Godwin's Law

 "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1."

Mike Godwin made this humorous, but true, observation back in 1990. In layman's terms, Godwin's Law suggests that in any conversation over the internet, on any topic, if given enough time, someone will eventually make a comparison to the Nazis or Hitler. As someone who's been using the internet most of her life, and who's watched people communicate on and off-line, I can attest that this is true.

Who hasn't had an argument or even a simple conversation with someone before, and found either themselves or the other party making a reference to Hitler that seemed like a bit of a stretch? Of course any conversation or argument that starts off about the Holocaust will approach a reference to Nazis pretty quickly, but Godwin is attempting to point out here that people tend to bring up Hitler, a cultural 'worst case scenario', much more often then we should.

Because Godwin specifically mentions the internet in his wording, the internet has adopted Godwin's law as a sort of canonical inside joke. People who are familiar with the law will call it out as soon as someone mentions Hitler, claiming that the person who made the reference has 'lost' the debate, and the conversation is over. The law really should apply to all forms of communication, but it is most often mentioned on internet chat groups.

I wanted to make sure everyone else knew about this. Mike Godwin formed this 'law' hoping to get more people to think seriously about the Holocaust, and not just use it as a historic 'yardstick' to measure evil to. Though it is lesser know, Godwin's Law is considered to be a logical fallacy, or bad reasoning, that many people fall victim to. In the future, when considering what comparisons to make in an argument, make sure you think beyond just the knee-jerk reaction.