Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#421

Post by jgh » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 10:48 AM UTC

0x8BADF00D wrote: post #300

moomin wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are an infinite number of bad ideas in the world. No-one’s life would be improved by hearing them all.

Maybe not. But is one’s life diminished by hearing bad ideas? I don’t think so. For instance, the idea that the Earth is flat is laughable. But my life doesn’t deteriorate nor improve based on that idea. We can all agree it’s a stupid idea, laugh at it, and move on.

Not all bad ideas are so easily brushed off as being "totally laughable". For example a common and particularly insidious one that gets a lot of "logical" people who think of themselves as good critical thinkers is tying IQ to genetics. This leads people down the path of [IQ is largely determined by genetics] => [X impoverished group has a lower IQ] => [Because of their IQ they are impoverished] => [White people are superior].

Looking at that line of thinking it's ridiculous, there are assumptions and a gross misunderstanding of correlation and causation and confounding factors. But if you are not educated enough to see the problems in those arguments (which I think would be a higher level of education required than believing in flat earth) or if you are a little bit inclined to let someone walk you down a "logical" path of fallacies then it's easy to make that leap. And that's an easy argument for a white nationalist to make. It's a lot less easy for someone to refute it.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#422

Post by yontherubicon » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 10:54 AM UTC

api wrote: post #212

braythwayt wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That argument works well in relatively small social groups where people generally can be relied upon to act in good faith, and where there are social disincentives to clinging to bad ideas after they have been refuted. When you have a small group with social bonds, you don't have to worry about a bad actor constantly repeating their already-refuted arguments to people who haven't heard the refutation. But when you ha…

You realize that your argument is an argument against democracy, right? If mere exposure to bad ideas is this dangerous then mass scale democracy is not viable. The viability of democracy beyond very small groups is dependent on the idea that human beings are capable of independent rational thought and of discussing and evaluating ideas on merit. If that's not the case then the neo-reactionaries are right and democra…

>The right response is to ask how and why Trump won and address the problems, ideas, and arguments that led to it rationally.

Absolutely.

> If Jones' BS is more "viral," then more rational thinkers need to learn how to play the viral game.

There's an inherent danger here. Viral media is in many ways a short-attention span, high time preference sort of game. It's probably not conducive to a high level of discourse. It is IMO a race to the bottom, much the same way fast-food restaurants compete. Eventually, you need to open up a Whole Foods or two.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#423

Post by test001only » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 10:55 AM UTC

CM30 wrote: post #86

This sort of thing illustrates the biggest issue with web hosting, domain registrars and the internet's infrastructure in general; everything is privately owned by companies who get unlimited rights to decide who and what they want to host. The solution is to require all hosting and domain companies to act as utilities, and require neutrality in regards to any content that's legal. They're not private forums or homes…

I am of the assumption that in the US ISPs no longer have to deal with net neutrality. So why would large hosting companies have to?

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#424

Post by tremon » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 10:56 AM UTC

hellbanner wrote: post #263

lylecubed wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's equally illegal to kill anybody based on race, class, political belief or religious belief.

Tell that to the soldiers spreading democracy.

It's equally illegal for soldiers to kill non-combatants.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#425

Post by yontherubicon » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:01 AM UTC

zokier wrote: post #107

ilove_banh_mi wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think of a bakery refusing to make a wedding cake for people they disapprove of?

Sounds perfectly fine by me. Of course they can be named&shamed, but legally I think you should be able to pick your customers (except in monopoly and some other special cases).

That is, I'm afraid, against the law in this country.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#426

Post by yontherubicon » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:12 AM UTC

api wrote: post #200

Nadya wrote: post #31

A common argument in philosophy is that bad ideas should occur in the open - where everyone may ridicule them. When they are cast to the shadows they can grow, under everyone's noses, in private where only there are they allowed to exist. In private, these bad ideas cannot be challenged by others and people will be convinced to believe in them, with nobody challenging the idea as a genuinely terrible idea. It gives b…

I'm shocked by how many liberals who really ought to know better are cheering for the deployment of corporate oligopolistic censorship at this scale. We're not talking about just kicking someone off Twitter... now we're talking about kicking them off supposedly neutral public cloud platforms. This is a major escalation and honestly it's changing my mind a bit about the whole issue. I was a fence sitter before but now…

>There's a reason the ACLU has in the past defended neo-Nazis and other unpopular speakers, and it's not because they support these speakers' messages. It's because you need a canary in the coal mine.

People aren't mentioning this, but this has already happened.

I'm not white, just to be clear, however back sometime last year I knew infrastructure-level censorship was coming when DNS services, GoDaddy in particular, started censoring sites. The canary in the coalmine was the Daily Stormer.

It's one thing to want them to be quiet. It's another thing to set the precedent of infrastructure forcing them to be quiet. As you said, it sets a precedent.

