Live data from Hacker News

Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

theguardian.com

11–20 of 454 posts

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#11
post #2

I always find it interesting that no level of violence is deemed inappropriate in the US but nudity has to be avoided at any cost.

Um, plenty of violence is deemed inappropriate. I doubt much of USA broadcast TV even comes close to a hard R rating. I'd also point out that Italy in particular has had little problem with making hyper-violent content like giallo movies, in addition to showing copious nudity, and Norway has quite a few violent horror films under their belt.

It's more broadcast standards originally prevented anything, nudity or extreme violence, from being shown, and mature content was exiled to cable.

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#12
post #2

I always find it interesting that no level of violence is deemed inappropriate in the US but nudity has to be avoided at any cost.

To be fair it is child nudity in this case, which has different legal ramifications in some situations. Also the views on nudity vary a lot from person to person in the US.

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#13
post #5
post #2

I always find it interesting that no level of violence is deemed inappropriate in the US but nudity has to be avoided at any cost.

Also the censorship of a few spoken words on TV while showing gore and other violent scenes are not a problem. I find it weird also cause when the word is censored as a viewer you already know that's what the character was meant to say.

violence in their movies... violence in their cinemas

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#15
Was the Norwegian Prime Minister's post removed because she posted the image again in that post ? This is a crucial question and not clear from the article. If Facebook censored only words then this is a much larger issue. If they censored the whole post (including photo) then while debatable this is Facebook's policy i.e. a blanket ban on such imagery, irrespective of history.

Edit: I don't find it clear journalism, but the fact is there:

Solberg was one of a string of Norwegian politicians who shared the iconic image after Facebook deleted a post from Tom Egeland

So the post was removed because it had the image, not because she had dared to criticize FB.

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#16
Why are we thinking of FB as some monolithic entity? Isn't the most likely explanation that some low-wage contractor in the Philippines saw a picture of a naked girl and flagged it? That contractor may not even know the historical significance of the picture.

You're in a low-wage job and have to look at horrifying shit all day, every day. Are you going to let the one image through that maybe will cost you the job that you really need?

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#17
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also the censorship of a few spoken words on TV while showing gore and other violent scenes are not a problem. I find it weird also cause when the word is censored as a viewer you already know that's what the character was meant to say.

"I find it weird also cause when the word is censored as a viewer you already know that's what the character was meant to say." A feature that can be utilized to make boring dialog really funny https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhJNwKpS6OU Edit: This just made me realize you can bump G rated content up to PG-13 just by adding beeps and blurs. I bet that's how most reality TV content is generated.

> Edit: This just made me realize you can bump G rated content up to PG-13 just by adding beeps and blurs

I can't believe I'm posting this on Hackernews but it actually is relevant - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AXPnH0C9UA

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#18
post #11
post #2

I always find it interesting that no level of violence is deemed inappropriate in the US but nudity has to be avoided at any cost.

Um, plenty of violence is deemed inappropriate. I doubt much of USA broadcast TV even comes close to a hard R rating. I'd also point out that Italy in particular has had little problem with making hyper-violent content like giallo movies, in addition to showing copious nudity, and Norway has quite a few violent horror films under their belt. It's more broadcast standards originally prevented anything, nudity or extre…

You'd be amazed what some shows can pass through the censors. Watch NBC's Hannibal to see what I'm talking about.

But nudity is a huge no-no.

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#19
Any centralized social network is subject to moderation because if it's centralized, it can be attacked, fined or shut down by a court. So facebook can't escape that rule and must decide what is acceptable or not and have to anticipate any flak they can get.

In the end, moderation is a gruesome job and nobody really wants to do it, and it will be subject to how moderators anticipate public perception, so it's a PR race.

So of course you will have those situations where facebook will make bad choices, but it doesn't only depends on their moderation team, it also depends on political correctness. That's why decentralized networks are better, because nobody is really responsible, and it can hardly be attacked.

You can decide to either have a politically correct website and get investments, or disagree with political correctness and be like 4chan.

It's not great, I'm sure people realize that, and that the internet will go back to decentralized systems.

Re: Facebook deletes Norway PM's post as 'napalm girl' row escalates

#20
post #2

I always find it interesting that no level of violence is deemed inappropriate in the US but nudity has to be avoided at any cost.

I find that violence doesn't really feel real to most Americans, and I think one of the main causes of this is that the US is so isolated from world events.

WWII, Vietnam, etc. all happened "out there somewhere", and aren't really considered by those who didn't actively participate. Veterans of such conflicts are acknowledged as being deeply affected, but the rest of the populace effectively shrugs as if to say "sorry, I don't get it", and go about their lives.

Terrorist attacks and Mexican cartel atrocities affect less than 0.00001 % of the population. (Assuming perhaps 3,200 people per year, which is quite a high estimate.) To the rest, it's just a special effect display or soap opera drama on TV. Street violence in poverty-stricken communities is the closest thing people have to experiencing violence in the US, but that only affects a relatively small portion of the country, and those with little influence.

tl;dr: I think violence is acceptable in US media because most Americans have no true comprehension of violence. It's all a video game or a movie to them.

Post reply on HN