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Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

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Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#31

This article seems to be a smoking gun... https://medium.com/@garycoby/twitter-restricts-trump-eb7e48c... Note that there are plenty of other custom icons that Twitter allows.

Are there examples of Democrat-funded attack ads like this with hashtags that Twitter allowed icons for?

EDIT: I ask because this is an example of an attack ad targeted to an individual candidate rather than a general promotion or political concept, which I can see why Twitter wouldn't necessarily want to promote.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#32
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's pretty common for conservatives to encounter ... censorship from other users of social media sites How, exactly? Is Facebook doling out admin privileges to random users? Or are we confusing "receive criticism" with "censorship" here?

Post an article in r/politics about anything positive Trump has done and you'll get a ban. On Facebook, a similar phenomenon might occur due to liberal users reporting conservative ideas they don't agree with as hate speech. Disclaimer: I'm not very familiar with how Facebook works so I could be way off

> Post an article in r/politics about anything positive Trump has done and you'll get a ban.

That's no more "censorship" than me unfriending you on Facebook would be.

> On Facebook, a similar phenomenon might occur due to liberal users reporting conservative ideas they don't agree with as hate speech.

That'll put it in a review queue, upon which Facebook employees make a decision. If it gets deleted, it's because you violated Facebook's rules.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#33
post #28

This article seems to be a smoking gun... https://medium.com/@garycoby/twitter-restricts-trump-eb7e48c... Note that there are plenty of other custom icons that Twitter allows.

I don't think refusal to allow a custom emoji with a hashtag is censorship - they didn't ban the hashtag. Custom emoji are a business/marketing/advertising thing, and if we want to restrict the ability of private businesses to decline advertising deals with other private businesses for any reason at all (including "we just don't like you"), that's a whole different conversation, and one I suspect many conservatives w…

> I don't think refusal to allow a custom emoji with a hashtag is censorship

It is if you allow the other side to do exactly the same, as noted in the linked article.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#34
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a pretty clear distinction between advertising and organic speech, and also a pretty clear distinction between wanting to restrict how other people use your platform and simply having views of your own.

Somewhat unrelated. Advertisers dont want their to be a clear distinction anymore. Hell pretty soon the most effective marketing strategy wont be shameless plugs but offhanded ones. Ones that sneak in like oh hey yeah I was using x the other day and it helped me with y. Once gun manufactuers catch up it might look something like: popular social media user offhandedly mentions purchase of lgun, posts some pictures fir…

This is already similar to how a lot of gun culture videos on YouTube operate. Go watch Hickhock45. Guy just shoots and chats about guns in a casual, mostly non-political manner. He’s really popular and the whole shebang is one big (indirect) advertisment for various firearms.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#36
post #9

The interesting aspect is that conservatives think that it is very likely that social media sites censor their views at a rate double that of liberals. Even if the social media companies were strictly neutral in the matter, it's pretty common for conservatives to encounter left-wing hostility and censorship from other users of social media sites.

> it's pretty common for conservatives to encounter ... censorship from other users of social media sites How, exactly? Is Facebook doling out admin privileges to random users? Or are we confusing "receive criticism" with "censorship" here?

The exact same way it happens on this site: users flag, system automatically responds, moderators might also respond, and if they do, typically it is to confirm censorship that has already begun.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#37

This article seems to be a smoking gun... https://medium.com/@garycoby/twitter-restricts-trump-eb7e48c... Note that there are plenty of other custom icons that Twitter allows.

Guy is director of advertising for RNC, so smoking gun no. What part of their message was censored.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#38
post #9

The interesting aspect is that conservatives think that it is very likely that social media sites censor their views at a rate double that of liberals. Even if the social media companies were strictly neutral in the matter, it's pretty common for conservatives to encounter left-wing hostility and censorship from other users of social media sites.

> it's pretty common for conservatives to encounter ... censorship from other users of social media sites How, exactly? Is Facebook doling out admin privileges to random users? Or are we confusing "receive criticism" with "censorship" here?

There's also the self-censorship that develops by encountering moral outrage when one express's one views on a social media site.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#39

I can fully believe that. Try for instance to have a discussion here on hacker news about the less fortunate sides of diversity initiatives. Then see how many minutes it takes before your entire thread is flagged and effectively censored.

HN is not owned by a social media giant, so this grievance doesn’t appear to have much to do with the article.

Re: Most Americans Think Facebook and Twitter Censor Their Political Views

#40

I can fully believe that. Try for instance to have a discussion here on hacker news about the less fortunate sides of diversity initiatives. Then see how many minutes it takes before your entire thread is flagged and effectively censored.

HN is a social media giant?
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