Facebook Says It's Banning the Phrase 'Stop the Steal' (thehill.com) 692
Facebook announced on Monday that it is taking down content on its platforms that contain the phrase "Stop the Steal" in the wake of the violent rioting by a pro-Trump mob at the U.S. Capitol last week. The Hill reports: "We are now removing content containing the phrase 'stop the steal' under our Coordinating Harm policy from Facebook and Instagram," the company said in a blog post on Monday. The move, the company noted in the message, comes two months after it removed a group called "Stop the Steal" that had gathered a following of over 300,000 members and would spread misinformation about the election.
"We've been allowing robust conversations related to the election outcome and that will continue. But with continued attempts to organize events against the outcome of the US presidential election that can lead to violence, and use of the term by those involved in Wednesday's violence in DC, we're taking this additional step in the lead up to the inauguration," the company said in the post Monday. "It may take some time to scale up our enforcement of this new step but we have already removed a significant number of posts," it continued. The company said its team will be working around the clock to enforce its policies around the coming inauguration of President-elect Biden.
"We will keep our Integrity Operations Center operating at least through January 22 to monitor and respond to threats in real time. We already had it active ahead of Georgia's runoff elections and Congress's counting of the Electoral College votes in the US presidential election. We extended it due to the violence at the Capitol last week," the company added. The company also said it will continue its pause on ads in the U.S. pertaining to politics or the elections in the meantime. "This means that we aren't allowing any ads from politicians, including President Trump," it stated.
"We've been allowing robust conversations related to the election outcome and that will continue. But with continued attempts to organize events against the outcome of the US presidential election that can lead to violence, and use of the term by those involved in Wednesday's violence in DC, we're taking this additional step in the lead up to the inauguration," the company said in the post Monday. "It may take some time to scale up our enforcement of this new step but we have already removed a significant number of posts," it continued. The company said its team will be working around the clock to enforce its policies around the coming inauguration of President-elect Biden.
"We will keep our Integrity Operations Center operating at least through January 22 to monitor and respond to threats in real time. We already had it active ahead of Georgia's runoff elections and Congress's counting of the Electoral College votes in the US presidential election. We extended it due to the violence at the Capitol last week," the company added. The company also said it will continue its pause on ads in the U.S. pertaining to politics or the elections in the meantime. "This means that we aren't allowing any ads from politicians, including President Trump," it stated.
1984 is here (Score:4, Insightful)
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What are the possible options to explain this post:
1) You have not read 1984
2) You did not understand 1984 when you read it.
3) You are arguing in bad faith.
In "The Principles of Newspeak", the appendix to the novel, Orwell explains that Newspeak follows most of the rules of English grammar, yet is a language characterised by a continually diminishing vocabulary; complete thoughts reduced to simple terms of simplistic meaning.
From wiki, “newspeak.”
Hmm. . .sounds kind of like your post.
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Funny you should talk about an authoritative government. We have a delusion man in power who believes the entire world is lying to him about the latest election results.
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Didn’t we all know it would come to this eventually? Perhaps we just didn’t think it would happen in our lifetimes. Despite their claims to the contrary, few humans have any desire for freedom. What they crave is a a society where people they don’t like are oppressed, whether it’s by government or corporations isn’t relevant, as long as the “wrong people’ are punished.
When you get down to it, it’s what we all want. And when the haves build up such a weal
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This is what Newspeak looks like.
This would seem appropriate [tumblr.com].
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No, thanks.
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody said that, but it is a little scary how all of these tech companies band together and effectively squelch unpopular speech in a pretty big way. Prior to two days ago I never even heard of Parler, nor do I particularly care about them if what the media says about them is true (however, I've had a very hard time believing the media recently) but I think it's very a bad thing when not having DDoS protection is basically a death sentence for any kind of vehicle for speech. You can sit here and say "oh well, good riddance", but who will speak for you when they come for your favorite unpopular view?
I'm sure that at some point, some of these people participating in the shaming have probably advocated for a decentralized internet to counter exactly this kind of scenario. Where are those people now, at a time like this?
