We can have democracy or we can have Facebook • Hacker News Board

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#61

Post by lldbg » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:51 AM UTC

Renaud wrote: post #40

lldbg wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Religion is already banned in places such as France. Did not do them much good. A ban on free speech will be equally as effective.

What do you mean Religion is banned in France? I'm curious about what sort of twisted broad exaggeration and misunderstanding do you have to believe to drop something like that?

Perhaps it was a poor choice of words considering HackerNews nitpicking, but in france display of religious symbols (such as wearing a cross) is banned in public places (mostly). I wrote it that way for effect, thinking that people would be familiar with the french laws.

I have no "twisted broad exaggeration and misunderstanding" of belief. I don't think this chain of comments has a good tone, and won't reply further.

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#62

Post by eptcyka » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:52 AM UTC

mnd999 wrote: post #49

eptcyka wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your argument that free speech exclusively attracts the scum of the earth? Maybe these hate bubbles wouldn't proliferate if they had to co-exist on a platform with a diverse set of opinions. These people are heavily outnumbered. But of course, all the major platforms are so successful because they aggressively silo people into pigeonholes via curation.

They’re not outnumbered though. They’re backed up by sock puppet accounts, nation state funded propaganda / troll organisations out to cause trouble and well funded PR companies pushing populist agendas. It’s not a question of free speech vs censorship, it’s which type censorship do you prefer? The corporate kind or the shitposting bullying trolling kind?

What makes you think that it's just the baddies that employ troll farms?

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#63

Post by cookieswumchorr » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:52 AM UTC

mhoad wrote: post #7

The case for free speech absolutism has never looked more questionable than it does right now. Every online platform that has tried to market itself as a “bastion of free speech” has become overrun with the absolute worst of society and as of 2020 is directly implicated in multiple real life terrorist attacks including most recently in the Nez Zealand government’s post-mortem on the Christchurch shootings here https:…

censorship is connected to regimes who killed (and continue to kill) way more people then all the terror attacks combined. Also, if you let out governments and look at non-government terror, those who are internet-rooted, are a tiny fraction, and a joke compared to the real terror networks.

It's been a year since the Halle attack, the attacker is a joke: a typical internet incel as you would picture him. Infantile, insecure, physically weak, clumsy with his firearms. It would be literally funny if not for the two people he killed. Sorry for them, but, should we really sacrifice basic freedoms and rights, being afraid of THIS GUY?

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#64

Post by kiba » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:53 AM UTC

anovikov wrote: post #34

lldbg wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, the case for free speech has never looked as good. A few (even hundreds) of murders are an acceptable cost of free speech. Restricted speech has killed millions. Little by little the western freedoms are being taken away. And you want it to go faster? Rap music which idolizes violence is allowed, despite thousands dying every year in connection to crimimal enterprise. The case to ban rap is just as naive as th…

The free speech is well... a lot like right to bear arms. While you only had muskets, right to bear arms had a clear benefit (ability to quickly raise reasonably trained militia ready to fight in days) and little risks. Now that you can buy assault rifles, and war has become so high-tech that people who are trained to use small arms and nothing else aren't of any benefit in it - it has become a different thing.... Wh…

The problem is with facebook making a post viral. Anyone can post anything online, but it won't do any good or bad if nobody reads it.

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#65

Post by eptcyka » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:53 AM UTC

Mysterise wrote: post #9

I think the "Facebook bad" horse has been beaten down to Earth's inner core. Yes, Facebook has its downsides just as any other social platform would. Yes, you can live without it. But I don't believe that the negatives Facebook has enabled comes close to the utility it has provided to society.

What utility is there?

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#66

Post by refurb » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:53 AM UTC

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #47

anovikov wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The free speech is well... a lot like right to bear arms. While you only had muskets, right to bear arms had a clear benefit (ability to quickly raise reasonably trained militia ready to fight in days) and little risks. Now that you can buy assault rifles, and war has become so high-tech that people who are trained to use small arms and nothing else aren't of any benefit in it - it has become a different thing.... Wh…

Where can you buy assault rifles?

What’s an assault rifle? A normal rifle with features that scared people but have no impact on the actual lethality?

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#67

Post by cptaj » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:53 AM UTC

raxxorrax wrote: post #60

I am sick that "hate speech" is an alleged problem because some people read something on the net they didn't like. I also don't like the people that write it. But the reaction to it is just infantile and the exchange of ideas is degraded. The nature of the medium has intrinsic properties and that means that if you broadcast opinions, you always get pushback. It doesn't mean there is or is no justification for it. It…

The problem isn't an awkward exchange of ideas.

The problem is industrial-scale disinformation campaigns manipulating public opinion and discrediting every single thing you can imagine, grinding the free exchange of ideas to a halt at every turn.

Its a DDOS attack on that very same free exchange of ideas you mention.

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#68

Post by kiba » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:54 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #57

lldbg wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, the case for free speech has never looked as good. A few (even hundreds) of murders are an acceptable cost of free speech. Restricted speech has killed millions. Little by little the western freedoms are being taken away. And you want it to go faster? Rap music which idolizes violence is allowed, despite thousands dying every year in connection to crimimal enterprise. The case to ban rap is just as naive as th…

Yup. I think it’s absolutely shocking that people think that with free speech “this time it’s different” and it’s time to further restrict freedom of speech. The thing that really pushed me over the edge was the poll that said “98% of people don’t believe what they read on the internet”.[1]. Unlike many people, I actually have faith that people will accept the truth, eventually. It may take time and it may be messy a…

You mean people believe whatever they want to believe and discard the rest?

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#69

Post by firepoet » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:54 AM UTC

feralimal wrote: post #24

Yuck. Neither democracy nor facebook, thanks. Nor any nannying or moralising about hate speech. Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me. Or you.

Boy do I hate that phrase. It's absolutely incorrect from a neuroscience perspective. Words can in fact hurt you, and, depending on circumstances, cause long term psychological damage. Here's a place to start to learn more if you want: https://www.td.org/insights/the-neuroscience-of-reward-and-t...

Re: We can have democracy or we can have Facebook

#70

Post by gjulianm » Fri, Dec 11, 2020, 11:54 AM UTC

sneak wrote: post #2

It's troubling to me that censorship is being set up as the narrative savior of a free society, when in fact just the opposite is true.

There are alternative solutions to censorship. Censorship would just be a patch, and not even enough for the problems Facebook and other social media is creating. The issue is that Facebook has completely changed the incentives for what type of speech gets the most exposure. Now the contents of the speech do not matter, nor the source, nor whether it is true or useful or anything. Instead the metric is how much "engagement" it can create. Facebook will, by design, show on your timeline a lie that creates comments before a truth that doesn't. And it will do this time and time again, and the effect of the repeated exposures to lies is that even if you don't believe them, you will start doubting.

Society can't keep up with that. It isn't just that there are people with polarized opinions, it's that you have people with completely different views of reality. Propping up lies is incredibly easy, and doing the necessary research to disprove those lies and spread the result is orders of magnitude more difficult. It's impossible to keep up the rhythm.

The solution is not censorship, the solution is to force these companies to change those incentives. Stop with the automatic suggestions to get more engagement, stop showing content to people who didn't explicitly subscribe to it, stop the uncontrolled spread of content of any type. We can live without viral memes, we can't without a functioning society.