Tyranny ALWAYS Pretends To Be Reasonable And Civil

Hah. Just thought this was interesting. No moderations have been necessary over the past 30 days or since the stream's inception as it has been about that old.

You found the stream the other day, and we engaged in as civil of a discussion as we usually have. That was fine.

Now go ahead and bomb one of those memes with spam again like you did a couple days ago, or whatever else you were planning next to prove whatever point you are trying to make.

Alright man.

You don’t dig the stream. We get it.

Simple solution: stick to “politics,” which has basically no attempt at fostering civility apart from deleting the very most bloodthirsty purgey-type stuff.

Or go to “conservatives” or some of the other like streams. They may police liberal content: not sure, as I don’t really go to those streams as they’re obviously not meant for me.

Every political stream is a little bit different. The entire point of dividing streams at all, which is one of the best features for fostering creativity and building communities on ImgFlip in my opinion.

An ImgFlip for you, an ImgFlip for me.

We’re all a happy ImgFlip family. Are we not?

I created streams in order to explore interests, share content and, yes, advance my viewpoints. Same as you do every day right here in the politics stream.

Just making the very basic point that divisions of streams on ImgFlip exist in order to promote creation of different communities and foster discussion of various interests and viewpoints.

Indeed: You can go anywhere on ImgFlip, be as off-topic and aggressive as you want, and it seems the Global Mods with their attitude of permissiveness will allow you to behave pretty much however you like, short of literally calling for jews to be thrown in ovens the way purgey does. Stream Mods may have their own different sets of rules set forth in descriptions.

Apart from that, you are only limited by your own good sense and conscience. "Personal responsibility," as you might say.

There are a trillion different conceivable ways to derail a stream, and I'm sure if you get bored you'll think of them all.

I admit it my stream has had plenty of shortcomings. There's plenty of room for improvement. I wish there was more diversity in the political viewpoints expressed there, I'm with you on that.

But, my stream was never intended to be propaganda, nor do I want to see it become an echo-chamber. I can understand your complaint, I get where you're coming from, but please do not slander me as a propagandist. That is false and uncalled for.

You and KylieFan_89 can butt heads all you like, but please just leave me out of it.

You don't understand. I NEVER planned to deny anyone freedom of speech, one of the most fundamental freedoms to a free society. I only wanted to encourage debate and discourse in a civil manner. Part of that, I reasoned, was discouraging the harassment that pervades other politics-oriented streams on this site. And don't try to tell me it isn't there.

Picture this: you're having a debate with someone who you disagree with on a specific issue, take your pick. You're just finding common ground, and you think you might be getting the other guy to see your side of the story, when some alt-right or alt-left wacko comes outta nowhere and starts calling you a 'west-hating communist shill' or a 'misogynistic homophobic Nazi'. That would be annoying and irritating, right? I wanted to discourage that kind of stuff in my stream. Never did I wish to censor anyone, I haven't and I won't.

But I didn't articulate my intent well enough, so here we are.

No, I would not delete your responses and comments if I could. I've already made it clear that I abhor censorship.

Hey man, no need to come after MY stream because of your disagreements with KylieFan_89.

I detest the concept of 'safe spaces'. I'm not trying to control anyone, quit putting words in my mouth. I intended to encourage open political discourse. I can see now that my goal was naive and shortsighted, too complex to really enforce.

Now, I will concede that there may be a bias present in my stream. But that is no fault of mine. The most predominant users are all politically left, I can't tell them to stop posting because right-wing viewpoints might be overshadowed. Look man: I would love to have more right-wing posters in the stream. You guys are welcome, as long as you abide by the stream's terms of service. I can elaborate on said terms if you would like, I can see you misunderstand them.

But don't come after me because of your beef with another user. Alright?

I'm not a 'leftist' though. I'm a libertarian, and strongly oppressed to censorship.

As I've said in some of my other comments on this meme, you're critiques of the politics_redux stream are valid and understandable. Look man, I get it, I can understand where you're coming from.

