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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

#41

Post by Sebb767 »

Lazare wrote: post #37

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.

> But recommend a snake oil cure for Covid-19, and you'll be in real trouble.

Except if you're in a position to get them in trouble. Remember that Trump (mostly) got away with this while in office.

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

#42

Post by whymauri »

DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #38
Mountain_Skies wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

That's what I find most incredible about this thread and the confidence of the person denying something Trump said on the record. It hasn't even been a year and we're already forgetting the dumpster fire that was the original response to COVID.

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

#43

Post by splithalf »

dannyw wrote: post #19
pumaontheprowl wrote: post #17

A lot of this is starting to remind me of the way Galileo and Darwin were treated for announcing their breakthroughs. I know nothing about this drug Maduro is touting, but I can't help worrying that one of these days somebody is going to find an actual cure and the world will never know about it because big social media companies exile them for wrongthink.

You don't announce the discovery of a miracle cure via social media, you announce it via clinical trial papers.

Peer review is “social media.”

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

#44

Post by TulliusCicero »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #32

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 gende…

A shallowly cynical take, if I've ever seen one.

What comments like this do their best to ignore, is that many people, perhaps most, agree that platforms bear some responsibility for managing misinformation and the like. But arguing that point requires targeting popular will, instead of an unpopular rich dude. Much easier to demonize someone few people like, than debate a position held by many in earnest.

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

#45

Post by macspoofing »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #32

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 gende…

No. This is revisionist.

This isn't Zuckerberg's doing. Up until recently Zuckerberg wanted as little moderation and censorship as possible. This mirrors the libertarian ethos of all the founders of modern tech companies. All of them (from Facebook, to Twitter, to Reddit, etc.) wanted to be just a platform for ideas. After Trump's election there became a concerted pressure campaign by woke culture, mainstream media and Democratic party against Facebook and other social media companies to moderate and ban anybody who doesn't conform to their particular narrative. Social Media was blamed for Hillary's loss. Social Media was blamed for Russian misinformation. Social Media was blamed for giving a platform to right-wing media and Trump supporters. We saw the end-result of this in the run-up to last year's election where Facebook and Twitter actively banned and suppressed Hunter Biden stories (which was applauded by many here as well). Stories that were true, by the way.

So no. Don't think for a second this is Zuckerberg. He never wanted this. None of the tech companies wanted this .. but here we are.

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

#46

Post by marcinzm »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #32

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 gende…

This misses the part where Facebook got massive complaints and government investigations over not doing anything to prevent the spread of certain information. You can't have it both ways.

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

#47

Post by dpweb »

dannyw wrote: post #19
pumaontheprowl wrote: post #17

A lot of this is starting to remind me of the way Galileo and Darwin were treated for announcing their breakthroughs. I know nothing about this drug Maduro is touting, but I can't help worrying that one of these days somebody is going to find an actual cure and the world will never know about it because big social media companies exile them for wrongthink.

You don't announce the discovery of a miracle cure via social media, you announce it via clinical trial papers.

The problem with that is, if it's not amplified on social media, it doesn't exist.

There were trials where it was shown that sufficient Vitamin D levels (most people are deficient) is very effective in preventing COVID. It got minor attention, but no-one is pursuing it on a widespread basis. Maybe it works maybe not, but even if there were clinical trials, it gets crowded out by what's being widely circulated in the media.

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

#48

Post by pjc50 »

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?

Everyone's fighting the last war.

They knew that wasn't OK, but were unwilling to do anything about it, and fear no reprisals from Maduro.

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

#49

Post by Sebb767 »

cabirum wrote: post #12

People should start thinking twice before using US-controlled platforms/services/anything.

... unless they want to reach people. Try publishing an app while avoiding the AppStore and the PlayStore - your audience will be fairly limited. Same thing if you're a politician (especially one not currently in office) and an US-controlled service happens to be popular in your country.

On the other hand, though, I doubt that much of this is actual government influence. Most of these actions are probably done based on the personal biases of the moderation team of the platform. These are surely a bit influenced by whatever opinion the current government tries to push, but they will not necessarily align with the current agenda. And this is not really an US problem; in fact, in terms of government influence on private companies, the US is probably one of the better countries.

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

#50

Post by TulliusCicero »

mc32 wrote: post #33
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.

For their own platform? Facebook is, obviously. How is this even a question?

It's not like a head of state doesn't have plenty of power to send messages through other means. Since when are private actors obligated to let them speak on private platforms?

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