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Funny)
Trumper bands.
The Pillage people.
Rage against the voting machine.
Smashing Trumpkins.
Never Had Sex Pistols.
Re: Perfect example of communism... (Score:4, Insightful)
As usual, the Americans do not have a single clue. What communism is, in this case.
And for he record, I agree that this, and all censorship, is completely unacceptable, and the mere attempt should result in the loss of citizenship for n years.
I also think communism is a deluded idea that cannot ever work in real life. Even if ita idealistic dreams are wonderful, it ignores how humans work.
I think the same about democracy too though.
I'm just saying: Get a damn clue.
This is what Trump asked for (Score:5, Insightful)
You do realize that explicitly this is what Donald Trump asked for.
He said that the Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act should be repealed. This is the section saying that internet sites aren't responsible for what people transmit across them. So he is saying that internet sites should be held responsible for what people post on them. That means: internet sites should be required to censor what people post.
Since the various "stop the steal" sites very clearly incited the lawlessness and mob violence in Washington last week, this is a clear example of what he asked them to censor.
Re:This is what Trump asked for (Score:4, Informative)
He said that the Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act should be repealed. This is the section saying that internet sites aren't responsible for what people transmit across them. So he is saying that internet sites should be held responsible for what people post on them. That means: internet sites should be required to censor what people post.
No: He said that internet sites should only get the escape from responsibility if they don't pick-and-chose what user content to carry (which is what the escape clause was supposed to enable).
- Accept anything (like a common-carrier) and you're not held responsible for what you accept.
- Pick what you'll carry and what you'll ban (like an editor of a magazine) and you're responsible for what you allow.
What's had to understand about that? What's hypocritical about it?
Re:Communism is single party rule (Score:5, Interesting)
Communism is the political implementation of Marxist economic theory. Words need to have meanings and they need to have some fixedness so we can all have intelligent discussions. It would make more sense to question if the Chinese Communist Party is actually communist than to insist they are simply because the word in their name. In many (not all) respects it bears more resemblance to what we historically termed fascism today at least in terms of its actions and current governance regardless of its stated platform.
Really I am loath to put labels on PRC today other than totalitarian, oligarchy and lest not forget evil incarnate.
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False. I keep seeing this same, ignorant idea posted all over the web. The definition of censorship is simply the deletion of anything considered objectionable. Retailers do this when they refuse to sell certain products (your slash ID is low enough that you ought to remember the time record stores refused to carry 2 Live Crew's albums.) Private universities do this when they ban books. Coffee shops censor when they install content filtering on
Re:Perfect example of communism... (Score:5, Funny)
Facebook and Twitter are perfect examples of communism: You get it for free, but you have no say in how it works.
The guy who runs it is rich far beyond anyone else. They control your access to information. They use psychological warfare techniques to prevent you from escaping. You have no privacy, and if you say anything they don't like, they shut you upï or make you disappear entirely.
You appear to have confused communism and free market capitalism.
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I'm afraid you're engaging in the "true Scotsman" fallacy
Your fears are irrelevant to me.
where you redefine the terms not to include the counter example.
Absolutely not. It's you that wants to redefine the terms so that you can abuse the word.
In this case there is no such thing as a "true communism" because "communist" nations rely on a national currency for commerce and _all_ of them have distinct ruling class with very low turnover, except for purges.
Communism by definition doesn't have currency or a class system, so those are by definition not communisms. Why don't you go enjoy the Democracy in NK if you think that governments are all what they say they are?
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Nobody said that, but it is a little scary how all of these tech companies band together and effectively squelch unpopular speech in a pretty big way.
Is "unpopular" the only adjective you can come up with for something that's on about the same level as ISIS recruitment speech.
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
Who says the next thing to be banned is just as bad as this has been?
What if the next thing that gets made illegal by tech companies is, I dunno, discussions about how to make an Oculus VR headset work without an active Facebook account?
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No, quite the contrary.
