Reddit's Warrant Canary just died

[popobawa4u]

@semiotix

That sort of thing sounds good when the people saying it cannot, under any circumstances, be put in a situation where they can suffer the consequences they’re urging others to suffer on behalf of their beliefs. E.g., “This security theater is outrageous! That TSA agent who told me to throw away my half-empty water bottle should resign in protest! Her not having a job and not being able to make her rent will show 'em!” The truth of the first sentence doesn’t give you moral standing to make extraordinary demands of people who you believe are more implicated than you are. Reality is a little more messy than our notions of bushido might lead us to believe.

A flaw underlying the reasoning here might be the notion that there is any objective difference between ones self initiating an action, or anybody else. Problems do not become any more special if they are yours, mine, or anybody elses. Also, I am not convinced that controlling or limiting ones own government qualifies as “extraordinary”. Assuming that it is might be serving only to normalize disenfranchisement. Why not promote it as a healthy norm?

@semiotix

As for one’s own complicity, my god, where do we begin or end. Do you eat food? Do you wear clothes? Are you using an electronic device to visit this website? That’s three kinds of slavery you’re complicit in–you know where those products come from, right? You might respond, “That’s a ridiculous thing to say!” and you’d be right. Just as it would be ridiculous to suggest that because you’re not blowing up federal buildings, you’re “complicit” in every single thing your government does. What’s the difference between you politely co-existing with what you see as an authoritarian regime and Reddit doing the same?

Your first few questions about how I live could easily turn into a derailing digression if I addressed them here. But to answer your last question - there does not seem to be any reason to assume that there is any difference between one group politely co-existing with an authoritarian regime and any another. I am not sure what you might be implying with this, but I never claimed to be politely co-existing with it, myself. Quite the opposite, as I am rather confrontational.

@semiotix

Incidentally, be careful throwing words like bushido around. It’s an interesting concept, and it sheds light on a lot of what feudal Japanese society was like. But its final incarnation was as a sort of death-religion that Japanese soldiers were indoctrinated with during WWII. Death in service to the empire was an absolute duty; nothing was pure except death in service to the (perfect) ideals of the state. This is what made conceivable not only suicide attacks (e.g., kamikaze runs by planes) but entire suicidal military campaigns. Hundreds of thousands of deaths from campaigns undertaken by a military leadership that was entirely conscious of the fact that such campaigns could not bring about victory–even when it was still possible to win by employing other strategies. Is that the model you’re looking for here?

I am happy that the irony of this was not wasted upon you. So, who is the kamikaze? The one who is willing to use a modicum of force to stand up to the out-of-control machine? Or those who let the whole enterprise be run into the ground with all hands aboard so that The Biggest Monkey in the Zoo gets their way?

@semiotix

You’re not a samurai and neither is Reddit. The difference is, Reddit did what it could.

That’s hardly the point. Reddit “doing what they could” is a tautology, since nobody does what they can’t. What is the point in comparing me to Reddit? Being given an option which is easier than abiding your conscience is certainly a possible course of action, but it would be naive to assume that it is the only viable course of action. Everybody who gives in makes it more difficult for those who know better.