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Resignation Letter

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Re: Resignation Letter

#631

Post by y2kenny »

bsder wrote: post #618
throwaway894345 wrote: post #603

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should simply allow political stances that have real harm to simply run amok with "debate"? Yeah, I'm kinda done with the "debate" idea. It's time to bring "consequence" to people's political stances. At least you're open about your opposition to free speech. That's something I guess... In your mind, are your political cohorts always going to wield the power to cancel or can you imagine a world in which the far…

> At least you're open about your opposition to free speech. "Free speech" is about the government suppressing your speech. If private individuals find your speech odious, they are perfectly within their rights to shun and ignore you. > In your mind, are your political cohorts always going to wield the power to cancel or can you imagine a world in which the far right wing holds that power and persecutes you and yours…

> "Free speech" is about the government suppressing your speech.

No it's not.

"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." -- United Nation Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 19 https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/

Re: Resignation Letter

#632

Post by HeavyStorm »

acituan wrote: post #288
jrumbut wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have 1,600 journalists last year that were sent to 150 countries [1]. What other organization is doing anything like that effort to gather facts around the world? Who is doing more collective discovery (and making it accessible to the public at a price an average person can afford)? I can only think of a handful of organizations that are serious candidates (Reuters? The BBC? Wikipedia?). Weird puff pieces, drama…

> They have 1,600 journalists last year that were sent to 150 countries ... to gather facts around the world Journalism is not our fact gathering apparatus. It is our sense making and relevance deciding apparatus based on those facts. If we don't have good journalists providing those functions, we are left with the ersatz, AI based versions to decide what to pay attention to; twitter's, youtube's recommendation algor…

I completely disagree - the main purpose of the journal is to expose _facts_. It's, of course, impossible to dissociate those facts from opinions they are always written by people, and people will always hold an opinion over subjects, whether they want or not.

But the best journalists thrive to separate their opinion from facts and make it clear to readers when it's one or the other.

Re: Resignation Letter

#633

Post by dragonwriter »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #630
zzleeper wrote: post #625

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WSJ? They do a better job at disguising their right-wing biases as reporting facts. I used to resd it daily 10-20 years ago but now I need to read it very carefully.

WSJ isn’t perfect, but they aren’t “right-wing”, and they at least try to mask their biases, which makes them markedly better than NYT, WashPo, etc in my opinion.

> WSJ isn’t perfect, but they aren’t “right-wing”

WSJ was solid right in the editorial but pretty neutral in news (though clear ideological bias was creeping in in the last decade or so) back before News Corp bought it out to augment their right-wing propaganda empire.

Now, it's definitely more high-brow and less in-your-face, beat-you-over-the-head with unsubtle propaganda than, say, FOX News, but it's just as clearly directed at the same ends.

Re: Resignation Letter

#634

Post by Nerdfest »

Taikonerd wrote: post #610
sillypuddy wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bloomberg had 2,300 editors and reporters in 72 countries in 2010. The Wall Street Journal had 2,000 journalists in 85 news bureaus across 51 countries in 2012.

The WSJ and Bloomberg are OK, although they tend to have business-heavy coverage. I feel like there's a real market opening here, for a centrist, general-interest newspaper. (Suggested slogan: "Like the NYT Was 20 Years Ago.")

I've seen some pretty right-wing stuff on WSJ in the last few months.

Re: Resignation Letter

#635

Post by nazgulnarsil »

yahnu wrote: post #608

I used to be a skeptic of MSM in general but started reading/following NYT and some other major news outlets about an year ago to challenge my own mindset. From what I have seen, to my surprise, the NYT's opinion section does encompass diverse viewpoints and reports in general are neutral in tone! Any criticism I have seen of NYT are either nitpicking (example: headline being too moderate) or taking an incident that…

consider that neutrality may be dependent on where one stands.

Re: Resignation Letter

#636

Post by [deleted] »

enraged_camel wrote: post #248
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #27

> Twitter is not on the masthead of The New York Times. But Twitter has become its ultimate editor. As the ethics and mores of that platform have become those of the paper, the paper itself has increasingly become a kind of performance space. Stories are chosen and told in a way to satisfy the narrowest of audiences, rather than to allow a curious public to read about the world and then draw their own conclusions. I…

>> Can't anyone there see past the current insanity and think? "To be inclusive, we have to get rid of her"? Don't they even hear the words coming out of their own mouths? This confuses a lot of people, but the explanation is simple: it is the Paradox of Tolerance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance Namely, not tolerating someone, who themselves espouse intolerant views and give voice to intolerant ex…

[deleted]

Re: Resignation Letter

#637

Post by [deleted] »

RonanTheGrey wrote: post #602
orwin wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But, in 2020 you cannot question or be skeptical of the "progressive" agenda. Merely hinting that you are not fully bought in will get you labeled as a racist, or even worse these days, a "Conservative". Is it really the case? Or is it a perception you have? I've become less and less liberal the past three months, for multiple reasons, and at least in my liberal bubble, i did not face any backlash.

