De-escalating social media conflict • Hacker News Board

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#261

Post by aebtebeten » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 12:48 PM UTC

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #212

Viliam1234 wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It happens in capitalism, and it happens in socialism, because it happens everywhere. It is like saying "entropy increases in capitalism"; technically true, but misleading. Things like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law happen regardless of political regime or economical system. In different situations they take different forms: in capitalism, companies try to maximize (short-term) (perceived) shareholder…

>The world has many problems, but lack of military dictatorships controlled by a communist party is not one of them. // There's N.Korea, but that's not controlled by a communist party. It's notionally controlled by people who call themselves Communist, but they don't appear to do anything ideologically communist. World politics isn't my strong point, where did you have in mind? I note that your structure was "in capi…

I have no idea if https://dprktoday.com truly is[1] DPRK or someone else's black propaganda (nor do I read korean) but the pictures on it are congruent with those from former communist countries.

New factory, with athletic courts (and maybe a stage/multipurpose hall?) for the workers: https://dprktoday.com/content/great/4/sajin/image/2020-05-02...

Kids wearing red kerchiefs in botanic: https://dprktoday.com/photos/18301

Inspecting big industrial things: https://dprktoday.com/photos/18390

Party meetings (other pics show voting by holding up cards, but the colours don't seem very distinct to me): https://dprktoday.com/photos/15113

Ski resorts: https://dprktoday.com/news/43327

Doctor's outfit, multi-ethnic star: https://dprktoday.com/photos/18257

Rods instead of chains on swing sets: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200527-03-1.jpg

Makeup only in demure colours: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200527-01-2.jpg

Apartment blocks: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200318-01-1.jpg

Karaoke (was this actually soviet, or only post-soviet?): https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200418-01-2.jpg

Comrades painting: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200502-02-2.jpg

Gender-balanced propaganda statues: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200421-pt18041-1...

"75 years victory"?: https://dprktoday.com/content//photo/2020/20200318-pt17942-3...

[1] traceroute is useless these days, and its whois registrar appears to be chinese.

Bonus /r/fullcommunism: "let's study" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukBcC-sK3wQ Unless they're trolling hard with the english subs, the chorus is about studying for a better future. I know grades were important for early selection in the Young Pioneers, but can't immediately think of such a swotty song in the soviet catalogue (choreography and backing band, however, is spot on). Closest I manage at the moment is the educational background of the main characters in the movie "Three Plus Two."

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#262

Post by new2628 » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 12:48 PM UTC

wffurr wrote: post #238

thinkingemote wrote: post #213

Forgiveness. Rather than encourage better behaviours of those targeted by the mob, it would be better to encourage better behaviours of the mob itself. Forgiveness is absent in every social media or comment section and yet it's one of the crucial ways we get along with people. Having others visibly but perhaps silently forgive another would allow social proof that its okay to forgive this perceived offender. Forgiven…

The author goes into that in the next section of the article. Forgiveness starts with an apology.

> Forgiveness starts with an apology.

This is often claimed, but I'm not sure I agree. Why can't I forgive someone who wronged me even if they didn't apologize? Or perhaps even if they don't see that they wronged me.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#263

Post by guerrilla » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 12:55 PM UTC

sukilot wrote: post #256

guerrilla wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fascists on both the far-left While I appreciate your comment otherwise, fascism is universally agreed to be a far-right ideology and claiming otherwise at this point in history can't really be taken as anything but inflammatory, which isn't what belongs here in an otherwise insightful comment.

Left and right are arbitrary labels applied to the two largest opposing parties in a country. They aren't ideologies.

Left and right are indeed not ideologies but properties of ideologies and they are well-defined in mainstream political science models of classification. In all of those models, fascism is a far-right ideology.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#264

Post by brigandish » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 12:55 PM UTC

asjw wrote: post #232

thinkingemote wrote: post #213

Forgiveness. Rather than encourage better behaviours of those targeted by the mob, it would be better to encourage better behaviours of the mob itself. Forgiveness is absent in every social media or comment section and yet it's one of the crucial ways we get along with people. Having others visibly but perhaps silently forgive another would allow social proof that its okay to forgive this perceived offender. Forgiven…

There is no way that something that is not enforceable will succeed though. Plus forgiveness works only on then forgiver side, nothing stop others to keep doing what they are doing after you forgave them. I would argue that the main reason we get along is laws, not forgiveness. Any society has written (laws) and unwritten (social rules) norms that regulate the interactions between members. People don't yell in public…

> Plus forgiveness works only on then forgiver side, nothing stop others to keep doing what they are doing after you forgave them.

