@deathbyguitar says:
I'm all for shutting people down for racist shit they say today but for really old stuff I think a slap on the wrists is fine if they're sincerely apologetic.
and
@Henry replies...
That is my sentiment too.
and I feel the same way...but with 3 caveats:
CAVEAT 1: I do think we need to be a little slower to label someone racist (or for that matter any -ist) when the offense is very old (statute of limitations 5 years, perhaps?) or when the data is ambiguous.
Towards that end, when some offensive-seeming tweet suddenly goes viral, I think there should be a 48-hour grace period in which the offender can "clarify" it, or even take it back entirely, and have the "clarified" version be the version that counts for the purpose of how the public judges their character. I think the "clarified" version should not be regarded as an
apology, but as an opportunity for the person to clear up any ambiguities about what they meant. (If an apology is warranted, that's a whole separate category of message.)
This grace period should be acknowledged by all participants, considered part of standard Netiquette. If it's over a weekend or something, perhaps it should be 72 hours.
Of course, I can see the potential for abuse in Caveat 1: You might have some jerk who repeatedly says obnoxious things and then "clarifies" them into some completely unrelated thing that obviously isn't sincere. (Actually, I can see a really good comedian getting a lot of mileage out of doing that: The original statement becomes the setup, and the "clarification" becomes the punchline.)
But, I don't think that kind of abuse undermines the case for Caveat 1, because it'll be pretty obvious if someone's using it insincerely or getting cute. The main advantage of Caveat 1 is that it allows innocent-but-unprepared persons, whose Tweets suddenly go viral, from having their lives ruined. Not everybody walks around with a PR flack at their right elbow! And people shouldn't suddenly be denied a job when they're in their 40's because some dumb comment from their teenaged years comes to light.
CAVEAT 2: As I've said before, I think there needs to be a mix of "Walled Gardens" and "Common Carriers" so that people can choose whether to filter their own inputs in various ways, or interact with society at large in an unfiltered way. A "Walled Garden" is a self-selecting community with community standards, and can reject those who violate those standards. A "Common Carrier,"
by law, can't do that, or can only do so at the outer extremes. Since there's a temptation to redefine your political opponents' norms as "extreme," limiting someone from access to a "Common Carrier" ought to require a broad vote of the general electorate, and there should be government overview so as to guarantee redress of grievances in the actual American court system. (Naturally, other countries would have their own equivalent Common Carrier platforms attached to their own court systems as desired.)
So, "shutting people down for racist shit they say" would apply to a "Walled Garden" but not to a "Common Carrier" ...or, only at the extreme end of the spectrum. Someone who says something ambiguous or merely insensitive should not be excluded from "Common Carriers" just as they should not be denied access to the Interstate Highway system.
CAVEAT 3: The mix of "Walled Gardens" and "Common Carriers" should handle the issue of "free speech"; but there are other basic freedoms to consider. Even a real, honest-to-goodness racist (or whatever other -ist we all decide to despise) should not fear that they suddenly lose access to medical care, attorneys or public defenders, funeral services, utilities, the ability to receive payments, the ability to use roadways and public transportation, the ability to post their resumes on job sites, the ability to pay for an ISP or cellphone plan, etc., purely on the basis of holding obnoxious opinions. Such things are fundamentals of modern life, and should be considered "Public Accommodations" just as hotel rooms and restaurant tables are. There's a difference between a bit of
ostracizing, on the one hand, and
starving a person's family to death, on the other.
Oh, since I just mentioned families:
No going after family members, not even to force them to renounce their obnoxious brothers-in-law. Just recently I heard that the mother of the Atlanta cop involved in the latest shooting got fired from her job, apparently for
not publicly declaring that she despises her son. (I have no further details; I
hope that's
not all there was to it. If someone knows better, please correct me.)
The goal is to have a free society with a "Marketplace of Ideas." All of the above Caveats are intended to protect that.
This means, of course, that sometimes we will all have to confront obnoxious ideas. Well, good! That's the proper civic duty of any mature adult in a free society: From time to time, we have to cope with obnoxiousness from others without losing our cool or becoming violent.
The alternative is the kind of soft oppression which makes politics invade every aspect of our lives. Think that it's hard to escape political nastiness
now? That's only the beginning. The limits on "cancel culture" that I'm describing above are intended to prevent it accosting you every waking hour.
Remember: You may not be interested in culture war; but culture war is interested in you. If we don't get back the protections and norms we used to have, then the fact that you have no particular opinion about this or that
cause celebre won't matter. You will be made to care.
And I don't want to have to care, all the time, every single second of the day, about whatever hobby-horse someone else wants to impose on me. I want life to be simple, every now and then. I want to be able to just get away from politics sometimes. I want to just play guitar and walk the dog and not worry that the brand-logo on my shirt or the type of stompbox I use might suddenly be mistaken for a Dipwad Supremacy Flag that I never even heard of. I don't want to have to check Twitter every ten minutes to make sure I'm up-to-date on the New Rules.
I hope at least a few folk feel likewise.
