Facebook to ban white nationalist content • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#541

Post by smsm42 » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:14 PM UTC

harrumph wrote: post #400

smsm42 wrote: post #324

Legally, of course, FB is completely right. Morally - try to replace "white nationalism" with, say, "communism" (one can argue communists killed a lot of people, so why not?), "Christianity", "Islam", "Black separatism", "Wiccans"... I could continue forever, but I hope you get the point. If you're consistently fine with any $GROUP put there, no matter how much you love it/disgusted by it, then your position is consi…

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> we are in no way faced with a growing trend of violent leftists

Ever heard of Antifa? BANM? Or maybe Red Brigades? Red Army Faction? Sendero Luminoso? BLA? Japanese Red Army? Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam? There were dozens, probably hundreds, violent leftist groups. I don't know if they shoot up mosques, specifically, but why this specific mode of terror is your sole concern? They certainly did shoot, blow up, hang, cut off heads, poisoned and murdered by other means many people. And that's just terrorists, wait until they get the real power of state coercion... then the count goes to millions.

You mean there's no active leftist militant group in your town right now? Good for you. You may want to familiarize yourself with recent history and wider world though, to get a bit more complete picture than the current news cycle.

Oh and btw, the guy that shot up the mosque was very concerned about the environmentalism and thought China is a model country. Should we start deplatforming environmentalists and those who like China?

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#542

Post by grawprog » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:14 PM UTC

function_seven wrote: post #31

I consider myself a free speech absolutist. Or very nearly so. But that runs both ways. Not only do I think that almost all (to borrow a mathematical term) speech should be permitted, but also that the onus is on the speaker to make themselves heard or to find an audience. No company or platform owes them anything. In earlier times, that meant that no newspaper or printing press was required to print everything sent…

I'm going to respond to this comment because my response is just kind of in general to the whole conversation this spawned.

In what way is facebook more of a public space than hacker news, reddit or any public forum, message board or website where users can sign up and post content?

You couldn't post a bunch of white nationalist comments here or on most other sites without getting banned.

Why would and should facebook be treated differently than other websites? Having a large amount users and money doesn't suddenly make them a public entity. The fact people use their real names and identities doesn't(they're not the only site that does this). Them tracking you across multiple websites and aggregating and selling your data doesn't either.

What is it about facebook that causes people to have this misconception?

If this were ISP's, DNS providers, even hosting providers really shouldn't be able to(as far as i'm concerned, but that's a different discussion and does happen), but facebook doing this is the same as any other website that allows user discussions and user content setting rules.

There's an internet outside of facebook. People making the choice to reside entirely there doesn't automatically make them any different than other websites.

It's the users that choose to give them this power over things by using their service. Though...i know not entirely not entirely...pre installs on phones and things like the free data facebook messaging in the Philipines puts things outside.individual users control sometimes. But that's on poor government regulation and other phone manufacturers.

And...i'm not a big fan of facebook. I find them shady and greatly distrust them. But, part of that is because I understand they're a shady private corporation with zero obligation to the public. Pretending otherwise is unhelpful.

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#543

Post by mynameishere » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

omegaworks wrote: post #535

tathougies wrote: post #100

Why are white people specifically targeted. As someone of an Indian background, I've seen plenty of Hindu nationalist content on Facebook, and -- despite it actually affecting my Christian family who are still in India -- there is no ban on that content. Such nationalism has led to more violence and death than any of the white nationalism stories.

Your assumption is that this targets white people generally. White supremacist content is spread by a tiny minority of violent extremists in hopes of recruiting others to their cause.

How is that an assumption? The post is very clear that this is targeting white nationalism/separatism/supremacist. Black nationalism, Jewish nationalism (ie, Zionism), etc, are all perfectly okay.

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#544

Post by rangerpolitic » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

josefresco wrote: post #376

weberc2 wrote: post #112

The obvious questions are and always have been "what constitutes 'harmful speech'?" and "who gets to decide?". Sure, we can agree that "white supremacy" is harmful, but in the last 5 years we've seen the definition of white supremacy slide from "people who espouse views that whites are better than nonwhites" to "people who espouse views that are not in line with progressive orthodoxy".

> we've seen the definition of white supremacy slide from "people who espouse views that whites are better than nonwhites" to "people who espouse views that are not in line with progressive orthodoxy". No we haven't. We've seen white supremacy being legitimized at the highest levels, and as a result white supremacists claiming to be "victims" openly because they feel emboldened by the election of white supremacist po…

> We've seen white supremacy being legitimized at the highest levels

"White supremacy" is extremely vague. Please define the term in a coherent manner, noting the attributes which must exist for something to be considered white supremacy. Thanks.

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#545

Post by ghobs91 » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

MockObject wrote: post #521

ghobs91 wrote: post #457

Far right: private businesses such as bakeries should be allowed to refuse service to whoever they want! Also the far right: why is Facebook censoring my ability to spread hate speech! I'm oversimplifying it, but the hypocrisy and lack of self-awareness is astounding.

