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Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

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Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the left has been written about extensively but I’d love to read a sympathetic, anthropological investigation into it. I say sympathetic because I don’t believe you can understand anything without really seeing how a reasonable person could come to those same conclusions.

René Girard has done an anthropological investigation of this topic. The gist of it is through the psycho-social mechanism of scapegoating, opposing groups can simultaneously believe they are victims while acting as oppressors, often using their victim status as justification for their oppression of "the other". Girard explores this phenomenon of scapegoating and postulates it goes back to primitive humans e.g. durin…

Thank you for referencing Girard!

Agreed that this is a compelling hypothesis

Have you looked through “A thousand plateaus” from Deleuze/Guattari (I don’t know anyone who has actually read the whole thing)?

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#202
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not advocating censorship to call for platforms (& co) to combat hate speech. Can you link to anything that actually backs up that claim of yours?

It clearly is censorship. Maybe you're conflating censorship with the First Amendment? The Constitution only protects certain kinds of speech. Only that of citizens with respect to government, and only Americans. When people speak about censorship, they are referring to all kinds of censorship by people all over the world, including private companies censoring individuals.

So just to be clear: you consider it censorship when the rest of the world tells you "you cannot harass x group by utilizing this set of harmful language"?

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#203
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it’s pretty important to point out that Signal allows you to import this number with a QR code, so it’s not very arduous to do to verification.

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I enjoy the internet because I can interact with and learn from people with very different skillsets and experiences than me. I don't think I would enjoy it very much if it were only used by computer enthusiasts.

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#206
post #46

Signal would be a lot more pragmatic if they would develop a funding model based on selling something for actual money, rather then subsisting off donations. Sell "Signal for Business" accounts or something so I can stop having my bank or local government depend on SMS to communicate with me. I know a number of doctors who'd really love to be able to use Signal to talk to their patients (and would tell them to instal…

If they sell anything at all, it exposes them to the local regulations of wherever they are taking money, and then the survival of the org and technology becomes dependent on the income, which has conditions attached to it. Saying Signal should sell something is like recommending someone develop a drug habit.

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

René Girard has done an anthropological investigation of this topic. The gist of it is through the psycho-social mechanism of scapegoating, opposing groups can simultaneously believe they are victims while acting as oppressors, often using their victim status as justification for their oppression of "the other". Girard explores this phenomenon of scapegoating and postulates it goes back to primitive humans e.g. durin…

Thank you for referencing Girard! Agreed that this is a compelling hypothesis Have you looked through “A thousand plateaus” from Deleuze/Guattari (I don’t know anyone who has actually read the whole thing)?

I timidly approached Deleuze a few years ago but didn't make it very far, haha. Should probably give it ago again... did you find it useful?

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#208

> The company’s aggressive pursuit of growth, coupled with lack of moderation in the app, has already led Signal employees themselves to publicly question whether growth might come from abusive users, such as far-right groups using Signal to organize. Lol what? What exactly does far-right mean in this case? Why intersperse irrelevant political digs at another ill-defined faction? Does far-right just mean non-progress…

> What exactly does far-right mean in this case?

I thought, just maybe, they're referring to the groups of openly fascist Americans who attacked the US capitol and organized other violent events. But maybe you're right and "far-right" is meaningless. I don't know why you would be right - it doesn't even make sense to raise the questions you raised, but I supposed we should consider your opinion.

Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#209

> The company’s aggressive pursuit of growth, coupled with lack of moderation in the app, has already led Signal employees themselves to publicly question whether growth might come from abusive users, such as far-right groups using Signal to organize. Lol what? What exactly does far-right mean in this case? Why intersperse irrelevant political digs at another ill-defined faction? Does far-right just mean non-progress…

Proud Boys would be a good example. Not sure why they have to single out the right though. I guess every periodical has to take a stance on politics. The original source just said: """ Employees worry that, should Signal fail to build policies and enforcement mechanisms to identify and remove bad actors, the fallout could bring more negative attention to encryption technologies from regulators at a time when their ex…

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Re: Signal walks the line between anarchism and pragmatism

#210

> The company’s aggressive pursuit of growth, coupled with lack of moderation in the app, has already led Signal employees themselves to publicly question whether growth might come from abusive users, such as far-right groups using Signal to organize. Lol what? What exactly does far-right mean in this case? Why intersperse irrelevant political digs at another ill-defined faction? Does far-right just mean non-progress…

Proud Boys would be a good example. Not sure why they have to single out the right though. I guess every periodical has to take a stance on politics. The original source just said: """ Employees worry that, should Signal fail to build policies and enforcement mechanisms to identify and remove bad actors, the fallout could bring more negative attention to encryption technologies from regulators at a time when their ex…

> It’s not only that Signal doesn’t have these policies in place. But they’ve been resistant to even considering what a policy might look like.

Could it be that Signal hadn't considered this type of policy because it's in exact opposition to e2e messaging? I swear these government propagandists don't even try to hide their intentions.

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