Carl-Richard

@Scholar I don't understand what you're saying.

I mean that he doesn't want to call him a nazi even if he fits his definition, but he calls him a fascist, a racist and an anti-Semite.

I can do it fine without a dictionary.

Depends on your definition.

There is no conversation without defining words.

Destiny has made a decision to create a double-standard for how he treats one word (nazi) in order to be able to convert Fuentes' audience, and Mr. Girl is pointing out how this double-standard might actually be making that mission harder. So they actually have the same goal in mind, just the means are different.

Thinking of fruits and berries as sources of sugar is a bit reductionist. For example, the fiber content has a big impact on how the sugar is processed, making it more akin to a slow carbohydrate. Eating a kiwi with the skin on feels almost like a complete meal in itself.

There is no absolute definition. It's always a mix between the three things.

Even if we go by the naive feeling that everybody has in their mind about a word, I bet that if you were to explain to any person on the street what Nick believes, the first thing that pops up in their mind will be "ah, nazi", not "neo-nazi" or "anti-Semitic fascist". You never rely 100% on a dictionary definition. It's always a mix between that naive feeling, things you've learned, and dictionary definitions.

Not if you let them respond afterwards. That is just a guess he is making. He doesn't actually know that. For all he knows, he might be radicalizing more people than he is de-radicalizing, which means that his strategy is failing. Mr. Girl just wants him to be more careful and warns that this might be happening. The dictionary definition says it's "a member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party". However, when you call a young American who is alive today a nazi, the implication is that they hold the same beliefs as those people (because they're not 90 years old or a German national). It's like the word "democrat" in the US. If somebody is not a politician and calls themselves a democrat, the implication is that they at least hold some of the same beliefs as the Democratic Party. And exactly what those beliefs are needs to be specified, and again, you do that by defining it in conversation. Could Fuentes fit the criteria necessary for such a definition of nazi? By Destiny's own hyper-restrictive definition, he admits "just barely not", and in my opinion, the reason for that is way too trivial (which Vegan Gains said the best: "only a chance he might be genocidal towards Jews?... ").

In the video, Mr. Girl was confronting Destiny about his decision to strategically avoid labeling Fuentes with a reasonable definition of nazi, not a brain dead one. That is what we're discussing here.

More proof that defining words in conversation is useful.

The real source of my misunderstanding is that I don't understand why you would bring up that in this discussion. We were talking about defining words in a reasonable way (adding nuance and making it more specific), not in the leftist Twitter brain dead way (generalizing it into obscurity).

Thank you for defining the word and demonstrating why we define words in conversation. There is no way around it.

...bro, that doesn't mean anything. How should I use "communist"?

But we do it all the time. It's a necessary part of communication. Communication is messy. It shouldn't matter if you have to take a moment to define a word. What does matter is that you're being internally consistent with how you generally use words, because you shouldn't create unnecessary mess. Unnecessary mess is what Fuentes capitalizes on and what Destiny is participating in because he thinks it's strategically important.

We usually define words in conversation not to assign a previously non-existent meaning, but to add nuance to that preexisting meaning. This preexisting meaning is often very vague and only gives you a general sense of the concept. There is no "original" definition though. You're either talking about a general feeling in most people's minds, or some vague dictionary definition (for which there are countless versions).

Then why is having own definitions laughable?

@Kksd74628 So when we define a word in a discussion, that word no longer has any use?

We went from a descriptive discussion ("socialization takes time away from intellectual activities etc.") to a normative discussion ("what about just living life man?!") for some reason.

I'm so lost lol.

"Fascist" and "racist" are just as poisoned as "nazi" (unless there is a way to quantify that), so there is a double-standard there when he calls him those things and not nazi. He apparently doesn't care about your idea of integrity when it comes to those words. He has fixated himself on one word which he has deemed as important for strategic gains, and that double-standard is the integrity I'm saying he is sacrificing. You label him after you find out his actual views, just like with "fascist", "racist" etc. Labeling him does not inherently hinder that process. It makes it easier in one way (the utility of categories) and harder in another (defensiveness). If you don't have a word for something, or if you're actively omitting using a word that fits that position, you're making it harder to get a grip on him. That is why words and categories exist, to make it easier to grip something. If that makes him defensive, ok, then they can talk about that. If Fuentes is truly reasonable, then he won't automatically shut down if you lay out exactly why his views fit with your definition of nazi. What makes him shut down is the mindless labeling twitter leftists do. Destiny should do exactly what you're advocating here AND be able to label things reasonably.

They do have meaning though, and you can influence that meaning in conversation by giving your own definition. You're not held captive by an absolute frame of meaning. Destiny has his own definition of nazi, and he can use that word, just like uses words like fascist, racist, and anti-Semite. However, the definition is also very restrictive, because he will probably never ever call somebody a nazi using that definition (again, perfect fortress). He can define the word in conversation, just like he defines any other word. He can then use the word in conversation, just like he uses any other word. If that makes Fuentes' audience defensive, it also makes Destiny's audience less confused. What that exactly looks like in terms of numbers, we can't know, but at least he is not sacrificing the integrity of clear communication and language. Fuentes' main strategy is his meta-ironic identity. Destiny makes little reliable effort to poke holes in that.

I think it's a bad trade-off in its current state: maximizing bridging a gap between communities vs. not doing anything to dampen Fuentes main strategy for spreading his views. The gap goes both ways, and he has no idea whether it's going in his favor or not. He should make a compromise to balance out the trade-off. If he doesn't call him a nazi (and I'll explain why I think he should), but he has no problems calling him fascist, racist, anti-semite etc., then that creates confusion. The last thing somebody needs who is on the bridge is confusion about which side is what. When Vegan Gains went over Destiny's three criterias for his definition of nazi, we get to know that the only reason he doesn't call Nick Fuentes a nazi is because he thinks there is only a chance that he has genocidal intentions towards Jews, and that he would have to hear Fuentes say it directly in a conversation and unironically. That is so ridiculous. There is no universe where anybody will straight out admit "yeah, I actually want to kill Jews", so he will probably never get to call somebody a nazi. If Fuentes is the closest thing that somebody will ever get to an actual nazi, then he should be called that. I still think he should continue engaging with him (I'm not fully in the Mr. Girl camp that he should not go on panels with him or not have normal conversations with him), but this autistic "probably"-dancing around the word nazi is a problem. If you're a serious thinker, you should value clear communication above almost anything else. Meta-irony, playing with words and frames is a great source of humor in some settings, but in other settings, it has to be treated seriously, particularly when dealing with Fuentes.