Horwitz's Corollary to Godwin's Law

by Liberty and Power

We all know Godwin's Law of the Internet: all discussion threads will eventually invoke Hitler and the person invoking him in an invidious comparison is deemed to have lost the debate. Invoking Godwin's Law has become a way to dismiss one's interlocutor as being a crazy crank.

Godwin's Law having been just invoked against me on another blog because I referred to the NRA as "fascist," despite the fact that I provided evidence and citations to back up my claim, I hereby announce Horwitz's Corollary to Godwin's Law:

"When people invoke Godwin's Law in the face of a serious, relevant argument about Hitler or Fascism made with evidence and citations, it reflects their own inability to respond rationally to the claim being made and thus they should be deemed to have lost the discussion."

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More Comments:

David M. Hart - 12/4/2008

Godwin's Law is all about playing the "Naziism Card" in any debate. A more historically informed discussant might say the following;

1. there were many national forms of fascism which emerged in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, each with their own take on how the state should be structured to achieve fairly common goals (Italian, German, Spanish, British, Australian, even American).

2. the German form of fascisim (i.e. Nazism) was unique in the ruthless way it went about exterminating their opponents (compared to say the Italian form).

3. it was not the most bloodthirsty form of statism in the 20th century. That distinction was reserved for "red fascism" (aka Communism) which, under Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot, which killed far more people (both in absolute numbers and in relative terms) than did Hitler

4. Since most people are ignorant of the above facts, "Nazism" has become a kind of short hand for any form of statism which has reached an extreme form, either in terms of control of the economy, control over peoples' everyday lives, and killing of its opponents.

Perhaps these points put playing the "Nazism card" into some kind of perspective. Libertarians could be more nuanced in their critique of statism: all forms of statism are bad, there is a continuum of state "badness" which would place Nazism somewhere in the middle of the spectrum and Mao's communism towards the "really bad" end of the spectrum. Current forms of statism (i.e. the current nationalisation of the banking industry for the benefit of bankers and mortgage lenders) is tending towards fascism but is not as bad as Hitler because they aren't killing many domestic citizens (yet). However, if one starts to add up the death of non-US citizens over the past few decades (Koreans, Vietnamese, Cambodians, Iraqis, etc) one starts to reach an pretty impressive total of dead. It is still not "Nazism" but give the Americans some credit for evolving their own, unique form of fascism which has not yet reached its historical end point. Obama has yet to show us what he can do.

Keith Halderman - 12/4/2008

I have always argued that it is a question of direction and our society is becoming more and more like Hitler's society on a daily basis.

John W. Payne - 12/4/2008

This pretty much already exists. From Wikipedia:

There are many corollaries to Godwin's law, some considered more canonical (by being adopted by Godwin himself)[2] than others invented later.[1] For example, there is a tradition in many newsgroups and other Internet discussion forums that once such a comparison is made, the thread is finished and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically "lost" whatever debate was in progress. This principle itself is frequently referred to as Godwin's Law. It is considered poor form to raise such a comparison arbitrarily with the motive of ending the thread. There is a widely recognized codicil that any such ulterior-motive invocation of Godwin's law will be unsuccessful (this is sometimes referred to as "Quirk's Exception").[6]

Godwin's Law applies especially to inappropriate, inordinate, or hyperbolic comparisons of other situations (or one's opponent) with Hitler or Nazis or their actions. It does not apply to discussions directly addressing genocide, propaganda, or other mainstays of the Nazi regime.[citation needed] Whether it applies to humorous use or references to oneself is open to interpretation, because although mentioning and trivializing Nazism in an online discussion, this would not be a fallacious attack against a debate opponent.

However, Godwin's Law itself can be abused, as a distraction or diversion, that fallaciously miscasts an opponent's argument as hyperbole, especially if the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate. A 2005 Reason magazine article argued that Godwin's Law is often misused to ridicule even valid comparisons.[7]