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8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

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Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#141

Post by nostrademons »

harryh wrote: post #65
commanderjroc wrote: post #6

I guess you could say that free speech has limits that are acceptable. You know you can't yell fire in a crowded room and not get litigation and charges brought against you. So, maybe 8chan just ran past the fine line of hate speech vs encouraging acts of hate. I.e you can be racist but you cannot encourage acts of extremism. If 8Chan was a breeding ground for Islamic Extremists would people be okay with still existi…

Did you know that the "fire in a crowded room" metaphor comes from Schenck v. United States in which Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr used the metaphor to defend the criminality of protesting the military draft? I'm not sure if that's the kind of history you want to align yourself with. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenck_v._United_States

The other irony is that the holding of Schenk vs. United States was later overturned in Brandenburg vs. Ohio, which set the line for where free speech becomes unprotected at "inciting imminent lawless action":

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

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#142

Post by IfOnlyYouKnew »

sigstoat wrote: post #80
tombert wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I'm on the same boat as you on this one; I tend to have a pretty libertarian view on free speech, but lately the bizarre rise of hyper-radical idiots on places like 8chan (and even YouTube to a lesser extent) has really made me question these things. It's very easy to shout the mantra of "Free speech!!! OMG!!!" but we gain nothing by acting like there aren't natural consequences to it. By having a liberal fre…

> I think I'm on the same boat as you on this one; I tend to have a pretty libertarian view on free speech, but lately the bizarre rise of hyper-radical idiots on places like 8chan (and even YouTube to a lesser extent) has really made me question these things. there have always been hyper-radical idiots. with 8chan and such, you can see them. you're not getting rid of anything, you're just sticking your head into the…

It's more like sticking their head into the sand, isn't it (metaphorically)?

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#144

Post by ethbro »

komali2 wrote: post #118
eridius wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's beyond clear to me that it absolutely had the potential to radicalize shooters and terrorists I mean, it literally radicalized white supremacist terrorists . There's no "had the potential" anymore, it's a fact. It also sounds like it held plenty of child porn, so I don't understand why it took until now for anyone to do anything about the site.

CP gets knocked off the board fast. 4chan and 8chan know the line, though it is in a weird place (it probably should be on the other side of "fomenting white supremacy")

*Formenting \w+ supremacy

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#145

Post by eridius »

komali2 wrote: post #118
eridius wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's beyond clear to me that it absolutely had the potential to radicalize shooters and terrorists I mean, it literally radicalized white supremacist terrorists . There's no "had the potential" anymore, it's a fact. It also sounds like it held plenty of child porn, so I don't understand why it took until now for anyone to do anything about the site.

CP gets knocked off the board fast. 4chan and 8chan know the line, though it is in a weird place (it probably should be on the other side of "fomenting white supremacy")

Do posters get banned? If it's not accepted on the board then why does it keep getting posted, and posted sufficiently often that many people are claiming 8chan has CP?

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#146

Post by bufferoverflow »

nilkn wrote: post #4

I've generally been on the free speech side of this debate, as some of my previous comments on HN will show. With 8chan, I legitimately don't know what my opinion is. I've read it before, and I spent a few hours reading it this weekend, and it's beyond clear to me that it absolutely had the potential to radicalize shooters and terrorists. I'm not referring to the simple use of racial or ethnic slurs -- of course this…

If you block 8chan, the only thing that it will result in is people will move to more censorship-resistant technologies. You will push people to TOR, distributed P2P, blockchain forums, etc. Which will make even harder to identify them.

You can't stop the signal. ThePirateBay proved it many many times.

We need to address the sources of the problem, not the symptoms.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#147

Post by jredwards »

DrDimension wrote: post #97

The truth is that information does not radicalize people - censorship does. That's why the channers are as radicalized as they are - they've been censored everywhere else. Censor their last remaining outlets and you will increase violence by orders of magnitude.

I'm not sure how one arrives at that conclusion. I don't think either of these things is what radicalizes people.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#148

Post by throwaway542134 »

danharaj wrote: post #52
vorpalhex wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that speech doesn't have consequences. If speech had no consequences, it wouldn't be worth defending. Rather, it's that no man is fit to play the censor - not the Government which would censor political criticism of itself, not a king who would censor his opponents, nor even a billionaire who would censor the media when it spurns him. At the same time, if someone points a finger at you and shouts "I'm going…

What you say is reasonable, and is not free speech absolutist. This isn't a No True Scotsman sort of thing. There are people on this very forum who reject out of hand any question that 8chan should be censored. Another reply to my comment supposed my criticism means that the alternative is a Soviet surveillance state. Really?

I think the point is more that there's nuance in preventing speech (like censorship) and punishing the actions as a result of speech. I get that some would call those the same thing.

In the context of 8chan, I think there's a difference between allowing people to say whatever they want online and punishing the people that use that freedom to incite violence.

The part where it gets blurry to me is the hateful rhetoric that doesn't directly call for violence, but the only logical conclusion of the position is genocidal or otherwise racial violence. Talking about "invaders" or "American cities under foreign occupation" for example.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#149

Post by 1000units »

kristiandupont wrote: post #95
1000units wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If 8Chan was a breeding ground for Islamic Extremists would people be okay with still existing? Strangely enough, most people who find censorship ideologically palatable consider Jihadists a more sympathetic group than Incels. Note that ISIS beheadings have been subject to far less censorship than the Christchurch shooter's propaganda, for example.

I doubt that.

I make a factual claim you can investigate on your own. Perhaps your findings will surprise you. As an aside, I recommend engaging with people you disagree with politically to understand their motivations and opinions. Much of political discourse is superficially ridiculous, but almost everything can be made sense of and appreciated once you get a view of the whole picture. Good luck.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#150

Post by happytoexplain »

DrDimension wrote: post #97

The truth is that information does not radicalize people - censorship does. That's why the channers are as radicalized as they are - they've been censored everywhere else. Censor their last remaining outlets and you will increase violence by orders of magnitude.

>The truth is that information does not radicalize people

I'd be fascinated by an attempt to elaborate on this frankly incredible statement.

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