KylieFan_89 didn't tell me anything. I saw that a stream I own was being slandered. Due to KylieFan already having posted a few comments on this image, as well as his heavy use of my stream, I assumed that this was what had prompted you to make the meme.

Again, some of your critiques of my stream are valid, but it is in no way leftist propaganda. You're right, there is a serious left-wing bias due to a lack of right-wing content, and I want to change that.

See, I wanted to foster actual debate and discussion around politics, something sorely lacking from the politics and politicsTOO streams. I now see that I underestimated the complexity of such an endeavor.

Re-read this comment I posted earlier:

You don't understand. I NEVER planned to deny anyone freedom of speech, one of the most fundamental freedoms to a free society. I only wanted to encourage debate and discourse in a civil manner. Part of that, I reasoned, was discouraging the harassment that pervades other politics-oriented streams on this site. And don't try to tell me it isn't there.

Picture this: you're having a debate with someone who you disagree with on a specific issue, take your pick. You're just finding common ground, and you think you might be getting the other guy to see your side of the story, when some alt-right or alt-left wacko comes outta nowhere and starts calling you a 'west-hating communist shill' or a 'misogynistic homophobic Nazi'. That would be annoying and irritating, right? I wanted to discourage that kind of stuff in my stream. Never did I wish to censor anyone, I haven't and I won't.

But I didn't articulate my intent well enough, so here we are.

No, I would not delete your responses and comments if I could. I've already made it clear that I abhor censorship.

Thanks for weighing in, bot556. I agree I’d like to see more conservative voices on the stream, and maybe Timber’s “attack” on the stream will draw some in, hopefully in a constructive manner.

I did worry from the start it might become another variant of PoliticsTOO, due to the user-base such a description would be likely to attract. (I love the description by the way, that is what got me so excited in the first place). But despite leaning left-of-center, the stream is not at all like PoliticsTOO, really.

It may not have been exactly the stream you envisioned from the start, but I think it is still a very worthy addition to ImgFlip.

As for me, I think hard about the kinds of memes I submit to Politics_Redux. I usually steer away from direct attacks on Trump. And more often than not, my meme submissions to Politics_Redux are different from the ones I submit to PoliticsTOO.

I submit memes to Politics_Redux praising conservatives when I can, and I try to think about issues deeper than the 24/7 news cycle. Such as the “whataboutism” series. I didn’t submit any of those memes to PoliticsTOO.

Apologies for having induced Timber1972 to put your stream on blast, but I think it is a sign the stream is getting somewhere.

Yes many complain "It's all conservative/republican and no other viewpoint can be heard", "it's impossible for anything but a right wing meme to make front page" etc etc.
But the reality is the politics stream is upholding most of the principles of true free speech. Some of the mods are clearly not following it with some of the rejections I have experienced but maybe they were declined as they met the few restrictions. But overall we are free to publish whatever we choose to.

Yes it's dominated by right leaning politics but it does not limit anything no matter how ridiculous I might find some of the memes and that's fine. It's dominated by the right because in the most part the majority of left leaning memes are just pure trolling. The majority of lefties who respond on every meme but never actually input more than a few memes a week dont really contribute anything to creating a balance of sorts. Their comments are always in line with whatever the establishment thought is and they just make that side of things look like what it is, Authoritarianism and so that combined with the right leaning trolling memes then of course the right side dominates the stream.

Free speech means that anything and everything you want to say is possible to say and can be said no matter whether anothers feelings or beliefs are injured in some way. Anyone and everyone should be able to put forth their viewpoint and if you are ridiculed or praised for what you have to say then that is again what free speech allows. And may the best ideas succeed.

"But it is not YOUR right to silence others, or attempt to silence others, just because you don't like what they say, or how they say it."

I never said that was my right, because I know it's not.

I NEVER planned to deny anyone freedom of speech, one of the most fundamental freedoms to a free society. I only wanted to encourage debate and discourse in a civil manner. Part of that, I reasoned, was discouraging the harassment that pervades other politics-oriented streams on this site.