I'm saying that when things are made illegal or banned it should be done by a democratically elected government, not a rich guy with a monopoly trying to earn his next hundred billion dollars.
Re:1984 is here (Score:4, Insightful)
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Trump probably lost even his 1st Amendment right to speech, let along private companies deciding they don't want to provide him with a free megaphone.
Brandenburg v. Ohio settled this, if speech is "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action" then 1A protections don't apply.
And of course the threshold for social media is merely a ToS violation.
Re:1984 is here (Score:4, Informative)
I've read the transcript. Turley seems to be right about the contents, but the media keeps repeating the big lie that he incited a riot. Just like the repeated the big lie that there is no evidence of fraud. It's certainly weak and inconclusive, but evidence does in fact exist. Most of it is only proof that vote counters prevented poll watchers from doing their jobs, which is not direct evidence of fraud, but does create a rebuttable presumption that they're doing something wrong. And the big lie that Trump called white supremacist "very fine people". There's a whole host of big lies about Trump. Which is part of the problem. By refusing to acknowledge the evidence and making it clear that they can't be trusted to report honestly about Trump, the media intensified the belief that the election was stolen.
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My proof is that he said it and then people took that as a signal to go overthrow the government.
Re:1984 is here (Score:4, Insightful)
This is not unpopular speech. It is objectively factually incorrect speech.
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I suspect you're right on that one. It'll be a quick and dirty hack.
Re: 1984 is here (Score:3)
No, this is just my own observation. If you want a Trump example, many news outlets stated that it was racist when Trump pinned the blame for covid-19 on China, which is an absolute load of shit. (Memories of a reporter sitting in front of him saying it was racist when it plainly wasn't come to mind.) With that, pretty much anything qualifies as racist to the media, so when they call racism, I'm more likely to roll my eyes than actually believe it.
It's not just that though, there are countless examples of t
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
"defense against lies" sounds like something the Ministry of Truth would promise
That's actually a very valid point. The way China controls the flow of information is it requires all of its tech companies to "prevent the spread of rumors", especially if those rumors happen to mention a bear eating honey while having all of the power.
Which is why we have laws about the gov't (Score:4, Insightful)
As for a private company that wants to control what is on it's webpage? Not really an issue. It's not like the information isn't out there. What *isn't* out there is a free advertising platform for discredited lies.
Also, can we stop this "all ideas deserve evaluation" bullshit. It's a smoke screen. The courts and electoral system evaluated the election 70+ times. In 1 instance 2000 ballots got tossed on a technicality. In every other instance the elections results were upheld. This was a month ago.
The market place of ideas *isn't* free. It's heavily manipulated and always will be. We need to stop pretending it's not, and that we can leave it to it's own devices. We saw on the 6th what happens when you do. There were people in the capital with the means, training and intention to kill our leaders and seize power. We came a hair's breath away from losing Democracy.
Re:Which is why we have laws about the gov't (Score:4)
It's legal to incite to violence, as long as there isn't a threat of imminent lawless action. These questions went in front of the Supreme Court in the 70s when southern states tried to convict leading speakers of the civil rights movement for using violent language during their speeches.
The Supreme Court didn't have any of that and shut the states down.
Re:You're splitting hairs (Score:5, Informative)
And it's understood that Trump incited violence (and continues to) when there is an immediate threat.
Actually the argument for that is quite weak:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/n... [wsj.com]
I personally believed in the Trump incitement narrative as it sounded quite plausible, until I tried to look up what exactly he said, which was disturbingly hard to find via google. That article was one among many that I found.
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until I tried to look up what exactly he said, which was disturbingly hard to find via google.
That's true, I just spent 5 minutes looking and couldn't find a transcript.
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First result on google for "save america march speech": https://www.rev.com/blog/trans... [rev.com]
Full transcript. Trump uses the word "fight" 20 times, and the crowd repeats it back to him. His words were inciting that crowd to fight. He ends it by telling them to go down Pennsylvania Avenue. Actually he says they will go together, but perhaps realizing what was about to happen he instead abandoned them and went to watch the violence on TV from a safe space.
