I flatly deny that the process as described is capable of discernment. What happened was: speaker announced, lots of people complain, conference organiser withdraws invitation to avoid focus on "inclusion and/or presence." Note that the organiser explicitly excluded consideration of the merits of the complaints.

Now compare my invocation elsewhere in this thread of the spectre of an anti-Zionist boycott: the complaints would be of a very similar nature, including references to 'racism', the number of complainants could be quite large, particularly if there was an organised attempt to find them (there is in fact a very considerable degree of organisation for anti-Zionist boycotts), and the strength of feeling would be equally high. Therefore it is only a matter of time at this point until Israelis are prevented from attending conferences like Strange Loop, as indeed we already are in much of the world.

I note in passing that those who favour excluding Yarvin have yet actually to state their opposition to this sort of thing.

I agree with you, but one point of caution is that the NRX movement that Yarvin helped found has many avowedly anti-semitic members who see "Jews" as part of the forces that oppress them.

None of this came from Yarvin, who is Jewish, and well worth defending, but get much beyond him into the movement and you'll be supporting anti-semitism, not tolerance.

Perhaps so, but I think it is enough in the vicinity of the chilling effect line that it is worth discussing and being concerned about.

I say this specifically because it was a professional conference and such conferences are important for earning a living. If private organizations vital to earning a living voluntarily censor people for their political opinions, that is equivalent to denying careers to those people, and that is a substantial chilling effect. If it's one conference, occasionally, then sure it's a minor effect; but look at the Hollywood Red Scare and you'll see it can become a major one.

Personally I'm even more uncomfortable with forcing private organizations to ignore participant politics than I am with chilling effects, but let's not deny the chilling effect. A culture which denies professional opportunities on the basis of personal politics is lacking tolerance and diversity where it really matters: for ideas, not just skin shades and accents.

Then again, China took the opposite model and seems to be doing fine. So YMMV.

It's also the case they don't care about skin shades OR accents either.

Huh.

I think you meant:

>It's also the case they don't care about skin shades OR accents, on the other hand.

"Right side of history", "moral arc of the universe", etc. seems to suggest that the people becoming uncomfortable think it's a slippery slope too.

I'd intended to concern myself entirely with why the responses in the parent comment were bad counter-arguments against the arguments/sentiments it quoted: the question of whether or not Yarvin's disinvitation might have a chilling effect on other types of speech did not even enter my head.

I'm sorry if what I wrote was unclear. I'll took another look at the first section and try to see how it ended up resembling the slippery slope fallacy you describe.