[Sonsowey]

I am in my 20s and so do not have the perspective of some older members here.

Currently feminists are trying to censor things that they find objectionable in various media. Many people have compared them to the "Church Ladies" of old.

I know in the past there have been similar moral panics. In the eighties Christian group were concerned with satanism and tried to censor music. Violent videogames were viewed as causing violence.

My question is, those of you who are in your forties or fifties, do you think feminist/SJW efforts at censorship are worse or different in a fundamental way than these other past efforts, or is it basically the same shit different toilet?

[Badamson]

(11-16-2014 11:29 AM)Sonsowey Wrote:  

I am in my 20s and so do not have the perspective of some older members here.

Currently feminists are trying to censor things that they find objectionable in various media. Many people have compared them to the "Church Ladies" of old.

I know in the past there have been similar moral panics. In the eighties Christian group were concerned with satanism and tried to censor music. Violent videogames were viewed as causing violence.

My question is, those of you who are in your forties or fifties, do you think feminist/SJW efforts at censorship are worse or different in a fundamental way than these other past efforts, or is it basically the same shit different toilet?

I can say that one of the big differences is in pressuring a person's employer to get them fired. Instead of just enacting a law to limit speech they don't like(something they also do) they will try to destroy and ruin a specific person.

The invention of the internet has amplified all this because of the free exchange in information that everyone has access to. 20 years ago if someone wrote or said something offensive, it wasn't available for the whole world to see. You couldn't even read newspapers outside your own city. So not a lot of people would even be aware what you said. Now, even an average person just expressing a thought on twitter can be targeted. Even just finding the contact information of a company someone worked for before the internet would have been a huge pain in the ass. Now you can find it in two seconds and start emailing immediately as well as share it with millions of people on social media. A lot of people didn't even have long distance phone service, and when they did they tried to use it sparingly as those calls were charged by the minute.

The first person I remember being taken out by the PC police was Jimmy The Greek at CBS back in 1988. Corporations have indirectly played a big role in speech suppression, because they cave in so easily and fire people to protect their image...thus encouraging the outraged mob to target more people.

[Sonsowey]

^Werent there organized boycott efforts against offensive media personalities back in the day? Like letter writing campaigns that got vompanies to pull their ads from offensive tv or radio shows?

Not the same as getting Joe Blow fired for a tweet I know.

[Badamson]

(11-16-2014 12:21 PM)Sonsowey Wrote:  

^Werent there organized boycott efforts against offensive media personalities back in the day? Like letter writing campaigns that got vompanies to pull their ads from offensive tv or radio shows?

Not the same as getting Joe Blow fired for a tweet I know.

Yeah, but that was pretty rare, and it took a lot of work and organization. Nowadays this stuff happens on a daily basis, and the standards have widened so far. Watch any TV show from the 70's or 80's, and you'll see it loaded with dialog that would end people's careers if it had been said today. Just to give an example, in the movie Return of The Pink Panther(1976) Peter Sellers several times jokes about his Asian companion, "they almost blew his little yellow skin off." Nobody even batted an eye. If that had been said today in a blockbuster movie there would be a shitstorm.

People just didn't get outraged to that extent back then.

[vinman]

Yes. With social media, blogs, and forums they can reach more people with their message. If a couple of people wrote letters you might get a talking to by your boss in years past. But with tweets, and Facebook posts trending, and YouTube videos going viral you can get toasted.

[Andy_B]

It has more support among young people. That seems to be the main difference.

[infowarrior1]

The Christians got told to get stuffed. The progressives on the other hand.....