Twitter to ban political advertising • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#931

Post by tekkk » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:10 PM UTC

spunker540 wrote: post #916

tekkk wrote: post #888

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's simple reciprocation from game-theory perspective: when the other party lies and gains advantage, you do it too. But I feel Republicans are way more untruthful than the Democrats and simply bring down the level of discussion for everyone. And I don't know why is it, that majority of Americans are so accustomed to lying that they tolerate it from politicians. In Finland if politicians get caught with outright lyi…

I know Trump is in a world of his own, but most often the “lies” are not lies to the speaker or the speaker’s fans. For example Obama’s “if you like your plan you can keep it” regarding Obamacare. It turned out not to be 100% true. To Democrats he was well-intentioned and over-optimistic and couldn’t deliver his promise (probably due to Republican obstructionism) while Republicans had always considered that a lie. If…

From what I heard about Obamacare it seemed a quite crappy deal indeed, and not really criticized properly by the Democrats. It's sad that either party can't acknowledge their own errors and have to just tout their own version of reality to make it true for their supporters.

And about lying, there are degrees of lying that can be established. The earth is not flat even though some believe it to be so, to state the opposite is untrue. On the other hand, sure you could say eg that Americans have obesity problem (compared to the rest of the world) or they are just normal weight as "only" 1/3 of the population is overweight. But which is a truth or a lie?

I think the problem is largely a cultural shift in politics where the issues have become secondary to the rhetorical war between the two opposite ideologies. It's not about establishing a truth in a sense than it's trying to beat the other party. Yet there is a consensus that can be established, honesty that could be had when stating facts and acknowledging their up and downsides. It's not just black and white wordplay.

Perhaps we should just get rid of the politicians, have our best scientists (preferably chosen at random from a pool of candidates) run the government and people would just vote on things that they wished to improve (immigration, job-safety, healthcare etc). All results would be evaluated afterwards and their effects measured with meticulous statistics. I know that it could be abused too, but even that would be better than what is the current situation in US government.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#932

Post by BurningCycles » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:10 PM UTC

krageon wrote: post #788

ralusek wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lowest level of truth telling is stating facts, but even stating facts can be extremely manipulative. If I were to say: "2x as many white Americans were killed by police as black Americans in 2018." This a true fact. If I take note of the fact that black Americans only constitute 13% of the population, then I can say "A black American is 2.3x as likely as a white American to be killed by police." This is also a t…

> In America, we understand American understanding birthed a society that openly fosters fascism. It should only be used as an ironic example, not as some sort of highroad ethical argument.

How is american society 'openly fostering fascism' ?

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#933

Post by jandrese » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:13 PM UTC

belorn wrote: post #922

yoavm wrote: post #784

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But these really aren't the type of lies that people consider fake news. Yeah, all the things you've written are facts, and their interpretations are what we call opinions. I agree with you that all of these statements, since they're true, should be allowed without a question. People still need to think and be critical. I just took a look at a long list of lies by your current President. It has nothing to do with fac…

If we go by polifact ( https://www.politifact.com/personalities/ ), the highest rated politician has a truth rating of 14%. From personal experience the issue we have with fake news is not caused by a president. It was the polarization from the 2016 election, which has resulted in people valuing the narrative over facts. Nothing was a clearer example to me personally when later that winter as I was participating in a…

> If we go by polifact (https://www.politifact.com/personalities/), the highest rated politician has a truth rating of 14%.

My very first check of that assertion has a fully "True" rating of 20%[1]. And if you count the entire true spectrum it's 73%. And there is not a small sample size. I assume your statement is only regarding the current executive branch?

I also tried a spot check of the Congress, but my very first check also failed to meet your criteria[2]. The problem with this is that it undermines your entire point. The executive branch has the most strained relationship with objective reality, and that stems from the demands of the current president. They're basically forced to lie for political reasons because the truth is too damaging.

[1] https://www.politifact.com/personalities/barack-obama/ [2] https://www.politifact.com/personalities/mark-warner/

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#934

Post by wpietri » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:14 PM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #442

wpietri wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, not at all. Freedom of expression is the right to say your piece to willing listeners. It's a guarantee the state won't interfere in most speech, not a guarantee that rich people can buy an audience. Cellphones and internet connections are content-neutral pipes that convey content between a willing listener/reader and a speaker they select. So paying for those is a very different case than buying ads, and especia…

There’s no such thing as “legal necessity” to allow something. Our law is based on what is not allowed, instead of what is allowed. There’s an increasing drive towards banning more things and that’s fine if they are warranted, but I hope that we never get to the point where there are a set of action that we are _allowed_ to do.

Sure, but did you really not understand what I meant?

