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Twitter to ban political advertising

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Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#941

Post by ralusek »

kazagistar wrote: post #899
matwood wrote: post #834

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that a centralized body immediately becomes too powerful. The body itself would need to be limited in scope with other outside checks and balances. SCOTUS is close to one of these centralized bodies you speak of, and they purposely only deal with cases that have gone through every other avenue. And even then, they are not trying to determine truth, but only fit the verdict within the existing body of l…

I prefer giving power no secrecy to hide behind and limiting it by democratic control. I dont know why the assumption is always that a central power has to be some opaque inscrutable beurocracy.

I don't know why the assumption is always that a democracy is incapable of tyranny. Gay marriage had been illegal for most of our modern democracies' histories under the tyranny of democracies. Prostitution and drug usage are currently illegal under the tyranny of democracies. In England the manner in which you discuss large scale immigration or transgender issues, or what pornography is acceptable to watch is subject to review under the tyranny of democracy.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#942

Post by naasking »

akie wrote: post #739
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 that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

> You philosophize on basis of the assumption that central authorities ('government') by definition cannot be trusted, and we should therefore be wary of anything that reeks of centralized decision making. That is a supremely American way of looking at the world.

Literally every government and civilization in the history of the world has eventually failed or been corrupted.

Given this inevitability, how is it not better that citizens have protections against a failing government abusing that power? Avoiding centralization of power is one such protection. This is not an "American perspective", it's a simple conclusion reached after looking at history.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#943

Post by belorn »

jandrese wrote: post #933
belorn wrote: post #922

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 fi…

Aah, my browser addons blocked the lower list, so I only saw the 2 Executive Branch and the 4 Congressional Leadership.

Off the two democrats congressional Leaderships, Nancy Pelosi has 14% and Charles Schumer has 11% in the True category. This in contrast with the republicans that has 12%, 0%, 10% and 5% (trump).

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#944

Post by linuxftw »

silvester23 wrote: post #728
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 that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

> I'm not trying to be snarky, but in all honesty, how do you feel this is working out for the US at this very moment?

Great. We still have many of the rights others have been stripped of. We haven't faced any invasions or domestic warfare in over a century, we have the worlds strongest economy, etc etc. Best of all, we can say pretty much whatever we want and not go to jail for it.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#947

Post by kaolti »

sjy wrote: post #854
kaolti wrote: post #798

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that we can mandate people telling the truth is laughable. The reason it seems to work in Denmark is probably because honesty is a social norm there. Secondly, there is no absolute, objective truth and there never will be. The best we can do is to individually strive for telling the truth and hope for the best.

You accept that honesty could plausibly be a social norm in some countries, yet you think it's laughable that the law might play a role in establishing and upholding that norm?

That's exactly right. I'm not contesting laws playing SOME role, but in the grand scheme of things they don't uphold norms.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#948

Post by IX-103 »

lr4444lr wrote: post #793
akie wrote: post #739

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In America, we understand that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

We do have libel and slander laws, you know.

Yes but that only works if they say something bad about someone or something. If they only tell positive lies or completely make up things it's hard for anyone to prove standing, much less show damages.

But it still has a negative effect on public discourse. It's like information pollution.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#949

Post by cloverich »

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…

I have a hard time believing Obama truly believed a plan could be kept. Given how it works, I just can't imagine how you could reform healthcare in any meaningful way without outright terminating some of the plans as they existed. I don't have a particular problem with it. Which is probably true for most -- they care more if their leader is acting ethically and trying to do the right thing, than how (pedantically) honest they are being. If Trump lied "I support Confederate statues" to get elected, and then led an effort to tear them down, I doubt history would have any issue with his lies.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#950

Post by Fnoord »

madaxe_again wrote: post #769
akie wrote: post #739

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In America, we understand that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

> Wouldn't it be great if you would have a powerful centralized body No. It wouldn’t. When that kind of power (arbiter of truth) is placed in a single point, that point will become the highly contested point of control. Eventually, inevitably, the body would end up turned to some ruthless power of the day, and would serve as the most phenomenal propaganda machine. “The Ministry of Truth is pleased to announce that bo…

We had total decentralization 9n Usenet. People went away from it. Mastodon split due to Japanese porn.
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