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Why do you host offensive content?

nearlyfreespeech.net

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Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#121

Post by sam_lowry_ »

Kye wrote: post #98
waynecochran wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This requires nuance and discussion, but things like the following are generally not productive and not protected by free speech. Defamation against private individual (including libel and slander) Child pornography Blackmail Incitement to imminent violence Solicitations to commit crimes I think any discussion concerning "ideas" is fair game. It gets murky when dealing with individuals. None of the things on the list…

>> "Defamation against private individual (including libel and slander)" What if it's against a group of individuals?

Like commies in 50..60ies.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#122

Post by waynecochran »

mikestew wrote: post #103
waynecochran wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about downvotes -- it was the immediacy of it.

That just means that a person inclined to downvote your comment saw it within seconds after posting. It’s not like there’s a shot clock for posts.

"saw it" bit did not "read it"

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#123

Post by jimbob45 »

UncleMeat wrote: post #55
waynecochran wrote: post #10

If it is offensive because it stems from "bad ideas" then it is imperative that it is posted in the "public market of ideas" so it can be exposed and refuted. If it is not posted then folks will not know how to refute it when it crops up again -- and it will. Free Speech for bad ideas is as important as free speech for good ideas. Don't be offended. That's your choice. P.S. This doesn't mean that everything offensive…

We've known how to refute genocidal racism for ages. The ideas aren't new and the reasons why they are garbage aren't new. Yet these ideas still exist and still spread. Why has the market of ideas not destroyed these ideas? If the market cannot destroy even the most terrible ideas that humans have ever devised, what does that really say about the market?

You have to keep refuting it for each new generation just like you have to teach each new generation the law of conservation of mass despite it having been proven over and over for centuries.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#124

Post by waynecochran »

sam_lowry_ wrote: post #121
Kye wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "Defamation against private individual (including libel and slander)" What if it's against a group of individuals?

Like commies in 50..60ies.

Publicly denouncing a group of specific folks as communists, when they were in fact not communists I believe was illegal even in the McCarthy era (that's libel if posted and slander if spoken publicly).

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#125

Post by rthrowayay »

UncleMeat wrote: post #55
waynecochran wrote: post #10

If it is offensive because it stems from "bad ideas" then it is imperative that it is posted in the "public market of ideas" so it can be exposed and refuted. If it is not posted then folks will not know how to refute it when it crops up again -- and it will. Free Speech for bad ideas is as important as free speech for good ideas. Don't be offended. That's your choice. P.S. This doesn't mean that everything offensive…

We've known how to refute genocidal racism for ages. The ideas aren't new and the reasons why they are garbage aren't new. Yet these ideas still exist and still spread. Why has the market of ideas not destroyed these ideas? If the market cannot destroy even the most terrible ideas that humans have ever devised, what does that really say about the market?

There are 8 billion people in the world. I'm not surprised some of them hold terrible ideas. The idea that some people hold X view so now we need to give the state Y power is insane with our population level because it can justify anything.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#126

Post by smsm42 »

stcredzero wrote: post #50
falcolas wrote: post #4

Honest, but leading, question in return: Offensive to whom? 90% of the population? Wouldn't that block out the Church of Satan's distributed materials (that is, coloring books)? To 80% of the population? Wouldn't that be the Book of Mormon? To 60%? The Quran? I think this part of their answer is a great response: "Of course, the simplest reason is that it's not up to us to decide what the rest of the world should or…

Check out their MFFAM policy. Search for, "What is the "MFFAM" policy?"

The policy is a bit of a misnomer though - as I understand, that's them funding the fight - by donating the money that would otherwise be their profit - not the "morons". But I think that's a very acceptable way to handle the problem.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#127

Post by gwbas1c »

Over the last few years I've been questioning what it means to have freedom of speech. This quote in particular strikes me:

> Finally, censorship is always bad, for a variety of well understood reasons that we don't need to repeat here. But in the case of some types of content, it has special dangers. When you censor a web site based on the extreme or dangerous views of its creator(s), you haven't stopped those people from thinking that way.

Why? The problem is that I've seen someone who was very close to me repost propaganda on Facebook that looks like it's following the Nazi propaganda playbook. Stuff against immigrants, against religious minorities, ect. Just take some classic Nazi propaganda, swap out "jew", and that's this person reposts.

(Or used to, as this person recently complained that Facebook is blocking their posts.)

Anyway, I don't think that this person really thinks this way; instead I think this person's thinking is manipulated to push a political agenda.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#129

Post by rthrowayay »

Frondo wrote: post #54
Nursie wrote: post #7

> "Finally, censorship is always bad, for a variety of well understood reasons that we don't need to repeat here. But in the case of some types of content, it has special dangers. When you censor a web site based on the extreme or dangerous views of its creator(s), you haven't stopped those people from thinking that way. You haven't made them go away. You certainly haven't stopped the people who hold those views from…

I used to be much more of a free-speech absolutist. It wasn't til I started reading about how genocides start that that started to change for me. There is a pretty direct line drawn between speech and violence against out-groups; anyone who says otherwise would do well to read about the Rwandan genocide and their 200 days of public radio broadcasting demonizing the Tutsis prior to the genocide itself. After all, if t…

Controlling speech in order to prevent violence does not work when the people carrying out the violence control the institutions. In your Rwandan example the Rwandan government could not be trusted to censor their own goals. The situations where this works are much rather and smaller because it is about preventing violence that doesn't have major backing.

Re: Why do you host offensive content?

#130

Post by Kye »

waynecochran wrote: post #118
Kye wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "Defamation against private individual (including libel and slander)" What if it's against a group of individuals?

Do you have specific example in mind?

For example: claiming gay people are pedophiles, or that trans women are men in dresses trying to sneak into bathrooms to assault people.

Claims like this--and these are the tip of the iceberg--target groups of people and affect every individual within. It's like passive libel/slander that every member of the group has to contend with.

It can even affect people outside the group. I don't think I know of a straight man under 30 who isn't afraid someone will think they're gay if they do the wrong thing. And more than a few cisgender women get run out of bathrooms because they present in a more masculine way.

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