Seems no more hypocritical and self-awareness-lacking than arguing that Facebook has the right to turn away white nationalists, but that a bakery must serve all the cakes. Either way, it's conceptual gerrymandering to carefully carve out a wiggly boundary that -- strictly by coincidence! -- protects their own side and restrains the other side.

You're equating someone asking for a cake for their same-sex marriage to hate speech? Are you kidding?

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#546

Post by brandonmenc » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

wvenable wrote: post #409

andrewla wrote: post #95

I am also nearly a free speech absolutist, but I feel that platforms like YouTube and FB are nearly in-scope. I can't specifically say what the criteria is, but there's some notion of how much responsibility they take for the content. Something like the notion of a DMCA shield; where a platform can expose third-party content without consequences so long as they response to take-down requests means that they do not ge…

Should anyone be forced to pay for someone else's speech that you don't agree with? Because that is what you're asking these companies to do. I think the explosion of hate speech on the Internet is entirely because someone else is basically paying for people to post whatever they want. They don't need to create their own newspaper and get advertisers. They don't need to print signs. It's all free for them. You can co…

> Should anyone be forced to pay for someone else's speech that you don't agree with?

Facebook isn't an "anyone" - it's a thing.

We can decide to do whatever we want to these things - they exist only because we permit them to. They have no natural rights.

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#547

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:17 PM UTC

atonse wrote: post #6

Good to see the Valley is starting to get off its "we are just a platform, all information should be free and neutral no matter how bad, so we're not responsible" extremism of the past few years and understand that some forms of speech are harmful should not ever be encouraged and accelerated on any platform or technology, ever. To the people that say "Where does it end?" – that's pretty easy. Let's start with curbin…

[deleted]

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#548

Post by vkou » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:17 PM UTC

lazyjones wrote: post #415

bduerst wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except deplatforming is shown to work against alt-right hate speech: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/bjbp9d/do-social-... Anti-semitic speech has traditionally relied on soap boxes to spread their message, for decades before the internet even existed. That's why most academics won't engage them, because these groups are not interested in genuine discussion but in broadcasting their prejudice.

VICE is trash content, not journalism. And the current debate obviously stems from the tragic results of increased alt-right hate speech, despite all the "deplatforming".

Alt-right hate speech is increasing because you've got a lot of people angry at the current state of economics, and a political party that is in half-in-bed with the alt-right, that keeps making promises that they will fix all those economic problems.

Without deplatforming, the situation would be far worse. With a better economy, the situation would be far better.

You're in a sinking ship, and there's a few people desperately using bailing buckets to get water out. You point at the bucket brigade, and say: "You are the reason the ship is sinking."

No, they are the reason the ship hasn't sunk, yet.

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#549

Post by mistermann » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:18 PM UTC

ratling wrote: post #470

99052882514569 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>To the people that say "Where does it end?" – that's pretty easy. Let's start with curbing speech that encourages harming others. But that is not where they're starting though, is it? They're going much further: >Today we’re announcing a ban on praise, support and representation of white nationalism and separatism on Facebook and Instagram Praise, support and representation not of speech encouraging harm, but the id…

If you want to make this argument maybe pick someone besides literal nazis to make it with. Last I checked we kinda had a bit of a scuffle from 1940-1945 that stated, "This ideology is not okay and responding to it with violence is acceptable." They're getting booted off the platform most people use to talk to grandma, not getting literally booted in the face. Unlike what they advocate for.

> literal nazis

Are "literal" nazis only who this new rule will be applied to? The accepted definitions of both "literal" and "nazi" seem to have drifted significantly in the last few years.

> not getting literally booted in the face. Unlike what they advocate for.

Funny, this type of story about people advocating for literal violence against non-whites is extremely common on the internet, I've heard it recounted I don't know how many thousands of times in the last few years, yet I've literally(!) never once encountered an actual instance of it anywhere I browse. Ironically, I have encountered hundreds of examples of violence being advocated against white people, although in the vast majority of cases the proponents themselves were white.

Could you possibly provide any examples of such statements on relatively mainstream sites, and also note whether you encountered it organically or found it via a google search?

Re: Facebook to ban white nationalist content

#550

Post by rsync » Wed, Mar 27, 2019, 8:18 PM UTC

function_seven wrote: post #31

I consider myself a free speech absolutist. Or very nearly so. But that runs both ways. Not only do I think that almost all (to borrow a mathematical term) speech should be permitted, but also that the onus is on the speaker to make themselves heard or to find an audience. No company or platform owes them anything. In earlier times, that meant that no newspaper or printing press was required to print everything sent…

"But that runs both ways. Not only do I think that almost all (to borrow a mathematical term) speech should be permitted, but also that the onus is on the speaker to make themselves heard or to find an audience. No company or platform owes them anything."

Thank you - that is very succinctly put and is a reasonable and actionable standard that I hope more people will subscribe to.

That being said, I can't imagine how difficult and frustrating it will be for facebook (and others) to police any kind of definition for "white nationalism" which seems very vague and open to all manner of misinterpretation.