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Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

reuters.com

21–30 of 60 posts

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#21
post #17

I don't follow the topic closely but it seems there would be a difference between "hate speech" and not wanting large numbers of immigrants from a poor violent region immigrating into one's society. I suspect the second is sometimes confused with the first, maybe on occasion deliberately by policy makers or others with an agenda.

The title used here on HN is inaccurate, and not what was used in the article. It's not what is actually happening either.

People can still say they don't want immigrants.

What they can't do is ask people to burn down houses where they live or do 'vigilante justice' on them. These are actual things that people have asked others to do, and actually done.

Facebook previously limited speech for things like sex, but was ok with keeping up criminal posts calling for murder.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#22
post #5
post #2

Free speech, European style.

Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech. The title is misleading, because they only agreed to remove hate speech only, not all anti-immigration comments. EDIT: To clarify, hate speech is for example speech inciting doing harm to others. As a concrete example, in the heat of the refugee crisis, I was regularly seeing calls to arms to go shoot all the refugees at the borders on my Facebook wall. It made…

> Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech.

I would argue that's exactly what it does.

I'd further argue that hate speech and the threat of violence should be separated into two distinct categories for clarity. Clarity is extremely, extremely important when you're dealing with the edges of acceptable speech. It's dangerous to load them both into one concept that can be wielded by politicians and the media for control purposes over speech and free expression.

It's also important to clarify that the threat of violence is not a form of speech, it's a threat (of violence). That's another obvious reason why "hate speech" should not cover threats of violence to begin with, it intentionally muddles the concepts. Just like smashing someone in the face should not fall under free expression: it's an act of violence. Free speech ends at the point of violence, putting violence and speech together generates a contradiction of terms that can only benefit people looking for levers of control.

The concept "hate speech" is already a broken, frequently abused tool for controlling people. It's clearly going to get much worse in the coming years given the rise of extreme political correctness, the 'protect my feelings' movement. "Hate speech" is by default devoid of nearly all meaning, and nearly anything can be claimed to be hate speech, because "hate" is a generic term that can vary wildly and is inherently subjective. It was of course used for that exact reason: you can't legislate control over speech, therefore create empty jargon to do the same thing, and then load anything you want into it. A method frequently employed by totalitarian regimes.

Are my posts, which openly express my dislike of elves, hate speech? You bet. Why? Because I say so. You can never successfully refute that.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#23

If it's speech condoning or encouraging harm against others, then it should be removed. But if people are just voicing their opinions, even hateful opinions, then it doesn't take a genius to figure out that banning such speech makes the sentiment run deeper, and only offloads it to even less "tolerant" parts of the web, like 4chan.

What about: "The US and Western Europe should attack ISIS soldiers", or "Convicted murderers should be executed by the state". Both of those statements are condoning and encouraging harming others. Should they be removed?

Can you not see the impossibility of regulating which speech is justified, and which is not?

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#24
post #5
post #2

Free speech, European style.

Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech. The title is misleading, because they only agreed to remove hate speech only, not all anti-immigration comments. EDIT: To clarify, hate speech is for example speech inciting doing harm to others. As a concrete example, in the heat of the refugee crisis, I was regularly seeing calls to arms to go shoot all the refugees at the borders on my Facebook wall. It made…

There is no such thing as "hate speech". What you call "hate speech" is merely speech that you find disagreeable. Free speech is valuable not when it protects those who already agree with you. "Hate speech" is very vaguely defined, and you can use the label to smear people raising perfectly legitimate facts like "group differences are recent, profound, and heritable".

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#25
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech. The title is misleading, because they only agreed to remove hate speech only, not all anti-immigration comments. EDIT: To clarify, hate speech is for example speech inciting doing harm to others. As a concrete example, in the heat of the refugee crisis, I was regularly seeing calls to arms to go shoot all the refugees at the borders on my Facebook wall. It made…

> Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech. I would argue that's exactly what it does. I'd further argue that hate speech and the threat of violence should be separated into two distinct categories for clarity. Clarity is extremely, extremely important when you're dealing with the edges of acceptable speech. It's dangerous to load them both into one concept that can be wielded by politicians and the med…

Except what counts is explicitly encoded in law, not what anyone makes up.

"Are my posts, which openly express my dislike of elves, hate speech?"

