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Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

theguardian.com

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Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#21

Post by DanielleMolloy »

noobhacker wrote: post #6
ddp wrote: post #4

[flagged]

I honestly don't know why it's better to ban denial rather than trying to engage and educate. It's been very confusing to me. Could you please explain?

Holocaust denial is, on the root, pure antisemitism, which has been an evil element of every Western society since the beginning of the diaspora. The ideology behind it is pretty much equal to that part of nazi ideology (and I'm not one of those who is quick to run around calling everybody nazi these days).

As someone whose school system has provided them with some insight on how this all happened I see the US absolutist view on free speech when it is about outright lies like Holocaust denial as a bit dangerous. Preventing deluted individuals from spreading a life-threatening lie is not censorship. I see that the US view is coming from a very humanist view here, but tolerance needs to have limits set by basic human rights values, otherwise it will be destroyed by itself sooner or later.

The approach to "educate the deniers" is indicating to them and the listeners that you are taking them and their delusions seriously, and dissiminate them in the process. In the current debates about e.g. evolution you clearly see what happens in wider society if you talk to the 1% "skeptics".

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#22

Post by IGI-111 »

JamilD wrote: post #9
noobhacker wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't know why it's better to ban denial rather than trying to engage and educate. It's been very confusing to me. Could you please explain?

Brandolini's Law: "The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it."

Queue long post about why such witty proverbs are overtly large generalizations that are never entirely true

This is so self referential it should be called Brandolini's paradox.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#23

Post by shankr »

mns wrote: post #16
noobhacker wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't know why it's better to ban denial rather than trying to engage and educate. It's been very confusing to me. Could you please explain?

The entire school system is based on how bad they were, how many bad things they did and how how everyone in Germany should never repeat the same mistakes again. Ok, I'm exaggerating a bit, but that's the general idea. I think Germany was one of the only countries to actually deal, accept and discuss openly in society the atrocities they did in WWII. So it's not just banning and getting over denial.

I suppose only country in the history which has gone to such an extent in educating the new generation about the past mistakes. Still people won't take a second before bringing it up, especially American and other European countries, in order to win their argument. I am not even German, and it makes me angry. I can hardly imagine how a German feels when they are thrown in their face their Nazi past in an argument which has nothing to do with WW2.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#24

Post by kumarvvr »

girvo wrote: post #2

How will the media and society deal with these sorts of situations if decentralised alternatives to these social media sites take off? There won’t be any one place or person or company to blame, no? Did the media write about email being used negatively when it was taking off? (That’s an honest question, I’m too young and a cursory search didn’t turn up anything interesting).

It seems to me, hopefully, that when there isn't one person or company to blame, there won't be one person or company to trust.

When you have decentralized social media infrastructure, hopefully, the cognitive overload of being active on all of them will be overwhelming enough to prevent people from not paying too much attention to it. And hopefully, it will remain out of our political lives.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#25

Post by emteycz »

shankr wrote: post #23
mns wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire school system is based on how bad they were, how many bad things they did and how how everyone in Germany should never repeat the same mistakes again. Ok, I'm exaggerating a bit, but that's the general idea. I think Germany was one of the only countries to actually deal, accept and discuss openly in society the atrocities they did in WWII. So it's not just banning and getting over denial.

I suppose only country in the history which has gone to such an extent in educating the new generation about the past mistakes. Still people won't take a second before bringing it up, especially American and other European countries, in order to win their argument. I am not even German, and it makes me angry. I can hardly imagine how a German feels when they are thrown in their face their Nazi past in an argument whi…

It's hard not to do it if you don't think much/deeply about it. Many family members of mine were brutally murdered by Nazis. I used to seriously hate Germans - I was a child though (it changed around 15 y/o) - not because of my parents/teachers/..., they actively tried to change it. Many people in my country never change their mind, there are even many swear words based on words that used to mean "German [person]".

