Yes, here, where there is a sizable libertarian contingent, libertarians and progressives manage to be civil. And from my rationalist libertarian perspective, that's a good thing, and I wouldn't want it to change.
I don't think it's good to initiate force. I think peaceful truce's are good things.
But I wasn't addressing the situation at LW, I was addressing the broader context where rationalist libertarians are taking bullets, but not returning fire. I consider pacifism a loser of a strategy. A better strategy, IMO, is some kind of proportionate tit for tat. But the first step is to realize that pacifism is the current strategy, and that it's probably a loser of a strategy.
I'd say the same with Nerd near social pacifism.
"The great are great only because we are on our knees: Let us rise."
Scott, known on LessWrong as Yvain, recently wrote a post complaining about an inaccurate rape statistic.
Arthur Chu, who is notable for winning money on Jeopardy recently, argued against Scott's stance that we should be honest in arguments in a comment thread on Jeff Kaufman's Facebook profile, which can be read here.
Scott just responded here, with a number of points relevant to the topic of rationalist communities.
I am interested in what LW thinks of this.
Obviously, at some point being polite in our arguments is silly. I'd be interested in people's opinions of how dire the real world consequences have to be before it's worthwhile debating dishonestly.