Re:You're splitting hairs (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:You're splitting hairs (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:You're splitting hairs (Score:4, Informative)
Praise supporters who attack campaign bus
The quote in the link is: “Did you see the way our people were protecting his bus?”
Is that an incitement to violence?
Praise for Rittenhouse
No quote in the link about that.
We're coming for you
That quote was directed at Republican lawmakers. It was a threat to primary them, not physically attack them.
Our country is under siege
This quote is not in the link, so the context is not clear.
You're allowed to go by very different rules
This quote is also not in the link.
Re:Which is why we have laws about the gov't (Score:5, Insightful)
As for a private company that wants to control what is on it's webpage? Not really an issue. It's not like the information isn't out there. What *isn't* out there is a free advertising platform for discredited lies.
Correct on all counts, though my concern is when you have both this, and what happened with Parler (again, a website I've never even visited before and probably never will) plus a combination of effort on the parts of cloudflare and AWS. Here, you even have a case of somebody wanting to set up their own platform, however given a sustained DDoS is pretty much guaranteed to happen against an unpopular site, (typically on the part of hacktivists that will ironically claim to support democracy) the amount of money you'd have to come up with just to stay afloat is virtually unfathomable. That pretty much means you aren't going to have a platform on the internet unless you have the blessing of at least one large tech company.
THAT is the problem.
Also, can we stop this "all ideas deserve evaluation" bullshit.
I'm not saying that all ideas deserve evaluation. Not at all. You're free to ignore them, you're free to walk out of the room just as much as you're free to not visit a site that you don't like. Free speech does not require you to evaluate any ideas unless you choose to do so. Policing speech, on the other hand, does require you to do that in the sense that it places your thoughts on a rail, even if it's a very wide rail.
It's a smoke screen.
Free speech is not a smoke screen. Having free speech means you allow even the speech that you don't like.
The courts and electoral system evaluated the election 70+ times. In 1 instance 2000 ballots got tossed on a technicality. In every other instance the elections results were upheld. This was a month ago.
I don't have any argument against that, and I won't argue against it. To me, Biden won the night after election night. I didn't care enough about Trump's blathering to pay any further attention to what they were arguing afterwards. Nonetheless, this is completely beside the point that I'm making.
The market place of ideas *isn't* free. It's heavily manipulated and always will be. We need to stop pretending it's not, and that we can leave it to it's own devices.
I don't know what country you were raised in, but it's not mine. The Chinese government felt the same way you do about Tiananmen Square. Can't have another one of those now can you?
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Correct on all counts, though my concern is when you have both this, and what happened with Parler (again, a website I've never even visited before and probably never will) plus a combination of effort on the parts of cloudflare and AWS. /.../ That pretty much means you aren't going to have a platform on the internet unless you have the blessing of at least one large tech company.
Yes this is scary. But these are all corporations who may do as they like. It is their choice to host or not host. It is just the way the Internet has evolved, unfortunately.
On the other side, is it right for companies to direct/encourage the gullible and foolish towards the likes of antivax and q idiocies for profit? Of course these fools are free to go elsewhere but look at what this practice has wrought - so much conflict and dysfunction. What to do about this? Reduce their size?
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Having free speech means you allow even the speech that you don't like.
No, no it does not. It means the government doesn't punish you even for speech that other people don't like. It definitely doesn't mean being forced to provide a soapbox and/or planning room to insurrectionists.
Even if corporations don't deserve any free speech rights (which is arguable) their officers, employees, and shareholders do. Forcing them to carry your speech is a violation of their right to free speech.
If you think corporations should be forced to carry your speech for no reason other than you wan
Re:Which is why we have laws about the gov't (Score:4, Insightful)
> Also, can we stop this "all ideas deserve evaluation" bullshit. It's a smoke screen.
NO. The problem is that censoring words ALSO shuts down valid questions.
For example if someone asks: "What is this "Stop the Steal" stuff? And why is it banned?
