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We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

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Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#171

Post by Zyst »

amichal wrote: post #98

I am appalled at how bad Facebook did here but buried at the very end of the article Vice does indicate that they needed to provide a valid traceable drivers license and last four of a (maybe?) matching SSN. This means that had they intended to actually publish the ads they would have put some real person on the hook (assuming the submitted data is actually checked against something). Still too easy but for the first…

>In order to run a “Paid for by” disclosure on Facebook, you must first submit the name to the company for approval, along with an image of a valid driver’s license and the last four digits of your Social Security number.

Paragraph in question.

Are the driver's licences they used not the ones of the Senators? Or maybe they photoshopped them, or something along those lines?

I'm a bit unhappy at the lack of elaboration on the methodology they used to test this out.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#172

Post by int_19h »

lawlessquestion wrote: post #106
hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

The government can limit speech if they have a compelling reason (the governments reasoning outweighs the persons freedom of speech, think yelling fire in a crowded theater). If the government has a compelling reason they can only limit the speech in the most narrowly tailored way to accomplish their goal and still allow the most freedom of speech possible.

Ah, "yelling fire in a crowded theater". I wonder how many people who use that phrase are aware of the original context in which it was introduced.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenck_v._United_States

TL;DR: during WW1, Socialist Party members protested against the war, and particularly against the draft. As part of those protests, they handed out leaflets that encouraged those eligible to resist the draft. The government cracked down on it, and the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the government, likening the action to "shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic".

Thankfully, the present standard is "imminent lawless action" instead, which is a far higher bar for the government to meet if it wants to regulate speech.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#173

Post by Waterluvian »

hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43
hadrien01 wrote: post #33

The best solution, and currently in effect as law in many European countries, would be to stop political ads altogether on Facebook and the Web. No more "hey who is paying for that anti-XXX political ad?", they just wouldn't exist anymore. Plus, less money raised and spent by political campaigns. Also, this article comes just one week after that one: "Facebook’s political ad tool let us buy ads “paid for” by Mike Pen…

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

I hear what you're saying. And I think there's plenty of room on this planet for many nations with different lines drawn in the sand on free speech.

On one hand, I think there are many nations that are subjectively better places to live than the U.S., whose citizens have ceded more of their freedom of speech for scores of years and it's worked out pretty well so far.

On the other hand, I think the manifestation of a nation is derived as much from the side effects of its laws as the primary effects. By this I mean it's likely impossible to answer, "would what makes America tick still tick if we changed freedom of speech?" Who can really predict what side effects would come out of trying to make the U.S. more like Europe, Canada, Australia, etc.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#174

Post by int_19h »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #107
hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

I too love idealism, but I have to wonder just how broken things have to get before people begin to accept that a thing that sounds good in theory just doesn't work right in the real world? In theory, unregulated free markets are always self-correcting. In theory, socialism works great. In theory, uninhibited free speech is one of the pillars of a free society. So if we start seeing torrential downpour of misleading…

The question is, what do those limits on speech really add?

For example, Germany has extremely stringent limits on hate speech. In fact, it goes beyond that, and gives courts the authority to outright ban political parties, and even informal associations, that promote certain political ideas (e.g. any form of government that is not a democracy), even if such promotion doesn't involve hate speech per se: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streitbare_Demokratie. They have a robust enforcement regimen, too.

And? They still have neo-Nazis marching in the streets (and, I must add, in far greater numbers than anything that happened in US to date). And they have AfD, which continues to grow in popular support, and to gain seats on both federal and regional level.

I would argue that in that regard, Europe and US inadvertently did a useful experiment: one side went all-in for free speech, another side decided to enshrine "intolerance of intolerance" in law. Looking at Europe today, I would dare say that the result of that experiment is that political censorship is a failure. It's not that you can't do it - clearly, there are many countries that do it quite successfully, even today. The problem is, all those countries are very heavy-handed about it - they don't wince at punishing people for being suspected subversives, for example. And so we call those countries dictatorships and tyrannies. But the amount of censorship that Europe decided it can afford while still retaining free society is fairly trivial to work around, and therefore ineffective. It's basically just security theater. It lets politicians point at all those laws and say, "See, we did something about the neo-Nazis! You're safe!" to their voters, even as said neo-Nazis openly march in the streets.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#175

Post by SilasX »

briandear wrote: post #64
SilasX wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corporate boards usually have controls against appropriating company resources for personal use.