This is the case outside of social media too. It's why forgiveness requires courage and sincerity, and not a little strength.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#265

Post by m0zg » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 12:55 PM UTC

Conflict == engagement, engagement == $$$. You can't make a person understand something when his salary depends on not understanding it. The sole reason for the existence of e.g. Twitter is to facilitate a woke mob going after people they don't like for whatever imaginary grievance they dream up on any given day. They don't care if they're wrong, they're going to do it anyway. And Twitter actively works to remove any and all pushback to this. Why? $$$. If it wasn't for this shit boiling over they'd be out of business long ago. Same with most of the mainstream press. Therefore, to get past this calamity, we must destroy both, through technological and/or legislative means. It is not good for society when such large, powerful actors exist specifically to fan the flames and incite violence and hatred with total impunity.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#266

Post by mirimir » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 1:00 PM UTC

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #205

mirimir wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually the full quote is: > fascists on both the far-left and far-right of the political debate According to Merriam-Webster, fascism is:[0] > a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible su…

>the Soviet Union was arguably fascist // You appear to be starting from an assumption that everything USSR did, politically, was left-wing; and thus concluding that fascism can be left wing. A dictator is diametrical opposed to left-wing ideology. What you're doing is like saying uxoricide (murdering your wife) is part of FOSS, because a proponent of FOSS did it.

> You appear to be starting from an assumption that everything USSR did, politically, was left-wing; and thus concluding that fascism can be left wing.

No, I did not. Basically I'm arguing that the USSR pretended to be "left-wing" but were actually "right-wing". So perhaps they were fascist, but that doesn't imply that truly left-wing governments and movements are fascist.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#267

Post by mirimir » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 1:04 PM UTC

chinesempire wrote: post #235

mirimir wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually the full quote is: > fascists on both the far-left and far-right of the political debate According to Merriam-Webster, fascism is:[0] > a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible su…

> the Soviet Union was arguably fascist No, it wasn't. Fascism is not simply "what you don't like" If USSR was arguably fascist, so are the USA then. Do you think bombing other countries for their oil or to seize control of countries close to the enemy borders (like in Vietnam) looks more democratic or fascist? USSR has been at war in Afghanistan for 9 years, mainly because USA financed the resistance, creating and a…

I agree with most of your comment. So I guess that I wasn't very clear in mine, if it elicited yours :(

> If USSR was arguably fascist, so are the USA then.

I wouldn't argue too hard against that. It's just that the US hides it better. Or at least, it seems that way at times.

But my main point is that the term "fascist" is being misused to mean extremist and intolerant of opposition. So many today who are "left-wing" are so, but that doesn't mean that they're fascist.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#268

Post by quotemstr » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 1:05 PM UTC

No. Totally wrong direction. Apologizing to a mob is just terrible advice. It's going to get people's careers and lives ruined. A mob cannot forgive, especially on Twitter. Never grovel in front of one. Apologizing to a mob and begging for a respite just makes the mob angrier. A platform-level feature to make this groveling easier is just going to encourage this wrong-headed response, and it can't possibly work, because even if you disable direct replied, people can still post about whatever they want an amplify their anger in a million other ways.

The article is right about one thing: social media is a hothouse of hate. The best way for us to get out of this dystopia of rule by Twitter mobs is to ignore everything that happens on Twitter. It's not the real world.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#269

Post by tarkin2 » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 1:15 PM UTC

ssalazar wrote: post #86

noobermin wrote: post #57

I think this work is great and interesting, and I respect it. One of the things I feel like it lacks is a discussion of the broader context: we all sort of suspect that one of the reasons Twitter does not generally allow for de-escalation (like FB not censoring misleading news articles) is that such escalation is in fact part of their revenue stream (escalation=more engagement), so while I think ideas like this would…

"Engagement" is the "paper clip maximizer"[1] of the modern software industry, or more generally an example of "instrumental convergence." Optimizing engagement without regard for negative externalities is a catastrophic ethical failure of the major players in the software industry, and we are finally seeing a backlash both from mainstream advertisers and widespread public outcry. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In…

Thank you for posting this. I rarely see anyone in tech discuss the negative sides of our success.

We revel in the adrenaline that chasing numbers provides yet rarely ponder the destructive nature of achieving those numbers.

Re: De-escalating social media conflict

#270

Post by luckylion » Sun, Jul 05, 2020, 1:20 PM UTC

sukilot wrote: post #254

luckylion wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may be true at some point in the future, but I believe we're quite far away from it. Most users on the internet are not savvy at all, and I don't see that changing. I had expected the younger generations to be "digital natives", but they're not. They know their apps and services, but it's not a generalized understanding to how things work or what's common. Imho the fact that adblocker-usage isn't approaching 100…

Why are you calling people "unsavvy" for understanding the complexity of how money works and how they can influence th behavior of billionaire elites?

You can understand different things to different degrees, you can have a better or worse understanding of web-technology (and computers in general) than of consumer activism. I don't believe that the average consumer has a great understanding of either, but my experience is that they certainly don't understand the technology they use more than they need to.