But he's not an active nazi anymore, plus he's famous for being the most righteously punchable face ever getting punched!
Like yeah, do whatever you can to get them to knock it off, but recognize that this is inherently a violent movement based around the idea that it should be fine to hurt or kill certain groups of people based on what they look like or where they are from or whatever.
Nobody is born a nazi, nobody is forced to become a goosestepping fascist fucker, and they can easily quit.
I've spent years arguing about all sorts of shit with people online, and the most illogical beliefs are the least swayed by reason and rational discussion.
They can keep being nazis in private, but by existing openly in public they are actively threatening innocent people, making them feel unsafe to be openly fascist in public is the least the rest of us can do.
I don’t think you can draw a line between him getting punched and not being “active” anymore. He did help organize and speak at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville later that year.
They need to feel like it’s safe
not to be a Nazi too, by which I mean support has to be offered to them as they’re transitioning from being in a hate group to being in society. I can’t imagine the other Nazis will be happy with the “defection” and I’m sure they make that known to would be “traitors”.
Equally so it might be years of habits that are ingrained that need to be changed. That doesn’t just happen overnight. Fine, they can be quiet about it, that doesn’t mean it has gone away. It might also involve cutting out a huge portion of their social circle, which also is it easy, especially if it involves family or partners.
You’re not going to convince someone that’s worth the effort by clocking them.
"Punch a Nazi" is like step 5, after you've already deplatformed them, and generally kicked them out of the polite society first. Nazi in the pub? Kicked out of the pub. Nazi on TV? Kicked off TV. Nazis organizing a gang? Banned as the terrorist organization it is.
If they throw the first punch whilst being kicked out, then you make they don't get the last. Problem with starting with expousing "punch a Nazi" is you're skipping the importance of those first steps to stop the Nazis being let in the door in the first place.
On the one hand yeah that’s going to stop the message getting around, but on the other, where are they going to go if they’ve been ostracized by “polite society”? Probably straight into the arms of hate groups who offer them acceptance and the like.
Like, even banning groups doesn’t necessarily work that well. The actual Nazis were banned after Hitler got arrested, so they just changed the name until Hitler convinced the Bavarian authorities to unban them. There’s also been some recent proscribed groups in the UK (within the last 5 years or so I think) just changing their name to get around bans, though that generally gets found out and prosecuted.