Is the current wave of internet censorship a good thing?

[LordFall]

The trend of the last few years and especially the last few weeks has been this whole #canceled movement and general censorship of stuff that goes against the mainstream. Whether that be things like big pickup companies, men's rights activists, and now the far right-wingers. They seem to be worried and calling it an abuse of free speech or some sort of conspiracy theory by the establishment to solidify their grip on society.

Is this generally good for the world though? Is this just what happens when society moves up the spiral? We have to censor things that are damaging to the collective consciousness? Or do they have a point and this is a bad thing? 

[Preety_India]

I think it's a double edged sword. There are pros and cons. 

The pros being that such censoring shields people from getting radicalized and controlled or manipulated to be recruited into right wing groups which can easily lead to formation of nazi parties,the kind that existed during the time of Hitler and this can easily give way to the possibility of someone like Hitler coming to power again. 

The cons being the cancel culture that goes overboard in its punitive action and causes needless suffering to an individual or group who might valid concerns about their issues or the state of society. 

This kind of behavior only accelerates further when the right wing uses extremist approaches and encourages violence. It's a vicious cycle for which the right is very much responsible. Had the right been peaceful and reasonable in their approach, there would be no reason to justify Banning or censoring anyone. 

See how it works. Like a cycle. 

 

[No Self]

They are censoring groups that they themselves created via their pro-extremism brain-hacking algorithms. Well-meaning people on all sides of politics are the victims here.

[Mason Riggle]

@LordFall if I started relentlessly spamming this forum with the raunchiest porn I could dig up, what would be the best course of action for Leo to take?  

[Mason Riggle]

@datamonster it becomes problematic when Governments enact laws that prohibit free expression. 

When Twitter, or Google, or Apple, or Facebook create policies, and censor content with the aim of safeguarding against violence, exploitation of minors, racism, etc. this is not in any way an infringement on anyone's freedom of expression.  

The conflation of these two things is the real problem. 

Edited January 14, 2021 by Mason Riggle

[Yog]

In a weird way I see it as a step forward.

I feel that at this level of development .... we have almost no choice but to do it. The collective psyche is out of whack and we are out of tools. Its a crude solution and a bandage upon a deep wound, but I do not see what else do we got.

Another important think to take into consideration is that censorship is by no means "removal", its pushing stuff into the collective unconscious. Its basically collective suppression.

In due time this repressed material will rot and fester, create other types of societal pathology and swing the pendulum in the other direction. So having this in mind, It does not look like a good thing in the long run, its just a quick fix.

Btw we do not know if this will be successful, we'll see that soon. Its very likely that there will be collective ego backlash, far bigger than what we got right now.

[Forestluv]

21 hours ago, LordFall said:

The trend of the last few years and especially the last few weeks has been this whole #canceled movement and general censorship of stuff that goes against the mainstream. Whether that be things like big pickup companies, men's rights activists, and now the far right-wingers. They seem to be worried and calling it an abuse of free speech or some sort of conspiracy theory by the establishment to solidify their grip on society.

Speech control is a concern is some contexts, yet it is much more complex and nuanced than this simple framing.

For example, Qanon cult propaganda has brainwashed millions of people to believe that the U.S. Congress is full of satanic-worshipping pedophiles that want to rape their children in the name of satan. These cult members are so full of delusional fear, anger and paranoia that they want to kidnap and kill members of Congress. (and have now attempted to do so). And social media companies have profited billions of dollars by promoting it. Do you really think that this should be allowed unpoliced?

Imagine that an online group convinced millions of vulnerable people that you were a satanic-worshipping pedophile and violent mobs came after you to kill you before you rape their children. Can you honestly say you would be ok with this and decline help from police? Not only is it harmful to you, it’s harmful to the people that got brainwashed into the cult. And people are profiting off this harm.

In another context, imagine a pharmaceutical company used sneaky online propaganda to convince vulnerable people that ingesting Mercury would protect them from demons. They cause millions of people to go mentally insane after Mercury poisoning. They start violently harming themselves and those around them. The pharmaceutical company profits billions of dollars off Mercury sales. Should this be allowed?

