
The Most Intolerant Wins: The Dictatorship of the Small Minority - golergka
https://medium.com/@nntaled/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dictatorship-of-the-small-minority-3f1f83ce4e15#.9169rn420
======
throwaway814
Fantastic article. Great examples, some of which I benefit from (English as a
lingua franca for example) and some that are pretty horrifying.

The realm that I most notice this happening every day is "political
correctness". My Facebook feed is dominated by people tripping over themselves
to attack racists, sexists, religious bigots, etc. Great. But many times they
go way too far IMO and crucify innocents. However, there's no way I care
enough to stake my reputation on defending innocent strangers. So they
continue to rack up positive feedback on their campaigns.

For example, this article is popular right now:
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/top-10-most-sexist-
thing...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/top-10-most-sexist-things-to-
occur-at-the-2016-rio_us_57a88bfce4b0c94bd3c9fb86)

Most of those remarks are totally fine in my book and are only sexist by
willful misinterpretation. For example, how is it not newsworthy that a recent
mom is competing? Even the article calls it "an incredible feat!" Then
Ledecky, who "swims like a man" because she is strong enough to use the
traditionally male stroke, unlike all of the other women. Girls "standing
around as if they're at the mall" was just an old commentator picking the most
casual place he could think of. And when he tried to defend himself by
pointing out the Cherry-Picking Fallacy (he has covered women's sports for
many years, so they picked one sentence online that _might_ be _misconstrued_
as sexist to crucify him online when his body of work is totally fine) they
actually cropped his defense and cherry-picked from _it_ as well.

Anyways. Things like that annoy me because I can't say them with my name
attached or I'll end up cast aside. Nobody is interested in rational
discussion, the Most Intolerant does always win.

~~~
tomp
That's a really terrible article. Sure, certain complaints are kind-of
legitimate (e.g. mentioning someone is someone's wife - although I'm sure same
is also often said of men married to famous women), but most just seem to be
petty denials of the fact that (the best) men are almost universally better at
a given sport than (the best) women.

~~~
throwaway814
For sure, and even the follow-up on that issue has the IMO totally reasonable
explanation + apology for how something that ridiculous came out:

[http://www.wbur.org/onlyagame/2016/08/12/cogdell-unrein-
twit...](http://www.wbur.org/onlyagame/2016/08/12/cogdell-unrein-twitter-
olympics-trapshooting)

The Chicago-based newspaper was trying to emphasize her connection to Chicago
(she's from Alaska) and overdid it. Then apologized. Woo, makes sense, no harm
no foul.

~~~
adrianratnapala
I don't see any foul either.

When the captain of the Australian cricket team was going out with a famous
Australian model, that was news. Even though she was overall a bit less less
famous than him.

Had she being going out with some otherwise unknown olympian, that also would
have been news -- especially if the dude won a medal.

------
tomp
I doubt the whole of Europe will ever eat Halal. Or, at least, I hope not.
Personally, I find the method of slaughter cruel (slicing the throat and
waiting for the blood to drain - granted, the animal can be stunned, but there
were plenty of footages of animals being tortured instead), and discriminatory
(has to be performed by a Muslim, Jew or Christian). I actively avoid eating
Halal meat.

~~~
tajen
I actively avoid anything Islam-related (I'm in France). It may sound racist
(and it may be) but France seems to be actively denying my identity as a
Christian. As a side note, there are about 55% Christians and 7% Muslims in
France.

We've been removing any reference to Christianity in state-related documents -
which is fine but let's see some examples: Christmas holidays are renamed
"End-of-year Holidays", just like Easter holidays are now "Spring holidays",
and we're removing Christian days off here and there. Street names are
renamed, churches aren't always maintained by Christian-adverse mayors.

On the other side, every vegetable mix is now a "tajin", often halal, the
state is funding Mosques, and our streets fill up with women with the foulard
(that thing to hide hair), our beaches with women in burkini, and males have
Arabic dresses and beards. When there is some sand on the floor, you'd believe
you were on the other side of the Mediterranean. Upon football matches, they
burn the French flag.

Most leftish people insist that we should encourage this because "tolerance"
(Fraternité). At the same time when they're introduced to a Christian they go
on and on about priests raping kids and the Spanish inquisition. Ok, I get it,
as a Christian I'm a murderer, and television headline news enjoy a lot
conveying arguments against Christian representants.

