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Voat Is Shutting Down

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Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#451

Post by dwardu »

torben-friis wrote: post #380
ignoranceprior wrote: post #4

Voat was founded as a neutral free-speech platform. After alt-right extremists were booted off reddit, they found a new home there. The site was bombarded by /pol/ chan culture, and after that nobody else of other political persuasions really wanted to join. Kind of like that "paradox of intolerance" meme. Free speech platforms usually end up becoming extremist platforms. I remember going on voat a couple years ago a…

For someone who has a bit of context: is this supposed to be real or tongue in cheek? It sounds like mental illness to me but maybe I'm just incredibly out of touch with the reality of the average voat user. > I will lay Voat upon the cross on December 25th 2020 at 12 noon PST. I have chosen Christmas as the day to do so in honor of the only True thing you will find in this world and that is Jesus Christ, the son of…

nothing bad about that. are you just annoyed jesus was mentioned?

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#452

Post by spion »

Spivak wrote: post #216
sthnblllII wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? It took a huge mobilization of media manipulation fear mongering and gas lighting to get the American public to swallow the Weapons of Mass Destruction and/or Saddam did 9/11 lies. If people had been free to speak their minds ( https://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/21/phil_donahue_on_his_2... ) back then we wouldn't have been lead into that war like lemmings. Information is control. I trust the funny cat lady n…

Other ways lies survive. * By being easily digestible and easy to state while the the refutation requires a long form explanation. * By spreading faster and being repeated more often than the truth preying on our innate bias toward things we’ve heard before. * By being tied to an unrelated political ideology or issue of intellectual or moral superiority. * By gaslighting where the authority of truth tellers are under…

Its not just lies either, its honest mistakes that are novel and/or cause emotional reactions. The retweet button is a mistake amplifier

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/359/6380/1146

People need to become aware just how bad most social media content that reaches them is.

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#453

Post by eska »

strken wrote: post #410
renewiltord wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So the answer has to be to stop the witch hunts in the places where everybody else already is. Got to be honest, bro, I don't really care to sacrifice for "the good of society" or whatever. If you make a website where some dude is going to post anti-Semitic shit everywhere and someone else is going to have to politely explain that Jewish lizard people are not conspiring to elect a Black woman as President then sure…

A more complete answer is that as platforms become more mainstream and get locked down, they crack down on all forms of transgression. This includes the forms we might come to view as a good thing in hindsight, and the ones we personally indulge in. The balance is currently that sites like Reddit allow a broad range of content, and have so far not banned a wide enough range of topics to push a significant enough frac…

This is not true. Reddit's political forums do not censor calls to violence against police for example (i.e. actual hate speech). At the same time they shut down the_donald while arguing that they threaten police (which is BS, since conservatives love the police).

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#454

Post by rswail »

BrandoElFollito wrote: post #392
esperent wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can we discuss if overweight people should pay more for sits in a plane? Can we discuss if a trans male who identifies herself to be a woman should be allowed to take part in female sport competition (box, running)? I am afraid we no longer can discuss such "uncomfortable" topics You can debate those things on reddit without being censored on a lots of subreddits. However, the reason these are such contentious topi…

The examples @piokoch made are very good. Seats in planes were designed for average people. It means that myself, as an average person, have the right to be relatively comfortable in that chair. If an obese person sits next to me, I have nothing against them on a human level - but the fact that they use my space. They are not comfortable either (certainly physically and probably psychologically) so if we accept obese…

Regarding the plane seats, the solution is that airlines provide larger seats for all passengers. The problem of obese passengers encroaching on fellow passengers "space" is because airlines have consistently reduced that "space" over the last 2 decades or more.

However, either obesity is a disability, in which case, perhaps the ADA or equivalent could be used to force airlines to provide accomodation, or it is not a protected class, in which case, airlines should force them to purchase two seats.

In sports, there are leagues and classes of competition that attempt to provide a "minimum platform" for teams to compete. That's why teams move up and down from the soccer premier leagues etc.

The problem/issue of trans-gendered individuals being on teams they don't "belong" to is going to be changed over the next decades given that genetic modifications and enhancements are likely to be available via CRISPR etc.

Drugs are banned in sport to avoid people using "artifical" enhancements to their innate trained abilities. If someone gets genetic modification to enhance, say, their muscles abilities to use energy, how are you going to police that?

Have everyone playing submit their genome for examination?

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#455

Post by base698 »

howlgarnish wrote: post #162
cbozeman wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its not that free speech platforms are destined to fail, its anonymity. You're not responsible for your words. That's why these fail. Notice I use my real name here on this website. Not a pseudonym. Whatever I say here, I would say to you in front of your face. Same as I do on Facebook and Twitter and Reddit and the other areas I post. I've always used my real name. I'll always use my real name. We don't require anyo…

"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." -Cardinal Richelieu, c. 1600 (attributed to, anyway) Given the political climate we're in and the complete intolerance to anything but the most milquetoast pablum in Silicon Valley these days, it's a brave or foolish person who posts anything online under their real name these days.

Seriously, all risk and no reward.

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#456

Post by spion »

intended wrote: post #395
pryelluw wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think charging for a forum account would change the outcome? Would having people pay for a user account in order to be able to post on a forum reduce the amount of hate speech and related?

No. Here’s a thought experiment I’ve come up with to illustrate this: what happens tomorrow if we shut down all social media (to whatever level you define social media.) This gets to the crux of the issue - the underlying reality of the speed of information broadcast/transmission and the social-informational structures that are constructed to absorb it.

We probably already have the means to develop tech to solve this, its just not in the interests of most SM platforms - and since they're proprietary you can't really make a 3rd party company to offer a filtering / "lens" solution either.

