YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation • Hacker News Board

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#611

Post by oceanplexian » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #558

BariumBlue wrote: post #545

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Perpetrators of lies will even hide behind this, and create a false image of rebellious heroism, instead of facing public discourse and the consequences thereof. Unfortunately, I think it's a bit of a classical liberal ideal that "the truth will come through and those who were wrong will see the error of their ways". To some, the truth is a tool. If it's not a useful tool, it will be discarded. Probably a more usef…

If you say it is naive to raise the idea that free speech alone will solve all issues, that is quite reasonable — but I would raise that is just as naive to think that a carefully administered censorship is an effective remedy, either. The only possible remedy in the end is to build our societies, our law, and our culture to be resilient against those cases when people are wrong, because they often will be.

There are countless examples in history where the majority believed medical facts that were utter nonsense, such as bloodletting, lobotomies, electric shock therapy, radioactive dinnerware, etc. It seems naive to think that somehow human nature has changed and the propensity of mobs to correctly determine what is factual or not is different in the 21st century.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#612

Post by cseleborg » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

jackhack wrote: post #528

Aeolun wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Censorship and other forms of regulating free speech is simply never a good solution. The almost free speech on the other side of the ocean seems to be working pretty well. You get to say anything that isn’t actively harmful to others, but you won’t be able to advertise bleach as a way to get Corona out of your system.

Nonsense. Almost free speech is censorship by another name. Working "pretty well?" Sure, unless one tries to talk about things that really matter and strays outside the dotted lines of permissibility. Some topics are verboten. When you say "other side of the ocean," I assume you're talking about Europe. Try to discuss the muslim rape gangs in the UK. Try to discuss the surge in grenade attacks and many-fold increase…

You're getting free speech wrong, at least by european standards. In Sweden or in France, you can certainly discuss the topics you proposed without risking prison or worse. But free speech applies to other people as well, who are equally free to refute your opinion. Free speech is not censorship merely because it stops at other people's basic rights. That's merely finding a balance between fundamental rights that may come in conflict.

Russia and China do not have free speech. If you say the wrong thing there, you go to prison (or worse). That's censorship.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#613

Post by Nasrudith » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:17 PM UTC

marbletiles wrote: post #567

dgb23 wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> things are going to need to be sacrificed I say this for emphasis, not to personally attack you: Whenever I read or hear this it makes me extremely suspicious, because it often doesn't come from those who will do the sacrifice themselves. Censorship and other forms of regulating free speech is simply never a good solution. Perpetrators of lies will even hide behind this, and create a false image of rebellious heroi…

The way to preserve free speech (really "free promotion" or "free publishing" in this case, as there are other avenues for these videos) is exactly what you say — consequences. Newspapers have free speech, but are subject to libel laws, for instance. There's no real mechanism to hold YouTube to account for promoting and spreading this stuff, and they are naturally incentivised for that mechanism never to come about.…

Funny how consequences always means bad ones, "people who say something I don't like get the stick!" and then later "I never thought I would get the stick sobs person brutalized with stick!".

Free speech is sancrosanct for a reason.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#614

Post by notahacker » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:17 PM UTC

jackhack wrote: post #528

Aeolun wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Censorship and other forms of regulating free speech is simply never a good solution. The almost free speech on the other side of the ocean seems to be working pretty well. You get to say anything that isn’t actively harmful to others, but you won’t be able to advertise bleach as a way to get Corona out of your system.

Nonsense. Almost free speech is censorship by another name. Working "pretty well?" Sure, unless one tries to talk about things that really matter and strays outside the dotted lines of permissibility. Some topics are verboten. When you say "other side of the ocean," I assume you're talking about Europe. Try to discuss the muslim rape gangs in the UK. Try to discuss the surge in grenade attacks and many-fold increase…

> Try to discuss the muslim rape gangs in the UK.

Like front page newspaper stories, senior politicians and even a dramatisation on the desperate-to-be-inoffensive BBC, you mean? Sure, not everybody approves of people whose take on the cases obsesses about the ethnicities of the perpetrators above all else, but free speech doesn't mean a point of view has to be agreed with.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#615

Post by mmmm2 » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:18 PM UTC

gotoeleven wrote: post #546

Aeolun wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Censorship and other forms of regulating free speech is simply never a good solution. The almost free speech on the other side of the ocean seems to be working pretty well. You get to say anything that isn’t actively harmful to others, but you won’t be able to advertise bleach as a way to get Corona out of your system.

