http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/03/godwins-law-mike-godwin-hitler-nazi-comparisons.html
Mike Godwin on Godwin’s Law, Whether Nazi Comparisons Have Gotten Worse, and Being Compared to Hitler by His Daughter
Last week, the president of the NRA compared Governor Andrew Cuomo to Adolf Hitler — a man responsible for the worst atrocities in human history — because of New York’s new gun-control laws. Such remarks, while absurd, are hardly rare, novel, or new. All the way back in 1990, a lawyer who has been on the Internet longer than you have, Mike Godwin, introduced the now widely familiar Godwin’s Law, which predicted the inevitability of a Hitler or Nazi comparison arising during any online debate. Godwin, who lives in D.C. and works as a senior policy adviser at Internews, spoke to Daily Intelligencer about how Godwin’s Law has changed through the years, whether it will still exist in the year 3000, and whether it will be mentioned in the first or second sentence of his obituary.
When you first proposed Godwin’s Law, it stated, simply, “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.” In other words, such a comparison is, eventually, inevitable. Would you give it the same definition today?
The only thing I would say is that it turns out not to be limited to online discussions. Other than that, it still seems to have some observational value. It’s the worst thing anybody can think of, so if you have some kind of rhetorical escalation with someone you disagree with, it’s sort of easy to go there if you’re not very reflective about what you’re saying.
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