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undo wrote:How do you rebuff these ideas that are actually getting into people's heads
You shouldn't protest against white supremacists, they want the attention and that's what helps them recruit others.
If you just ignore them they will stop marching and just fade away.
You should never punch nazis because it gives them a justified reason to attack back.
Antifa, whoever that is and whatever they stand for, idk, should stop dressing in black and hiding their faces, it makes them look like the scary and dangerous ones.
I think the obsession with "rebuking ideas" instead of groups getting out there and stating what they're all about is the problem. There's so much wasted energy in the news media on restating or framing (ugh) what has already been said (one fine example is the "let's go to the heartland and ask Trump voters what we missed!" fluff pieces).
The mass media echo chamber is not a lecture hall. No one is learning a damn thing. To go overboard trying to combat bad ideas with "reason" and "logic" online or in print is the bad idea itself. Sure, it can be useful to have a face to face conversation with someone who disagrees with you and engage deeply with their ideas to try to convince them otherwise, but that is not what happens is the most visible platforms online. Sure, there is some value in doing columns and blog posts that "fact check". There's nothing wrong with PolitiFact. But the paradigm of facts vs fakes has become a complete obsession. All it seems to do is create this perception of an eggheaded media class that people across the spectrum mutually dislike.
People should go out there and act how their conscience tells them. If someone is naive enough to draw the conclusion that "dressing in black and hiding their faces" = scary and evil, why would they be susceptible to a carefully reasoned argument about the merits of radical action? If you're so much of a simpleton that "violence is bad, DUR, both sides!", you're not going to have a serious conversation about social change with anyone.
The media noise is just that, noise. If there isn't a legitimate example of Antifa punching right wingers in the face, it doesn't matter. They will make one up anyway. Anyone who has even vaguely engaged with far right OR far left radicals on Twitter know that facts are irrelevant to the real foot soldiers.
My take is that people are perfectly capable of knowing which side they are on by listening to what the groups have to say for themselves. Our completely out-of-wack electoral system gives more weight to the voices who are more likely to sympathize with reaction and hate than help. We have White Supremacy in the White House because white Americans voted for that and want it.