I guard my opinions very carefully, to the point one would be hard pressed to identify what political ideology I identify with (largely because I don't identify with any of them). The other day on Twitter when the couple pointing guns at the protesters in Kentucky issue was trending, someone posited "I wonder what happens to people who don't have guns". So I posted a video of a couple who were dragged out of their sh…

[deleted]

Re: Resignation Letter

#638

Post by stale2002 »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #594
stale2002 wrote: post #534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But that doesn't mean it's wrong People aren't just expressing their opinion. Instead a whole bunch of people are engaging in actual illegal harassment, when these mobs start up. No, I am not talking about criticism. I am talking about the actual harassment that often comes out of these mobs. Harassment such as death threats to you, your friends and your family, and the like, all because someone said something dumb…

When we debate cancellation, we're mostly debating other kinds of harassment: doxxing, pressuring one's employer to terminate an employee, and defamation. Specifically, we're talking about harassment campaigns --in other words, large movements that engage in any of these behaviors for the purpose of punishing wrongthink. While these mobs have a few people who make death threats, there aren't usually large enough numb…

> When we debate cancellation, we're mostly debating other kinds of harassment:

Sure, but I think it is unfortunately that this is the only thing that people talk about.

The reality is that there is a whole bunch of stuff that is really really bad, such as death threats and the like, that will happen whenever there is a hate mob/harassment campaign that was started against someone.

When people try to defend these kinds of online mobs, they tend to focus more on the grey stuff, and they try to ignore the really bad stuff that happens. It is much easier to defend someone just "criticizing" another, instead of the much worse stuff that I've seen happen.

I don't think that someone should be able to distance themselves from the truly horrific stuff that can come out of these kinds of movements. It is much worse than people just be criticize, or whatever. And people need to recognize that those kinds of things happen.

IE, the stuff that happens can often be even worse than the, admittedly still very bad things that you brought up that I agree shouldn't happen either.

And by bringing up the even worse stuff, it gives less room for contrarians to make arguments and claims like "Well, actually, criticism isn't harassment", or "well actually, maybe the person deserved to be the target".

Re: Resignation Letter

#639

Post by joly_ »

dcolkitt wrote: post #394
jakelazaroff wrote: post #7

> All this bodes ill, especially for independent-minded young writers and editors paying close attention to what they’ll have to do to advance in their careers. Rule One: Speak your mind at your own peril. Rule Two: Never risk commissioning a story that goes against the narrative. Rule Three: Never believe an editor or publisher who urges you to go against the grain. Eventually, the publisher will cave to the mob, th…

There's a fantastic Slate Star Codex essay (which unfortunately I can't ironically link to, because that blog was cancelled by the New York Times) about the very point you raise. Basically anytime someone famous and successful comes out against cancel culture, the standard rejoinder is it can't be so bad. Doesn't seem to have stopped your career, so why are you whining? And the point is for every high-profile person…

I think the article is "CAN THINGS BE BOTH POPULAR AND SILENCED?", archive link https://perma.cc/9XBH-VQT9

Re: Resignation Letter

#640

Post by [deleted] »

dcolkitt wrote: post #394
jakelazaroff wrote: post #7

> All this bodes ill, especially for independent-minded young writers and editors paying close attention to what they’ll have to do to advance in their careers. Rule One: Speak your mind at your own peril. Rule Two: Never risk commissioning a story that goes against the narrative. Rule Three: Never believe an editor or publisher who urges you to go against the grain. Eventually, the publisher will cave to the mob, th…

There's a fantastic Slate Star Codex essay (which unfortunately I can't ironically link to, because that blog was cancelled by the New York Times) about the very point you raise. Basically anytime someone famous and successful comes out against cancel culture, the standard rejoinder is it can't be so bad. Doesn't seem to have stopped your career, so why are you whining? And the point is for every high-profile person…

[deleted]
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