I have the feeling that tolerance, mutual understanding and equality of
chances only goes towards the 7% Muslims.

Same goes for women. Someone else in the thread pointed to a link which "10
sexist things", saying they didn't see them as sexist. I don't know, if there
are fewer women in IT, it could also be that programming is hard and few
people can live the life of a good programmer. Meanwhile all girls of my
Engineering school were promoted way before men, and get a better salary than
men I know, while having usually less technical knowledge. It doesn't match
the usual message that feminists tell, but stats aren't built to find such
results. Once again equality only strikes one way and women don't have to work
as hard as men to succeed.

So how can we stop harassing the white, the Christian, the male, the hard
workers? Do I really have to vote for that extremist party, or could women and
Muslims have a bit of tolerance and check we still have an equality of
work/results ratio even though we're white?

 _Goes back to running my own company, because I was never promoted while
employed_

~~~
omginternets
T'inquiète, t'es pas le seul à être frustré...

For non-French readers, it should be mentioned that the degree of political-
correctness in France often exceeds that of the united states, especially in
the capital.

It's quite hard to imagine for those who haven't encountered it.

Regarding feminism, I think the problem is that internet-feminism (and indeed,
most forms of feminism you see in the media) represent a very specific and
strange brand thereof. Namely, it's a very vocal sliver of 3rd-wave American
feminism, which appart from it's mind-boggling ethnocentricity, has it's roots
in a very misandrous circle of American lesbian thinkers (or rabble-rousers,
depending on your perspective). I should, of course, mention that I have no
quarrel with the bulk of lesbians, American or otherwise.

In particular, this group is characterized by the ascetic rejection of biology
as an explanatory factor for ... well... _anything_ related to observed sex
differences. Otherwise stated, they assume that all observed differences
between men and women _must_ stem from social injustice -- biology can have no
role whatsoever, here. To claim otherwise is quickly met with accusations of
essentialism, or worse.

As an interesting aside, I'm "surprised" they haven't taken up the cause of
getting more men into nursing...

Lest this be interpreted as a rant, my point is twofold:

\- The climate of political correctness in France is increasingly suffocating
to the majority, and this in a climate of repeated bloodshed perpetrated by "a
certain group that must not be named". The tension is palpable, and the
majority (it seems to me) feels increasingly alienated, if not outright
_invaded_. I'm not saying it's a fair assessment, but rather that the
phenomenon exists, and will likely inform some very concrete changes in
policy.

\- Feminism is not fundamentally insane and I think sexism does exist. I also
think its effects are vastly overstated by the profoundly anti-intellectual
demagogues that have hijacked the feminist movement. By and large, I find the
intellectual and moral substance of mainstream American feminism to be
appallingly weak, and frighteningly zealous.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Regarding feminism, I think the problem is that internet-feminism (and
> indeed, most forms of feminism you see in the media) represent a very
> specific and strange brand thereof.

"Internet feminism" represents pretty much the entire range of feminism; if
you disproportionately perceive some particular segment, its probably because
you have a disproportionate reaction to it.

> As an interesting aside, I'm "surprised" they haven't taken up the cause of
> getting more men into nursing...

I'm surprised you think that they _haven 't_ taken up the issue of men in
nursing , since its been a fairly common theme in feminist circles (including
on the internet) for quite a number of years, including especially the idea
that the lack of men in the field is directly tied to the same gender
stereotyping that leads to disrespect for the field as "women's work". (And,
frequently, this discussion also treats it as a failing of early waves of
feminism that this issue was neglected in the past.)

See, among others:

[http://feminismnursing.blogspot.com/](http://feminismnursing.blogspot.com/)

[http://minoritynurse.com/rethinking-gender-stereotypes-in-
nu...](http://minoritynurse.com/rethinking-gender-stereotypes-in-nursing/)

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15238127](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15238127)

~~~
omginternets
>"Internet feminism" represents pretty much the entire range of feminism; if
you disproportionately perceive some particular segment, its probably because
you have a disproportionate reaction to it.

Please stop playing with words, and please stop the thinly-veiled accusations.

Yes, the full range of feminism is represented on the internet, but far from
proportionally. Some groups are distinctly louder, more zealous, and receive
more "air-time" than others.

