy and argumentum ad populum here.

 

[drug_mentor]

Cherry picking requires a conscious effort of going through and selectively picking one that suits your argument, picking the first thing Google shows therefore cannot be cherry picking. I suppose you wouldn't be satisfied unless i go through every single possible definition and make an argument for every single point of every single possible definition and if even a single one of all of those isn't satisfied then you won't accept it. Talk about unreasonable.

When I Google "define: fascism", the definition you explicitly relied on is not the first one which shows up, it first shows up as the second definition provided in the third link. Also, you cited several definitions but only made explicit mention of the one which effectively made your point, whilst ignoring the one which undermines your point, that is cherry picking.

The notion that I expect you to go through every definition is a disingenuous misrepresentation of my position. Your argument relies on the premise that you are using an objective definition of the word fascism, my point is that it is questionable whether contemporary use of the word fascism has an objective definition whatsoever, and if we suppose that it does then it would take some argument to establish this fact, as well as the fact that your chosen definition qualifies as objective. A link to one of many controversial definitions falls far short of this. Your argument is weak because you have misrepresented your value judgement as an objective fact. If you think that my expectation that you should provide some defense of your controversial assumption qualifies as unreasonable there is little wonder why you are so quick to dismiss, belittle and insult those who disagree with you.

And yes, voting and supporting are two entirely different concepts. Since you're harping on about being absolutely precise and perfect about words with several possible definitions how about you show me where the two are defined the same, preferably using the first definitions Google shows instead of searching through countless ones to try to find one that you can argue proves they're the same (ie, without cherry picking)?

I never said voting and supporting have the same definition. If voting was a necessary condition of supporting someone then it would be impossible to support anything or anyone which did not appear on some kind of poll. Supporting someone generally means providing assistance to them, buttressing their position, or otherwise promoting them (here is the link you requested, unlike yourself, I actually did rely on the first definition that came up). On this definition, it should be clear that voting for someone qualifies as a sufficient condition of supporting them. Since you seem a bit confused by logic, allow me to clarify: A's being a sufficient condition for B in no way whatsoever implies that A and B are equivalent. Rain in my suburb is a sufficient condition for my garden being wet, but rainy weather in my suburb is not the same concept as my garden being wet.

 

[Droppersneck]

Cherry picking doesn't imply that the definition doesn't predate Trump, I never said the person who coined the definition did it for Trump, in fact I acknowledged it was coined in 1995; none of this precludes you from cherry picking said definition to fit your agenda. The point is that there are many definitions (at least 19 on that page alone) and you selectively picked one which best fits your narrative of Trump being a fascist. You said, and I quote (post #61): "When a word's definition describes something you use that word to describe it", the problem is that the word fascism has so many definitions that you are making a normative judgement about which of these definitions is correct, and then going on to argue as though this is an objective fact. In doing this you are being disingenuous at best, and I think you know it. In fact, I even pointed out that on one of your cited definitions, which you were careful enough not to appeal to directly, it would be a stretch to call Trump a fascist.

If using your democratic right to vote in order to help grant someone political power doesn't qualify as supporting them, I don't know what does. Also, in the quote I used in my previous post you said you thought of "several valid reasons to vote for Trump" (post #59), your use of the plural suggests these reasons cannot be exhausted by the single 'lesser of two evils' reason.

The fact is that you can't make a deductively valid argument that Trump is a fascist without presupposing a controversial value judgement, this puts you on much shakier logical ground than you have suggested, and that is before we even start talking about whether all his supporters are fascists. I have shown that politically and historically educated people can reasonably disagree that Trump is a fascist, but you didn't bother to address this. The strength of your entire argument rests on an imprecise and controversial definition. You have accused others of resorting to ad hominem attacks, but that is exactly what you are doing when you casually throw the term fascist at everyone who supports an arguably non-fascist politician whom you oppose. Your value judgements are not objective facts, you should stop acting like they are and drop the condescension towards those who disagree.

In my view, it is exactly this kind of unreasonable, divisive nonsense that made Trump supporters come out in droves; they are sick of being demonised for their political views. The solution is finding common ground through reasoned debate, not shit slinging. Again, I am no Trump apologist, but when you start moralising political disagreement and use this to endorse violating the rights of those on the other side of the political spectrum (I believe your words in another thread were 'beating fascists is as American as apple pie', or something to that effect), you are making a very pernicious contribution to contemporary political discourse. It doesn't solve anything, in fact it is counter productive.

Pretty much this exactly is why his supporters came out in droves. Everything is racist, sexist, homophobic so therefore there is no reason to have a discussion. I think the left, at this point, is acting in a more fascist manner. Not defending trump or his movement, but drug_mentor did you watch those hidden camera videos of leading democratic operators? Where they talk about sending people into crowds to pick fights with trump supporters?

