Live data from Hacker News

Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

propublica.org

21–30 of 71 posts

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#21
> * Unlike American law, which permits preferences such as affirmative action for racial minorities and women for the sake of diversity or redressing discrimination, Facebook’s algorithm is designed to defend all races and genders equally.*

This is inaccurate as to the allowable purposes for affirmative action. In Bakke, (1978), the Supreme Court held that diversity was an allowable rationale, but redressing past discrimination was not. As described in the NYT:

Diversity isn’t just one rationale for creating or maintaining a racially integrated student body. It is the only rationale. Ever since the Bakke case nearly four decades ago, no other reason for affirmative action has passed constitutional muster in the view of the Supreme Court’s majority: not equalizing opportunity, not redressing past wrongs (the flagship Austin campus was formally all-white until 1956 and functionally segregated long after that) or opening previously closed doors. Only “diversity.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/24/opinion/the-supreme-court... (an opinion piece related to the Fisher case, which pertained to affirmative action in university admissions)

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#22
Well, this calculus of protected classes they seem to be using does give off an impression that it was either designed by someone aggressively unthinking or sufficiently opposed to the premise that they tried to sabotage it as much as they could get away with. Under some pretty reasonable assumptions (complements of protected classes are protected; two permissible posts bolted together are a permissible posts), a system where protected ∩ unprotected is unprotected is trivially circumventable: for instance, rather than posting "women suck", you can always post "women drivers suck; also, women non-drivers suck".

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#23
post #6

> Now the German government is considering legislation that would allow social networks such as Facebook to be fined up to 50 million euros if they don’t remove hate speech and fake news quickly enough. As an American I can't imagine being arrested for speaking my mind about a race or religion whether it's considered hate speech or not. It's just unfathomable. Thanks to our forefathers for putting free speech on such…

I'd love to see how quickly an ISIS recruitment rally would be squashed in any city in the USA with nobody shedding a tear over the abuse of freedom of speech.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#24
Where they draw the line on some of these things seems... odd. A degrading generalization about a nationality like one of their examples

> the Irish suck

seems relatively harmless, while the permissible

> Keep the horny migrant teenagers away from our daughters

seems much more dangerous. The latter is much more likely to spur some sort of antisocial behavior from a reader.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#25
post #12
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the very begining of free speech theorization, limits such as hate speech were mentionned, just saying.

Mentioned how? In which countries? In the USA, 'hate speech' is simply not a category of unprotected speech under the 1st amendment as it's understood today: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201... https://www.popehat.com/2015/05/19/how-to-spot-and-critique-... An example of a category that is not protected in the USA would be death threats or false & defamatory statements.

[deleted]

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#26

Context is important here. I'm guessing it got lost on you?

Personal swipes aren't ok on HN. Please remain civil. (Edit: It read like a swipe to me, but if you didn't intend it that way, I apologize.)

We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14659259 and marked it off-topic.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#27
I left facebook last month. I don't miss it, I'm happier for it, and articles like this kinda vindicate that decision.

It's nice to see that the things I was observing there are, in fact, exactly what the company is okay with: racism, sexism, homophobia are fine on Facebook as long as you craft your posts and comments with surgical precision. It explains how, nearly every time I reported one of the assholes making those types of posts, nothing would happen.

Edit: and, as usual, downvotes instead of replies. Never change, HN.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#28
post #17

When you consider what Facebook is trying to accomplish, which is to establish a universal code for acceptable content across multiple cultures and languages - this looks a lot more acceptable to me, than it would be otherwise.

Except it isn't universal. According to the article, each region has its own set of guidelines for acceptability.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#29
post #6

> Now the German government is considering legislation that would allow social networks such as Facebook to be fined up to 50 million euros if they don’t remove hate speech and fake news quickly enough. As an American I can't imagine being arrested for speaking my mind about a race or religion whether it's considered hate speech or not. It's just unfathomable. Thanks to our forefathers for putting free speech on such…

As an American, I'm perfectly happy with what Germany is doing and wish Americans were less absolutist about free speech.

Re: Internal documents shed light on the guidelines that Facebook’s censors use

#30
post #6

> Now the German government is considering legislation that would allow social networks such as Facebook to be fined up to 50 million euros if they don’t remove hate speech and fake news quickly enough. As an American I can't imagine being arrested for speaking my mind about a race or religion whether it's considered hate speech or not. It's just unfathomable. Thanks to our forefathers for putting free speech on such…

I'd love to see how quickly an ISIS recruitment rally would be squashed in any city in the USA with nobody shedding a tear over the abuse of freedom of speech.

"Those Demanding Free Speech Limits to Fight ISIS Pose a Greater Threat to U.S. Than ISIS" (The Intercept):

https://theintercept.com/2015/12/29/those-demanding-free-spe...

Post reply on HN