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Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

reuters.com

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Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#31

Post by tmux314 »

Facebook is acting on behalf of the US's long-term, bipartisan effort to undermine any Latin American government that doesn't grant its corporations access to that nation's resources. More specifically, the Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations have undermined the Venezuelan government in many ways, including supporting coup attempts.[1]

I'm not arguing that I support what Maduro said. He has an awful record as a leader. I'm arguing that this is the natural result of social media censorship. It's censorship by the US government by proxy.

Here is a simple test to see if the above statement is true: would Facebook censor a world leader as swiftly and as severely if this were a leader of an allied state, or even a leader within our own government?

[1] https://theintercept.com/2020/05/09/venezuela-coup-regime-ch...

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#32

Post by dukeofdoom »

Say you are successful tech Billionaire. Watching your other billionaire friend's hubris get the better of him, and decide to take up flying only to crash into the ground. You go through some phase of self reflection, and realize you won't live forever, and so decide you can make the world a better place. You consult some self help books, listen to some new age mysticism, and read some exciting woke ideas about gender and critical theory. You are now ready to do "good". You fund every fringe woke charity, you pay forward for the right candidates. But as hard as you try, there are still these every day common folk, simple minded kind, that don't agree with all the goodness you are trying to foist onto the world. They make rude comments in online forums, doubt your every move, and they even have candidates that plays up to their ignorance. You seeth with disgust, and a bit of despair. Finally you decide the best way forward, is to not to give these people a platform to speak their simple minds. So you censor the internet, kick of their political leaders, and decide that in order for the world to be a better place, you must control the narrative. To win, you must control their simple minds. Its you and your allies that must write the truth of what the simple minded folk should think.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#33

Post by mc32 »

abhinav22 wrote: post #2

Not sure about this - I don’t think government leaders or anybody should be censored. Better to have public health messages as part of the platform than to censor It’s a fine line between hate and misinformation and dissent (Clearly the content in question is wrong; but in other cases, WHO and others been proven incorrect - eg on masks and asymptotic transmission) Don’t know what the answer is, we don’t want echo cha…

Obviously Maduro is a problematic despotic leader, but who are Facebook to be arbiters of thrush and falsehood?

We’ve gone down the path of good intentions that leads to hell.

Does this not interfere with self determination? Is there one true north now? Have Facebook found all truth?

This is getting ridiculous.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#34

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

concordDance wrote: post #11
d3nj4l wrote: post #5

Wait, Trump promoting chloroquine as a miracle cure and recommending bleach injections were okay, but Maduro doing the same can get him banned?

> recommending bleach injections This is a mischaracterization.

Trump spitballed about injecting disinfectants into people's lungs. He didn't say that individual people should do it, but he did say that doctors should test it out.

> And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs. So it would be interesting to check that. So, that, you're going to have to use medical doctors with. But it sounds - it sounds interesting to me. So we'll see.

The specific disinfectants Trump was talking about were bleach and isopropyl alcohol. Trump's comments came right after a presentation by the undersecretary for Homeland Security about using these specific disinfectants to clean surfaces. Trump then genuinely appeared to think it might be a good idea to try these disinfectants out inside the human body. Anyone can watch the video and judge for themselves whether Trump was being sarcastic, as he later claimed - I think it's obvious that he was completely serious.

* C-SPAN: https://www.c-span.org/video/?471458-1/president-trump-coron...

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#35

Post by Mountain_Skies »

henryjcee wrote: post #23
annadane wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good god am I fucking sick and tired of the 'they're a private platform' argument

comedically broke take isn't it

Especially since eventually the winds will change, as they always do, and the "but it's a private company" crowd will find little argument against these same companies as they press the censoring boot against their necks. Creating a monster just ends up with that monster running out of control destroying everyone but they naively believe they'll always have it on a tight leash.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#36

Post by Mountain_Skies »

DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #34
concordDance wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> recommending bleach injections This is a mischaracterization.

Trump spitballed about injecting disinfectants into people's lungs. He didn't say that individual people should do it, but he did say that doctors should test it out. > And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lu…

So as the commenter said, a mischaracterization.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#37

Post by Lazare »

Conventional wisdom in the US is that Maduro is a ruthless, violent dictator, who has suppressed opposition, smuggled drugs, funded terrorism, violated human rights, etc.

But that doesn't get you kicked off Facebook. Facebook and Twitter happily provide platforms to violent, human rights abusing regimes.

...but recommend one snake oil cure for Covid-19, and suddenly the hammer drops, I guess? Interesting priorities.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#38

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #36
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trump spitballed about injecting disinfectants into people's lungs. He didn't say that individual people should do it, but he did say that doctors should test it out. > And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lu…

So as the commenter said, a mischaracterization.

A slight mischaracterization (doctors should do it, instead of people should do it themselves), and the original does not make Trump look any better.

Edit: Looking again, OP did not misrepresent Trump's comment at all. Trump did clearly recommend that doctors try injecting disinfectants (including bleach) into patients.

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#39

Post by whymauri »

concordDance wrote: post #11
d3nj4l wrote: post #5

Wait, Trump promoting chloroquine as a miracle cure and recommending bleach injections were okay, but Maduro doing the same can get him banned?

> recommending bleach injections This is a mischaracterization.

Sure, whatever you say. Here's the quote since apparently we've all forgotten:

>"A question that probably some of you are thinking of if you’re totally into that world, which I find to be very interesting. So, supposedly we hit the body with a tremendous, whether it’s ultraviolet or just very powerful light, and I think you said that hasn’t been checked, but you’re going to test it. And then I said supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or in some other way. (To Bryan) And I think you said you’re going to test that, too. Sounds interesting, right?"

>"And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning, because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it’d be interesting to check that, so that you’re going to have to use medical doctors with, but it sounds interesting to me. So, we’ll see, but the whole concept of the light, the way it kills it in one minute. That’s pretty powerful."

Re: Facebook freezes Venezuela president Maduro's page over Covid-19

#40

Post by caseyscottmckay »

annadane wrote: post #16
varispeed wrote: post #7

Facebook is a private platform, so they should be able to censor whatever they want as long as it is not discriminatory against protected characteristics.

Good god am I fucking sick and tired of the 'they're a private platform' argument

What is a solution? Facebook is a private company, so they can do business as they please within the confines of applicable laws and regulations. Those laws and regulations say they can censor as they please on their platform. Should we enact laws forcing private platforms to give everyone a voice?
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