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#457

Post by arbitrage »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #50
ignoranceprior wrote: post #4

Voat was founded as a neutral free-speech platform. After alt-right extremists were booted off reddit, they found a new home there. The site was bombarded by /pol/ chan culture, and after that nobody else of other political persuasions really wanted to join. Kind of like that "paradox of intolerance" meme. Free speech platforms usually end up becoming extremist platforms. I remember going on voat a couple years ago a…

> Free speech platforms usually end up being extremist platforms. ...when the popular platforms stop being free speech platforms. Reddit, in its earlier days, was never dominated by the Voat contingent. They were there, but they were far less extreme there than they were on Voat. And then whenever they would post rank inaccuracies, there were clearer-minded people to point out why they were wrong, in the same place w…

So, what you're saying is that there are good people on both sides?

Piss off with your fascist apologist garbage. Hate isn't guaranteed a platform.

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#458

Post by joepie91_ »

lukeramsden wrote: post #381
esperent wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can we discuss if overweight people should pay more for sits in a plane? Can we discuss if a trans male who identifies herself to be a woman should be allowed to take part in female sport competition (box, running)? I am afraid we no longer can discuss such "uncomfortable" topics You can debate those things on reddit without being censored on a lots of subreddits. However, the reason these are such contentious topi…

> The last 1% is people who legitimately care about these people and want to discuss their wellbeing and rights. But I'm putting that in to be generous, I don't think I'm ever seen these topics discussed in good faith. Or do your existing opinions mean you view all discussions on this topic as bad-faith, exactly as the parent comment describes? > However, the reason these are such contentious topics is that 99% of th…

> Or do your existing opinions mean you view all discussions on this topic as bad-faith, exactly as the parent comment describes?

Not likely. That in and of itself is a bad-faith claim frequently used by bigots to try and evade getting thrown out of a venue, by turning around the accusation onto those calling out bad behaviour. Unfortunately a lot of peope have taken this claim at face value, and have started repeating it.

The thing is, I have discussed these sorts of topics with people in good faith. The common factor is that those discussions were never in public venues, because someone who wants to discuss these topics in good faith realizes that they are sensitive and easily-abused.

On the other hand, every time I've seen someone "discuss" these topics in public, there were clearly identifiable signs of bad faith, independent from the topic itself. It usually doesn't take much prodding to make the mask come off, so to say.

Edit: For additional background, I'm mostly speaking with my "community moderator" hat on, here. I somewhat regularly get brought in to clean up mismoderated communities that have gotten completely out of hand, so over time I've learned how to identify bad-faith actors quickly, separately from opinions.

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#459

Post by Can_Not »

marvin wrote: post #344
ashtonkem wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Folks can rant about free speech all they want, but no sane person would actually want to experience it. Always remember that "free speech" is 100% about the right to say what you want and not be prosecuted for it . It has never, ever been about the social consequences of any particular one person's speech. Insulting your boss and getting fired isn't an abridgement of free speech, neither is getting banned from the…

This is the canonical meme of free speech, but there's a corollary that is becoming increasingly relevant. People who repeat what you just wrote usually seem to ignore it: If every arena where people actually meet is privately owned, and all of these places agree on what ideas are valid topics of discussion, the effect on society will largely be the same as if a state actor suppressed free speech. We're not quite the…

> There will be people who make life-changing mistakes because they didn't have access to a viewpoint that catalyzed an insight that was important for them.

This goes both ways though. Some people will choose to transition their gender because internet people might over-encourage them, but far more people who should transition won't because trans erasure, censorship, and discrimination was the norm until this decade. And technically, mostly still is the norm. You have far more "don't you dare imply being trans is ok" IRL than you have "don't you dare imply being trans is not ok" online.

And this comment leaves out critical facts. Medical professionals don't just hand out pills and surgeries to anyone who just walks in. Individuals are given serious consultations where they can help get a diagnosis and then the ability to make an informed decision in regards to their options.

People who regret transition are actually a tiny minority. Why is it a tiny minority? Because medical professionals put a lot of effort into vetting patients.

People getting "censored" are actually just repeating "somebody once regretted it, therefor no one should ever get it" over and over again, usually in less honest wording, often just transphobia or bullying just for the sake of it.

In normal parlance, this is just called "moderation".

Re: Voat Is Shutting Down

#460

Post by cycomanic »

piokoch wrote: post #309
renewiltord wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So the answer has to be to stop the witch hunts in the places where everybody else already is. Got to be honest, bro, I don't really care to sacrifice for "the good of society" or whatever. If you make a website where some dude is going to post anti-Semitic shit everywhere and someone else is going to have to politely explain that Jewish lizard people are not conspiring to elect a Black woman as President then sure…

Yes, but there is some middle ground between antisemitism and following what mainstream loves the a given point of time. And right now if someone dares to stick outside mainstream views this is considered hate speech, anti-XXX, etc. Can we discuss if overweight people should pay more for sits in a plane? Can we discuss if a trans male who identifies herself to be a woman should be allowed to take part in female sport…

These comments always reek of hipocrasy. Try having a debate on the existence of God, the legitimacy of the church or even the right of gay people to exist somewhere in rural US, you often get threatened with violence (and I mean the actual physical kind) very quickly. But somehow it's the poor antisemists, or homophobes who complain about being "censored" in these discussions.

Two examples of the hipocrasy: John Safran knocking on doors to tell people about atheism in utah: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=A1G8nJ2IFjA And here how Tucker Carlsson reacts to his interviewees challenging him and guess what he never aired it (/s censorship!) https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6_nFI2Zb7qE

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