Breaking Bread: We Don’t All Need a Seat at the Table.

A (messy) Essay on Jubilee, The Shade Room, and the Dangers of ‘Both-Side-Ism’.

Meret Oppenheim’s ‘Le Festin’ 1959

Old habits die hard, it’s true,

and Jubilee presents even-sided debate as a means of further ‘educating’ its viewers, in the way we’re taught to at school when we learn to consider both sides of the argument in an essay and good luck getting a decent grade without breathing life into the ‘other side’. This was hard for me, of course, that 50/50 because my true feelings towards the arguments often lay more on the side of 70/30. Given that I have more control over my arguments here in this space, where I am, for the most part, grade-free, this split looks kind of more like a 70/30, as are so many of the other posts I read on here. We often only sacrifice just a bit of time, a few sentences to the other side, as is the habit learned from such a young age in that the conversation feels almost incomplete without it. It’s like we’re professing our arrogance and feeding into that perception of young adolescents now - that we’re all so very self-righteous and ‘narrowminded’ as a vice or a symptom of our moral ‘grandstanding’. But the way we’ve learned how not to sit across the dinner table from our enemies is the same way that we should learn how not to debate with them on topics regarding our human rights.

Don’t get me wrong, those 20v1 videos can be really entertaining. Specifically, they seem to satisfy a particular thirst when we watch Dean outsmart 20 Trump supporters, relying on real evidence to support his claims, rather than the baseless assertions made by the other side.

But on the flip side, when we watch Charlie Kirk smile his way through what can only be understood as extremist language, we shudder a little despite attempts to digest what he’s offering. What is educational about hearing a man admit that he would force his infant daughter to carry a pregnancy conceived through rape? We really don’t always need a completely balanced perspective.

Of course, the argument on the other side posits that suppressing extremist views because they don’t ‘align with our own’ represents another form of extremism/intolerance, right? Popper’s Paradox of Intolerance speaks to this concern, and I can see the attractiveness of this argument. If a society suppresses extremist viewpoints without engaging in them, it risks becoming guilty of the very authoritarianism and dogmatism it seeks to prevent, potentially undermining the core values of liberalism and components of ‘free speech’.

Having studied philosophy at university fully aware of the fact that it wouldn’t necessarily support my current professional ambitions, the prospect of approaching the conversation of platforming ‘both sides’ was really exciting, because I surely had a few notes memorised that might could apply here :)

“Debunking The Tolerance Paradox”

I’ll fast forward to the end quickly for you guys, and state clearly that I don’t believe in liberal approaches to radicalised discourse or debate, or the supposedly ‘neutral’ and ‘rational’ end of achieving some kind-of ‘middle-ground’, when the establishment of this middle ground requires us to make room for old, regurgitated right-wing extremist talking points. Further to this, it’s important to consider the implications found at the end of these ‘talking points’. Even the paradox recognises as its caveat how tolerating intolerance must end at the point where there is the threat of violence, a feature commonly found at the end of a debate asking whether ‘Pride is still necessary’, (Jubilee, 2023).

I’m wondering what it is that is sacrificed in the name of debates of this kind.  Traditionally we’re looking to explore and resolve issues and problems when we conversate with our political opponents. When we watch the presidential debate, like that of Harris and Trump, we have a clear aim, that being to figure out which candidate holds the most effective and promising policies, as well as allow US citizens to assess their respective characters and make an informed decision come election day. This is why so many people on both sides hated Biden V Trump because the clear objective here wasn’t achieved. But when we platform ‘Fat men vs. fit men’ and ‘Israelis vs. Palestinians’ in one space, we do nothing except reinforce previous inequalities, where the theory discussed often forgets the real lives present in front of them. When we drag right-wing extremists from the fringes and allow them to bring forth their bait disguised as equal provisions, we simply normalise their extremist views under the guise of equality in thought.

Take the Israeli’s vs. Palestinian’s example. It’s interesting to me the encouragement of a debate that ultimately comes down to asking whether or not Palestinians have the right to exist in the midst of a genocide, whilst platforming Zionist talking points. Similarly, if we look at ‘Fat men vs. Fit men’, we’re helping to boost the already solidified notion of the ‘perfect body’ within the context of a fatphobic society whilst claiming that all this represents is healthy produce. We can sit here and dream of a utopia in which everything is good and equal from the moment we sit at the table. In this case, engaging in ‘balanced’ debates might be productive in the way that thought experiments are. But when opponents aren’t even starting from the same position regarding the extent of their oppression, then their voices aren’t able to hold equal weight either.

And then there is the risk placed upon those ‘democratic values’ we claim to hold so near and dear to our hearts. Entertaining extremist viewpoints, particularly those that advocate for, let’s say, ethnic supremacy, violence against minorities, authoritarianism or segregation, we re-open the door to anti-democracy as a natural byproduct. If these views find their ways into the political arena, we’ve seen how they manage to devastate entire communities, infringing on the rights of those who engaged in this conversation to profess their rights to personhood, whilst supporting the views of extremists who in reality engaged in the debate for funzies. There are no stakes for Charlie Kirk in his 20 V 1, because he already lies on the side of comfort, (no matter how many times right-wingers claim their rights are being impacted by… further acceptance). Contrastingly, a young person, or a black person, or a gay person or a disabled person, has a lot to lose if they’re not able to convince a majority that they’re worth advocating for. In this way, marginalised voices almost become a part of the menu on the table rather than guests, in that they can only stand to lose no matter how nicely prepared the place setting.

I for one, have witnessed how the rising popularity of ‘both-side-ism’ has begun to erode the field I’m aspirational in. You’ve likely seen think-piece after think-piece on here about how journalistic standards are falling, not through a lack of trying by journalists in search of real, impactful truths, and not through the lack of exposure we have to knowledge. It is quite the contrary, we are in possession of more knowledge (to some, too much knowledge) than ever before, and yet, people find themselves at times, unsatisfied with articles that insist on neutrality in the name of unbiased reporting. We diminish the role of these kinds of professions when we popularise neutrality, which, as I’ve stated alongside many others, often acts as a breeding pot in which extremism can simmer.

I saw a video yesterday about the power we hold when it comes to de-platforming platforms that find are unreliable in various ways. ‘Thinkpiece Tribe’ uses The Shade Room (TSR to you) as an example, where we all simultaneously agreed somehow that due to their emphasis on celeb gossip, unverified information, and love for sensationalism (in addition to their gradual move to the right) that they were no longer a credible source of news. In the same way, he argues that Jubilee should receive the same treatment. “Treat Jubliee, like how you used to treat TSR, and BLOCK THEM” he says, and repeats. He doesn’t elaborate, in a way that is equally as satisfying as those debates earlier mentioned. We can kind-of feel that he’s right when he says this even if at the time we weren’t sure how to articulate why we agreed, because the weird nagging feeling of distrust is the same. Nonetheless, here’s me articulating I suppose. I for one think that one of the best ways to destabilise bigotry (if that is our goal, Jubilee), is to drumroll, please…

**Ignore them altogether**.

For the right-wing extremist point, imagine they’re comparable to a celebrity you don’t like - those who coincidentally all seem to hold some questionable views. All publicity is good publicity. We should in reality stop breathing life into them and maybe they’ll die off one day in the near future.

I refuse to dine with extremists only to have them sour the thing,

thanks though.

A comment from YouTube video essay by Tirrrb entitled “Jubilee Has A Racism Problem”, which speaks for itself.

Asisa.