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Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

frenchpress.thedispatch.com

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Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#91

Post by JetAlone »

zozbot234 wrote: post #80
JetAlone wrote: post #70

I think censorship actually could help us in a huge way back to cultural health; start censoring big data, rage cycle algorithms, sexploitation, advertising. Then on top of that giving people independent, client-based, advanced AI powered tools en masse, and making sure they know how to use them and why, for accurate elected censorship on their own devices of things they personally find detrimental to their mental he…

It might easily happen via antitrust intervention. The big internet companies might be forced to adopt federated standards and "open up" their big walled-garden platforms to enable free interaction among users across different "social" service providers. Then the service providers would start to compete and differentiate by adopting things like user-facing AI scores for content. The feasibility of this varies by plat…

It will never be perfect, there'll always be someone trying to exploit a power vacuum, but we'll see how things go. There's a possibility some changes could make our situations improve more than they deteriorate. It's worth being a little optimistic...

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#92

Post by ianai »

commoner wrote: post #45
JohnTHaller wrote: post #3

"We are a digital media company providing engaged citizens with fact-based reporting and commentary on politics, policy and culture—informed by conservative principles." A ton of conservative opinion pieces are being posted to Hacker News every single day lately. Often by younger accounts that tend to post a lot of things in a similar vein. Political opinion pieces generally don't belong on HN: "Off-Topic: Most stori…

I'm disappointed that this submission was (edit: had originally been) flagged. While The Dispatch leans center-right (and anti-Trump),* this particular article argues from a libertarian position and tries to appeal to everyone from the left to the right. I don't think it's off-topic, because HN has had a ton of submissions about social media removals hit the front page, and individual rights like speech are often dis…

I’m hoping that uptick in the past of politics hitting the front page was an aberration and we’ll now trend back towards the mean.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#93

Post by tomlockwood »

dang wrote: post #65
JohnTHaller wrote: post #3

"We are a digital media company providing engaged citizens with fact-based reporting and commentary on politics, policy and culture—informed by conservative principles." A ton of conservative opinion pieces are being posted to Hacker News every single day lately. Often by younger accounts that tend to post a lot of things in a similar vein. Political opinion pieces generally don't belong on HN: "Off-Topic: Most stori…

The article seems thoughtful and within the range of what we treat as on topic. "Opinion piece" can cover a lot of different genres—for example, blog posts are mostly opinion pieces. We don't want shallow articles on garden-variety political ups and downs, but thoughtful ones on deeper topics are occasionally ok. They don't cover those on TV news. How to handle political topics on HN has been a hard problem over the…

I actually think this article is a pretty standard and trivial reading of the situation. I don't think its particularly thoughtful, and is probably upvoted because it conforms to the already-held views of many of the upvoters. Oh? So you were warning the left about censorship, for its own good? I *have* heard that one before.

I'd prefer it stays flagged.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#94

Post by 11thEarlOfMar »

otterley wrote: post #64
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Observations of possible irregularities in an election are not proof, however, a fairly held election is one in which the votes can be explicitly audited by any of the candidates, and each voter's valid status can be verified after the vote is completed and counted and a winner is declared. Is that true in today's elections? (and was it ever true). If so, any questions can be resolved through executing an audit, and…

> a fairly held election is one in which the votes can be explicitly audited by any of the candidates You're confusing a verification procedure with an outcome. A fairly held election -- i.e., the outcome -- is simply one in which the pollsters and voters adhered to all the rules. And it is possible for an election to be fairly held that is not auditable. Sure, it might make people feel better post hoc about whether…

I prefer to make the question moot and conduct auditable elections, even if everything has been fine so far.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#95

Post by [deleted] »

wpietri wrote: post #78
klyrs wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this is a conservative opinion piece -- or at least, it's not well aligned to the Republican tribe. While it does mention some examples of cancellation on the left, it also devotes significant focus to legislation by Republicans attacking the freedom of speech in academia. But, sadly, it appears that most of the commenters here are responding to what they expect from the title.

It is very obviously conservative in language and origin; you only have to read French's bio or about where The Dispatch's come sfrom. Their tag line is, "Fact-based reporting and commentary on politics, policy and culture -- informed by conservative principles". 5 years ago this would have no question passed for a conservative piece. What has shifted here is the rapid Republican/Trumpist slide toward authoritarianis…

[deleted]

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#96

Post by Nursie »

josephcsible wrote: post #61
Nursie wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that doesn't make them illegitimate. neither is it illegitimate to continue to boycott something you think is likely still causing harm but is now just being quiet about it. > After he had his conversion and became Paul the Apostle, would you really continue to boycott him? Given I don't believe in any of his writings, nor that the church he helped bring into being is a force for good, sure, why not? I'm boycotting…

Okay, pick anyone else then. Someone who definitely did something bad enough to be boycott-worthy, but later completely turned over a new leaf. Would you really never forgive them?

