But of course I've read the CEO's statement. I'm glad that he feels conflicted, that's really the important takeaway here after all.



Reading.

Edit: Interesting, it looks like there was an uptick of hate speech usage in migrant sub-reddits, but they were unable to demonstrate causation. It's unfortunate that the scope is limited to reddit only, but I imagine it would probably be difficult to study the impact across site. There are "fat people hate" threads up constantly on 4chan, for instance, so one wonders whether users are just self-segregating by jumping ship from reddit for greener pastures, so to speak. The authors note that "Therefore the migration of users to other sites could have also played a role in reducing the amount of hate speech generated within Reddit, following the subreddit bans. In the case of users who stay, they may fulfill those other needs elsewhere, while continuing to post on reddit as before."

This post was edited by bogie160 on Aug 5 2019 07:25am

See, and that's where things get dicey: exactly because deplatforming does have an effect is it a slippery slope. No one will miss a cesspool like 8chan, but who says that the deplatforming efforts will stop there and not be extended further to places like r/The_Donald or breitbart?

We have already seen other platforms like twitter and youtube ban people for legal and inoffensive statements, simply because they didnt agree with the political viewpoint of those statements. If content providers (and content protectors like cloudflare) start deplatforming not just single users, but whole channels, forums or sites, the resulting damage to a fair political competition will start to quickly ramp up.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Aug 5 2019 07:18am

My concern is that the impact on mass shootings is negligible, but that it will work to censor alternative thought and eliminate the ability for that thought to exist.

As you said, few people are going to miss the more degenerate boards on 8chan, or perhaps the entire site, but if 8chan is not ok, shouldn't 4chan logically be next? I don't see where this ends. Problematic behavior (ambiguous) must be self-censored by site admins or the site will go down.

This post was edited by bogie160 on Aug 5 2019 07:31am

/r/The_Donald has already been put in quarantine and delisted from /r/all for not adhering to TOS.

The government has no obligation to guarantee free speech on private messaging boards. Or the government is going to have to make social media part of the public domain, which would be a very interesting form of nationalization.

In some countries certain forms of speech are banned that would classify as free speech in the US. Over time, have those countries increased the limits on free speech? No, at least not as far as I know.

The problem with all of this is that we're living in the social media age, social media is instrumental in political and ideological competition, but all of it is pigeonholes through half a dozen platforms which all have a stranglehold on their "type" of social media.
Politicians and activists who get deplatformed by the social media giants simply have no option to replace the lost outreach and exposure to their arguments and ideas. There simply exist no alternatives of equal value.

Therefore, deplatforming does have the potential to distort the political competition. And hence, it becomes highly problematic when those social media giants ban or otherwise deplatform people for legal and inoffensive points of view, it becomes problematic when those social media giants exhibit a substantial political/ideological bias of their own. (Google on election night 2016: "We lost.")

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Aug 5 2019 07:52am

What TOS is that “don’t support Drumpf and no memes allowed”

I personally don't think deplatforming is the correct way of dealing with this issue, but the correct way of dealing with this issue (gun regulation) is literally impossible in the US.

Also deplatforming is possible without governmental action. And I do think you're overstating its effect on the public discourse. So far that has been incredibly minor. After all, right-wing talking points and politicians are ever-present in the current public discourse. They're all over on YT, Twitter, whatever you name. There is currently no argument to be made of "censorship", unless you can provide data that everyone who makes certain legal and inoffensive statements is being banned from those platforms.



Moderators unwilling to take down calls for violent action.



This post was edited by balrog66 on Aug 5 2019 08:18am

que sarcastic "nothing can be done about this" memes from Euros, and "nothing can be done about this" responses from gun proponents in the USA.

meanwhile no one has tried refusing to print the shooters face, identity, and manifesto yet. (in the USA)

mental health reform is a huge hurdle, gun control is a huge hurdle, banning the identification of the shooter seems to be easier.

all 3 are potential constitutional violations, 4a due process with mental health, 2a for guns, 1a for freedom of press. if i have to choose between violating 4a to take people from their homes, 2a to ineffectually "ban" guns, or stop profiteering fuckboi press junkets i'll fuck the press twice then enjoy a smoke.

also a fairly good point by NDT

https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/1158074774297468928?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1158074774297468928&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbsnews.com%2Fnews%2Fneil-degrasse-tyson-twitter-neil-degrasse-tyson-faces-backlash-for-tweet-about-mass-shootings-in-el-paso-dayton%2F

This post was edited by thesnipa on Aug 5 2019 08:22am

Yeah, the first amendment really is not a hurdle at all!