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Culture War Roundup for the week of January 30, 2023

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(this isn't directly about hitler, it's about 'fighting' and 'hate being good sometimes). Does it mean anything to 'forgive' hitler? That makes it sound like animosity towards people is somehow ... innately bad. But present-day animosity towards hitler isn't about hitler, it's (rightly or wrongly) against present-day racism. Crucially, it's possible for this to be justified - if (hypothetically, this isn't anywhere near true ofc) Ye/Fuentes was a serious political movement genuinely threatening jews with a shot at power, then fighting against them and for 'jewish lives', casting them as a born-again hitler, and acting in a manner very inconsistent with 'forgiving hitler' would be justified. And whether you're leading a fiery political campaign for human rights against hitler 2, or doing cold-hearted backroom plotting against hitler 2 ... these are still 'anger', 'resentment', or cold-blooded hatred of hitler. Such things are contingent relations present in human instinct for useful ends, just like hunger, friendship, and bravery. If someone attempts to harm your child, "anger" at that is merely a desire to prevent that harm, or discourage similar harms from happening in the future punitively. Which is valuable! Even today, it's not totally impossible that Hitler 2 will come in 80 years, necessitating the same fight - and if one 'forgives' hitler today, does one ... unforgive him then? So, for most's morals, 'forgetting hitler' is good because hitler isn't relevant to today's politics, the left caring about hitler is borne of specific false claims as opposed to a lack of forgiveness, and 'forgiving hitler' attempts to meld anger with hitler personally, irrelevant as he's dead, and general political distaste using hitler as a vehicle, which isn't in principle wrong.

That makes it sound like animosity towards people is somehow ... innately bad. But present-day animosity towards hitler isn't about hitler, it's (rightly or wrongly) against present-day racism. Crucially, it's possible for this to be justified

Whether or not the hatred is "justified," I think the argument would be that hatred is not conducive to dealing with with the problem in a constructive way. Hatred tends to make irrational actors out of people with rational causes, leading to actions that create more problems rather than solutions. I think we can see this in play in the current anti-racist/BLM movements, wherein a zero-tolerance and aggressively diagnosed approach to "racism" is creating a radicalized sense of white identity in some people who thought of themselves as previously race-blind but who now feel under-attack as a racial group.