Censorship is never the solution -- it is precisely the problem. WHO determines what is acceptable? You?
Not really (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Remember, corporations are racist and underpay women. The kick independent business out of the market and use their monopoly powers to corrupt our government. The government is beholden to these racist corporations, and they collude to keep minorities down. These are common progressive positions.
It’s odd then, that you support these corrupt, racist deciders to decide what information Americans can access. See, like you, they think that they should have the right to do as they please on their own p
Re:Which is why we have laws about the gov't (Score:5, Insightful)
If they came armed, with handcuffs, and planned it all before hand on Parler, Gab and other sites then it wasn't impulsive. They didn't just go there in body armour and gas masks to listen to Trump.
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Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
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Tell that to the grieving family of the cop who got his head bashed into mush by the Trump Mob's putsch attempt. Or the family of this DC cop who was dragged onto the stairs by the MAGA Mob and beaten half to death
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ne... [dailymail.co.uk]
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You can let a few hundred people dictate how you get to approach 75 million
I love how the right wingnuts always equate every single member of the group with the worse. What the fuck is wrong with you bro? I'm pretty firmly not a republican, this should be obvious, and I don't think the average is nearly as bad as you seem to.
Re:1984 is here (Score:5, Insightful)
It's those other people who are the problem. They have to be stopped, or we won't have a country to protect.
Said every bigot ever.
Sure we do (Score:3, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sure we do (Score:4, Informative)
I doubt many people would have a problem with any of those people being stopped by law enforcement.
Of course your definition of "egged on" is bullshit, the Democrats were widely criticised for not supporting the peaceful BLM protests enough, especially the call to defund the police.
Re:Sure we do (Score:5, Insightful)
I must have missed that part where Bernie Sanders constantly called conservatives or Republicans evil people part of a massive cabal who cheat and lie at everything and said that the only way to stop them was to get tough and take matters into your own hands.
Both sides have a problem with violent extremists. One side weaponized them for direct action targeting political leaders. That you don't see the difference speaks volumes about you.
Re:1984 is here (Score:4, Insightful)
You accomplish nothing by silencing the President of the United States from communicating.
Silence the president? What are you talking about. He had his twitter account cancelled. He can call a fucking press conference in the whitehouse with a guaranteed audience, just like every president prior to 20 years ago had to do.
"defense" is critical thinking, a lost art (Score:5, Insightful)
So society should have no defense against lies spread by the President. Got it.
No you don't. The defense is to teach school children critical thinking. How to be skeptical, search for evidence of a claim, and to verify it themselves. Of course neither political party really wants that.
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So society should have no defense against lies spread by the President. Got it.
Before there was an Internet we got rid of Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson by letting them speak. Their own words convicted them.
In other news, Facebook is going to propose banning oxygen, on suspicion that Donald trump breathes it.
Re:Hah (Score:5, Informative)
The questions have been answered in the proper way over and over and over.
- the voters answered the questions in the proper way
- the election officials in 50 states run by both parties answered the questions in the proper way including multiple recounts and audits
- over 50 court cases answered the questions in the proper way
- over 90 judges (many appointed by Trump himself) answered the questions in the proper way
- 50 state legislatures answered the questions
- the Supreme Court of the United States answered the questions - twice
- the Electoral College answered the questions
- A joint session of the United States Congress answered the questions
According to the US Constitution, the steps above represent the proper way questions are answered.
Just because you don't like the answers does not mean your "questions" haven't been answered.
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You don't get to decide what's a lie
No, but the courts do. Five dozen lost cases later, we have our answer: it was a lie.
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Well, a lot of them care about Trump's pronouncements, and that's a huge-ass problem for the rest of us.
Banned phrase (Score:2)
So does that mean that Facebook's blog post announcing this decision must also be taken down? Doesn't it contain "Stop the Steal"?
Re:Banned phrase (Score:5, Funny)
Decline the purloin
I dn't get it (Score:2)
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I presumed it was a sportsphrase.
