User blog:Fimber/Godwin's Law

I think most people have already heard of Godwin's law. It states (to quote from the page)

''"As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches." In other words, Godwin observed that, given enough time, in any online discussion—regardless of topic or scope—someone inevitably makes a comparison to Hitler or the Nazi''s.

Although in one of its early forms Godwin's law referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions, the law is now often applied to any threaded online discussion, such as forums, chat rooms and blog comment threads, and has been invoked for the inappropriate use of Nazi analogies in articles or speeches.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

Godwin's law can meanwhile be also be quoted in regard to other discussions in which sooner or later other morally questionable accusations are being used in order to belittle a discussion partner or to make someone lose credibility.

We are here to discuss a TV show. It's fiction with fictional characters, and whilst it's not unusual that TV shows cause discussions about real life topics, it's totally inappropriate to accuse anyone who disagrees with an opinion of any morally questionable motive or intention. It's very obvious that once a user refers to either racism, hatred of anything, homophobia or whatever, the person who is alleged can either ignore these accusations or explain himself/herself in order to not get being accused again. This means that the person who is accused of having an opinion due to a morally/ethically questionable motive/motivation is being forced into a position of self defense, and soon the discussion won't be about the subject anymore but only about a discussion partner who has to defend themselves against accuations and allegations. Very often the accused users see themselves forced to even give away private stuff in order to reassure the offender of not being either a racist, homophobe or whatever.

This is not the purpose of a discussion forum. It's not the purpose of a discussion forum/site to belittle others and to impeach someone's credibility whenever someone else disagrees with an opinion.

During the past years when reading but rarely participating in forum discussions, I have witnessed multiple times that users accuse others of being racist because they prefer Morgana over Gwen, of being a nazi because they liked Uther, of being stupid and immature because they preferred Gwen and Arthur over Gwen and Lancelot, of being abusive in the real world because they disagreed with Morgana's reasons for hating everyone (and the funny thing is, this happened to me too, once I decided to write on a certain forum), of being homophobe because they don't see Arthur and Merlin as being gay and/or prefer them to be straight - and vice versa, of being "gay lovers" and perverts when they prefer them as a couple rather than just friends (fortunately, this has never happened here).

This is not the right way to discuss or to exchange opinions. And it's nobody's mission here or elsewhere to make a site more "tolerant" by accusing others of being homophobe or racists. Those who preach tolerance better stop trying to make straight people feel guilty when they only see a bromance, to make people feel guilty when they don't like Gwen because they are "racists" then, or make people feel guilty if they don't like Morgana, Uther, Gaius, Merlin or whoever because they are supposed to be either stupid, immature, silly, nazis and much more. Some time ago, when a friend of mine discussed politics in a forum and criticised both Israel and Palestine, she was called an antisemite even though she is jewish herself.

Since people on the internet most of the time don't know each other, it's not only inappropriate but also very hard to figure out any personal motivation behind an opinion. We're not here to question the person behind an opinion, but, if ever, to question the arguments that back up an opinion whenever we disagree and want to talk this over.

I'd like to quote from the definition of homophobia:

"Homophobia is observable in critical and hostile behavior such as discrimination and violence on the basis of sexual orientations that are non-heterosexual.[1] [2] According to the 2010 Hate Crimes Statistics released by the FBI National Press Office, 19.3 percent of hate crimes across the United States "were motivated by a sexual orientation bias."[5] Moreover, in a Southern Poverty Law Center 2010 Intelligence Report extrapolating data from fourteen years (1995–2008), which had complete data available at the time, of the FBI's national hate crime statistics found that LGBT people were "far more likely than any other minority group in the United States to be victimized by violent hate crime."[6] 

(....)

Homophobia manifests in different forms, and a number of different types have been postulated, among which are internalized homophobia, social homophobia, emotional homophobia, rationalized homophobia, and others.[19] There were also ideas to classify homophobia, racism, and sexism as an intolerant personality disorder.[20] 

Some studies have shown that people who are homophobic are more likely to have repressed homosexual desires.[57] In 1996, a controlled study of 64 heterosexual men (half said they were homophobic by experience, with self-reported orientation) at the University of Georgia found that men who were found to be homophobic (as measured by the Index of Homophobia)[58] were considerably more likely to experience more erectile responses when exposed to homoerotic images than non-homophobic men.[59] Another study in 2012 arrived at similar results when researchers found that students who came from "the most rigid anti-gay homes" were most likely to reveal repressed homosexual attraction"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophobia

If anyone has an issue with another user because there were really inappropriate remarks or if someone feels offended, users better contact an admin. Sure thing that offensive comments/remarks will be removed. But playing the racist- or anti gay-card - or the other way around, insulting others because of a different culture and/or sexual orientation - in discussions in order to impeach someone's credibility does not only go against the rules but it's also quite rude. It's neither a crime to be straight nor to be gay. It's not a crime to prefer one character over another or one relationship over another. And in case that anyone has any problem with another user, it's inappropriate and also unnecessary to condemn the entire Merlin wikia, for it insults other users who have nothing to do with it.

So far, almost all discussions have been very pleasant. There were some trolls who insulted either users or characters and actors/actressess, but most of the time their intention was quite obvious when swearing and seriously insulting users and/or actors/actressess and their offensive remarks have been removed. Aside from that, this place has been one of the few places where other people's opinions are welcomed and only very few people got offensive. It would be a good thing to keep it that way and to refrain from starting public fights because of different point of views. Having said that I would also like to mention that calling characters being ugly is an insult directed toward the actor or actress in question. Please think about what you write before publishing it.