Speech that is controversial is the only speech that needs protecting. You don't need free speech to protect your cat pictures or tweets about a salad you ate.

Even in the most corrupt police state you are free to publicly praise the people in power.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#616

Post by shadowgovt » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:18 PM UTC

umvi wrote: post #609

shadowgovt wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our fellow citizens elected a reality TV star as president of a country with nuclear weapons. People are passing judgment for, I think, fully rational reasons. The Atlantic has had several good articles on how fundamental societal trust is dissociating in America. The election of Trump isn't the only aspect of it, but it did scare about half the country into thinking the other half isn't rational in the same way they…

> Our fellow citizens elected a reality TV star as president of a country with nuclear weapons. But not the majority of our fellow citizens (by popular vote). Though you could argue that a large % of democratic voter base (voters looking for handouts) is also uneducated.

The size of the electing body is a little irrelevant. People trusted the system to disallow someone as unqualified as Trump, and it does not. Disillusion with that system runs high.

If anything, it probably runs higher than it would have if he had been elected by a majority. People feel let down not only by their fellow citizens, but by the laws that govern who is president.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#617

Post by Njikl » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:18 PM UTC

tossAfterUsing wrote: post #600

TeaDrunk wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you indicate some cases where the precedence of hate speech law has been expanded? Thank you!

Canada has some good examples of this.

Okay, then name the examples. It's not sufficient to say that examples exist without any further proof.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#618

Post by umvi » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:20 PM UTC

tw04 wrote: post #607

owlbynight wrote: post #174

I'll preface this by stating that I hate the idea of censorship and I always have. However, were I to happen across someone motionless on the floor with a needle in their arm, I would give them NARCAN instead of a ride to a rehab center. I'm from the United States. Social media is currently poisoning our country to a degree that I think it may be too late to try and draw out the fight for free speech by using free sp…

I don't know how this ever became an issue of "free speech" in the first place. This isn't a matter of free speech and never has been. If you call up Rush Limbaugh or Howard Stern in the middle of afternoon drive hour and he doesn't like what you have to say, he's going to hang up the phone on you (assuming you could get through in the first place). This is no different - google has absolutely no obligation to host y…

Free speech is a meaningless freedom if there are effectively zero public fora in which you can exercise it.

"I said some garbage on Rush Limbaugh's show, so he hung up on me"

"So then I put it on Facebook, but Facebook censored it"

"So then I put it on Youtube, but Google censored it"

"So then I self hosted, but then Cloudflare censored it"

"So then I hosted it out of my own house, but then Comcast blocked it"

"Oh well, I'm not in jail so that means I still have free speech I guess"

I would say the above are signs of a decaying democracy.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#619

Post by mistersquid » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

owlbynight wrote: post #174

I'll preface this by stating that I hate the idea of censorship and I always have. However, were I to happen across someone motionless on the floor with a needle in their arm, I would give them NARCAN instead of a ride to a rehab center. I'm from the United States. Social media is currently poisoning our country to a degree that I think it may be too late to try and draw out the fight for free speech by using free sp…

> Banning obvious bullshit, albeit akin to censorship, is NARCAN.

This is the crucial comparison.

YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook do not promulgate free speech. They are driven by algorithms that prioritize certain information over others. Such algorithmic prioritizations are not platforms for free speech and removing harmful content from these algorithmcally-generated feeds is not the same as censoring speech in the domain of free discourse.

Given YouTube's algorithmically-generated feed, removing certain harmful content is more accurately identified as curation than censorship.

Re: YouTube bans coronavirus vaccine misinformation

#620

Post by shadowgovt » Thu, Oct 15, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #604

shadowgovt wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's always a fallacy. If A leads to B, B leads to C, and C is bad, argue that people shouldn't do B, not A. Especially if A also leads to D, which is good.

If jumping out of a window usually leads to uncontrolled descent and flight into terrain, which then leads to experiencing a very large and sudden velocity change, which is followed by death from the injuries caused by said ∆v/∆t, I'm definitely going to argue against jumping out of a window. Sure, for the above A->B->C->D(eath) chain, there are many ways to prevent it from reaching the last node, but the default beh…

But if you're arguing not to jump out a window, and I have base jumping experience and am wearing a parachute, the argument is silly. Especially if the building is on fire.

Slippery slope arguments assume A leads to D and discard any positive effects A could have out of hand. That's why they're a fallacy.