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Mob justice hasn't been visible for a while often because regular justice was being used for direct oppression in its stead. Injustice is institutionalized, and
by mononcqc 6y ago
Mob justice hasn't been visible for a while often because regular justice was being used for direct oppression in its stead. Injustice is institutionalized, and so as long as the majority group does not see the mob, it does not see oppression even if it exists.
Tell me that for every person getting yelled at on Twitter you couldn't find countless more groups of minorities who have been denied justice over the years, whether because they are aborigines, black, lgbtqia+, or any other group of the kind. That open criticism and denial of cultures and ways of life wasn't just the default mode of operation. That one's life being valued less than someone else's property, beatings by police, harsher criminal sentences, and lack of equal rights wasn't just the mode of operation.
Getting yelled at on Twitter by people fed up with someone's bullshit is not even close to actual mob justice. It's just angry people shouting. Sometimes people shout enough that it turns to direct action (like letter-writing, which was used at least as far back as the 1800s), boycotts, and stuff like that. Today's cancel culture isn't mob justice any more than it was before, and it's not new.
Again, it's just a bunch of people who usually were never on the short end of the stick seeing its shadow pointed their way and freaking out.
- jimbokun 6y agoThis is a complete non-sequitur. Let's respond to injustice and oppression, by trying to extend a little bit of injustice and oppression to other people who haven't experienced it yet, just because we can. How about less injustice and oppression all around?
- mononcqc 6y agoThe so-called cancel culture is not new, and the people complaining about it were generally fine with its presence (along with the presence of systemic injustice) as long as it wasn't pointed in their general direction. I would take the plea for "less injustice and oppression all around" as more honest if it actually came before it started being a sort of perceived threat to the person complaining, and if they actually complained about the other types of injustice as well. As far as I can see, most of the complaints about cancel culture have nothing to do with any other type of cancelling nor injustice, they're just people afraid that other people are now able to criticize them in ways much less important or impactful than said other people always had to contend with. The expectation I have is that if the new wave of cancel culture -- often directed at people denying or perceived as reinforcing systemic issues -- were to stop, the "cancelled" would be content to stay in place, and calls for systemic changes would be far easier to ignore.
- waterhouse 6y agoIt's an exceedingly common deflection. "Group X has suffered and/or is suffering worse, therefore your complaint can be ignored." It tends to come up sooner or later when someone complains about the negative impact of certain types of policies.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- renewiltord 6y agoActually, maybe that's an interesting viewpoint splitter. Would it be better if everyone who hit a zebra crossing button twice were arrested or if only 26-year-old Irish-Americans with less than $500k in their bank account were arrested for hitting the zebra crossing button twice? The former has less overall state oppression. The latter imposes it on one group. It feels reasonable to me that they could say "If this is going to happen to me, it should also happen to everyone else. If no one else is getting this, then it shouldn't happen to me either." (p->q, ¬q->¬p) But perhaps you believe that the first part of that is not acceptable and only the second part is.