(But I don't follow American sports)
Trump Created His Own Nightmare (Score:5, Insightful)
Section 230 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Section 230 (Score:5, Insightful)
Now do we see what's wrong with Section 230 as is written? Facebook should not be able to do this. Take away the immunity and throw liability at them and they'll come around.
Idiot. Throw liability at them and nobody would ever again allow Trump to post anything anywhere.
Re:Section 230 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Section 230 (Score:4, Interesting)
Manage content beyond law, you are a publisher (Score:5, Informative)
So every site must host a flood of spam and porn, allow every conversation to devolve into racial slurs etc, or lose liability protection?
Not quite, illegal content can always be removed. For questionable legal content they can offer end user filtering. A user can choose if they want such things filtered out. Get over it, if you want to manage content beyond that required by law you are a publisher. Sorry you can't have it both ways, enforce a personal political ideology and be a platform.
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Well that's pretty much the dumbest policy I've heard all day. You completely can have it both ways and all the sites on the Internet do, otherwise either
a. all sites would be garbage full of spam
or
b. all sites would ban user submissions
Fortunately there's another option called "moderation" that is in the middle
User filtering and user moderations (Score:3)
Well that's pretty much the dumbest policy I've heard all day. You completely can have it both ways and all the sites on the Internet do, otherwise either a. all sites would be garbage full of spam or b. all sites would ban user submissions
Fortunately there's another option called "moderation" that is in the middle
Nope. You use user selected filtering and/or user moderations. The key is the user made the decision not the provider. There is little difference between "6MWE" being filtered out because a user checked "[x] Hate" on their provider's filters or a publisher did it automatically. Either ways its gone.
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Re:Section 230 (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, if you are going to filter, then do so, but that means the content you're letting through is APPROVED by you and thus you need to take liability for it.
Re:Section 230 (Score:5, Insightful)
What about classic style forums that want to enforce that posts stay topical? Should they be liable for all content posted for having moderators that remove off-topic posts?
What about your aunt's food blog? Should she be held liable for all comments posted if she removes SPAM-bot posts?
What about review sites that remove fake reviews, such as those posted by bad actors trying to slander their competition? Should they be held liable for all content posted because they try to detect and remove such posts?
What about a hypothetical site that auto-expires user-generated content after a certain period of time. So ALL posts get removed after x number of days (why would this exist? I don't know .. it's just a thought . Maybe a certain demographic would be into it. Temporary posts.). Should that type of hypothetical start-up be legally unfeasible just because people don't like what social media sites are currently doing?
Personally I like the idea that you're not liable for stuff that other people post, period. And I personally like the idea that I can dream up any kind of web-site that allows any kind of user-generated content that I want to and other people can mind their own damned business.
Maybe the solution to these problems is that people should stop being so dependent on social media. I cut Facebook and Twitter out of my life entirely and I must say that I feel much better for it. Oh, and I happen to be a business owner. I've never used social media to promote my brand. Never needed to. Claims about social media's necessity in current year are insanely exaggerated IMO. They only have the power and influence that people choose to give them. Make better choices.
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I personally like the way Slashdot works. My comments do not get filtered
Somebody clearly has never encountered the lameness filter.
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I would actually propose that Section 230 be change so that either the site filters and then is held liable, or it doesn't filter and is not held liable.
And the end result will be 100% movement towards filtering. Sites which don't filter turn into cesspools of shit.
I personally like the way Slashdot works.
In what way? In the way that Slashdot filters posts to prevent discussions of nazzis (misspelling on purpose because of filtering), or the fact that despite the filtering you can still find an endless stream of bile by browsing at -1, or by the wonderful echo chamber it has created (ever read the contents of a story about Microsoft? Just write "derp derp MS bad mmmkay" for an instant +5 informati
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Slashdot does filter. Certain words cannot be posted, too much of some types of text trigger the lameness filter. Periodically the site admins turn off anonymous comments until they can fix it.
No site has ever not had a filter. Even 8chan had a filter. Daily Stormer comments have moderation. Your suggestion would be more persuasive if you could cite a single example of that setup ever working.
