I have a real problem with this statement from prepear: "As is the case in all bullying, silence about the behavior of the bully is the same thing as support."
This is deeply untrue, and problematic. In situations of bullying, people who remain silent may be afraid, may be disenfranchised in some other way to make them powerless, or may simply feel powerless. I've been seeing arguments like this crop up in other contexts as well, from social issues to personal disputes and it's more than just wrong, it can also be tactically unsound, and can lead to worse social outcomes.
In terms of tactics: the organizer who uses this tactic is trying to accomplish two things, they're trying to rile up their supporters and they're trying to recruit new supporters. This tactic is extremely successful in the former, by artificially generating a new out-group to unite against: the innocent bystander. The tactic of attacking bystanders is however abysmal at recruiting new supporters, no matter one's beliefs, they're less likely to side with the person pointing the finger at them.
Use of this tactic has bad social outcomes for the very same reason. Getting pepople riled up makes them less likely to make logical decisions, it makes them more likely to turn to violence, it makes them more likely to entrench their views and polarize.
Given all this, why do people use this tactic when they're trying to rally people? Why would you spend energy attacking people with no power to help? Unfortunately there's a perverse incentive to do so. When your supporters are fervent, they support you more wholeheartedly, increasing their financial contribution as well as contributing to your power. For the supporter, it feels like you're helping when you attack people, period, whether they're actually your opponent or not, and the innocent bystander is both powerless to stop your attack and is less likely to fight back. Taking out your frustrations on the powerless feels a lot like bullying to me, and maybe you'd get better results if you addressed people who actually have the power to help.
At the very least, I know Apple (as a company made up of people) is not universally supportive of action like this (at face-value: assuming Prepear isn't hiding anything from us) - nor the whole App Store tax situation - and many other controversies Apple gets embroiled into: I've got many software-eng friends at Apple who share their personal opinions with me with fair criticism of the company all the time. Apple practically bans their FTEs from identifying as Apple employees on social-media (all the Apple FTE SEs I know all have private Twitter accounts - and they never talk about their work online) so obviously you won't see anyone Retweeting AAPL SWEs voicing their support of Prepear (or Epic Games...). I know their social-media policy stems from their culture of secrecy, but it also has the effect of making it seem like everyone toes the company-line.
This is partially what I'm concerned about. From the basic facts that I've seen about this case I believe that Apple is in the wrong. That being said, seeing prepear resort to dehumanizing tactics in trying to rally the public beside them is disconcerting. I think there's an "every foot counts" mentality in activism these days that's not just destructive to the state of discourse, but is actually counterproductive as well.
> This is deeply untrue, and problematic. In situations of bullying, people who remain silent may be afraid, may be disenfranchised in some other way to make them powerless, or may simply feel powerless.
Or alternatively might feel they don't have enough information. The justice system is designed to make a best-possible effort at reaching the truth. The process can take months to years in some cases and requires the attention of some very clever people.
Bystanders don't have time for that. They can take a position on what would and wouldn't be acceptable hypothetically. But mobs of bystanders have a terrible track record at assessing what happened from a neutral fact-based perspective to work out if the hypothetical applies to a specific situation.
This assumes the uncharitable interpretation of "silence about the behavior of the bully is the same thing as support" really means "[people who maintain] silence about the behavior of the bully is the same thing as support [by those people intentionally and inexcusably]". I choose to read it as "inaction is the same as a supporting action" which in this case may be true and is a statement about the effect of inaction rather than a judgement on the persons or whether their inaction is excusable.
Even under that reading, you're making the claim that someone is somehow a cause of the harm by being a bystander. What I fail to understand is why someone would try to shift the blame from the perpetrator to a bystander. The only reason I can think of is that the bystander is an easy target.
On the more metaphysical side, how can inaction be the same as a supporting action? Are you really trying to say that being a bystander is just as bad as being the bully's sidekick? Imagine this schoolyard bully scenario where a child is threatened and extorted by a bully. During the incident, the bully is actively supported by a friend, cheering them on, and perhaps even restraining the victim. There are three bystanders just watching in shock at the situation, but do not have the courage to act. After the incident, the victim decides to take this route, and begins to lash out and claim that by doing nothing, the bystanders are just as responsible as the kid who was holding him down.
Does this accusation really make sense? Does this accusation help the victim resolve the situation? Does this accusation make the bystanders want to help the victim?
This is deeply untrue, and problematic. In situations of bullying, people who remain silent may be afraid, may be disenfranchised in some other way to make them powerless, or may simply feel powerless. I've been seeing arguments like this crop up in other contexts as well, from social issues to personal disputes and it's more than just wrong, it can also be tactically unsound, and can lead to worse social outcomes.
In terms of tactics: the organizer who uses this tactic is trying to accomplish two things, they're trying to rile up their supporters and they're trying to recruit new supporters. This tactic is extremely successful in the former, by artificially generating a new out-group to unite against: the innocent bystander. The tactic of attacking bystanders is however abysmal at recruiting new supporters, no matter one's beliefs, they're less likely to side with the person pointing the finger at them.
Use of this tactic has bad social outcomes for the very same reason. Getting pepople riled up makes them less likely to make logical decisions, it makes them more likely to turn to violence, it makes them more likely to entrench their views and polarize.
Given all this, why do people use this tactic when they're trying to rally people? Why would you spend energy attacking people with no power to help? Unfortunately there's a perverse incentive to do so. When your supporters are fervent, they support you more wholeheartedly, increasing their financial contribution as well as contributing to your power. For the supporter, it feels like you're helping when you attack people, period, whether they're actually your opponent or not, and the innocent bystander is both powerless to stop your attack and is less likely to fight back. Taking out your frustrations on the powerless feels a lot like bullying to me, and maybe you'd get better results if you addressed people who actually have the power to help.