Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#41

Post by olefoo » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 1:58 AM UTC

assblaster wrote: post #31

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

Words can not be violent. If you think one person being offended means speakers must be silenced, then you're on a dangerous pathway to fascism.

If I were to post here linking your legal name and identifying information and residence to this post and issuing a call to have you disemployed and harassed at home; evicted if possible and subjected to a general boycott covering everything from sex to food.

You would object strenuously.

Yet I would only be engaging in "free speech".

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#42

Post by jmspring » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:00 AM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #4

They can’t have this responsibility. It gives them too much centralized power and fails to devolve power locally where people are better fit to understanding the audience and the content. I really think the answer is in localized, community-based moderation (with appeals to localized corp) like forums used to be. Obviously that goes against their will to control every aspect of their platform.

Recall the early FB stories where Zuckerberg was pretty gung-ho about eaves dropping (and the company as a whole did) on people's private info. Said behavior has probably been moderated due to legal and financial ramifications, but I don't doubt it's still there in some lax form.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#43

Post by bduerst » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:00 AM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #35

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

So-called hate speech doesn’t cause harm other than to feelings. It’s constitutionally protected in the US, and Facebook is going down the wrong path trying to eliminate it.

And hate speech is illegal in some societies, which is just as irrelevant as the US First Amendment because Facebook isn't a government organization.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#44

Post by AmericanChopper » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:00 AM UTC

bduerst wrote: post #33

assblaster wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Words can not be violent. If you think one person being offended means speakers must be silenced, then you're on a dangerous pathway to fascism.

>Words can not be violent Words are not the only form of speech, and physical violence is not the only way to cause harm. This is a "No True Scotsman", since hate speech is limited to neither.

You’re talking about hate speech as if it were a universally agreed upon concept. Hate speech is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Any speech I consider to be hateful is hate speech, any speech you consider to be hateful is hate speech, and there are 7.5 billion other unique sets of criteria out there for defining hate speech that are no more or no less valid.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#45

Post by mango7283 » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:01 AM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #35

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

So-called hate speech doesn’t cause harm other than to feelings. It’s constitutionally protected in the US, and Facebook is going down the wrong path trying to eliminate it.

Yet even here on HN it is possible to get banned for what you type.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#46

Post by manicdee » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:05 AM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #35

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

So-called hate speech doesn’t cause harm other than to feelings. It’s constitutionally protected in the US, and Facebook is going down the wrong path trying to eliminate it.

I can choose who to serve in my pub. If you start mouthing off at the other patrons, you will be asked to leave.

That is not censorship or silencing, it’s simply advising you that my place is not the place for that kind of behaviour.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#47

Post by bduerst » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:08 AM UTC

AmericanChopper wrote: post #44

bduerst wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Words can not be violent Words are not the only form of speech, and physical violence is not the only way to cause harm. This is a "No True Scotsman", since hate speech is limited to neither.

You’re talking about hate speech as if it were a universally agreed upon concept. Hate speech is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Any speech I consider to be hateful is hate speech, any speech you consider to be hateful is hate speech, and there are 7.5 billion other unique sets of criteria out there for defining hate speech that are no more or no less valid.

If you want to get into a semantics argument on the definition of hate speech, then here's Wikipedia's definition:

>Hate speech is speech that attacks a person or group on the basis of attributes such as race, religion, ethnic origin, national origin, sex, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#48

Post by azinman2 » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:09 AM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #35

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

So-called hate speech doesn’t cause harm other than to feelings. It’s constitutionally protected in the US, and Facebook is going down the wrong path trying to eliminate it.

I can’t tell if you’re trolling or not. I hope so, otherwise I’m very worried for your lack of understanding history and how the world works.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#49

Post by contras1970 » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:09 AM UTC

assblaster wrote: post #31

bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

Words can not be violent. If you think one person being offended means speakers must be silenced, then you're on a dangerous pathway to fascism.

> Words can not be violent.

sure, sure.

please explain how Facebook did not contribute to the Rohingya "situation" in [Myanmar].

please document how violence-inciting speech never helps spark actual violence (xenophobic violence everywhere since the dawn of speech).

i know, i know... guns don't kill people, people kill people. the issue is: we're all latent murderers. civilization is a very thin veneer. if we were all perfectly rational, maybe we could all get along much better. but were but speaking [animals] and need all help we can get to maintain our outward civility.

i know it's a very fine line to tread, but we must not conflate the baby with the bathwater.

[Myanmar]: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-facebo... [animals]: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#50

Post by beatpanda » Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 2:11 AM UTC

jmspring wrote: post #5

Having a bunch of likely millenial aged individuals with limited life experience based in Menlo Park to have a say in discourse that crosses so many boundaries? What could possibly go wrong?

This is exactly why Silicon Valley engineers, and engineers generally, need to stop being so dismissive of people with "useless" liberal arts educations, and instead bring in sociologists and anthropologists to think through these processes in a comprehensive way.

I'm being downvoted into oblivion elsewhere on this site for suggesting this, but I feel like it's a very obvious move for tech companies that have this problem.