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Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

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491–500 of 1001 posts

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#491
post #276
post #231

All of these HN comments are defending shouting "Fire!" falsely in a theater under the guise of it being a slippery slope before all speech is lost. I have lost a lot of respect for these slippery slope arguments because they are easy to make and ignore the obvious problem which is that some speech shouldn't be tolerated... Especially intolerant or harmful speech.

> which is that some speech shouldn't be tolerated who get to decide what should/shouln't be tolerated ? harmful/harmful ? facebook ?

We do. You act like collective decision making is impossible while living in a democracy based on it.

Who gets to decide our taxes, criminal code, safety regulations, or election rules?

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#492
post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, perhaps, by no longer having access to Facebook, Mr Trump's eccentricities may moderate? Facebook does people a service by cutting them off. I honestly see such disconnections as healthy. If only they would cut people off before they are radicalized. Conversely, Mr Trump is now a free agent looking for a nest elsewhere. There is probably lots of closed door planning happening: "What do we do if he decides to use…

My guess is Trump is going to create his own media company to compete/destroy Fox News.

yep, i made the same prediction in another thread. To go further, i bet it will be and livestreaming commentary on inauguration day and probably outperform the actual inauguration in terms of viewership.

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, now this will overshadow the WhatsApp blunder. Great timing.

What's the WhatsApp blunder?

It's still on the front page of HN. Forcing people to allow data to go to Facebook if you use Whatsapp.

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#496

A single social network shouldn't wield this much power - and I mean not the act of suspending a political figure but the fact that doing that has such a big impact. I'm not saying Trump should be unblocked from Facebook here. It's the fact that him getting blocked to begin with is a big enough deal to at this point probably have hundreds of news articles written about it that deeply bothers me. We handed the keys to…

> We handed the keys to the public square

Not only in virtual spaces.

'In 2010, during a London Assembly planning and housing committee meeting, Jenny Jones, from the Green party, said: “It has taken us eight years to negotiate with More London so that we politicians can do a TV interview outside our own building.”'[1]

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/aug/04/pops-privatel...

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#497
This is so Facebook.

* Enables and encourages (and makes money off of) spreading hate messages on their platform for years

* Hamhandedly does a full reverse and bans of one of the leading spreaders only after it's too late to make a difference.

* But just in time to curry favor with the groups newly in power.

A twist to the old cliche: too much, too late.

How cowardly.

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#498

I don't like the thought of trillion-dollar advertising companies being the custodians of the platforms where (sadly) a majority of speech in the world happens. That being said, if direct calls to violence and to insurrection against a democracy aren't grounds to take away your megaphone, then what is? If you're a free speech maximalist you'll be opposed to any sort of "censorship" (then again, people with those view…

I'm neither a free-speach maximalist, not a Trump supporter - on the contrary, I would say I'm pretty far left-wing. And that is exactly why I feel pretty ambivalent about this. Because what if next time there is a BLM demonstration in front of the Capitol, or for any other progessive issue? What if things get worse here, and we need a democracy movement / "peaceful revolution" like in east Europe? Then I might find myself on the other side of the ban.

I have the theory that we never really defeated fascism in western society. But mass media limited what you could say in public and so we kept a lid on it. Imagine someone disputing an election or calling for violence in the New York Times or on prime time TV. But with the internet and social media, this control function fell away. As a society we are realizing how problematic this can be and slowly reinstating the limitations that we had before the internet.

This silences the violent, the racist, and the extreme right-wing-nuts, but it can also silence progressive ideas and marginalized voices if we are not careful.

Right now we are moving to a situation where people like Trump cannot speak on the common public forum (putting the lid on them), but they can cause a lot of damage. I'd rather have the opposite situation, where they can rant as much as they want, but the society is so strong and principled that they cannot cause damage. But we are far from that, so I guess the pragmatic solution is to put the lid back on for now...

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#499
> Facebook "indefinitely" blocking Trump's account is meaningless theater.

> The Stop The Steal hashtag is still active. Stop The Steal events are "currently happening" ras we speak. And there are Stop The Steal groups with thousands of members you can join right now.

https://mobile.twitter.com/broderick/status/1347228893124702...

Re: Facebook Indefinitely Suspends Trump

#500

Good. This was absolutely the right move from Facebook. Finally.

[flagged]

Trump - and his supporters - are the "they". They are the monsters here. They are the ones invading capitols. They are the ones emboldening white supremacists, racists and fascists. They are the one demanding to overturn the legitimate outcome of a democratic election.

It's an insult to the millions and millions who died during WWII to corrupt the message behind this famous poem/statement and insinuate that Trump and his supporters are the victims here. They are not the victims. They are the problem. And they need to be crushed.

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