EDIT: DNS censorship has indeed been mentioned in this thread.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#427

Post by superkuh » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:17 AM UTC

kanox wrote: post #415

superkuh wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is not to create more laws which will give the real danger (governments) more power to use their violence. The solution is to simply have everyone host themselves. Even a moderate home broadband connection is more than enough to serve up your personal website. Once you start relying on third parties you've lost. That's their property, not yours. When you claim it is yours and use government violence to e…

Your ISP is also a private third party. If Microsoft rejects you why wouldn't Comcast? The 70 dollars you pay for a home connection isn't worth dealing with a twitter mob, so they'll gladly boot you.

Some might. But that's where this fight should be fought: keeping internet access as dumb pipe infrastructure. The solid base on which the internet rests.

As long as that's true people can always route around censorship in services provided remotely.

In terms of implementation notabug.io is a pretty cool (and simple for the user) way to do p2p + federated node discussion boards on the web. It's not perfect but this kind of thing paired with tor for domain resolution and transport could provide a communications platform as long as internet access is still uncensored.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#428

Post by TeMPOraL » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:22 AM UTC

candiodari wrote: post #413

specialist wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lie is half-way around the world before the truth has its pants on. — Mark Twain Younger me was a free speech ultimatist. Alas, human nature. Propaganda works, so well that people aren’t even aware of changing their minds. Overton windows. Blowback, where refuting further cements the falsehood. Belief as attire. Etc, etc.

And, as has been clearly illustrated, "trusted" news source can't always be trusted either. So preventing "lies" (lie is almost always a matter of perspective) to spread ... is really always also preventing people from finding out the truth. We just used to find that acceptable. Wars have been started by fake news from "reputable" sources. If fake news regulations become widespread and usable, they would be trivially…

> lie is almost always a matter of perspective

This meme I do not understand. There is one physical reality[0]. A thing either happened, or it didn't. Physics doesn't change its workings because of perspective. A precise enough statement about reality can be either true or false, there's no middle. There's no "depends on perspective". If I say, "the Sun is shining", the truth of that fact does not depend on perspective.

Of course, very often we're dealing with complex statements that deal with many aspects of reality simultaneously. We often talk about indirect evidence. But that doesn't suddenly open a wormhole to a post-truth dimension. We have tools and frameworks to deal with that. We can say, there is strong evidence that this occurred. Or, there's strong evidence that it didn't. Or, the current evidence points in neither way.

Arguing that truth and lies are a matter of perspective is just trying to deliberately confuse people. After all, if we really accept this view, then reality doesn't exist, nothing makes sense, and we can all go back to the caves we came from.

--

[0] - simulation ideas and other things aside, though they are all conveniently defined in a way indistinguishable from us all being separate minds inhabiting one reality.

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#429

Post by practice9 » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:26 AM UTC

weirdstuff wrote: post #173

qop wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN is well into the territory of censoring, rather than moderation. Let's be real here. Ever since dang, it's been a free fall.

I'd add it's not just HN, but most social sites are far into self-censorship territory. I agree though, HN is much more hostile these days. WRT dang, even today he shut down a thread regarding the deepening SEC inquiry into Musk (which had new news as of this afternoon), and said that this was something along the lines of "Musk hysteria" or some such thing. I was kind of shocked at the removal of that thread as it wa…

I rarely agree with dang, but he is correct in this case.

Media should take a break with reporting about Musk, most of the recent articles are either oil-sponsored FUD about Tesla or personal attacks on him.

Would be nice if Elon took a break from Twitter too...

Re: Microsoft threatens to stop hosting Gab unless posts are removed

#430

Post by guessthejuice » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 11:27 AM UTC

Nadya wrote: post #31

A common argument in philosophy is that bad ideas should occur in the open - where everyone may ridicule them. When they are cast to the shadows they can grow, under everyone's noses, in private where only there are they allowed to exist. In private, these bad ideas cannot be challenged by others and people will be convinced to believe in them, with nobody challenging the idea as a genuinely terrible idea. It gives b…

> A common argument in philosophy is that bad ideas should occur in the open - where everyone may ridicule them.

Also, so that good ideas can have their day in the sun. Lets not forget that most "good" ideas were once considered bad ideas.

List of ideas that was once considered bad.

Abolitionism. LGBT rights. Heliocentrism. Germ theory. Endless list.

The idea is that all ideas deserve discussion so that the good rises and the bad sinks.

Also, by allowing censorship when you have likeminded people in power, you also allow other people to censor in the future when power shifts.

This is just basic stuff you learn in philosophy 101. Unfortunately, we don't seem to be teaching basic principles in high school/college anymore.

People naively think that censorship keeps the bad ideas away. Most of the time, it is used to keep the good ideas away. Look at the censorship by the catholic church, soviet union, china, nazi germany, etc.

If your ideas have solid footing, you would be against censorship. It's when you can't defend your ideas that people advocate for censorship.