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Slashdot most definitely does filter.
Go ahead and try to post in all caps. Or ASCII art. Or post any link anywhere and watch them put a domain after it to make it so that you can have a clue of what you're clicking on before you see a photo of some guy's gaping asshole filling your browser window.
Now, they have a fairly liberal filtering that is meant to keep out things that have very little use in a discussion of ideas, with the idea that moderation can take care of most of the other shit people try to p
What about fact checking articles? (Score:5, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3)
Disinformation campaign (Score:5, Informative)
Has there been any actual evidence of fraud? I mean, something affirmed by a court somewhere, not just someone's assertion?
These claims of fraud are like claims on the Internet without citations. Where are the citations from credible sources?
2018 was the first year that California put in place its new voting mechanism, with vastly expanded mail-in ballots and 3rd party delivery of votes ("ballot harvesting"), and various other changes. [politico.com] The Republicans got spanked, which led to that initial suspicion of voter fraud. From the article:
"We were only down 26 seats the night of the election and three weeks later, we lost basically every California race,’’ Ryan said Thursday. “This election system they have — I can’t begin to understand what ‘ballot harvesting’ is.”
In part due to mail-in and provisional ballots that delivered the margin of victory to Democratic challengers in a handful of seats, California’s Republican delegation appears to have been slashed in half — in the new Congress, Republicans are likely to hold just seven of the state’s 53 House seats, the party’s lowest number since the 1940’s.
In an op-ed earlier this week, former state GOP Chair Shawn Steel, a member of the Republican National Committee, stopped short of claiming outright fraud in the aftermath, but charged that California’s moves to expand vote by mail, “motor-voter” registrations, early voting and allowing voting for ex-felons have “systematically undermined” voter protection laws.
Ryan’s comments about a state’s elections process put him in league with some prominent California Republicans who have recently expressed befuddlement — and anger — about the series of GOP incumbents whose defeats came after officials completed the tallies of millions of absentee and provisional ballots.
So, this is the kernel from which the charges of "stolen election" arise, as these things have moved to many states and the covid pandemic amplified the mail-in balloting.
However, back to the core issue: The Republicans had 2 years to investigate California voting, and this time, there has been a month to present any evidence of theft and to my knowledge, there has been no evidence up till now. Certainly the issue should continue to be investigated, just as the Capitol riot should be investigated, but until there is concrete evidence, claiming there is, is merely a disinformation campaign.
Re: Disinformation campaign (Score:5, Informative)
So they enfranchised a lot of people who weren't voting by getting them on the rolls. Then they enfranchised a lot of people who would not have voted due to the pandemic. Still no evidence of widespread fraud that delivered a landslide.
Re: Disinformation campaign (Score:5, Insightful)
In short: "voter fraud" is RWNJ-speak for enabling voting by citizens whom the Republicans had spent a lot of money and effort disenfranchising. i.e. blacks and poor people and other undesirables.
It's not fair! They went to all that trouble to prevent them voting and they got to vote anyway.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm in California, and I got two ballots. My friend did, too.
FB Censoring Ron Paul (Score:4, Interesting)
FB censoring Ron Paul today is what got me. He has been the loudest advocate for peace since Iraq II.
Re: (Score:3)
What we've accomplished since "1984" is that now the Ministry of Truth has been privatized:
https://fee.org/articles/faceb... [fee.org]
Re: (Score:3)
It doesn't matter how much peace Ron Paul promotes, he's being judged on his counter-productive action to the peaceful transition of government.
When Facebook removed Ron Paul's access, they didn't say what the offending content was, or the specific part of the TOS was violated. Supposedly, Paul posted a column about tech censorship, then he was locked out. Facebook has since said the admin lockout was a mistake:
Paul's facebook pa [facebook.com]
1984 here we come.... conform or be deplatformed (Score:3)
And this is why big tech needs government regulation and oversight.
I am wondering if big tech really cares or if this is just a ploy to try and win the favor of the Harris-Biden administration.
