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In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

economist.com

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Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#101

Post by elgenie »

funkythings wrote: post #6

This comment vastly understates the effects of this law. Social Media companies are scared af to be fined by the German government, so the filters are so strong, that it targets the wrong people. A couple of comedians and satire magazines have been hit, left leaning people as well as right leaning people alike. In general, I don't think it's a good idea for the government to decide what I can post on social media or…

"Volksverhetzung" is a compound word with two roots: "Volks" (the people) + "Verhetzung" (manipulation) and the official translation of the criminal code is "Incitement to hatred" [1], rather than the "instigation of the people/masses" that a naive translation would imply.

[1] http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/englisch_stg...

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#102

Post by psyc »

pluma wrote: post #91
robbiep wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it right that in civil society someone stands on a soapbox and calls for violence against a person or people? Witness Pres. Trump at his rallies. Not illegal but Really, telling a mob to punch someone is pretty off colour and not the sort of thing that we should be promoting. There are ways to express your opinion on any issue that don’t lead to vilification and potential or actual harm. So I disagree. It isn’t ri…

Freedom of expression is meaningless unless you have the social/political power to back that expression up. If Joe Blow tweets "kill the kikes", nobody cares. If someone with millions of devout followers says the same, there will eventually be blood. Or in your case, if a person with influence tells their fan club to harass someone, the victim may suffer actual mental health issues when enough of them act on it.

I simply disagree that the speaking is a good place to insert the pre-emptive legal monkey-wrench. It's paranoid. The idea that you can keep ideological genies in their bottles by zipping people's lips is superstitious, like something a schoolchild would believe. It's obvious Germany is overcompensating here out of national shame.

The whole idea seems to be: murder and genocide are so bad, that any legislation that either statistically reduces them, or even just seems like it might do, is worth it. I'll grant that I can see how a reasonable person might think this. Then it's a question of values. Remember that one of our great American heroes literally said, "Give me liberty, or give me death," immediately after doubting that life is dear enough, or peace sweet enough, in themselves.

As far as that goes, I'm old and it saddens me that we keep going from one oppressive cultural regime to another. When I was young, there were also things you couldn't say, they were just different things. But I will say that this is the first time in my life that freedom of speech itself has been explicitly challenged by a significant bloc in the US.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#103

Post by psyc »

pluma wrote: post #80
b6 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hitler rose to power by manipulating people's sentiments with language. He created scapegoats and convinced people it's okay to channel their hate and frustration towards those scapegoats. People should have the freedom to be persuaded to believe things that you don't agree with. It's OK to have a "wrong" opinion. Let people say what they want and believe what they want. I'm stunned that I still have to defend free…

If you think anything is worth defending at all cost , that should give you pause. You seem to understand that speech can persuade people of wrong things. Do you think it's possible you've been wrongly persuaded to hold the belief that free speech trumps all? Maybe the same people that persuade you that you need free speech above all are also those that have the most to gain from being able to persuade you freely of…

That is more properly a value, than a belief. You can say that literally anything is a belief, but then you've got a useless Godelian argument.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#105

Post by falsprofet »

skrause wrote: post #19
adventured wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's the fault of the German authorities and the German culture. They've been pushing toward increased speech controls online since the Web became popular. The point is to better match their speech restrictions offline. The imbalance between the two was guaranteed to end. This didn't just start with the popularization of Facebook the last ten years.

> No, it's the fault of the German authorities and the German culture. They've been pushing toward increased speech controls online since the Web became popular. Source? Because as a German I strongly disagree with that statement.

For one anecdote, webmasters are held liable for comments hosted on their discussion platforms, if there's no moderation.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#106

Post by Dumbdo »

hardwires wrote: post #87
zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You want your German Extrawurst. Now, that is an interesting interpretation of the rule of law if I have ever seen one! So, in your opinion, having to follow the laws of a country you visit or that you do business in is somehow illegitimate because it's an Extrawurst? Is it your expectation that the US will apply German law to you when you visit the US? > These are not German companies, they don't need to operate o…

>> Now, that is an interesting interpretation of the rule of law if I have ever seen one! That isn't an "interpretation of the rule of law", that's a response to the bold statement that "We really need to teach [...] all those companies some manners and respect for our society". Yes, we can introduce all sorts of stupid laws to make foreign companies do as we please or have them leave. No, we're not "teaching" them "…

> We killed millions of people, not even a hundred years ago, but now we're the paragons of virtue?

I don't see how this was relevant in any way to the discussion. What happened 100 years ago should of course be considered in discussions and in the law-making process today and it should not be forgotten, so that it will not repeat. But it isn't fair to still judge people born in a country where some of their grand(grand)parents did bad things.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#107

Post by Dumbdo »

snvzz wrote: post #46

A reminder that the EU is useless in protecting the rights of EU citizens.

This is a pretty generic statement and sounds like EU bashing without a good base. There are many things to critize the EU for, but calling them out for not intervening on a (discussable) law, that a single country has just pushed through is definitely not one of its weaknesses.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#109

Post by alphonsegaston »

novalis78 wrote: post #62
Yetanfou wrote: post #31

For those of you who read German the following article sheds a revealing perspective on the effects of these new laws: https://motherboard.vice.com/de/article/kznxz3/vom-netzdg-zu... The leading paragraph claims that "Trolls and right-wing activists conspire through pr0gramm, Discord and Twitter to 'turn the law against hate speech' into its opposite: a tool to denounce left-wingers, women and migrants." In other wor…

Amen...and that's how Bismark's Prussian super government whose bureaucratic super machine was the pride and glory of the Germans turned into Hitler's nefarious totalitarian regime more or less overnight. The same tools that ensure 'order and safety' become tools for 'suppression and conformity'. You would think the Germans, if any, would have learnt what totalitarianism feels like. But no, all they learned is that t…

Ah yes, that bastion of freedom the US. The place that promulgated eugenics as the solution to all social ills and forcibly sterilized the poor and minorities. Whose ideas Hitler so loved, he decided it was necessary to do one further. Who turned away Jews fleeing his genocide because of its own fabricated, racist ideas about genetic “undesirablity,” which were presented uncontested all over popular media.

I’m starting to think Germans might have a better handle on history.

Re: In Germany, online hate speech has real world consequences

#110

Post by paulddraper »

blablabla123 wrote: post #93
funkythings wrote: post #6

This comment vastly understates the effects of this law. Social Media companies are scared af to be fined by the German government, so the filters are so strong, that it targets the wrong people. A couple of comedians and satire magazines have been hit, left leaning people as well as right leaning people alike. In general, I don't think it's a good idea for the government to decide what I can post on social media or…

Yeah, obviously the law is not well designed and at least in some aspects redundant. I mean there was this popular Heise case (the German publisher) where it was clearly stated that Heise is responsible if people do violations against the Hate Speech law. On the other hand the law got there because sites like Facebook - and yes also Heise - do a questionable job at handling racist content. And there are tools beyond…

> I mean...HN has such a simple solution for this, the rating button

Simple indeed. This rating system must why it is so rare to see objectionable content on social media like Reddit.

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