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Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

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Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

India has one of the most robust Internet trolling, astroturfing apparatus in the world. You will not be treated well if you criticise the government.

That doesn't match my experience. My ex-colleagues and I used to criticize the government regularly, and publicly, when I lived there, and we faced no hostility or opposition.

Been my experience too. It's annoying/sad, but not hostile.

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that you have to search for the name shows you are not enough clued in about what is happening in India. Wish you take some time out and get the facts straight from some Indian friends to understand both side of the story. It will become a long comment, all I can say , BBC, NyTimes etc has some axe to grind with the current dispensation.

Being Indian, I am clued in well enough. I understand by "Indian friends" you mean upper caste Hindu Indian friends who are Modi acolytes and his primary voting demographic. Not Indian Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Dalits or Shudras who form greater than 50% of the Indian population.

No, I mean people with loads of common sense who can tell you both side of the story.

>> Not Indian Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Dalits or Shudras who form greater than 50% of the Indian population.

Acc to you, if they are more than 50% AND not happy with Modi, why is Modi winning back to back elections and almost certain to come to power again in 2024?

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#114
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

[flagged]

> In hindsight Nazism is an almost cartoon like singular epitome

Not that singular, even in its time, which is why we usually call the more general thing that it is an example of by the name of its Italian contemporary and ally.

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#115
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then banning bomb making is censorship but there’s no opposition to that.

Banning instructions on how to make bombs would be censorship. Banning the making of bombs is not censorship.

The former is banned.

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#116
post #79
post #17

Interesting, because Indian Government recently jailed an independent fact checker for a tweet he made 4 years ago. This new body seems to be a tool to suppress dissent and promote the fake news machinery Government and the ruling party is notorious for. https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/alt-news-pratik-sinha-mohamma...

Altnews the left wing version of Tucker Carlson. I'd go as far as to say that if Alt-news told me there was no Earthquake in my house, my first instinct would be to find cover. Local and politicized news in India is notoriously biased. But the direction of the bias varies from news org to news org. Somehow, American & British news orgs are notorious for giving megaphones to the worst faith actors within Indian politi…

Alt News is much more similar to Rappler, a Filipino news website and fact checker whose founder (Maria Ressa) was awarded the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize after she was arrested and convicted by the Filipino ruling government for "cyberlibel" in retaliation for her journalism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rappler

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Ressa

The Peace Research Institute Oslo nominated the Alt News founders (Mohammed Zubair and Pratik Sinha) for the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize after Zubair was jailed for "hurting religious sentiments" in retaliation for his journalism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Zubair_(journalist)

https://www.prio.org/nobelshortlist

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the usual protocol of astroturfing. Accuse the whistleblower of something vague and discard them with name calling. Straight out of playbook of authoritarian governments. Nothing new. I searched the name Nupur Sharma and it gave me this article which explains everything. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-61716241.amp It says that the fact checker shared a video of what she said.

The fact that you have to search for the name shows you are not enough clued in about what is happening in India. Wish you take some time out and get the facts straight from some Indian friends to understand both side of the story. It will become a long comment, all I can say , BBC, NyTimes etc has some axe to grind with the current dispensation.

Please do something new than the other authoritarian shills. It’s the same playbook.

Why do you assume that everyone outside of India is incapable of understanding things on their own and need help from Indian friend? Why do you patronise? Isn’t that racist? Isn’t the that some kind of twisted supremest thinking?

I can read the stats and make up my mind on my own.

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#118
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

[flagged]

Argumentam ad Hitlerum isn't awesome either.

Let me restate my point. A persons reasons for supporting the Nazis in 1933 may be quite different from the reasons you think people are pro-Nazi in 2023. So such comparisons don't add very much to the discourse.

That's not whataboutism right?

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#119
post #4

I'm not even opposed to flagging posts as “fake, false or misleading” because abusing those flags will cause them to be ignored, but removing content is a problem. State censorship is a much bigger threat to Democracy than false or misleading tweets and facebook posts.

I find it fascinating that people defend censoring "misinformation" because people (supposedly) cannot discern it from "real" information. If we cannot trust the judgement of the common folk, why have a democracy at all?

Yes, very pertinent. The hypocrisy is obvious that voting 'adults' need to be protected from 'misinformation'.

Re: Indian government empowers itself to “fact check,” delete social media posts

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that you have to search for the name shows you are not enough clued in about what is happening in India. Wish you take some time out and get the facts straight from some Indian friends to understand both side of the story. It will become a long comment, all I can say , BBC, NyTimes etc has some axe to grind with the current dispensation.

Please do something new than the other authoritarian shills. It’s the same playbook. Why do you assume that everyone outside of India is incapable of understanding things on their own and need help from Indian friend? Why do you patronise? Isn’t that racist? Isn’t the that some kind of twisted supremest thinking? I can read the stats and make up my mind on my own.

Of course when you come here with a half-baked knowledge and accuse someone* of astroturfing , one has to call you out.

By your own admission, for the first time you heard Nupur’s name, you did a quick search and within minutes you reached the conclusion what you wanted to reach.

Since when asking to understand the issue in depth - rather than a 2 mins cursory look up - racism?

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