Considering he controls 60% of the company, such controls are meaningless.

The controls would be something agreee to as part of taking the company public or some stage of auditing.

Owning a controlling stake doesn’t mean you can fiddle around with every corporate asset at your whim.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#176

Post by int_19h »

hadrien01 wrote: post #67
bluecalm wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can they pay for their own website? What about a website about their ideas? What about linking to that website? Limiting speech like that sounds dystopian. It's sure great for established players though as they are already known and get a lot of air time anyway while the competition can't even pay to try to convince others to their ideas.

They can have their own website, but only promoted through organic means. > Limiting speech like that sounds dystopian Europe, with its vastly different past, has a very different view on free speech compared to the US. We don't allow unlimited free speech, but we don't view that as censorship. Nazi symbols are banned in Germany. Hate speech is condemned through most of Europe (one of our far-right politicians in Fra…

It's still censorship, by definition. You have just decided that it's worth it, but let's be clear about what it is.

Funny thing is, for all your hate speech laws, far right parties don't seem to be much frustrated by them, and are quite successful at competing for votes lately. All they have to do is wink and nudge without spelling things out bluntly - everybody still knows what they mean and what they stand for.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#177

Post by notatoad »

hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43
hadrien01 wrote: post #33

The best solution, and currently in effect as law in many European countries, would be to stop political ads altogether on Facebook and the Web. No more "hey who is paying for that anti-XXX political ad?", they just wouldn't exist anymore. Plus, less money raised and spent by political campaigns. Also, this article comes just one week after that one: "Facebook’s political ad tool let us buy ads “paid for” by Mike Pen…

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

>This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set,

Except for all the other countries in the world that have mostly free speech with a few sensible restrictions, and it mostly work pretty well.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#178

Post by airstrike »

hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43
hadrien01 wrote: post #33

The best solution, and currently in effect as law in many European countries, would be to stop political ads altogether on Facebook and the Web. No more "hey who is paying for that anti-XXX political ad?", they just wouldn't exist anymore. Plus, less money raised and spent by political campaigns. Also, this article comes just one week after that one: "Facebook’s political ad tool let us buy ads “paid for” by Mike Pen…

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

> We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things).

No, it doesn't, and the U.S. isn't the only country that understands freedom of speech. God, this is so tiring.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#179

Post by isoskeles »

ceejayoz wrote: post #124
lolpython wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government doesn't meddle in the NFL. The NFL issued the bans

That's plainly false. "NFL execs admit pressure from Trump a factor on anthem policy": https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2018/05/24/nfl-execs-a... "Trump says U.S. should change tax law to punish NFL": http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/20978787/president-donald... "The report found the Department of Defense had spent $6.8 million on what they called 'paid patriotism' between 2012 and 2015. This money was spread…

Interesting, although I can't say I care much about the fate of these organizations that accepted money from the DoD. Accepting payments for allowing these patriotic displays is, IMO, a sort of deal with the devil (I don't actually think the U.S. is the devil). This sounds even less of an issue of government abridging free speech and more like the NFL breaching contract.

Re: We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them

#180

Post by hazz99 »

Waterluvian wrote: post #173
hoorayimhelping wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For varying definitions of best. We have the first amendment in America. It says the government can't make laws that limit a private citizen's ability to express themselves (among other things). That includes their political advertising. This is a really dangerous / slippery precedent to set, and the whole "we should change longstanding laws to deal with a problem that feels like a local maximum" is something that ma…

I hear what you're saying. And I think there's plenty of room on this planet for many nations with different lines drawn in the sand on free speech. On one hand, I think there are many nations that are subjectively better places to live than the U.S., whose citizens have ceded more of their freedom of speech for scores of years and it's worked out pretty well so far. On the other hand, I think the manifestation of a…

> ... there are many nations that are subjectively better places to live than the U.S., whose citizens have ceded more of their freedom of speech ... it's worked out pretty well so far.

As someone not in the US, I agree there are many places that are subjectively "better", but this is /definitely/ not because of free speech restrictions, but because of universal healthcare/welfare/education.

Freedom of speech is incredibly important, and countries who restrict it (in the philosophical sense) walk a dangerous path.

E.g. Australia making it illegal for people to comment on living conditions within refugee camps, or making it illegal to take photos inside factory farms.

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