101–110 of 823 posts
> According to a recent survey of adults in the US aged 18-39, almost a quarter said they believed the Holocaust was a myth, that it had been exaggerated or they weren’t sure. Wow!
To me that seems like three very different positions to be bucketed together?
Admirable move. I think Facebook (and all its properties), Twitter, and other hyper-connected social networks must show a healthy level of intolerance towards groups and ideologies that are beyond reason and recall, especially when those said groups are overtly and unmistakably intolerant themselves. This heavy-handedness isn't an encroachment on free speech but a necessary impediment to keep the spirit of free speec…
How would you have them weigh in on the Armenian Genocide, Holodomor, or Tianenman? Each of those conflicts has deniers of various levels, some of whom are states. And, if Facebook gets it wrong (and perhaps decides the Tianenman square massacre was a hoax by the West to discredit the CCP) - how should we respond then? This is a company that was censoring pictures of mothers feeding their babies, but still has conten…
Not sure about Facebook in the Ukraine; I googled it and an information page came up first, not sure if people in the Ukraine can actually access it.
Facebook is banned in China, so that's not an issue there.
Anyway Facebook is far from perfect, and in cases like this they have to push their own agenda; they try to look neutral and an open platform but in some cases it's difficult.
I want to mention something about facts vs government denial, but in some cases said facts / history itself is rewritten, to the point where we can no longer be sure. I wouldn't be surprised that if the right-wing gains more power, we'll see another modern biblioclast with e.g. historical records of the holocaust and/or slavery removed. The (failed) Confederate state's remnants already tried that by writing their own elementary school history books wherein slaves were depicted as well-treated helpers (look up the Daughters of the Confederacy, or e.g. https://www.facingsouth.org/2019/04/twisted-sources-how-conf... ).
The effects of the losers writing the history books in the South are still felt today (it's only been a few generations, and the pro-Confederacy history books were still being used up until the boomers generation).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In reality it's like Comcast. You could theoretically switch ISPs, but realistically and in practice it's a monopoly.
A monopoly on what? Spamming users with cat videos / baby videos and various other irrelevancies? I haven't used Facebook for many years and I can contact family and friends just fine. Granted I use WhatsApp, which is owned by Facebook, but WhatsApp doesn't suffer from censorship (to my knowledge).
I don't know what Facebook is for, but I'm told that Telegram is a great replacement for Whatsapp and even people who both have Whatsapp seem to prefer Telegram between them.
Admirable move. I think Facebook (and all its properties), Twitter, and other hyper-connected social networks must show a healthy level of intolerance towards groups and ideologies that are beyond reason and recall, especially when those said groups are overtly and unmistakably intolerant themselves. This heavy-handedness isn't an encroachment on free speech but a necessary impediment to keep the spirit of free speec…
What is tolerance? You can't tolerate something if you agree with it. Tolerance means putting up with things with which you disagree.
This is an encroachment on free speech (and it's intolerant). You may believe that it's necessary -- and perhaps you're right: maybe the country will fall apart unless we censor voices outside the mainstream. But to frame this issue as you have done is nonsensical, as if, through sheer power of righteous will, you can transmute censorship into something else.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you completely blind to the countercultures that have popped up completely unchecked because of social media bans?
So, unless hate is completely unchecked, it will be completely unchecked?
Before you accuse me of failing to understand the sensitivities of victims of the Holocaust or the nature of Austrian anti-Semitism, I should tell you that I am the son of Austrian Jews. My parents escaped Austria in time, but my grandparents did not. All four of my grandparents were deported to ghettos in Poland and Czechoslovakia. Two of them were sent to Lodz, in Poland, and then probably murdered with carbon monoxide at the extermination camp at Chelmno. Another one fell ill and died in the overcrowded and underfed ghetto at Theresienstadt. My maternal grandmother was the only survivor.
So, I have no sympathy for David Irving's absurd denial of the Holocaust-which, in his trial, he said was a mistake. I support efforts to prevent any return to Nazism in Austria or anywhere else. But how is the cause of truth served by prohibiting Holocaust denial? If there are still people crazy enough to deny that the Holocaust occurred, will they be persuaded by imprisoning some who express that view? On the contrary, they will be more likely to think that views people are being imprisoned for expressing cannot be refuted by evidence and argument alone."
Peter Singer.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Facebook is a private entity. Facebook’s shareholders have given Mark Zuckerberg and his management team the power to manage the company as they see fit. If users disagree with the terms and conditions of using the site, they don’t have to use it.
This is an accurate description of how things are , but they don't have to be that way.
This has many advantages:
1. It does not force groups into underground forums
2. It raises visibility to everyone that there are people with strange ideas and how many of them there are (which I personally think is a problem if it grows too big)
3. It removes the potential argument of such a group that they are suppressed or that online content is moderated by people that "try to hide the truth"
4. It removes the ability to easily censor valid criticism/movements (Hongkong?) because the censorship infrastructure is already in place
5. It leaves some really strange and sometimes funny content that I can dive into if I get really bored, such as believers in flat earth. It can be good entertainment
I believe that if such content really has to be banned, we have already lost the war