http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law The law states that "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1." I have noticed this in many forum discussions. Have you? Discuss.
I don't notice this very often. Maybe it's just confirmation bias. ..though I don't really participate in threads where people are growing towards calling others Nazis..
I haven't noticed it here on EMC but I try to steer clear of the ones I know will end up with a bunch of trolls and people insulting one another/other countries.
Well, that's not quite how it works. Godwin's law is most often invoked like this: "The Nazis supported X, therefore X is bad," or "The Nazis opposed X, therefore X is good." If you start calling someone else a Nazi, I think that's more of an ad hominem. Also, Godwin's Law is not invoked when an actual discussion about Nazi Germany is taking place, or if Nazis are used as a serious reference, and not just a cop-out. It's really not all that common, though in my experience, it grows more common the younger (or perhaps the less mature) the people who are involved in the argument are.
People talk about Grammar Nazis a lot here. And I think that the probability of this thread being about Nazis or Hitler was at 1 before it started