We outlaw things when a) they cause sufficient harm, and b) don't have sufficient countervailing utility. E.g., kitchen knives remain legal even though people are murdered with them, but you aren't allowed to buy a tactical nuke. I'm saying that whatever previous necessity drove us to allow political advertising despite the historically obvious harms, the Internet makes that much, much smaller.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#935

Post by orthecreedence » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:19 PM UTC

navigatesol wrote: post #810

yoavm wrote: post #784

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But these really aren't the type of lies that people consider fake news. Yeah, all the things you've written are facts, and their interpretations are what we call opinions. I agree with you that all of these statements, since they're true, should be allowed without a question. People still need to think and be critical. I just took a look at a long list of lies by your current President. It has nothing to do with fac…

> I just took a look at a long list of lies by your current President. The idea that one side tells lies, and the other only truth is part of the problem here. > You can't argue that it's some interpretation, or just half of the picture or anything like that. It's simply a bunch of words phrased as a fact but they never happened. "Russian collusion" appears to fit this description, yet I still read about it every day…

> The idea that one side tells lies, and the other only truth is part of the problem here.

Your divisive thinking is the problem here. Someone said that Trump lies, they didn't say "Republicans lie and dems don't," but that was somehow your interpretation of the statement that Trump lies (which is true of any president, yet you and I both know in our heart of hearts that he lies more than anybody by an overwhelming margin).

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#936

Post by CobrastanJorji » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:22 PM UTC

zobzu wrote: post #535

ljm wrote: post #521

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difficulty is that we once used propaganda in war time, because we needed it. The problem now is that you don’t know who is doing it, and for what. And propaganda back then wasn’t so clear cut. We were allied with Russia and at the end their population was truly decimated.

nowadays most of us have no idea what is propaganda and what isn't. heck sometimes you eventually research it and realize stuff you believed was true for decades because you were just told so by some authoritative source (like "TV" or what not really), turn out, is between misleading to flat out wrong. Note that I'm not even thinking about this in terms of politics. It seems to be the case for so many different thing…

My favorite example is "eating carrots improves your vision." Came from WW2 propaganda trying to hide the existence of radar.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#937

Post by 50656E6973 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:32 PM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #525

rapind wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Incumbents usually have a lot more money to spend on advertising though too. On average I doubt advertising helps challengers more than incumbents (there are always edge cases of course).

The research shows - contrary to common wisdom - that money only helps a campaign until it's reached all reachable voters with their message. After that, more spending does not matter. It's true that (A) the candidate with the most money (B) usually wins, but that doesn't mean A causes B. It's more likely that the most popular candidate attracts both the most money and the most votes, simply by being more popular.

Money can create popularity.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#938

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:37 PM UTC

dariosalvi78 wrote: post #822

azangru wrote: post #743

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You know what works? De-platforming them. Not giving them a voice in the public discourse Many people (me included) find this approach very unpalatable because of how inherently authoritarian it is. (Ironically, this suggestion often comes from the same people who are concerned by how underrepresented some groups are in the public discourse and how the voices of those groups are not heard, and want to artificially…

Wait, de platforming is very different than censorship. Examples: Should climate change deniers be given the same space as actual science? Should communists (to not only focus on far right) be invited to every serious talk about economy?

[deleted]

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#939

Post by naasking » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:37 PM UTC

moksly wrote: post #666

In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise. This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. It’s also allowed for different sides of things, because you can interpret things like socioeconomic statistics and facts differently and wr…

> In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise.

The problem is, who gets to define what's truthful and how do you quantify the bar for "truthfulness"? This is a deep philosophical question that doesn't really have a satisfactory solution at this point. Some cases are "obvious", but laws shouldn't be written with just the easy cases in mind.

> This died with Facebook, YouTube and the non-editorial entertainment “news” and as a result we have anti-vaxxers, flat-earthers and what not.

This is incorret. Anti-vaxxers and anti-vax protests have existed since the inception of vaccines back in the 1800s [1]. Flat earthers for longer.

It's a convenient narrative that the internet somehow created these anti-science movements, or somehow spread them, but that's not really supported by facts. Celebrities like Jenny McCarthy arguably spread that message far more than people talking with each other on Facebook.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine_hesitancy

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#940

Post by code_duck » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 4:45 PM UTC

tekkk wrote: post #931

spunker540 wrote: post #916

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know Trump is in a world of his own, but most often the “lies” are not lies to the speaker or the speaker’s fans. For example Obama’s “if you like your plan you can keep it” regarding Obamacare. It turned out not to be 100% true. To Democrats he was well-intentioned and over-optimistic and couldn’t deliver his promise (probably due to Republican obstructionism) while Republicans had always considered that a lie. If…

From what I heard about Obamacare it seemed a quite crappy deal indeed, and not really criticized properly by the Democrats. It's sad that either party can't acknowledge their own errors and have to just tout their own version of reality to make it true for their supporters. And about lying, there are degrees of lying that can be established. The earth is not flat even though some believe it to be so, to state the op…

Obamacare was hardly what Obama or the Democratic party wanted originally. They arrived on the final system only after two or three years of negotiation in Congress and intense corporate propaganda towards the American public regarding health insurance. I've only seen PR and advertising of that level previously during elections. So of course it wasn't perfect... It was very much a compromise with the powerful and well-funded healthcare industry.