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Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

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Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#121

Post by partiallypro »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #89
partiallypro wrote: post #58

There is a lot of strawmanning when it comes to free speech. Virtually no one claims the 1st Amendment guarantees people a platform or that it applies to corporations. Yet, I see people clarifying that constantly...when no one is saying otherwise. Free speech as an American ideal, that's all people are really saying. Anyhow, Joyent has every right to shut down their hosting services to anyone they feel...and no one r…

You say it's a straw man, but for example literally two top-level comments down from yours (as of right now at least) is this [1]: > If you're not a courageous and principled defender of free speech, you should get out of the cloud business. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18318895

Where does that mention the 1st Amendment or a guarantee of the 1st Amendment when it doesn't relate to government? It doesn't. When people say "free speech" don't assume they are only talking about the 1st Amendment. Free speech is a civic ideal, not just a government one.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#122

Post by partiallypro »

jbarciauskas wrote: post #63
partiallypro wrote: post #58

There is a lot of strawmanning when it comes to free speech. Virtually no one claims the 1st Amendment guarantees people a platform or that it applies to corporations. Yet, I see people clarifying that constantly...when no one is saying otherwise. Free speech as an American ideal, that's all people are really saying. Anyhow, Joyent has every right to shut down their hosting services to anyone they feel...and no one r…

>Are we setting the right precedent, because while we all likely agree that things like Daily Stormer and Gab are platforms for truly hateful people...are we emboldening them by driving them underground? Yes. No. I don't find the slippery slope argument compelling. As a society we can decide what is and isn't within the realm of reasonable debate and discourse. Whatever the lines are, the discussion of racial suprema…

Since there have been large crackdowns on these sites, violence and seething has ticked up across the globe, and the "far right" has taken control of more governments (and I'm not talking about Trump, I'm talking about Europe/South America where there are open threats of violence and anti-Semitism.) I am just saying that perhaps driving these people underground where they can't be monitored is not the best approach.

I would argue that it is possible that cracking down on public platforms them gives them a platform in and of itself that once did not exist. It's similar to a Streisand effect. People become even -more- radicalized because they feel "oppressed." It sort of reminds me of how the ATF raid on Waco unwittingly played into their cult's idea of the apocalypse and has since bred people like McVeigh.

THAT is the slippery slope.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#123

Post by someguydave »

uniqueid wrote: post #120
someguydave wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Isn’t viewing someone as “beyond the pale” such that they deserve summary punishment and/or execution dehumanizing? How is that different than the guy who tortured small animals because he views them as objects and not living things? 2. Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves. Consider this video: https://youtu.be/NUqytjlHNIM

> Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves. Somehow I have found myself arguing for violence, which wasn't so much my original intent. I mainly wanted to remind the OP it's an American value to oppose demagogues and authoritarians. The clip I linked is from a film which is one of the best-selling and most critically successful pieces of Ameri…

Thank you very much for your candor and honest engagement. You made me feel better about America's future.

>The clip I linked is from a film which is one of the best-selling and most critically successful pieces of Americana.

This is true, but I would like to take issue with this scene in particular. The guy might not have been a Nazi sympathizer - he might have thought that the Soviet Union was far worse, and it was better not to have intervened.

>If the court had been less tolerant, they would have spared 6 millions Jews, 20 million Russians, and many others.

Yes, and the Soviet Union had already murdered 3-8 million people in the Ukraine famines before the war started. It's not easy to make moral calculations in foreign policy.

>how much obligation do we have to give a talking stick to a movement that condones torture for fun

There's no doubt that's disgusting, but I would put it to you in a different way: wouldn't you rather the "movement" be given the right to speak so that they can expose themselves as lunatics to the public? Violent (or peaceful) suppression magnifies the amount of potential sympathy they could gather in the public eye.

Who can precisely define the line between "beyond the pale" and "normal speech"? If you can't put it in words that can be written down and made law, then it's merely a matter of subjective opinion. Human history has taught us that suppression is used against all kinds of minorities, virtuous and otherwise. It's best to avoid it altogether, for fear of endangering human liberty.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#124

Post by partiallypro »

walrus01 wrote: post #77
partiallypro wrote: post #58

There is a lot of strawmanning when it comes to free speech. Virtually no one claims the 1st Amendment guarantees people a platform or that it applies to corporations. Yet, I see people clarifying that constantly...when no one is saying otherwise. Free speech as an American ideal, that's all people are really saying. Anyhow, Joyent has every right to shut down their hosting services to anyone they feel...and no one r…

If you want to host something really controversial, but not illegal on the internet, do as the largest adult websites/content providers have done, and become your own ISP. Put your own gear in colo at some major IX points, get an ASN and IP space, hire some network engineers who know bgp, etc. Buy transit from like 5 different top ranked (by CAIDA ASRANK) transit providers, and set up peering. This is a great deal mo…

In the end it's just going to lead people to using the "dark web" more and more. Making for it to be harder to monitor. It also doesn't help that registrars are pulling the plug as well, because you can't truly be your own registrar.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#125

Post by arcseco »

krschultz wrote: post #112
otriv wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that The Daily Stormer is creating their own content while Gab is just hosting others. I'm sure I could find YouTube comments equally as bad as comments on Gab.