I can forgive people certainly. But if (for instance) a public figure has espoused some pretty abhorrent views then I'm probably not going to bother looking them up or engaging with them specifically - we have an excess of talking heads as it is, and they've made clear that they are prone to holding those sorts of views. I wish them well in another career.

Yes, people can be redeemed and forgiven. But that doesn't mean we don't take their past into account at all, or believe the first set of crocodile tears or profit-preserving contrition that they punt out to save face.

Let me throw it back - Would you trust a new medical testing company headed up by Elizabeth Holmes?

I wouldn't, regardless of how genuine her regrets and apologies on the matter seem. That doesn't mean she shouldn't be able to get a job and live a life, after she's served her time, paid her dues to society and demonstrated she's moved on. Perhaps she'll achieve something honest and good with her life. But I'm never getting a blood test from Theranos MkII, regardless.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#97

Post by ReactiveJelly »

BobbyJo wrote: post #83
JetAlone wrote: post #70

I think censorship actually could help us in a huge way back to cultural health; start censoring big data, rage cycle algorithms, sexploitation, advertising. Then on top of that giving people independent, client-based, advanced AI powered tools en masse, and making sure they know how to use them and why, for accurate elected censorship on their own devices of things they personally find detrimental to their mental he…

> Then on top of that giving people independent, client-based, advanced AI powered tools en masse, and making sure they know how to use them and why, for accurate elected censorship on their own devices of things they personally find detrimental to their mental health. Basically, do what you can to allow for the censorship of the influence of the people with money, onto the people without it. I lay blame for a lot of…

I wonder if this is true.

Is there any guide to finding these ideas that I might be sheltering myself from, that I should not be sheltering myself from?

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#98

Post by vehemenz »

Nursie wrote: post #18

The rants about "cancel culture" from the US right are hilarious, given their long history of boycotts of brands they dislike and escalating hate and fear for everything up to actual book burnings of material like Harry Potter. I'm not saying that the accusations of cancel culture are unfounded, I'm saying they are wildly hypocritical. (It's good that efforts at censorship on the right are raised in the article as a…

Since you invoked "US right", I'll assume you're not American. Criticism of "cancel culture" is not limited to the right wing. If you think it is, then you haven't done your homework.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#99

Post by Nursie »

vehemenz wrote: post #98
Nursie wrote: post #18

The rants about "cancel culture" from the US right are hilarious, given their long history of boycotts of brands they dislike and escalating hate and fear for everything up to actual book burnings of material like Harry Potter. I'm not saying that the accusations of cancel culture are unfounded, I'm saying they are wildly hypocritical. (It's good that efforts at censorship on the right are raised in the article as a…

Since you invoked "US right", I'll assume you're not American. Criticism of "cancel culture" is not limited to the right wing. If you think it is, then you haven't done your homework.

The article is about the US right, written by someone on the US right. The US right makes a lot of noise about it. The UK right does too.

It's massively hypocritical given their history. This article points out that the fringes of the right have now started doing it, my contention is that the whole of the right has been doing it for decades.

Re: Our nation cannot censor its way back to cultural health

#100

Post by Pxtl »

The reason 21st century young people have come around against free speech is quite simply because they've experienced it in its purest form: the 2000s internet.

The upside: we all pirated a crapload of good music. The downside: new era of fascism. And it's worth noting that the piracy, which is in itself a form of speech, was shut down... But the racism wasn't.

Like, if I copied and pasted the above Dispatch article into the comment below, what would happen? Would I get moderated down? Banned for copyright infringement? C&Dd?

We all believe in limitations to speech. Copyright infringement, threats, fraud... I mean go ask a C-level working on a merger how "free" their speech is about the state of the company.

We protect a zillion things with restrictions on speech via the legal system.

We protect the legal system with laws against perjury and filing false reports.

We protect business interests from fraud.

We protect consumers from false advertising.

We protect anybody who can afford a good lawyer from defamation.

But we don't protect public health. Rebroadcasting Hulk Hogan's video will get your business obliterated, but telling Grandma that vaccines are fake, ultimately leading to her untimely death? Totally fine.

Lying about climate change? Totally fine. Lying about democracy? Totally fine.

Tricking hundreds of people into invading the capitol with lies about a stolen election? Well that's okay... except for the voting company you lied about. They have grounds for a lawsuit. The people who were beaten and terrorized in the capitol probably don't.

The line is arbitrary.

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