No, because that's really silly. The law would let you do that.

If instead you asked people to kill people, that would be taken down.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#26

If it's speech condoning or encouraging harm against others, then it should be removed. But if people are just voicing their opinions, even hateful opinions, then it doesn't take a genius to figure out that banning such speech makes the sentiment run deeper, and only offloads it to even less "tolerant" parts of the web, like 4chan.

What about: "The US and Western Europe should attack ISIS soldiers", or "Convicted murderers should be executed by the state". Both of those statements are condoning and encouraging harming others. Should they be removed? Can you not see the impossibility of regulating which speech is justified, and which is not?

The difference is proximity and legitimacy. One can say ISIS should be bombed but that's a matter of war, declared by one's state, and is therefore considered legitimate. It's also far different from posting "Someone should stab these immigrants down the block living in state housing."

Yes it's hypocritical and arbitrary when considering that we are all humans, but that is simply how law and society stratifies speech worthy of regulation. I don't think it's impossible at all.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#27

If it's speech condoning or encouraging harm against others, then it should be removed. But if people are just voicing their opinions, even hateful opinions, then it doesn't take a genius to figure out that banning such speech makes the sentiment run deeper, and only offloads it to even less "tolerant" parts of the web, like 4chan.

What about: "The US and Western Europe should attack ISIS soldiers", or "Convicted murderers should be executed by the state". Both of those statements are condoning and encouraging harming others. Should they be removed? Can you not see the impossibility of regulating which speech is justified, and which is not?

You can easily separate the concepts via the initiation of force.

The murderer is the initiator. ISIS is the initiator.

Example: "The US should murder the Japanese people and nuke all of their cities immediately." Japan isn't an aggressor, hasn't invaded anyone, isn't slaughtering the people of some country they're trying to annex (ISIS). Calling for a response to to the initiation of violence, is not the same as calling for the initiation of violence. If you remove these blatant lines, you can never differentiate on a legal basis who is the victim and who is the perpetrator in acts of eg crime.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about: "The US and Western Europe should attack ISIS soldiers", or "Convicted murderers should be executed by the state". Both of those statements are condoning and encouraging harming others. Should they be removed? Can you not see the impossibility of regulating which speech is justified, and which is not?

You can easily separate the concepts via the initiation of force. The murderer is the initiator. ISIS is the initiator. Example: "The US should murder the Japanese people and nuke all of their cities immediately." Japan isn't an aggressor, hasn't invaded anyone, isn't slaughtering the people of some country they're trying to annex (ISIS). Calling for a response to to the initiation of violence, is not the same as cal…

That is so damn relative. Don't you see it?

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#29

If it's speech condoning or encouraging harm against others, then it should be removed. But if people are just voicing their opinions, even hateful opinions, then it doesn't take a genius to figure out that banning such speech makes the sentiment run deeper, and only offloads it to even less "tolerant" parts of the web, like 4chan.

What about: "The US and Western Europe should attack ISIS soldiers", or "Convicted murderers should be executed by the state". Both of those statements are condoning and encouraging harming others. Should they be removed? Can you not see the impossibility of regulating which speech is justified, and which is not?

Yes, it's not impossible. It happens all the time already.

The HN system which allowed people to downvote you is limiting your speech. Facebook removing posts about sex is limiting your free speech.

I find it really perverse that people are ok with banning people talking about sex, but are fine with them calling for murder.

Take a guess which society has tens of thousands of murders, and millions in prison? The one that takes away free speech about sex, but protects people calling to kill immigrants.

Re: Facebook, Google, Twitter agree to delete hate speech in 24 hours: Germany

#30
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free speech does not give you the right to hate speech. The title is misleading, because they only agreed to remove hate speech only, not all anti-immigration comments. EDIT: To clarify, hate speech is for example speech inciting doing harm to others. As a concrete example, in the heat of the refugee crisis, I was regularly seeing calls to arms to go shoot all the refugees at the borders on my Facebook wall. It made…

There is no such thing as "hate speech". What you call "hate speech" is merely speech that you find disagreeable. Free speech is valuable not when it protects those who already agree with you. "Hate speech" is very vaguely defined, and you can use the label to smear people raising perfectly legitimate facts like "group differences are recent, profound, and heritable".

Exactly. +1 to this
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