>Fighting bigotry and exclusion by refusing to do business with people and calling them out for it is absolutely reasonable.

No this is not reasonable in any way shape or form, this isn't fighting "bigotry" this is political prosecution regardless of how vile you might see their political views to be.

Democracy works when anyone can express their political voice without suffering for it. When your political voice comes with a hefty price it is effectively thought control.

P.S.

It is pretty ironic that the "left" especially in the US forgot what it had endured https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/28/college-apol...

I didn't say this was fighting bigotry, I said it's acceptable to refuse to do business with bigots and to call them out.

> Democracy works when anyone can express their political voice without suffering for it.

I wouldn't advocate for violence or oppression of political beliefs. It's entirely valid to refuse to remain idle in the face of bigotry. If someone opens a shop up and puts up a sign that says "No gays" then I consider it entirely reasonable for a bunch of gay men to stand outside protesting, organize a boycott, etc...

But would you fight all bigotry?

If a group of black people said "No Whites", would you fight that?

Or if women opened a store (or a gym) and said "No Men"?

Or if Latinos started a scholarship fund and said "Only Latinos may apply"?

Would you call out racism if someone didn't support Ben Carson, or sexism if they opposed Carly Fiorina, or sexism if they joked about Trump's "hands"?

To ask the question is to answer it, as the man says.

You should be able you express your own opposite political view in a proper manner, forcibly disturbing their business is not any different than some bigots doing the same to a black owned business. For the most part if some one puts a sign that says "no gays allowed" it should be handled through anti-discriminatory actions set by law.

A proper action in this case would be to contact the authorities, write an opinion letter to a newspaper, organize a town meeting.

That said there is a huge difference between individual political activity and involving groups and businesses. I don't understand how people can call themselves liberal and effectively DOX people all the time and try to get them fired because they expressed a specific political view.

In this specific case I also find the fact that people claim that liking a post on twitter (a post in which BTW did not violate Twitter's own pretty strict anti-hate speech policy) is hate speech on its own to be quite disturbing, or amusing depending on your point of view.

But overall boycotts should ideally never be used in proper political discourse, they are antithetical to democracy, a boycott is the refusal to conduct a dialog, to hear any opposing opinion and to discuss things in a proper manner. It is effectively the "grown up" version of sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling nananananana I can't hear you.

Overall "Trump" to some extent is the outcome of the current political climate, there are many liberals that still hold true liberal values that are scared shitless of what the left is doing, they look to the alt and see crazy nut jobs, the alt right has been dubbed as "closet racists", and the center is pretty much deserted. Partisanship and political extremism has pretty much taken over everything, and everything now is binary and almost bundled together if you don't support A+B+C you are X, and we hate X.

I really wonder what happened to the ideal of free speech and appreciating the fact that you can be "offended" and having your opinions challenged as a healthy sign of living in a pluralistic and free society.