I wish we could stop the slide of the term "performative" into meaninglessness.

Just because something is hard or even impossible to enforce, doesn't mean you don't state that it is not allowed and that there are consequences for being caught. That's a common fallacy that overly engineering-minded people fall into.

We're humans. We care about things. There is nothing strange about me asking you not to do something that I can't stop you from doing.

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chungusamongus 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

There is absolutely no fallacy in the statement you're responding to. Laws are meaningless if they cannot be consistently enforced.

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AndrewDucker 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Actually, laws can be really effective even if they are only enforced intermittently.

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0x3f 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I'm not sure how true this is.

If you consider low-stakes crimes, typically to get to a steady state of effectiveness you need at least some sort of bootstrapped period of ubiquitous enforcement. If that's impossible then I'm not sure you ever get to effectiveness.

If we're talking high-stakes, death-penalty-lottery-if-you-break-the-rules type stuff, then I think actually detection rate (i.e. consistent enforcement) is the biggest predictor of reduced rates, not severity of punishment.

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happytoexplain an hour ago | parent [-]

Sure, but even giving 100% of the benefit of the doubt you're raising, it still doesn't follow that it is purely "performative" to formally establish a rule just because it may soon become impossible to identify rule-breakers without whistle-blowers or intel.

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0x3f an hour ago | parent [-]

Well what purpose does the rule serve if it can't be enforced, if not signalling/norming?

	▲	happytoexplain an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Your premise is fallacious - at best, it is partially enforceable (like I said: whistle-blowers, intel), which gives it teeth (not necessarily much, but more than zero, which makes it useful to some non-zero extent). Even at worst, it expresses intent, which has meaning to humans. We are humans. I can't force you to do anything, but I can ask you to. Don't disparage what it means to be humans talking to each other - it's one of the few things we have left on Earth.

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happytoexplain 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

That just doesn't follow.

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0x3f 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How are there consequences for being caught if it's impossible to detect?

Moreover, why stop here? There are many great rules that are impossible to enforce. Why not a rule that the author isn't allowed to have any racist thoughts when writing the material?

We can't read minds, but it sure is a nice thing to care about, don't you think?

	▲	edmundsauto 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It doesn’t always have to have consequences when it’s a curated access club like the Oscars. It’s ok to have cultural norms that aren’t enforced by consequences, at the very least some of the ethical participants will follow them. I know that I try to follow the spirit of the clubs I participate in, and if they don’t have these types of statements often I just don’t know what the community thinks is ok. It breaks down when assholes join, or the overly self-interested. This mindset permeates America today, but there are still many collective organizations that don’t need punitive measures. These are less common but when you find them, it’s often a positive signal.