Picture this: you're having a debate with someone who you disagree with on a specific issue, take your pick. You're just finding common ground, and you think you might be getting the other guy to see your side of the story, when some alt-right or alt-left wacko comes outta nowhere and starts calling you a 'west-hating communist shill' or a 'misogynistic homophobic Nazi'. Unproductive and uncalled for, right? I wanted to discourage that kind of stuff in my stream. Never did I wish to censor anyone, I haven't and I won't.

"If you want to debate with someone, do so with civility because hate speech and harassment will not be tolerated." should be taken as a suggestion, not a rule. This was my fault: I didn't articulate my intent well enough, so here we are.

I believe I've made myself very clear that I won't censor anything.

Yes, rebuttal would be the method i would use to address that speech.

Dolores Umbridge? From Harry Potter?? That's the second or third "Dolores Umbridge" reference I believe I've heard you make lately, lol.

I read those Harry Potter books a long time ago.

*after reading a quick refresher*

Oh, okay. So she was the schoolmarmish tyrant of the books. I see. To wit:

"In 1995 by order of the Ministry, she was installed as Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and then later Hogwarts High Inquisitor and Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, after Professor Albus Dumbledore had been fired. In all three of these positions at Hogwarts she had enormous power over the students, teachers, and the curriculum, which she wielded despotically. Her time at Hogwarts was characterised by cruelty and abusive punishments against students, and because of her interfering and condescending ways, she was widely despised by most students and teachers alike.

"After her suspension from these additional posts and the fall of the Ministry of Magic, Umbridge ran the Muggle-Born Registration Commission and sadistically prosecuted many innocent people. After the Second Wizarding War, she was sentenced to Azkaban for her crimes against Muggle-borns, where she would remain for the rest of her life."

ALSO NOTE:

"The power granted to Umbridge by Fudge to consolidate his political strength and squash his perceived enemies is not unlike the abuse members of the Nixon administration committed during the Watergate Era. In addition, Umbridge's final crimes are the 'ethnic cleansing' of Muggle-born wizards, analogous to the Nazi persecutions leading to the Holocaust."

So, you're talking about her petty schoolmarmish ways with the students at Hogwarts -- certainly nothing to celebrate. But her real crimes, what she got convicted for and sentenced to a term in Azkaban for life, were her post-Hogwarts persecutions against Muggle-borns.

So, I think Ms. Umbridge can be read instead as a cautionary tale for the dangers of excusing Nixonesque abuses of power, and allowing racism and bigotry to infect the midsets of those in charge.

Interesting stuff! Should we put J.K. Rowling on the line?

Read more about Dolores Umbridge here: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Dolores_Umbridge

I wanted a stream that would encourage productive political debate. I hoped for both left and right viewpoints to be represented. The Politics stream is a conservative echo-chamber, and the politicsTOO stream is a liberal echo-chamber, with a few exceptions from time to time among both.

Post a left-wing meme in politics, or a right-wing meme in politicsTOO and an entire f***ing division of commenters will come after you, often with personal attacks and harassment. I wanted a place on this site that had a different environment, one where people could have debates and discussion, hell, maybe even find common ground. But, hey, this is the internet, what the hell can you expect, right?

Well, I sure as hell thought I could expect something different. But after failing as a mod, I began to see that my stream's mission has been unrealistic and unsustainable from the start.

The best I can hope for is to at the very least encourage civil discussion and debate. I don't intend to censor anyone, as a libertarian, I'm strongly opposed to censorship.

Believe it or not, I didn't write that stream description. The founder of the stream, bot556, did.

I know you'll say that doesn't matter, just thought it worth pointing out. As I'm not sure you would have taken so much time out of your day to write your screeds here if so.

Thanks for the extra advertising for the stream, though!

Here's a link for easy reference: imgflip.com/m/Politics_Redux

As far as the Trump-king meme: not generally the kind of meme I would make, and it is a tad out of character for the stream, but I allowed.

If someone wanted to submit an Obama-king meme, that’d be fine.

These are far from the most hateful images you’ll find associated with either President.

Yeah, indeed: civility and rationality are subjective terms that everyone will define a little differently but that is no reason to abandon our commitment to these worthy goals.