Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ya-ta Boy]

Do you remember back in the good old days when the Patriot Act was being debated and people upset with gov't snooping etc accused the Bush administration of sliding into Nazism and within seconds two or three defenders would rush in and shout about Godwin's Law? Or when the Gitmo debates over incarcerating people for life without trial were going strong and the same people would mention Hitler and the same defenders would holler about how using Hitler's name just shut down debate? And while not all those invoking Godwin's Law were right wingers, they always seemed to find allies.

I remember complaining that it was just a self-serving tactic to shield what was going on. No one ever agreed with me. Fine. But...

For the last year we've been hearing 'Nazi' and 'Hitler' being thrown around (along with Stalin and Marxist) pretty much randomly. Here is a good example from this week:

"I know we're not supposed to talk about Adolf Hitler but this administration is making it really, really tough to ignore some facts out there. ... [T]he "Big Lie" was an expression coined by Hitler. And the "Big Lie" is exactly what all of liberalism is. ... This is how the OSS described Hitler's psychology: "His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or a wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong" -- hello, George W. Bush and the Republicans," - Rush Limbaugh

I don't so much wonder about the right wingers, but where are those who agreed with Godwin's Law now?

[visitorq]

Obama should just change his name to Hitler. That would simplify matters.

Anyone else think it's funny how yata always prattles on mindlessly about "right wingers" and the GOP when there's basically nobody left on this forum who even supports them? I can't even remember the last time I saw someone post in favor of the Republican party.

People just bash Obama, because he's a liar and a horrible president.

[Leslie Cheswyck]

I'll show you my nazis if you'll show me yours.

[Sergio Stefanuto]

Godwin's law merely states that the longer a discussion takes place, the likelier a citation of Hitler becomes. Comparisons with Hitler may, however, be the completely different reductio ad Hitlerum fallacy. Meat-eaters use the fact that Hitler was a vegetarian to 'prove' that vegetarianism is undesirable, for example. Hitler believed in evolution, therefore evolution is false - another example. Rush Limbaugh's comments here don't seem to be similar, as he has cited certain Obama behaviors as being similar to Hitler's (and that appears to be that) which is legitimate comment and not at all reductio ad Hitlerum, nor relevant to Godwin's law. A close example might be when sometimes in life we meet an extremely authoritarian person and accuse them of behaving like a fascist. This is reasonable enough, and completely different from using the fact that Hitler did or believed something in order to discredit someone's ideas.

Yataboy's OP isn't well thought-out.