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Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#151

Post by complector »

scarejunba wrote: post #144

How does everyone have so much trouble with Facebook and Twitter? I have both and have used both for years and I know that both require you to pick what you want to look at. I exhaust my Twitter feed in seconds and then have nothing to look at. Both my FB feed and my Twitter feed are more heartwarming, adorable, funny, or touching than angry or whatever. Maybe all of this is just a reflection of who you guys are. And…

To borrow the catch phrase from XKCD, sometimes, it's just that:

  Someone is WRONG on the internet.
But there's a sort of natural conductivity/inductivity to social networks, that varies as you chain together personalities, and the dumber you go, the more emotive things get.

Ask any lawyer, picking a jury usually involves pulling the dumbest, most incompetent people, while polling for their gut alignment, relative to case at hand. These are the most emotional, and likely most easily driven to judgement. They also usually lack power in their daily lives, and are eager for some trigger time, so to speak.

So, now, put that on the internet. Pack these people together in clusters relative to their home towns and high schools, and never let them escape each other. Preserve every last memory, especially the most embarrassing ones that their family members can command, to bring an obnoxious personality to heel, if possible.

Take everyone with a shit job, with company and store policies design to screw the customer. Ever call center goon, every cellular and wireless store clerk gunning for contract sign ups. Ask them what's wrong with the world.

Now, randomly distribute agit prop into a flashing marquee on their home page, to gin them up, as they start cruising for love interests, and the unattainable crushes that taunt them on a daily basis. Give them parking tickets, too many bills to pay. Make them late with the rent. Get them pregnant.

Welcome to Facebook.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#152

Post by ben_w »

colordrops wrote: post #95
bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

"harm" is a pretty vague word, and the supreme court has laid down a very narrow definition of it with regards to speech.

The Supreme Court of one nation. Part of the problem is that not every nation agrees on the foundational principals to base everything else on.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#154

Post by yepguy »

Godel_unicode wrote: post #40
monochromatic wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So-called hate speech doesn’t cause harm other than to feelings. It’s constitutionally protected in the US, and Facebook is going down the wrong path trying to eliminate it.

It's constitutionally protected from the government infringing upon it. As Facebook is not the government, they are perfectly free to limit speech in any way they choose.

What hope does constitutional free speech have for the future if its citizenry doesn't hold the principle dear? The public must actually practice something that approximates the free speech protections they want from the government or else they will lose those protections.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#156

Post by pjc50 »

scarejunba wrote: post #144

How does everyone have so much trouble with Facebook and Twitter? I have both and have used both for years and I know that both require you to pick what you want to look at. I exhaust my Twitter feed in seconds and then have nothing to look at. Both my FB feed and my Twitter feed are more heartwarming, adorable, funny, or touching than angry or whatever. Maybe all of this is just a reflection of who you guys are. And…

You're not popular enough.

> unfollow

In the nastier situations, it's not people who you follow that's the problem. It's the people who @ you from a constant stream of new accounts.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#157

Post by chrisseaton »

PavlovsCat wrote: post #129
chrisseaton wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Having a bunch of likely millenial aged individuals with limited life experience A millennial is going to be around 30. They're not children. In fact they likely have children of their own.

Life experience isn't just a result of accumulated years, as one dictionary summarizes it: "experience and knowledge gained through living". If it rains a lot, but I don't catch any of it, I still have no water, yet if it rains just a tiny bit, and I hold out a cup, I do have some water. Of course, if I hold out a cup and it doesn't rain, I have no water either. You have to live to be able to gather life experience,…

I was replying to the idea that a millennial is a young person. They aren't. If you've got other comments about life experience direct them at the original commenter.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#158

Post by throw2016 »

There is a lot of apologism for censorship on this thread in sharp contrast to the threads on china and others where they are demonized for the exact same thing.

This is troubling as it seems when we do it commentators are ready with a litany of justifications in contrast to the blanket judgements on other discussions. This kind of double standards is abusive of discourse and the values sought to be defended and cannot then be a forum for informed discussion.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#159

Post by michaelt »

dropit_sphere wrote: post #72
bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

So this is the thing now? We don't believe freedom of speech is a good thing anymore? Who decided this? I don't recall being consulted on this. Not that I'd think of arguing , mind you! I'm loyal, I swear!

Back before internet access was widespread I saw a lot of people online who foresaw a future where an internet connection provided access to the sum of all human knowledge, and forums to participate in the marketplace of ideas. Between human curiosity, good will and people's natural desire to not be wrong, everyone will learn and reason their way to the truth (incidentally ending up agreeing with me).

Surely once everyone can access the equivalent of several university educations online, the masses will come to realise that sodomy should be legal for libertarian reasons; transparency and access to information will mean voters will demand and get honest officials; that employers will realise it's not rational to discriminate against a sysadmin for not wearing a dress shirt; and it'll be the year of Linux on the Desktop.

In the subsequent decades, people have re-evaluated some of those predictions for understandable reasons.

Re: Facebook’s Secret Rulebook for Global Political Speech

#160

Post by zeckalpha »

gojomo wrote: post #57
bduerst wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were completely full of willing listeners for hate speech, then that might be applicable. Hate groups aren't sending private forum messages to each other, they're broadcasting Even John Stuart Mill, a founding philosopher of free speech, postulated that speech needs to be curtailed when the expression harms others.

These platforms also censor private person-to-person messaging, between people who don't complain about the content. That's willing-speaker-to-willing-listener, and being censored. And, rather than trying to square-the-circle of global speech standards enforced by crude algorithms and rushed, underinformed low-wage moderators, they could make the remedy for unwanted speech simply unsubscribing/unfriending the source.…

The platforms may themselves be unwilling listeners.
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