I like the metaphor of the peacenik wanting to rid the world of violence by suggesting that police not use weapons. Let’s elaborate on the analogy between Dark Arts and violence.
Tit For Tat is a common policy for trying to control violence. One obvious and much lamented flaw in the strategy is that it tends to foster cycles of violence, with each side claiming that the other side started it and that “they” use more vicious tactics.
To get past the problems of biased measurement of proportional response and so on, and thereby break the cycle of violence, at least one side has to undertake to dramatically de-escalate—while still providing a deterrent to unrestricted use of force. The last point is essential. Absolute pacifism may well work brilliantly as a response to some provocateurs, but not all.
I like to summarize my views on violence by saying that the only thing worse than two armies fighting a war is one army fighting a war. If rationalists foreswear the Dark Arts, the result will be one army fighting a war. And we’ll be the targeted civilians. Well, not quite. Reason is roughly comparable to small arms; the Dark Arts are heavy artillery and airpower. Or so I fear. If anyone has links to research on the relative persuasive powers of reason and unreason, it would certainly help clarify the issue.
There might be worse things than being the targeted civilians… like being the soldiers. One thing soldiers report is that after they kill they stop valuing life as much as they did before, a psychological barrier is broken and violence becomes easier. If you are spending a lot of time arguing with your enemies and you are constantly practicing the Dark Arts, I think there is a much greater chance of the Dark Arts weaseling their way into the rest of your thinkings. I used to participate in a few very popular liberal community blogs- part of the reason I don’t anymore is that I’ve changed. But I think another part is that those communities made decisions to sacrifice certain norms of traditional rationality in order to win their rhetorical battles with the right (who we felt had long given up those norms). Once the communities grew up and internalized this rhetorical anarchism the quality of thought degraded rapidly. Indeed, they even started to take policy positions that I believe they wouldn’t have if their had been no political advantage in doing so.
That’s a very real danger, but that’s where the “dramatically de-escalate” part comes in. One can also call foul on one’s own side when excessively dark maneuvers are used.
I like the metaphor of the peacenik wanting to rid the world of violence by suggesting that police not use weapons. Let’s elaborate on the analogy between Dark Arts and violence.
Tit For Tat is a common policy for trying to control violence. One obvious and much lamented flaw in the strategy is that it tends to foster cycles of violence, with each side claiming that the other side started it and that “they” use more vicious tactics.
To get past the problems of biased measurement of proportional response and so on, and thereby break the cycle of violence, at least one side has to undertake to dramatically de-escalate—while still providing a deterrent to unrestricted use of force. The last point is essential. Absolute pacifism may well work brilliantly as a response to some provocateurs, but not all.
I like to summarize my views on violence by saying that the only thing worse than two armies fighting a war is one army fighting a war. If rationalists foreswear the Dark Arts, the result will be one army fighting a war. And we’ll be the targeted civilians. Well, not quite. Reason is roughly comparable to small arms; the Dark Arts are heavy artillery and airpower. Or so I fear. If anyone has links to research on the relative persuasive powers of reason and unreason, it would certainly help clarify the issue.
There might be worse things than being the targeted civilians… like being the soldiers. One thing soldiers report is that after they kill they stop valuing life as much as they did before, a psychological barrier is broken and violence becomes easier. If you are spending a lot of time arguing with your enemies and you are constantly practicing the Dark Arts, I think there is a much greater chance of the Dark Arts weaseling their way into the rest of your thinkings. I used to participate in a few very popular liberal community blogs- part of the reason I don’t anymore is that I’ve changed. But I think another part is that those communities made decisions to sacrifice certain norms of traditional rationality in order to win their rhetorical battles with the right (who we felt had long given up those norms). Once the communities grew up and internalized this rhetorical anarchism the quality of thought degraded rapidly. Indeed, they even started to take policy positions that I believe they wouldn’t have if their had been no political advantage in doing so.
That’s a very real danger, but that’s where the “dramatically de-escalate” part comes in. One can also call foul on one’s own side when excessively dark maneuvers are used.