Israel-Hamas War 2023

[OttoVonBismarck]

Anonymous communication is an ancient and sacrosanct thing. Many of the U.S. Founding Fathers wrote some of their most important things under nom de plume's like Publius.

[Josquius]

Anonymous communication is an ancient and sacrosanct thing. Many of the U.S. Founding Fathers wrote some of their most important things under nom de plume's like Publius.

Writing a book is quite a different thing to having the ability to send continuous coordinated directly targeted hate to anyone you and your friends decide is worth it.

[Barrister]

Anonymous communication is an ancient and sacrosanct thing. Many of the U.S. Founding Fathers wrote some of their most important things under nom de plume's like Publius.

Public communication is also very different.  It used to be you could say something on the streetcorner and everyone within earshot would hear you.  Now you can say it on Twitter and potentially millions will see it.

Anonymous communication also used to appear quite shady.  I don't know about revolutionary times, but 30 years ago it was all a world of photocopied underground magazines or trash books like The Turner Novels or the Unabomber manifesto.  Now of course anonymous posters can have tremendous influence (think Q drops, or Catturd2).

We're all trying to navigate a world where how we communicate is very different from the past.

[Admiral Yi]

What we did have was a pretty clear threat to a business not from the person employed but from those shouting about them being anti semites.

What were they threatening to do?

[Razgovory]

But that's just it. I think the only way to evaluate is in the specifics of the transgression. And if the transgression is not targeted at one's own identity, it is easier to wave it by as not warranting any reaction.

Yeah for sure.

Nonetheless, the dynamics by which one transgressor gets subjected to long term consequences while (most) others do not,  often seemingly independently of the seriousness of the transgression, seems arbitrary and problematic to me.

I'll note here that I'm not speaking exclusively about social justice and political related topics but also things like (alleged) animal cruelty, crappy customer and other social behaviour, (alleged) petty crime, road rage, and the like.

That said the main driver of my current ambivalence on the topic is seeing how elements on both sides in the current Israel-Palestinian conflict are attempting (sometimes successfully) to deploy this kind of social media "fuck around and find out" consequence-visiting on their opponents. And since I'm not in a place where I have the moral conviction that "everyone on this side is evil, and everyone on that side stands with truth and justice sufficiently that whatever wrongs they commit are acceptable" I find that the problematic elements of the dynamic stand out much more starkly.

You can posit that that position is informed by privilege, but honestly I think it's more informed by the fact that I don't strongly identify with a side in this particular case and can see the humanity of most of the people involved (and maybe that's a privilege). Normally I do identify with one of the sides (and typically I believe we're on the same side in most things, privilege notwithstanding), and I'm reasonably prone to indulge in "and fuck you, and you... and you deserve what you got you fucker. This is justice being served and it's oh so satisfying", much like many people.

It would be so much easier if the person looked like this

[Josquius]

What we did have was a pretty clear threat to a business not from the person employed but from those shouting about them being anti semites.

What were they threatening to do?

Threats don't have to be explicit to be worrying.
Back when I had fascists threatening my family it was never explitilcy saying anyone would get hurt. Just they'd be seeing me around, if my parents still lived in such and such address, I better be careful with what I say, etc...

For a business little things can hurt. They make a lot of noise about how it's in line with anti semites, no doubt leading to review bombing and all manner of other petty sabotage that really adds up.

[Admiral Yi]

Threats don't have to be explicit to be worrying.
Back when I had fascists threatening my family it was never explitilcy saying anyone would get hurt. Just they'd be seeing me around, if my parents still lived in such and such address, I better be careful with what I say, etc...

For a business little things can hurt. They make a lot of noise about how it's in line with anti semites, no doubt leading to review bombing and all manner of other petty sabotage that really adds up.

So you think they were implicitly threatening bad Yelp reviews.  Ok.

[Josquius]

Threats don't have to be explicit to be worrying.
Back when I had fascists threatening my family it was never explitilcy saying anyone would get hurt. Just they'd be seeing me around, if my parents still lived in such and such address, I better be careful with what I say, etc...

For a business little things can hurt. They make a lot of noise about how it's in line with anti semites, no doubt leading to review bombing and all manner of other petty sabotage that really adds up.

So you think they were implicitly threatening bad Yelp reviews.  Ok.

Thats the least of it. And this kind of thing can have a huge impact on a business.
When its a simple matter to just kneejerk fire somebody at the slightest hint negative attention could be coming your way, then you'll do it.