I'm not really sure we can blame them. The atrocities that Nazis have commited are still in living memory, there are still bullet holes in walls, whole villages are destroyed and the remains are still there... and hate over death of family members is an extremely strong emotion.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#26

Post by zaarn »

axaxs wrote: post #10
ddp wrote: post #4

[flagged]

There is no good reason to make a law against free speech, however objectively dumb it may be. But enjoy your collapsing police state.

Well, that's a pointless argument since free speech as in the US doesn't exist in Germany. There is freedom of opinion which has a higher level of entry, so the speak, than free speech.

It's simply a different philosophy than the US freedom of speech. As long as it is merely your opinion and only your opinion, you can use any medium you want to tell others your opinion without repercussions. The moment your opinion starts to hurt others, even if it's not directly violent, those protections collapse.

It's part of the concept of a defensive democracy.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#27

Post by jetblackio »

girvo wrote: post #2

How will the media and society deal with these sorts of situations if decentralised alternatives to these social media sites take off? There won’t be any one place or person or company to blame, no? Did the media write about email being used negatively when it was taking off? (That’s an honest question, I’m too young and a cursory search didn’t turn up anything interesting).

I think the distinction is "reach". Emails are generally directed to dozens, maybe hundreds of individuals, whereas with modern social media, an individual can reach millions of people. It begins to enter the realm of traditional media organizations.

But unlike traditional media organizations, there are far fewer laws in place regulating the responsibility that comes with that reach.

It is an interesting problem, and I'm not sure there is a good solution, other than try to combat it head on with education (how to properly evaluate the information you accept), and possibly PSAs.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#28

Post by DanielleMolloy »

mns wrote: post #16
noobhacker wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't know why it's better to ban denial rather than trying to engage and educate. It's been very confusing to me. Could you please explain?

The entire school system is based on how bad they were, how many bad things they did and how how everyone in Germany should never repeat the same mistakes again. Ok, I'm exaggerating a bit, but that's the general idea. I think Germany was one of the only countries to actually deal, accept and discuss openly in society the atrocities they did in WWII. So it's not just banning and getting over denial.

The german school system is not about indoctrination or assigning guilt.

The post war german generations were not teached that they are guilty, but that they do carry responsibility for being aware of how easily facism and dehumanisation happens and escalates, and of keeping the memory of such evil present.

And yes, this includes the responsibility of being aware that similar things may happen again, clearly detecting extremism by the root, calling it out and hopefully averting it. Probably every country in the world should put such emphasis in their history lessons, but nobody else ever really will for obvious reasons.

So this kind of became a responsibility of the people born in modern germany. This is why it is one possible Abitur topic in politics, history and german lessons, why it is one element of the curriculum in (3 to 4)+2 different middle school years + Abitur (saxony speaking) and why there are high school visits to concentration camps.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#29

Post by zaarn »

rjvbk wrote: post #17
daseiner1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

banning holocaust denial == “total control of information” ?

Banning the spreading of ideas requires control of information, yes.

It does not require total control or even partial control of information.

There is a ban but it doesn't mean the german government goes out of it's way to remove any piece of such material before it even hits the internet.

It's largely post-factum, when the piece is already on the internet and spread elsewhere when the original author of the information is punished.

Re: Zuckerberg defends Facebook users' right to be wrong – even Holocaust deniers

#30

Post by pjc50 »

girvo wrote: post #2

How will the media and society deal with these sorts of situations if decentralised alternatives to these social media sites take off? There won’t be any one place or person or company to blame, no? Did the media write about email being used negatively when it was taking off? (That’s an honest question, I’m too young and a cursory search didn’t turn up anything interesting).

There have been social panics over communications technologies since the start of industrialisation. While most of them have been spurious, some aren't and there can be very nasty downsides to stirring up murderous panic. The Rwandan genocide was effectively led by hate-filled talk radio, for example.

The decentralised stuff will probably be left alone until people start getting killed by it in the West. Once that happens there's a choice: allow it to escalate or start banning it.

It's very hard to imagine a country that makes everyone submit to the TSA allowing decentralisation to continue once it's used by a non-white terrorist group to start blowing up airliners.

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