>I'm surprised you think that they haven't taken up the issue of men in
nursing , since its been a fairly common theme in feminist circles (including
on the internet) for quite a number of years

Indeed, though not in third-wave revolutionary circles that are the object of
my criticism.

Please understand you're conversing with a feminist, and please understand
that most people _would_ be surprised by the (very valid) examples you bring
up. This speaks to my original point: a very thin and radical sliver of
feminism is over-represented on the internet and in the media, which in turn
hurts our cause.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Please stop playing with words, and please stop the thinly-veiled
> accusations.

I'm not playing with words, and the accusation was direct and not veiled at
all. Your description that internet feminism represents only the particular
narrow subset that you claim is ridiculously unconnected with reality and only
explainable by either a complete ignorance of the domain (which you deny, and
I believe you), outright dishonesty (which I don't suspect, and, as the least-
charitable interpretation, I wouldn't suggest even if I had suspicions in that
direction), or the common human trait of magnifying the significance of things
to which one has a particularly strong negative reaction.

------
bambax
> _Should a society that has elected to be tolerant be intolerant about
> intolerance? (...) Yes, an intolerant minority can control and destroy
> democracy. (...) So, we need to be more than intolerant with some intolerant
> minorities._

This has been tried during the French Revolution, one of its slogans being
"pas de liberté pour les ennemis de la liberté" (no freedom for the enemies of
freedom).

It led to Terror and mass executions, so I'm really not sure it's the right
path.

~~~
omginternets
Provocative counter-argument: the revolution undoubtedly benefited future
French generations immensely, and led to (arguably) one of the most successful
and tolerant nations in the West. Maybe it was necessary to purge the enemies
of freedom?

French revolution aside (the Terror was, indeed, a dark period I would not
like to see repeated), there is an argument to be made for:

\- the lesser of two evils

\- the necessity of cracking eggs to make an omelet

------
mcguire
Fascinating article, although probably not for the reasons Taleb would like.

He's signaling something, but I am too much of a plebe to know what:

" _a glass of that type of yellow sugared water with citric acid people
sometimes call lemonade_ "

This reverses his majority/minority argument:

" _Let us apply the rule to domains where it can get entertaining:_

" _An honest person will never commit criminal acts but a criminal will
readily engage in legal acts._ "

This argument is pretty nonsensical; if the majority is flexible, then in what
sense does it make sense to say "submit"?

" _...then the (flexible) majority will have to submit to the minority rule._
"

Taleb seems to need to work on his cut-n-paste skills:

" _Note that these slaughter rules_ [for halal/kosher meat] _are skin-in-the-
game driven, inherited from the ancient Eastern Mediterranean [discussed in
Chapter] Greek and Semitic practice to only worship the gods if one has skin
in the game, sacrifice meat to the divinity, and eat what’s left._ "

I'll just note this in passing:

" _In promoting genetically modified food via all manner of lobbying,
purchasing of congressmen, and overt scientific propaganda (with smear
campaigns against such persons as yours truly), the big agricultural companies
foolishly believed that all they needed was to win the majority. No, you
idiots. As I said, your snap “scientific” judgment is too naive in these type
of decisions...It is strange, once again, to see Big Ag who spent hundreds of
millions of dollars on research cum smear campaigns, with hundreds of these
scientists who think of themselves as more intelligent than the rest of the
population, miss such an elementary point about asymmetric choices._ "

Could someone run through this with the math? This is not a use of
renormalization I am familiar with.

" _The method of analysis employed here is called renormalization group, a
powerful apparatus in mathematical physics that allows us to see how things
scale up (or down). Let us examine it next –without mathematics._ "

Signaling again: " _flâneur_ ".

Are we talking about the same French language?

" _...the prestige of France or the efforts of their civil servants in
promoting their more or less beautiful Latinized and logically spelled
language over the orthographically confusing one of trans-Channel meat-pie
eaters._ "

~~~
zby
I actually found the article interesting, but you are right that it would
improve much if he worked a bit more on these parts. I stopped at exactly the
same points.

As to the last point French is a bit more logically spelled than English -
even if it is still horrendous.