Cult victims are often vulnerable people that have suffered from abuse, trauma, drug addictions and depression. A cult environment can give them a surface level sense of support and meaning, yet ends up causing more harm to them and others.

Speech is not a black or white issue. It is a complex system that involves a spectrum of degrees, relativity and context.

21 hours ago, LordFall said:

They seem to be worried and calling it an abuse of free speech or some sort of conspiracy theory by the establishment to solidify their grip on society.

It goes both ways. Authoritarians could label any legitimate dissent as a conspiracy theory in an effort to suppress dissent and maintain power. In another context, delusional conspiracy theories of stolen elections by satanic communist pedophiles causes real world harm. 

 

[Boethius]

Liberals are always ALWAYS  the ones who come to suffer under free speech restrictions since they are the ones who make proposals that break conventional ways of understanding or participating in society. So while we probably do need some reasonable restrictions to prevent the spread of hate and disinformation, if left-leaning folks think they're gonna be able to use free speech restrictions for political gain, they will learn (at least eventually) how sorely mistaken they were in that.

[Forestluv]

Roger McNamee, a major investor to Facebook and former advisor to Zuck, describes how the business model of large social media platforms is hyper-focused on grabbing attention and engagement. Hate speech, inflammatory rhetoric, covid hoax, disinformation and paranoia are extremely engaging and profitable within this business model.

He also discusses the benefit of policing online extremists. The vast majority of people at the capital insurrection were regular people that became swept up in a civil war re-enactment through a Truman Show reality enabled by social media. Only a small percentage were intentionally planning and preparing to overthrow the government through violence, bombs and taking hostages. And this minority was not communicating via open social media. They were already communicating their plots underground. It is easier for them to carry out their plots when 10s of thousands useful idiots are causing chaos and distracting security. The intentional insurrectionists were able to penetrate deep into the capital building and steal documents and government hard drives. It would have been much harder to do this on their own. The downside-side was that hundreds of useful idiots were stupid enough to livestream the whole thing, which helps the fbi track them down. 

He also discusses how we can develop safe social media platforms.

 

[Boethius]

@Forestluv That's an interesting point about these platforms already participating in the "attention economy".

My fear is if legitimate criticism gets de-platformed for reasons of naively short-sighted political gain. Which would be bad from a free speech perspective and also bad for the health of any political party in the long term. I suppose my concern about free speech can be addressed by still allowing critical material to be available but harder for an interested party to find.

But the politics of all these restrictions are going to take a couple years at least to work out. I worry what becomes of the anger and resentment of Trump's supporters if they have absolutely NO outlet to express themselves. In particular, I would prefer if the Republicans don't put up a more polished version of Trump in 2024. So I remain sceptical about these restrictions.

Edited January 15, 2021 by Boethius

[Willie]

If you were a business owner and someone had been shouting hateful bullshit through a megaphone in your shop and drawing disruptive crowds, wouldn’t you kick them out? 

[LfcCharlie4]

Double edged sword, you have to police these platforms but it's hard. 

Read 1984 for how it could go all terribly wrong with power in the wrong hands.

[No Self]

We should not be fighting one another. We should be fighting the tech companies who make billions from fucking with our brains, and know very well what they are doing.

[Willie]

2 hours ago, No Self said:

We should not be fighting one another. We should be fighting the tech companies who make billions from fucking with our brains, and know very well what they are doing.

If you don’t like a business, don’t use their product or service.

[hamedsf]

there's no good censorship. yep, in some serious cases, you should ban terrorist groups on platforms but government officials not at all. 

this paves the way for "pure oligopoly" and the modern conservatism manifests.

Angela Merkel, German chancellor, has sharply criticised Twitter’s decision to ban US president Donald Trump, calling it a “problematic” breach of the “fundamental right to free speech”.

[hamedsf]

negative sides: it's like you will receive a death threat for allowing people to freely express their opinions as a founder of a platform. just like john matze experienced recently.  

Edited January 16, 2021 by hamedsf

[No Self]

6 hours ago, Willie said:

If you don’t like a business, don’t use their product or service.

Personally I don't use much of it, and am able to do so in ways that do not cause me to hate half the population. But apparently millions of others don't have the same capability, so I stand by my remark.