Very well put drug_mentor

 

[tathra]

When I Google "define: fascism", the definition you explicitly relied on is not the first one which shows up, it isn't even in the top five. Also, you cited several definitions but only made explicit mention of the one which effectively made your point, whilst ignoring the one which undermines your point, that is cherry picking.

You do know that's how multiple definitions work, right? Nothing satisfies every possible definition, that's why there's multiple. As long at one is satisfied, its vaid to use that word for what the one definition describes. If they didn't work that way, we'd never ever be able to use contronyms , words that are their own antonym.

I never said voting and supporting have the same definition.

Oh right, you said that voting for somebody necessarily means you support them in everything, implying that people never vote against their own interests or 'hold their nose' and vote for the person they disagree with the least to prevent an even worse candidate from getting in. My bad for not being pedantically perfect and instead looking at context and meaning.

Btw, i like this kind of debating, looking for logical issues in somebody's argument and ensuring its logically valid or redoing it so that it is valid. It strengthens one's debate and logic skills.

 

[drug_mentor]

You do know that's how multiple definitions work, right? Nothing satisfies every possible definition, that's why there's multiple. As long at one is satisfied, its vaid to use that word for what the one definition describes. If they didn't work that way, we'd never ever be able to use contronyms , words that are their own antonym.

Contronyms are a poor example because their meaning is generally inferred from the context in which they are used. Context can't help distinguish between most possible definitions of fascism. Obviously most words have several meanings, but most also have much more concrete meanings than fascism, meanings usually revealed by the context in which one uses the word, of course, there are many exceptions to this.

The problem with the word fascism is the meaning is so varied and imprecise that the word is virtually meaningless. You attempted a deductive proof to show that all Trump supporters are fascists, if you were more honest about the fact that you were using one controversial definition, and that if you had chosen to use many others your argument wouldn't follow, then I wouldn't have criticised your reasoning. My problem is you represented your definition as though it were objective, you said (post #61): "When a word's definition describes something you use that word to describe it", this implies your chosen definition of fascism is the definition of fascism. If we reformulate the sentence thus: 'when one possible, but debated, definition of a word describes something you use that word to describe it', the assertion no longer seems particularly sound.

You still haven't addressed the article I posted from a left leaning source in which politically informed people argue Trump isn't a fascist. You are welcome to pick whatever definition of fascism suits you, I suppose, but if you are being intellectually honest you should at least engage with these arguments, instead of just pointing to a controversial definition with nothing more to say on the topic. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but if you think your opinion ideally ought to be objective then you should be able to provide some defense of how you have chosen to use the word, or at least some criticism of how others have used it.

Oh right, you said that voting for somebody necessarily means you support them in everything, implying that people never vote against their own interests or 'hold their nose' and vote for the person they disagree with the least to prevent an even worse candidate from getting in. My bad for not being pedantically perfect and instead looking at context and meaning.

You are misrepresenting my position again. I said voting for Trump is a sufficient condition of being a Trump supporter, not a sufficient condition of supporting him "in everything". Presumably, when you said all Trump supporters are fascists, you didn't mean only those who support Trump "in everything" are fascists? Assuming that is correct, you are applying one standard to your own statements and a more stringent one to mine. If that is incorrect, then to say all Trump supporters are fascists is virtually meaningless, how many people do you think genuinely support Trump "in everything"? My guess is few to none. I should reiterate that it isn't at all clear Trump actually is a fascist, so even if some do support him "in everything", they are not necessarily fascists.

Btw, i like this kind of debating, looking for logical issues in somebody's argument and ensuring its logically valid or redoing it so that it is valid. It strengthens one's debate and logic skills.

It is the only kind of debate I care for. I agree with you that reasoned argument is an excellent way to improve ones ability to think critically; that is why I advocate for reasoned political debate instead of violence and name calling. Polarising rhetoric doesn't change minds, logic and reason doesn't always, but at least it stands a chance.

Edit: Rereading the thread, I missed this comment because you edited it into a post (#73) whilst I was responding to it.

You also seem to be making the odd argument that "not everyone agrees he's a fascist, therefore he can't be one", so we'll apply that here too - there is no consensus among everyone even in this little forum that supporting somebody and voting for them are the exact same thing, therefore they can't be the same. You're essentially committing the nirvana fallacy and argumentum ad populum here.

You are actually committing the fallacy of ignoratio elenchi, I never said he isn't a fascist because not everyone agrees he is. As I have said repeatedly, your misrepresentation of a controversial definition as an objective one is a serious flaw in your argument that all Trump supporters are fascists. Earlier in this post I quoted a sentence you made in post #61 where you implied your definition was objectively true, and showed that when it is reformulated to explicitly reflect the actual state of affairs it no longer serves as a reasonable premise in your argument. How you managed to interpret this as argumentum ad populum is honestly beyond me. Moreover, (erroneously) accusing an opponent in a debate of committing a fallacy, then going on to use the same fallacy in order to prove a further point which is not a reductio ad absurdum of your opponents argument is an exceptionally strange debating strategy.