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I'm unclear what the distribution of opinions is around here. I get the broader strokes, but on some details I'm apparently confused.
I casually dismissed white nationalism recently and received more pushback against that than for any other opinion.
I don't think we are largely a cabal of rightoids. But maybe I'm confused on how large of a subfaction they are around here. We need an ideological consensus around here. I predict the Motte is more sympathetic to trans people than the median American, and by a large degree. But also vastly more critical of trans talking points than the median upstanding PMC progressive.
I didn't see exactly what happened in that case, but as someone who was occasionally part of pushback like that, my perspective is that it is simply because there's a lot of lazy thinking when it comes to criticism of the white nationalists. When you're talking in mainstream society you can just say "x is a white nationalist" and if true that's a devastating critique that destroys someone's reputation by itself, let alone the argument they're making. But that's not the case here - they can actually mount arguments without just instantly being obliterated from the discourse. This means that if you use the same lazy and poorly thought out attacks that get by just fine when the white nationalists have no ability to respond, you'll get destroyed when they can actually mount a defence at all. That's not to say that there aren't any white nationalists here, but I really don't think they're a majority at all.
I also don't think white nationalists are more than a small minority here. But I didn't expect significant pushback again rejecting their silly redefining of terms. One of them tried a lazy gotcha redefinition. I said "no". A number of them leapt to defend the lazy invalid gotcha redefinition.
The redefinition of otherwise sensible terms in question was: if you care about white people, then you necessarily must be a white nationalist. "Ethnostate or you don't care" was the completely invalid false dichotomy. Given that level of argument: they are the ones being obliterated by their wrong redefinition of terms. A single "no" is a complete argument against hostile fringe redefinition of common terms. That's indeed not what "care" means to almost everyone almost always. They can't trap me into saying I don't "care about white people" because I'm not a white supremacist. They don't get to define these words or make me answer to them.
But I have seen young American progressives and religious immigrant Muslims being completely unable to form a counterargument because they've never before been challenged. They think merely asserting their group's consensus is a knock down argument. "I understand you think that, but I don't agree" is beyond their experience or ability to deal with. So I get your larger point.
This sounds strange and unlike most interactions I see on these forums, are you able to find a link?
That’d be hammi in this train wreck of a thread. See also his response for some of the pushback he got.
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