Big tech has taken very few blanket steps against activists up to this point but now everyone (Apple, Stripe, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Twitter) have all decided that their policies are being violated. I guess they all rode the Trump Train as far as it could go and now they have to transfer to the Harris-Biden train.
When the German Chancellor steps up to defend Trump the world just got really, really weird.
https://apnews.com/article/mer... [apnews.com]
HALT THE HEIST! (Score:5, Funny)
T-shirts and commemorative memorabilia now available!
Twitter & FB are inalienable rights (Score:5, Interesting)
Facebook thrives on extremism (Score:5, Interesting)
Moreover, extremism withers in the sunlight, not the ghetto. Don't believe me? Look up Daryl Davis, the black pastor who converts KKK members by talking to them and letting them see him as a person. (Link: https://www.theguardian.com/mu... [theguardian.com]) What Facebook, Twitter etc. is doing is not helping.
When are they banning Pelosi? (Score:5, Insightful)
- Nancy Pelosi (5/16/17)
Re:When are they banning Pelosi? (Score:5, Informative)
That has a totally different meaning. As in, outside influence hijacked public thought and the course of the election and people made likely different choices than they would have absent the influence. People really did vote for Trump in 2016 and really didn't as much in 2020.
facebook is the Minitrue (Score:4)
I bellyfeel facebook is doubleplusgood to rectify thoughtcrime and makeTrump an unperson, the net will have goodthink and duckspeak. Now pardon me while I go to the online Hate to throw beanbags at Ron Paul on my monitor.
Well, of course- (Score:5, Insightful)
It refs unpersons, after all.
But really, what's the motivation? I'm guessing:
1. Petty vindictiveness. I don't have any doubt about this one: I've been in IT for 40 years, and I've never seen such an assortment of entitled, self righteous, and utterly uninformed little shits. I and my cohorts took pride in the fact that we were building something that could be deployed unstoppably under the noses of oppressive governments, especially ours. (This predated the TIS FW toolkit). The whole thing was SUPPOSED to be the Wild West, that's what made it beautiful.
2. Money. Big Tech is bending over for the new administration and all those delicious dollars to be coaxed out of China.
3. Arrogance. Why is it such a common theme that Progressives seem to feel the need to tell others what to do? Or, said differently, protect people from themselves? I'd like to see a little more culling of the gene pool- stupid persists if it's not painful.
.
.
98. I think some noble aspirations about "Democracy" and "violence" are far, far down on the list.
I know some people personally that work at FB, and by extension, some of their FB social circle- also personally. I realize this is anecdotal, but it's been consistent so far: they are absolutely over-the-top clinically batshit crazy. I say this with neither hyperbole or humor. They've been raised in an echo chamber and told that they're the coolest, smartest thought-leaders ever... and while they can sling Ajax or whatever they're using now far better than I, they're actually completely introspectively, emotionally, and intellectually stunted. It's like Ellen Degeneres or Streisand in tech. In their mind, you're not even allowed to look at them.
Section 230 and if Facebook was a carrier... (Score:3)
What if Verizon or T-Mobile filtered the words each time you told a friend it's time to "stop the steal?" You're speaking with them in a real conversation but Verizon's network recognized the words as they were transmitted them and just... silenced them. Not good, right?
That's exactly what Facebook is doing, and it's exactly why they do not deserve Section 230 immunity.
If somebody paid me a cent (Score:3)
every time "stop the steal" was mentioned on twitter or facebook, I would probably afford a home in Silicone Valley.
Have you seen my horses? (Score:3, Funny)
learn to code (Score:3)
"learn to code" got banned too, when it was directed at laid-off journalists.
It was ok when it was directed at miners
Not really (Score:3)
What those 10 companies bring is an audience. One pre packaged. One you can literally buy. Ever heard of Praguer U? Their a right wing video blog that has a ton of subscribers. Why? Because they've got billionaire backing and they bought a ton of ads on YouTube.
As for Trump, it's not that he couldn't cooperate. It's that he's destabilizing the country, he's riski