381–390 of 1001 posts
They stand for free speech as long as it suits them and they stand against misinformation when it doesn't, the fucking sociopaths.
Regardless of what you believe to be 'The Truth', has suppression or censorship ever worked to quench dissonance or convince skeptical people, again, whether right or wrong, that there really is 'nothing to see here'.
Yes. Absolutely it has. It's naive to think that censorship, propaganda and such never work. They're not absolutes, certainly. But thinking of these as impotent and doomed is a dangerous naivety.
Chris Hitchens had a great piece about banned literature like Orwell in Czechoslovakia: More people seemed to have read it than in the west. There are plenty of examples where censorship fails.
That said, thinking that it always fails is dangerous. There's a reason censorship exists by default unless it's explicitly banned. There's a reason why strong censorship (heresy bans) exists in all monotheistic religions. Not only have they had an effect, but it's a defining feature of the religion and (IMO) the reason why these have taken over the whole world.
It matters what the top papers print, top channels run, and what appears (or does not) on social media. It may not be a predictable and mechanical effect, but censorship is not inert.
That said, we tend to overuse the word "censorship." The difference between an editor and a censor is reach. If the editor of newspaper X edits all newspapers, they are a censor. Youtube is wading into the murky gray area of this dichotomy.
Is this really the best phrasing Youtube could come up with?
I'm betting this will not work out well long-term.
Stop worshiping these websites like they are the only things on the internet that matter. It's ok if stuff gets removed from YouTube, it's one website and it's not obligated to host your HD videos for free for any reason. Get over it. Pay for the hosting if you want to project controversial content on the internet that people don't want to host for free.
But what's to stop the private company that's hosting me from de-platforming me if a twitter mob pressures them to do so? It's private companies all the way down. Free speech is impossible on the private company controlled internet.
We are very fortunate to have the algorithms, employees & management of Youtube/Google watching out for us. We're not intelligent enough to view a video and decide for ourselves what is fact v. propaganda v. entertainment. Hopefully some day we will have the same protections the CCP gives its people with even more content moderation. Thank you Google - you're the nanny the American people and the world always hoped f…
Once again a thread about censorship invites comments that ignore the nuance of the situation. Having companies dictate what information is widely accessible is dangerous for democracy. Having the sitting president make completely baseless claims in an effort to delegitimize the results of an election because it didn’t go his way is also dangerous for democracy. That’s what we call a tricky situation. We don’t have a…
The whole point is that this is a biased assumption. You can't prevent people from making counterpoints, and then say "completely baseless claims." For the conversation to be fair, you need to allow the claims to be made, and then disprove them.
This way of thinking is part of the problem.
How do I know? I'm from Russia. Authoritatism begins with tight control of news sources.
Excerpts:
Voltaire was right when he said "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." And social media lets authoritarians push absurdities to millions of people. President Trump using Twitter has spread conspiracy theories more than 1700 times to his 67 million followers.
Freedom of speech is not freedom of reach. Sadly There will always be racists, misogynists, anti-Semites, and child abusers. We should not be giving bigots and pedophiles a free platform to amplify their views and target their victims.
Zuckerberg says people should decide what's credible, not tech companies. When 2/3rds of millennials have not heard of Auschwitz how are they supposed to know what's true? There is such a thing as objective truth. Facts do exist.
We are very fortunate to have the algorithms, employees & management of Youtube/Google watching out for us. We're not intelligent enough to view a video and decide for ourselves what is fact v. propaganda v. entertainment. Hopefully some day we will have the same protections the CCP gives its people with even more content moderation. Thank you Google - you're the nanny the American people and the world always hoped f…
20 years ago reputed organizations such as newspapers, radio stations and television informed people the truth. Conspiracy theories were fringe and didn't have a way to spread. Today more than half the population believes in conspiracy theories because they learn the "truth" from disreputable sources on social media. This is dangerous for society. I am glad social media companies are taking action themselves, instead…
20 years ago I remember TV shows talking about the moon landing being a hoax, and a decent number of people I talked to at the time believing it. This is just an anecdote, but I've noticed that people make the claim that conspiracy theories are on the rise and I've yet to see hard evidence to support that claim.
We are very fortunate to have the algorithms, employees & management of Youtube/Google watching out for us. We're not intelligent enough to view a video and decide for ourselves what is fact v. propaganda v. entertainment. Hopefully some day we will have the same protections the CCP gives its people with even more content moderation. Thank you Google - you're the nanny the American people and the world always hoped f…