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Terminating Service for 8Chan

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Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#811
post #469

This is the same argument cake shops make against taking order from gay people. I do believe that so-called manifesto is mind-numbingly dumb, fact-free and it is dangerous in the sense it will inspire more violence against innocent people. But that precisely what makes it a good test case for asking some fundamental questions. Can commercial businesses with deep reach, pricing power and critical function deny service…

Refusing service to people based on their ideology or sexuality is vastly different to refusing service to people who threaten harm to others.

To you. Many others don't see it that way. So your truth isn't the same as theirs, even if you are backed by current science.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#812
post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

> Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't.

Sites like 8chan, Hacker news, etc are publishers, and I think it's reasonable if the service providers that disagree with their content don't want to do business with them.

A proper analogy (IMO), would be if a newspaper was printing hate speech and the company that prints the newspaper refused to do business with them. That would be perfectly acceptable, and has nothing to do with the government protected free speech. People aren't robots (or dumb pipes) after all, and if they don't want to enable/support what they see as a morally reprehensible enterprise with their work that is their right.

> any controversy at all means losing access to anything internet related

Giving a platform for manifestos that are propagating violence and mass shootings should not be dismissed as "any controversy at all." It feels like you are trying to minimize what happened here.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#813

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White supremacist terrorism cannot be directly ideologically challenged by our present political system in America because it is the founding ideology of the country https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_Destroyer

I think this statement is completely wrong and America is on of the most resistant countries against fascism because of its adherence to freedom which fascist really dislike.

There is systemic racism everywhere you look; criminal justice system from top to bottom, the job market, school segregation. The political system routinely demonizes foreigners in racist ways that lead to unaccountably brutal and pointless wars, one after another. We are resistant against ‘fascism’ only as the convenient boogeyman of propaganda.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#814
I'm not sure I understand what those here rallying in defense of "free speech" are arguing. Free speech has not been violated. The government did not mandate this. As an individual citizen, I am allowed to say whatever I want under the protection of free speech. But I am not entitled to others providing me a platform for my speech. Other people/companies can't be coerced to provide me such a platform. And even if every person and company refuses to provide me a platform, my rights still aren't being violated, so long as the government isn't mandating it. Its just tough nuts.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#815
post #665

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provide electricity, or your phone provider cut off service or what not. I think it's key that in this case cloudflare are actively between you and 8chan. The phone provider is the most reasonable comparison, were you able to switch provider. I wouldn't be hugely shocked if…

What’s wrong with hosting a manifesto? Getting insight into the state of mind of such an individual seems valuable, no?

Giving hate manifestos easy access to a global audience can help get more people killed.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#816

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White supremacist terrorism cannot be directly ideologically challenged by our present political system in America because it is the founding ideology of the country https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_Destroyer

It's seductive argument, but how does that differ from any other colonized country? Australia certainly has white supremacist elements (and undercurrents of racism in the dominant culture), but nothing (I think) of the scale of the US. Do you suggest that it is impossible for a country to change?

It is no different, Australia also has fundamentally racist foundation.

Anything can change, but not by willful blindness.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#817
post #726

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those always sounded like noble, wise words. And maybe they once were. But in age when white supremacy/fascism/nazism/strongman-leader-ism is rising again, I’m no longer sure I agree with them.

> I’m no longer sure I agree with them. the problem is that the alternative is, basically, a white-list of approved ideas. Who makes this white-list? That's the issue with wholesale censorship. A system like that will get gamed as soon as the political winds change one way or another.

I think most people can see that there's a huge gulf between "everything is lawful" and "the government regulates ideas and risks doing so in their favor".

Most people accept that you cannot say "how unfortunate it would be for him if Jack ate seafood tonight" to your Mafia henchmen. Nor can you say "we will storm parliament at dawn using these weapons" if you are part of a plot to replace the state with a capitalist anarchy.

And in the same manner, it seems that there are plenty of laws in place already against saying "if white people are to defend ourselves and survive as a race, our immune system must go to work" in an 8chan manifesto.

But that's different than saying "Jack has betrayed me", "representative democracy is defective and must be replaced by capitalist anarchy" or "the white race is superior; non-whites are traitors and should be dealt with harshly; vote for me".

(Whether a text advocates violence cannot necessarily be reduced to a few words, as I hope my first example demonstrates. The context in which the words are uttered and the interpretation the speaker can reasonably intend are relevant. Fortunately, no legal system has been replaced by a computer program, but are generally interpreted by intelligent human beings.)

Free speech absolutism was never intended by the Voltaire or the American founding fathers - as can be seen by their other actions. It is a recent populist view without warrant of careful analysis. I support free speech; but I do not support free speech absolutism.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#818
post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

> Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provide electricity, or your phone provider cut off service or what not. That would be ridiculous, yet it's exactly the situation we're in with internet services. No one wants to just be a utility. These are flawed comparisons, becau…

Flawed comparison. Nothing 8Chan did or possibly could do would result in service disruption to other Cloudflare customers.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#819

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provide electricity, or your phone provider cut off service or what not. That would be ridiculous, yet it's exactly the situation we're in with internet services. No one wants to just be a utility. These are flawed comparisons, becau…

Flawed comparison. Nothing 8Chan did or possibly could do would result in service disruption to other Cloudflare customers.

Unless any of the people who were killed in El Paso were Cloudflare customers

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#820
post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

The dumb pipe is DNS + ip routing. No one wants to share or sell their smart pipes (CDN, analytics, cloud platform, etc.) into a powder keg. > Imagine if real life utilities did this TV & Radio platforms have declined to provide amplification to numerous fringe ideas / platforms over the years. As a direct "knowledge/information utility" that corollary carries the most weight for me. But again, DNS is the real "utili…

Why is a CDN a "smart pipe" but DNS is not? That seems like a rather arbitrary distinction to me.

Is the internet not a "knowledge/information utility"? Do CDNs not provide critical protection against DDOS attacks? How then does denying service not "prevent 8chan from delivering it's message"?

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