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Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

bbc.com

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Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#71

Post by MattGaiser »

sbilstein wrote: post #21
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #10

I'm skeptical of this kind of analysis without concrete examples of the kind of content that wasn't removed. Even if you trust the researchers (I personally am not familiar with them), there are legitimate reasons why they might not categorize things the same way as social media platforms. e: Turns out that the researchers' full report actually does contain concrete examples, which seem to be legitimately bad and tak…

I've reported this page countless times that purports to be about 'jewish contributions to society' but is clear as day dog whistling. https://www.instagram.com/jewish.contributions/?hl=en

> but is clear as day dog whistling.

I think it is dog whistling, but if you aren't familiar with anti-Semitic arguments and angles of attack, I don't think it is clear at all, which is probably the point.

On the surface it just seems like a list of facts and some are even seemingly laudatory, such as helping to end apartheid. The bad stuff is subtle or lower down the page.

If I were a moderator and just doing a quick check, I probably wouldn't spot anything wrong with the page.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#72

Post by fennecfoxen »

djohnston wrote: post #23

Does this include all the legitimate criticisms of Israel that people try to lazily deflect with accusations of antisemitism? Who is doing the counting?

The problem with banging the drum about "legitimate criticisms of Israel" is that they're co-occurent with illegitimate criticisms and anti-semitism.

There's also a very special kind of monomania. Some big account will post on Twitter or Facebook lamenting violence. "This synagogue in London got vandalized!" for instance, or perhaps "this US citizen living in the state of New York was beaten and there's security camera footage." Then about 500 people will immediately jump in to post, "Israel is bad!!"

Here, for instance, is Chelsea Football Club tweeting this past May, about a week after a Norwich synagogue was graffiti'd with a Swastika:

https://twitter.com/ChelseaFC/status/1396189477173923853 "Chelsea FC stands with the UK's Jewish community, and Jewish communities across the world, in the face of rising antisemitism. This hatred and intimidation towards the Jewish community is unacceptable and must stop."

Here's a blue check reply (accompanied by dozens of random Tweeters with the same sentiment):

"Condemning Israel attacks is not antisemitism, Supporting Palestine and against settlers is not antisemitism, Anti-Zionism is not Antisemitism". https://twitter.com/ManarSarhan/status/1396207673473970190

Consider replacing this with any other race. "Discrimination against African-Americans is bad!" posts the NFL, as someone has burned a cross in front of a Black church. But the Twitter replies stridently call out: "Look at the violence in Africa! Look at the dictatorships! Look at all those schoolgirls who were kidnapped in Zimbabwe!" Would you really tolerate that kind of reply for a second longer than it took you to overcome your disbelief?

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#73

Post by sbilstein »

MattGaiser wrote: post #71
sbilstein wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've reported this page countless times that purports to be about 'jewish contributions to society' but is clear as day dog whistling. https://www.instagram.com/jewish.contributions/?hl=en

> but is clear as day dog whistling. I think it is dog whistling, but if you aren't familiar with anti-Semitic arguments and angles of attack, I don't think it is clear at all, which is probably the point. On the surface it just seems like a list of facts and some are even seemingly laudatory, such as helping to end apartheid. The bad stuff is subtle or lower down the page. If I were a moderator and just doing a quic…

Yea I agree... the winky face emojis and comment sections tell you the audience knows exactly what they're looking at though.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#74

Post by fighterpilot »

afpx wrote: post #39

Unless people are inciting violence or organizing systematic discrimination, I think people should be free to say whatever they want. I understand why some people want to ban such speech, and there will always be those people, and there will always be ignorance and bigotry. It’s a slippery slope to give a subset of people control over what is allowed to be said. Maybe someone will point out my ignorance, too.

> It’s a slippery slope to give a subset of people control over what is allowed to be said.

Hate speech is also a slippery slope, as the Rwandan genocide and many other genocides/massacres attest to.

For those arguing for unfettered speech on social media, if you're going to convince me of your argument, you at least need to acknowledge that this history exists. If you're focused only on the risks associated with clamping down on free speech (which I agree are very real risks) and ignore the flip side of that coin, then it's hard to take the argument seriously.

