You're not wrong about the danger posed, but take a step back and consider who this attitude helps. The greatest beneficiaries of a culture in which good faith and civility are unconditionally granted for fear of misguided righteous anger is a paradise for fraudsters and bad faith actors. I think we're seeing that world now.

Spot on. Leaders in my company love to tout the line "assume good faith". If you say anything that indicates someone else is not operating in good faith, you are deemed the bad actor. This allows bad actors to run absolutely rampant.

You can assume good faith initially without having to tolerate a bad actor who invalidates that assumption.

It seems like your company leadership missed that part of the lesson.

I would argue that there's an incentive to "miss" that part of the lesson.

For people who abuse the concept, sure. Again, that's just evidence that you're clear to drop the initial assumption.

This is a good point. I tend to be careful not to fall into this trap myself, but it doesn't really do any good to call it out in public. it ends up empowering the bad actors. Thank you for this awareness.

That's the same line of reasoning racists use to justify their hatred. I will not have a part in it.

This is almost random its such an odd response. Unconditionally granting good faith should be given to people because... racism.

Do you know the amount of times I've been lectured about "Holocaust Privilege" using the same line of logic? Because I don't, I have long lost count.

There's a depressingly common tactic of using the Holocaust to defend current genocide and atrocities, one that has been very effective until recently. It's exactly the kind of strategy that always assuming good faith allows for, and what I'm warning against. Unfortunately, the backlash against allowing bad actors to use victims as a shield is emboldening bigots. Another knock-on danger of the culture of unlimited civility is that it will eventually end and the overcorrection will see a lot undeserving people hurt.

This isn't the danger with assuming good faith.

It's the danger with not updating your behavior when the balance of probabilities shows that the individual/group/organization you're dealing with is acting in bad faith.

Our modern era has so many megaphones blaring into the void that it's become significantly more difficult to determine which ones are overtly lying. Accordingly, it's far more difficult to establish a consensus about who's operating in bad faith.

Again, the failure point isn't with the assumption of good faith. It's with not recognizing bad faith when it's made manifest.

I agree, that's why I'm talking about unconditional assumption of good faith. I strongly believe in assuming good faith by default, and also in the importance of updating your priors as new information becomes available.

Tone policing is a time-honoured tactic for devaluing valid opposition.

Go fuck yourself you piece of shit.

Aw, that's too bad. My comment as originally drafted floated that you might be participating in that tactic, but I changed it because it could've been interpreted as accusatory. I offered you an assumption of good faith, and got burned for it again. Eventually this will train really bad behavior. I promise to try my best to keep it focused on the knowing defenders of genocide and fight the tide of antisemitism you're causing.

Please don't sermonize like you have in this thread. It's not cool to heap blame on one person for vast, complex global societal problems, and it's certainly not what HN is for. This site exists for curious conversation about interesting topics. It's specifically not for ideological battle, and the first rule of commenting on HN is "be kind".

You can't comment like this on HN, no matter who or what you're replying to. I understand it's a heated topic in which everyone was posting escalatory rhetoric, but it's everyone's responsibility to avoid pouring fuel on the flames. Please take a moment to read the guidelines and make an effort to observe them in future.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

> consider who this attitude helps

It helps the good people, who do good and influence their society to do the same, and live in a good society. The best societies give the accused the full protection of the law, and give them fair trials. The problematic ones have mob rule.

Much of what you write assumes the OP author and you know what evil is, with certainty. That is the critical and most dangerous flaw.