------
bobthechef
Why aren't the LGBTQXYZ movements given as a recent example? A tiny group of
people (that is disproportionately wealthy and powerful) managed to slide the
West from something unthinkable (gay marriage, same sex attraction) into
legalization and acceptance of the phenomenon as normal. Granted, we should
distinguish between those with persistent same sex attraction and gays i.e.
those who embrace the so-called "gay lifestyle" and express support for its
acceptance and legal recognition. The left has a history of such manipulation.
Saul Alinsky is famous for it. Soros is a contemporary symbol of it.

~~~
taserian
Regarding same sex attraction, the fact that you never thought of it before
doesn't make the concept "unthinkable". History begs to differ with that
label.

Also, you shouldn't use "i.e." to equate those who _are_ LGBT to those who
_support_ their being accepted into society and legally recognized _despite_
not being LGBT themselves.

------
sitkack
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nassim_Nicholas_Taleb](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nassim_Nicholas_Taleb)
is freak'n hilarious. If you have a chance to see him in person, I highly
recommend it. [0]

Preprints
[https://arxiv.org/a/taleb_n_1.html](https://arxiv.org/a/taleb_n_1.html)

[0]
[http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/scheduledseminars.htm](http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/scheduledseminars.htm)

~~~
sremani
He is one of my favorite authors, who does not feed you pop-psychology or some
feel good narrative. I understand people here are turned off by his seeming
arrogance, but I like one quote (probably by someone else), "Character trumps
reputation." and Reputation is fragile. This one quote gives me more courage
than any to speak my mind.

~~~
mcguire
But there is nothing _but_ pop psychology in this article. Well, and some
paranoia and grammar errors.

And did you check the end? I think he decided that it didn't feel good enough.

------
golergka
Question to moderator. I thought HN allowed dupes as long as community found
them interesting. Now the post is marked "[dupe]". Did it change?

~~~
DanBC
It's always better to email the mods, because they often don't see these
questions if they're posted in threads.

I'm guessing the [dupe] tag is a mistake.

------
NetStrikeForce
So the article talks about intolerant minorities taking over and we have the
comments section here taken over by intolerant minorities pushing their
agendas.

I feel like this is an elaborate joke.

------
rayiner
His use of the intolerant-minority principle to address the challenge faced by
tolerant societies is very interesting.

~~~
g8oz
I'm a little confused as to how the West is committing suicide as he puts it.
Allowing the sale of halal meat? What a joke compared to the old communist
threat.

------
r-w
> Aramaic is a Semitic language which succeeded Canaanite (that is,
> Phoenician-Hebrew) in the Levant and resembles Arabic; it was the language
> Jesus Christ spoke. The reason it came to dominate the Levant and Egypt
> isn’t because of any particular imperial Semitic power or the fact that they
> have interesting noses.

Well then.

~~~
golergka
The author is from Lebanon himself and is probably referring to his own
interesting nose in that passage.

------
skybrian
This is just a rant. Why is it here?

It's very easy to advertise what's not in food if it never had it anyway. This
is just good marketing. Many foods are kosher or halal or vegan or whatever
because as far as the majority is concerned it's a checkbox feature that
doesn't affect you and maybe even works as a signal of quality. I'm having a
hard time seeing the issue.

On the other hand it seems like nearly everything having to do with nuts is
labelled as processed on machines that also process peanuts so apparently
economics wins much of the time.

~~~
throwaway814
As far as I can tell, this article isn't even angry. It's just explaining the
mechanics behind some changes. How is that a rant?

~~~
skybrian
You can't really call it "explaining the mechanics" when there's no evidence
he actually talked to anyone or did any research to see if his theorizing
holds up.

~~~
Anon1096
So can nothing be published unless it's cleared by experts in the field? This
isn't even in a scientific journal - it's a Medium blog post. I'm not sure why
you're attempting to hold it to the rigor of a journal (which he'd have to pay
for to apply to, I might add). And on the accusation of having "no research",
his research is all the things he observed happening in the world in the first
half of the essay.

~~~
skybrian
Speculation is fine - everyone does it. But usually you admit that right up
front. "I've done no research but here's my half-baked theory of how this
works." You show a bit of humility, some understanding that you might not have
it right the first time, and invite corrections. (Also, if it's based on what
other people wrote, links help.)

------
triplesec
Previously on HN
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10567630](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10567630)
Edit: as a pdf with a marginally different title but the same content.