The best I've heard from people making your argument is hand-wavy sloganeering of tired, unoriginal memes like "the best disinfectant is sunlight" or "the solution to bad speech is more speech", with at most one small anecdote provided in support of this idea.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#75

Post by JohnWhigham »

sbilstein wrote: post #70

Frankly when us Jews call out anti-Semitism, the whole room stands up to tell us what is and is not anti-Semitism. Imagine doing that to LGBT folks or other minorities. I'm not even much of an Israel supporter but it is exhausting to hear a bunch of white progressives who have never set foot in the Middle East tell me I am wrong about the criticism I hear. Recently, folks at Rutgers have been criticizing Campus Hille…

If people can't criticize Israel's actions as a country without being labeled anti-Semitic, then nothing is going to get solved.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#76

Post by fennecfoxen »

sbilstein wrote: post #70

Frankly when us Jews call out anti-Semitism, the whole room stands up to tell us what is and is not anti-Semitism. Imagine doing that to LGBT folks or other minorities. I'm not even much of an Israel supporter but it is exhausting to hear a bunch of white progressives who have never set foot in the Middle East tell me I am wrong about the criticism I hear. Recently, folks at Rutgers have been criticizing Campus Hille…

I have posted elsewhere in this thread about the reply of "anti-Zionism" which you will find whenever someone complains about anti-Semitic attacks and prejudice in places which are very much not Zion. If it's not anti-Semitic in intent, it's monomaniacal and inappropriate to the point where it's anti-Semitic in practice.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28037722

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#77

Post by rvz »

liorben-david wrote: post #51
hirundo wrote: post #42

I'm a Jew, a Zionist, and a knee-jerk supporter of Israel. That makes me the type of person many of these posts are hating on. But I don't think that they should be taken down. I would rather that the hatred of me and my tribe remain public and visible, so that we can see it and respond appropriately. Hiding it does not remove the sentiment or the danger. Words spoken against such hate, convincing people that it is n…

I'm with you, it's more just telling that these companies say they want to take down hateful speech, but anti-semetism always seems to be the exception. If I was setting their content policy I would allow it to, but something is off about claiming to be stop hatred but turning a blind eye to jews.

> I would allow it to, but something is off about claiming to be stop hatred but turning a blind eye to jews.

If they are true to enforcing their guidelines equally, then I should not be seeing 84% of anti-semitic posts still spreading around on these social media websites.

Either it is open season on 'hateful content' so that we can see who posted what and why, or everything gets banned entirely and every post is policed with 'guideline checks' everywhere.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#78

Post by fennecfoxen »

JohnWhigham wrote: post #75
sbilstein wrote: post #70

Frankly when us Jews call out anti-Semitism, the whole room stands up to tell us what is and is not anti-Semitism. Imagine doing that to LGBT folks or other minorities. I'm not even much of an Israel supporter but it is exhausting to hear a bunch of white progressives who have never set foot in the Middle East tell me I am wrong about the criticism I hear. Recently, folks at Rutgers have been criticizing Campus Hille…

If people can't criticize Israel's actions as a country without being labeled anti-Semitic, then nothing is going to get solved.

When synagogues in the UK are being vandalized with swastikas, when residents of New York and US citizens are getting beaten on Fifth Avenue, and people lament these things on social media, that is not an appropriate time to criticize Israel's action as a country. Yet this is the norm.

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#79

Post by dahfizz »

seattle_spring wrote: post #55
hobs wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the evolution of the GS conspiracies are just putting a name to the "Jews are running the world" conspiracies, giving him god like powers to manipulate and control.

Exactly this. It's a dogwhistle for extreme anti-semites, whether the people sharing it know it or not.

Assuming you are correct, does that mean it should be impossible to criticize Soros? A group of radicals dislike him, therefore he is beyond reproach?

Re: Anti-Semitic social posts 'not taken down' in 80% of cases

#80

Post by cultofmetatron »

hobs wrote: post #24
cultofmetatron wrote: post #9

I know this is probably going to cost me some downvotes on here but here goes... I've personally stopped listening or caring about this dog whistle after seeing it used constantly to squash any discussion of the Palestinian apartheid.

You can hold multiple things in your mind at once. "The Jews" are not Israel. The idea that anti-semitism is somehow intrinsically tied to Palestine is historically and obviously false. While there's plenty of reasons to hate Israel for its actions on Palestine the history of pogroms, blood libel, genocide, expulsions, etc goes on centuries before there was ever a nation to hate in the first place.

so first of all, I'm going to say that I agree with you in that antisemetism is a problem that predates the creation of Israel. While I disagree with the motivations for its founding, I understand why it happened given the sheer impact of the atrocity of the holocaust. It should never happen again.

I personally feel that should apply to everyone. No group of people should have to bear with an occupation and genocide. With that, Its a bit disingenuous when I see how israel treats the palestinian people. Here we are talking about internet memes that are antisemetic. I agree its a serious problem but at the same time, we have mainstream media which dehumanizes palestinians. Its close to career suicide to advocate for their rights if you're in the media. These people live completely annexed to an open air prison. For them a 9/11 type event is a tuesday.

You can hold two ideas in your head of course. But when it comes to what I focus my attention on. One side has funding and an active branch advocating for their humanity. The other is being systematically oppressed RIGHT NOW by an active miltary force.

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