The era of tech washing their hands of being accountable for user generated content on their platform is over. YouTube works quite hard to keep their platform safe. It's still not good enough. But I'm sure they have more people working on that problem than have ever worked on Gab.

Do you think 4chan also be moderated in this way and users purged for using abusive language? And how do I become the moderator of language? I sure would like to be the gate keeper of acceptable speech.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#126

Post by charlesism »

someguydave wrote: post #123
uniqueid wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves. Somehow I have found myself arguing for violence, which wasn't so much my original intent. I mainly wanted to remind the OP it's an American value to oppose demagogues and authoritarians. The clip I linked is from a film which is one of the best-selling and most critically successful pieces of Ameri…

Thank you very much for your candor and honest engagement. You made me feel better about America's future. >The clip I linked is from a film which is one of the best-selling and most critically successful pieces of Americana. This is true, but I would like to take issue with this scene in particular. The guy might not have been a Nazi sympathizer - he might have thought that the Soviet Union was far worse, and it was…

  > so that they can expose themselves as lunatics to the public?
How worldly and erudite is the public? How are they supposed to know?

Besides, it's not necessarily the case that there is any "correct answer." There have been societies that were extremely brutal. I read somewhere that ancient Mayans may have played soccer with human heads. I presume Mayans were generally content with that sort of society.

I happen to like the living in a liberal democracy, and I'll advocate for liberal democracy as long as there's breath in my lungs. That doesn't mean it's objectively better. It's just better to those who share my values. There are probably plenty of sound arguments for other systems under which I personally could not bear (or perhaps be allowed!) to live.

  > suppression magnifies the amount of potential sympathy they could gather in the public eye.
Hrm, it's not that simple. There is no one outcome when you suppress people. Sometimes they go away, never to be heard from again. Sometimes they redouble, and prevail. Often, they mutate and come back again in a more palatable form (how much more palatable, varies). I could list about half a dozen examples of this last case, if you want them.

It's tempting to think of humanity in terms of a narrative. The truth is, an asteroid could smash into the earth a year from now, and none of the human events we may feel are so inevitable today would come to pass.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#127

Post by SwellJoe »

jnbiche wrote: post #110
SwellJoe wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is there always an "all lives matter" person?

For the record I support BLM.

That's cool, and while I was dismissive, I was making a valid point, I thought (the audience disagrees with me, judging by my downvotes).

The point I was trying to make was that the tragedy you're referencing targeted people because they were Jewish. Saying, "oh, but white people have to be fearful, too" dismisses the hate that drove this despicable act of terror, and it hides the purpose of it. Terrorist actions are meant to scare specific people, and white folks (by the terrorist's definition, which doesn't include Jews) aren't who this terrorist wanted to scare. He wanted to remind Jewish people of what he views as their proper place...running scared. He also had a history of white supremacist posts throughout his twitter and gab history. This was a racially motivated crime, don't downplay that by saying white people could be a target, too.

While we (white folks) could be the target of hate crimes, in the US today, we are not. Jewish folks, black and brown folks of all sorts, LGBTQ folks, are the target of hate crimes, and in growing numbers.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#128

Post by ubernostrum »

faissaloo wrote: post #107
jbarciauskas wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if, instead of either of these, we made it clear as a society that advocating violence against or the elimination of a class of people is unacceptable and we gave no venue for that conversation whatsoever?

But most people believe some people should be eliminated, the only thing that changes is who depending on your political alignment.

I think some people should suffer social consequences for their beliefs, which may include absolutely no-one from "polite" society being willing to associate with them unless/until they show a genuine change.

Those people, in turn, tend to believe that people like me should be forcibly rounded up into camps, gassed, and then cremated or dumped into mass graves.

Do you really and truly believe, deep in your heart of hearts, that these are exactly perfectly identically equivalent positions? That both of them consist of "eliminating" opponents? Because from where I'm sitting, only one "side" is advocating for actual literal violent mass extermination of the people they don't like.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#129

Post by ubernostrum »

mychael wrote: post #16

I don't visit Gab, but I will definitely be closing my Joyent account. If you're not a courageous and principled defender of free speech, you should get out of the cloud business.

Do you believe a baker should have the right to refuse to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple, if the baker has a deeply-held religious belief that same-sex relationships are sinful? If the baker turns out to have that legal right, would you argue that baker should nonetheless not exercise that right?

Asking because people in these kinds of threads often seem to get suspiciously selective about when and why they decide to argue for stripping the right of free association -- and disassociation -- from others.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#130

Post by cjhopman »

lgleason wrote: post #103
cjhopman wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually when people make these statements, they don't actually mean it. If Gab were strictly a child porn site, would it be okay if Joyent stopped serving them? If yes, then your absolutist statement isn't actually what you mean and it's just a question of where to draw the line. If not (which has yet to have been the case when someone initially stated such a trivial statement), then I disagree with you and maybe the…

Making racist statements is not against the law in the US. Child porn is. As such they would have a legal obligation to cut them off if they were hosting child porn.

Oh please. Smoking marijuana is illegal in every part of the US but every so-called "defender of free speech" that I've met would be totally up in arms about a host shutting down a site for being involved in that.
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