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‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

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Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#131

Post by n0nc3 »

tptacek wrote: post #76
busterarm wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worse than that. We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't. It's the literal definition of fascism. And you see it being championed by people as defending against "the greatest threat to our democracy".

It has never in the history of western civilization been easier for people to inject random claims into the public discourse. Neither Mike Wallace at 60 Minutes nor Otis Chandler at the LA Times would have given an inch of space for QAnon or antivax, but the "giant corporations" you allude to today do so happily, and at a scale no newspaper publisher would have imagined 50 years ago.

Conversely, it has never been easier to inject true claims that are inconvenient for gatekeepers. What tilts the balance of equities in favor of censorship for you?

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#132

Post by dragonwriter »

busterarm wrote: post #47
varispeed wrote: post #40

The problem is that we didn't teach people about manipulation techniques because that was governments' favourite tool to control the masses. Now that anybody can reach anyone with any information, bad actors use these techniques to control people to their advantage. Governments' are now in an awkward position - ramp up education in these areas and forever give up a tool that worked for ages, or censor the information…

It's worse than that. We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't. It's the literal definition of fascism. And you see it being championed by people as defending against "the greatest threat to our democracy".

> We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't. It's the literal definition of fascism.

Well, its arguably corporatism, which exists in lots of non-fascist systems as well as being a part of fascism, and propagandizing the population, which also is done by lots of non-fascists systems, but unless its coupled with totalitarianism and militant, xenophobic nationalism I don't think going "fascism" is literally accurate of the current state, though its definitely a risk (since the propagandization + corporatism easily enables at least totalitarianism, and is also quite leverageable for the rest.)

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#133

Post by scottlocklin »

AntiImperialist wrote: post #63

As great as free press and democracies are, they also come with huge weaknesses. Those make it easy for foreign propaganda to influence the public and hence run the countries from outside. Thanks to The Great Firewall and the CCP rule, China is mostly immune to foreign propaganda. At the same time, China is using a lot of effort to affect countries with democracy and free speech, like India and the U.S. China is obvi…

Anyone who actually use the excuse of "foreign interference" for totalitarian censorship basically basically doesn't believe in the concept of democracy.

"Foreign interference" has been going on from day 0 in the United States. It very obviously got us into WW-1 (the British -a largely untold but very obvious info ops campaign for something that served no US national interest), it got us into the middle east (nothing the US does there happens but for foreign interference from Saudis, Emirates and Israelis, who overtly bribe our think tanks and politicians), and it fairly obviously got us our "free trade" policies which gutted the US manufacturing capabilities to the point we can't make enough surgical masks in the US to protect our people (thanks, China).

None of the above happened because of dipshits saying things on twitter or facebook or sharing Russia Today articles. None of the above will go away if the CIA, the political center and the tech oligarchs censor the internet to protect us from meaningless internet bugaboos.

It's a naked power grab, and anyone who supports it because of "muh democracy" is a collaborator with tyranny.

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#134

Post by paxys »

war1025 wrote: post #51
paxys wrote: post #24

Fits well with the current wave of authoritarianism/nationalism that has taken root all over the world. A free and open internet represents everything that a government that wishes complete control over its people would be afraid of.

The interesting thing about this is that nationalism is in general associated with right-leaning politics, and the censorship is far and away being applied more aggressively to those very same right-leaning nationalist groups. You would be hard pressed to find liberal / progressive content being censored online.

Huh? It's the exact opposite. In the US sites like Facebook & Twitter routinely refuse to censor conservative content even if it is against their policies because they are afraid of pissing off Republicans in Congress.

A "liberal" on Facebook calling for the beheading of a conservative politican would be banned (possibly even arrested) immediately. The opposite can and does happen every day, with no penalty.

And all this still isn't relevant because we are talking about government censorship.

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#135

Post by the-dude »

VBprogrammer wrote: post #125
busterarm wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worse than that. We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't. It's the literal definition of fascism. And you see it being championed by people as defending against "the greatest threat to our democracy".

The president of the United States has been using these platforms to lie to the entire world unashamedly. For the most part not even the skillful half truths, statistics and selective quoting that politicians are known for, just complete fabrications and nutjob conspiracies. The corporations had the choice to continue to be complicit, silence him completely or provide some balance from other sources. It seems to me t…

You are talking about Bush the 2nd right?

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#136

Post by dragonwriter »

teraku wrote: post #105
lilactown wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the literal definition of fascism but it's also Not Good(tm).

Yes, it's feudalism

> Yes, it's feudalism

Its really, really not feudalism, which is highly de-centralized.

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#137

Post by l33tbro »

Maybe I'm naive, but I'm done with trying to create startups that integrate within current online ecosystem. Startup culture bullshits on so much about "pain points" to solve in the world, but surely one of our biggest societal pain points right now is the Orwellian panopticon being assembled before us.

Online culture desperately needs rewilding, and I'm at the point now where I believe it is my moral obligation to only work on projects that work toward decentralizing the internet.

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#138

Post by cblconfederate »

neximo64 wrote: post #26

Emmanuel Macron has been getting newspapers to pull down their articles in the past few weeks (the FT usually never removes articles but they did too). I bet barely anyone notices. Interesting that politico sent one straight to print today without an online article first.

Wasnt that an editorial decision? he did write an opinion about them but how did he get them to pull them down?

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#139

Post by natoliniak »

ed_balls wrote: post #35

Can someone link to sources? Which sites Norway and Poland blocked?

it is unclear from the article what sites were censored in Poland and by whom (and i couldn't figure it out in the sourced paper). However, if in fact the Polish govt has censored any human rights websites, I feel like that should be bigger news there. AFAIK Poland only blocks access to certain gambling sites, which are publicly listed here: https://hazard.mf.gov.pl/

Re: ‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

#140

Post by mistermann »

VBprogrammer wrote: post #125
busterarm wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worse than that. We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't. It's the literal definition of fascism. And you see it being championed by people as defending against "the greatest threat to our democracy".

The president of the United States has been using these platforms to lie to the entire world unashamedly. For the most part not even the skillful half truths, statistics and selective quoting that politicians are known for, just complete fabrications and nutjob conspiracies. The corporations had the choice to continue to be complicit, silence him completely or provide some balance from other sources. It seems to me t…

>> We're seeing the teaming up of governments and giant corporations to control the narrative and tell people what's true and what isn't.

I think there may be some legitimate truth to this statement that you are not seeing.

Donald Trump is far from the only bad actor we've had in our history, and things weren't running smooth as silk before he arrived on the scene, but you sure wouldn't know it from the way people talk.

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