I was Zuckerberg’s speechwriter

Re:I was Zuckerberg’s speechwriter by pjc50 on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @11:47AM (#16859408)

The distinction has to be between exclusive ethno-nationalism and more inclusive forms of civic nationalism. It can't just be for "ordinary people", it has to be for everyone, with a minimum level of rights protected by law. That's how we avoid collapsing back into ethnic cleansing.

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Re:I was Zuckerberg’s speechwriter by Bartweiss on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @02:45PM (#16861127)

> It can't just be for "ordinary people", it has to be for everyone, with a minimum level of rights protected by law.

Nicely put.

Around the Iraq War, I remember some clever cynic pointing out that while we might 'export democracy', it's still democratic for 51% of the people to vote to murder the other 49%. Or perhaps more commonly, to vote for a permanent dictator from the 51%. The fundamental advance of a healthy government isn't (just) democracy, it's a bedrock of inalienable or hard-to-alienate rights.

The recent talk about the 'paradox of liberalism' has been interesting, but it's all felt a bit misguided to me. There's a real question, sure, but the entire fight between "let intolerance go unchecked" and "be intolerant of intolerance" was a false dichotomy. The missing alternative is liberalism within boundaries - setting some threshold of behavior which isn't permitted, and can't be permitted by any minor political swing.

(Arguably what we were having was a debate about where to set those boundaries, but if so I wish we could actually say that.)

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