Like spreading a meme about a fighter ace that never existed? I’ve seen a lot of that, it’s wild to see misinformation spread like wildfire.
Pardon me, but how exactly is spreading an image of a war time hero - that frankly if real or not is needed - the same as spreading the notion that the west needs to be unraveled, the american capitalism destroyed (sure it needs improvement, but total obliteration?), countries erased, and that entire ethnicities shouldn't exist?
I have been blasted with propaganda and lies from the west for almost a week now. Things that never happened: - Ghost of Kiev - Sunflower Seed Lady - Snake Island Defiance - Miss Ukraine Airsoft Fighter Then I get sources of info closed off to me, I find that exceedingly concerning. The west is winning the information war, but at the cost of the truth? I’m of a mixed mind for sure.
What is actually concerning you? I don't think we actually need all the information at all right now. Ukraine is fighting an uphill battle and they are holding longer then anyone expected. If that's the price of the truth, im happy to pay it. The truth will get out eventually anyway.
> "Freedom of speech is freedom from government censorship, not private censorship." I really detest this line of thought. What good are the concept of human rights when people declare that private companies by definition cannot infringe on them?
Interactions with companies are fundamentally voluntarist. Not in the sense that you can’t end up with a corporate dystopia; but rather in the sense that a motivated populace can destroy a corporate dystopia just by demanding legislation, without fighting a literal civil war, the way they’d have to do for a government dystopia.
That's a pleasant fiction. Just like the fiction that the large company and the job-seeker are on an equal foot when contracting... Unfortunately, there are such things as corruption, lobbying and regulatory capture everywhere. The bigger the companies, the bigger the corruption, lobbying and regulatory capture, up to the point where, shazam! you're not in a democracy anymore.
Because your rights end where other peoples' begins, and controlling what a company allows or doesn't allow on its platform is compelled speech, which is unconstitutional in the US. For example, a baker has the right to censor you by not allowing you to order a cake that says "Heil Hitler" on it.
> "Because your rights end where other peoples' begins" Understandable, but what happens when rights conflict in the other direction? Why doesn't my ISP's right to block access to parts of the Web end where my right to consume information begins? Why do we place more importance on the 'rights' of an abstract non-living corporation above the rights of actual citizens? > "what a company allows or doesn't allow on its p…
Would this make things like Net Neutrality and public broadcasting laws likewise unconstitutional
These are a trade the provider makes with the government to abide by certain rules such as content neutrality and in exchange get many advantages from the government. For example, common carriers are exempt from state and local barriers to entry and receive universal access subsidies. While I wish US ISPs were common carriers they currently are not.
I have been blasted with propaganda and lies from the west for almost a week now. Things that never happened: - Ghost of Kiev - Sunflower Seed Lady - Snake Island Defiance - Miss Ukraine Airsoft Fighter Then I get sources of info closed off to me, I find that exceedingly concerning. The west is winning the information war, but at the cost of the truth? I’m of a mixed mind for sure.
I don't think all of the things you have listed have been proven to be false? Do you have sources on any of this?
I'm pretty sure sunflower lady is definitely real, there was a video.
Because your rights end where other peoples' begins, and controlling what a company allows or doesn't allow on its platform is compelled speech, which is unconstitutional in the US. For example, a baker has the right to censor you by not allowing you to order a cake that says "Heil Hitler" on it.
This is not about the US and you are misinterpreting the baker's Supreme Court case anyways
I'm also not referencing it. The gay wedding cake case was decided on the basis of the baker being directly targeted by the local government.
It's depressing how utterly normal this level of censorship has become in Western society. Ten years ago there would have been at least a modicum of ho-hum about decisions to ban foreign media. I've watched RT on a few occasions and I never thought their reporting outright propaganda. It does have a clear non-pro-West bias which gives you a dose of awareness that Western reporting is biased too.
What is your point? That Russia state TV should be available everywhere so everyone can watch Russian propaganda?
IMO they should be closed after due process. Not by administrative decision, i. e. censorship. If they were closed because after a short trial, a judge determining that they were spreading disinformation systematically, that would be completely fine.
But some administrative authority claiming that it should be closed, then getting it closed in a few hours? with hundreds of actual professional journalists getting shown the door as a consequence? That's just the sort of shit Putin does. I want my country to do better than Putin in all matters, please.
>>> That isn't to say the west hasn't done anything wrong. But by my account, we can pin the following on Russia: >>> - Installing puppets in foreign governments >>> - Schroeder >>> - Trump / GOP >>> - Pushing for Brexit What .... Trump and GOP are russia plants? got proof?
I can provide arguments in favour of the position but not definitive proof, you can decide whether all of this is just "circumstantial". - First day of war, Trump praises Putin for his behaviour, on tape, call him a genius [1, 4]. - Second day of war, Trump doubles down, on tape. [1] - When asked whether [Trump] made a mistake calling [Putin] a genius, Moskow Mitch dodges the question, responds that Putin is a "ruthl…
This comment is misleading.
Trump didn’t call Putin genius, he called Putin’s tactics genius. Which (at first) it definitely did seem like.
What is your point? That Russia state TV should be available everywhere so everyone can watch Russian propaganda?
Have you not encountered this sort of "information cannot be harmful" type of free speech absolutist before?
I disagree with these sort of bans on speech as well, and it has never been because I naively believe that the speech is harmless. It is because I believe that granting the government the authority to pick and choose which speech is harmful is far more dangerous, and prone to abuse. It is because I think it is beneficial for reasonable members of the public to be able to see what garbage the other side is being indoctrinated with. It is because I believe that the portion of the public who is mostly likely to believe the harmful speech will see the censorship as more proof that they should. Most importantly it is because I believe that sheltering people from harmful ideas might protect them in the short term, but won't prepare them to deal with the seductiveness of harmful ideas that sound right when they do slip through.