On the Internet, and civilized discourse

I wrote this as a reply to a syndicated column in the newspaper today regarding the distressing rise of comparisons to Nazism in political discourse today. I'm reposting it here, because I think it's something we should all seriously think about.

Back in the early days of the Internet, comparisons to Nazism as an insult for some trivial offense were so common that an idea spread to combat them. Referred to as "Godwin's Law", it stated that in any argument, as soon as someone brought up Hitler or the Nazis they lost and the discussion was over. This idea came about in large part for the reasons Mr. Pitts describes - because the evil that the Nazis perpetrated was so vast that trivializing it for the sake of an argument was an insult to the millions upon millions of their victims.

Godwin's Law was (and is) necessary because, in this new world of cyberspace where people were represented by strings of characters, participants had little reason to be civil to each other during arguments. Sure, there was a certain level of social conditioning, but once people realized the true extent of their anonymity they had no reason to pull punches - there was nobody to make them take real-life responsibility for their words, and they couldn't see the hurt they'd caused in the other person with their remarks. So in many places discussion on the Internet devolved into vicious, nasty, personal attacks against people with ideas others didn't like. (Sound familiar, Empire board members?) Godwin's Law, and a few other basic rules that are nameless but equally universal (don't post personal attacks, don't "troll" - post inflammatory statements specifically for the purpose of getting a rise out of people, etc.) began to be enforced on various boards, sometimes unofficially by group members, sometimes officially by moderators. While there are still dark corners of the Internet where flamewars continue, in most places online discussion stays on a certain level of civility, because the alternative is chaos.

Here's what scares me. As stated above, nastiness was a problem in the early days of the Internet due to anonymity; in the real world, people remained at least moderately polite to each other because they could be taken to task for their words. But now, the level of discourse among people in the real world is quickly degrading to early-Internet levels. People call in about Nazism on talk shows as if they've never heard of Godwin's Law (which, to be fair, they may have not), pundits make completely false declarations without offering any supporting evidence whatsoever, normal people interrupt town hall meetings (which are supposed to be a forum for rational discussion) to scream about how Obama wants to kill your grandmother, etc. Once upon a time you didn't want to be known as the guy who was on television (or YouTube) saying all that crazy conspiracy stuff; these days, people wear it as a badge of honor.

What's changed? I honestly don't know. Certainly our celebrity-obsessed culture has done its fair share of encouraging behavior like this; when your entire goal is to be recognizable, there's no such thing as bad publicity. Undoubtedly, the aforementioned pundits and the billionaire neoconservatives bankrolling the town-hall protests share some responsibility as well, for encouraging extremist thought. Perhaps even the Internet has played a role - it used to be that you didn't want to offend people who lived near you, but now that literally anyone can go online and find a subset of folks who think exactly like them, their ideas are reinforced and their motivation to avoid stepping on others' toes is reduced.

Whatever the reason, we're rapidly becoming a nation of trolls starting flamewars over politics. How ironic would it be if the moderated Internet became the last bastion of rational, civilized argument?

On the Internet, and civilized discourse

I wrote this as a reply to a syndicated column in the newspaper today regarding the distressing rise of comparisons to Nazism in political discourse today. I'm reposting it here, because I think it's something we should all seriously think about.

Back in the early days of the Internet, comparisons to Nazism as an insult for some trivial offense were so common that an idea spread to combat them. Referred to as "Godwin's Law", it stated that in any argument, as soon as someone brought up Hitler or the Nazis they lost and the discussion was over. This idea came about in large part for the reasons Mr. Pitts describes - because the evil that the Nazis perpetrated was so vast that trivializing it for the sake of an argument was an insult to the millions upon millions of their victims.

Godwin's Law was (and is) necessary because, in this new world of cyberspace where people were represented by strings of characters, participants had little reason to be civil to each other during arguments. Sure, there was a certain level of social conditioning, but once people realized the true extent of their anonymity they had no reason to pull punches - there was nobody to make them take real-life responsibility for their words, and they couldn't see the hurt they'd caused in the other person with their remarks. So in many places discussion on the Internet devolved into vicious, nasty, personal attacks against people with ideas others didn't like. (Sound familiar, Empire board members?) Godwin's Law, and a few other basic rules that are nameless but equally universal (don't post personal attacks, don't "troll" - post inflammatory statements specifically for the purpose of getting a rise out of people, etc.) began to be enforced on various boards, sometimes unofficially by group members, sometimes officially by moderators. While there are still dark corners of the Internet where flamewars continue, in most places online discussion stays on a certain level of civility, because the alternative is chaos.

Here's what scares me. As stated above, nastiness was a problem in the early days of the Internet due to anonymity; in the real world, people remained at least moderately polite to each other because they could be taken to task for their words. But now, the level of discourse among people in the real world is quickly degrading to early-Internet levels. People call in about Nazism on talk shows as if they've never heard of Godwin's Law (which, to be fair, they may have not), pundits make completely false declarations without offering any supporting evidence whatsoever, normal people interrupt town hall meetings (which are supposed to be a forum for rational discussion) to scream about how Obama wants to kill your grandmother, etc. Once upon a time you didn't want to be known as the guy who was on television (or YouTube) saying all that crazy conspiracy stuff; these days, people wear it as a badge of honor.

What's changed? I honestly don't know. Certainly our celebrity-obsessed culture has done its fair share of encouraging behavior like this; when your entire goal is to be recognizable, there's no such thing as bad publicity. Undoubtedly, the aforementioned pundits and the billionaire neoconservatives bankrolling the town-hall protests share some responsibility as well, for encouraging extremist thought. Perhaps even the Internet has played a role - it used to be that you didn't want to offend people who lived near you, but now that literally anyone can go online and find a subset of folks who think exactly like them, their ideas are reinforced and their motivation to avoid stepping on others' toes is reduced.

Whatever the reason, we're rapidly becoming a nation of trolls starting flamewars over politics. How ironic would it be if the moderated Internet became the last bastion of rational, civilized argument?