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U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

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Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#521

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

gameswithgo wrote: post #494
coryfklein wrote: post #353

It's the practical erosion of Free Speech. Liberal (small "l" liberal) democracy and liberal science thrives on members: 1. Being willing to admit they may be wrong 2. Having access to a diverse information diet But the past two decades have shown erosion of not only legal Free Speech, but practical free speech: * Whereas previously they were just ignored (or even rebutted), today employees, students, and professors…

I see things almost completely opposite to you. Twenty years ago we had far less diverse access to information. You would get things from your local newspaper, or tv networks. Professionals would work and filter what we see. Today anyone can fire up a blog, twitter, youtube, and start talking about anything. People today thus have been getting exposed to all kinds of ideas, and being taken in by them: the earth is fl…

I think you are wrong. While the cost of authoring and distributing content are cheaper than ever and anyone can broadcast to the planet trivially, the ability to actually bring attention to your content has never been more scarce. It is deeply controlled and manipulated by huge confirmation-bias-as-service platforms in every recommender system, personalized ad system, and content feed across the mainstream internet.

Your fellow citizens deserve more credit. They have brains. They really can and almost always do form adequate understanding of reasonable takes on new information.

But when their eyeballs are subjected to consumerist bidding wars and ranking algorithms to inflame, to stoke fear and insecurity, to render feelings of inadequacy, and they are so thoroughly manipulated, then you get information monoculture.

We need information diversity and information vitamins. Instead we’re allowing ourselves to be spoonfed information junk food.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#522

Post by hyko »

umvi wrote: post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

The President of the United States can’t admit that he lost, and is evidently willing to throw an entire country and political system under the bus in the service of his ego.

One side effect of this personality type seizing power is that the Overton window has been inflated into a vast, festering portal through which our worst nightmares can crawl out. I doubt it was his intent, but it is the result.

You’ve almost got to admire the raw primitive energy and boundlessness of that level of id. How very sad that it has been employed to such feeble ends; it will ultimately have to be crushed for democracy to prevail.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#523

Post by dtauzell »

joshuamcginnis wrote: post #321
dhruvkar wrote: post #47

Are there people here on HN that believe the election was stolen? I haven't seen any evidence, most of the lawsuits haven't borne fruit either. However, I also recognize that there may be blindspots/biases. I'd really like to hear from anyone who believes this, to present a cogent argument. I promise not to attack. I want to hear the argument from the other side. I also beseech the rest of HN to please refrain from a…

If you don't get a lot of responses, it isn't because those with cohesive arguments don't exists; it's because it has become increasingly dangerous to express views counter to the mainstream narrative.

Even those with opinions that match the mainstream (the vote was valid) are getting threatened:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/us/election-officials-thr...

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#524

Post by [deleted] »

umvi wrote: post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#525

Post by jedberg »

Very related to HN and tech, Trump posted a video on Twitter urging protestors to go home, but in the same video he reiterated his belief that the election was stolen.

Twitter promptly marked the video as misinformation and disables likes, comments, and shares, basically preventing the message from getting out.

I'm not even sure what the right move for Twitter is there.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#526

Post by rement »

jsheard wrote: post #434

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/13469288825958850... "This claim of election fraud is disputed, and this Tweet can’t be replied to, Retweeted, or liked due to a risk of violence" That's a new one. Twitter openly admits the content is dangerous, but they still don't want to ban him so they carved out a special quarantine mode instead.

Not only that but the "call to go home" will be limited because it can't be retweeted or liked.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#527

Post by bumbada »

dhruvkar wrote: post #47

Are there people here on HN that believe the election was stolen? I haven't seen any evidence, most of the lawsuits haven't borne fruit either. However, I also recognize that there may be blindspots/biases. I'd really like to hear from anyone who believes this, to present a cogent argument. I promise not to attack. I want to hear the argument from the other side. I also beseech the rest of HN to please refrain from a…

There is no argument here.

The fact is that you should never let electronic voting machines ever in the first place. I went crazy the first time I saw them in the US long time ago and said: "this is the end of democracy"

You should only count physical ballots in front of someone that represents all the parties.

As an engineer I can not trust them. There are 20 different ways I can cheat using those machines, from network hacks to software that self modifies.

The US election system is a joke, with no national ID card.

The worst thing is that they are trying to import those defective systems into Europe.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#528

Post by samch »

I think, for the safety of all involved, it may be time to enact section 4 of the 25th Amendment.

Amendment 25 - Section 4: Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#529

Post by Havoc »

umvi wrote: post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

>Self-reinforcing social bubbles?

This mostly I think. It's always been a case of birds of a feather flock together. But internet communication has bridged distance and recommendation engines created echo chambers

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#530

Post by dcolkitt »

hertzrat wrote: post #225
umvi wrote: post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

All the social media sites did the research and learned that filter bubbles and outrage drives engagement more than anything else. If you tune your systems to maximize engagement and ignore the side effects, the side effects still happen, whether it’s deliberate or not

There's no evidence that heavy social media users are in any more of a bubble or echo chamber than non-users.[1]

[1] https://twitter.com/degenrolf/status/913067759612973057

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