give me a break, Obama's team was allowed to suck up Facebook's entire social graph and also used an app to get the data for all of the app users friends without consent
The media called it genius and a good thing when obama used data and social media to win. Those dumb dinosaur conservatives were being left behind by tech savvy democrats. Now it's portrayed as evil when the reverse happened. Pure propaganda
This is propaganda level whataboutism that is attempting to conflate two different things.
1. The Obama for America campaign directly asked users permission to access their friend graph, which was allowed and stated in the permissions at the time before FB reduced app permission scope.
2. The action taken on that data was to cross reference publicly available voter registration lists to suggest those most likely to respond to an invitation to join the campaign sent by the first user. No consent was missed here either.
Whereas Cambridge Analytica:
1. Bought the data from a third party, who had slurped it down under the pretenses of "academic research" in a random quiz app. Already a couple layers of misdirection here. This was after FB had tightened up their data usage policy
2. Peddled the data for targeted harassment and voter manipulation with false or misleading info. The leadership pitched services such as staging blackmail by spreading rumors about an opponents sexuality, targeting them with prostitutes and then disseminating that info.
Does anyone else remember when, circa ±2009, Zuckerberg used to frame Facebook as (in his words) a utility? What has happened since? The company grew and became more "normalized" and thus inline with the "company activist" model so prevalent today?
Among other things, they realised that being a utility would not be as profitable. Also, many of the people who work there legitimately don't want Facebook to be used as a tool to make the world a worse place.
As always, this begs the question between hate speech and disfavored political speech. I think Britain First is doing their best to actively revert the UK back 50 years, but I struggle to see why it is they're simply hate speech and not a valid political movement.
I agree with you here. Details of this particular issue aside - the chilling effects are likely to have a significant impact in the future. I don’t generally agree with censorship, but in cases where it’s needed I think it must be objective and not subjective. Eg. “i’ll know it when i see it”.
This is always going to be subjective because it has everything to do with the speaker's intent, not the actual words. Determining hate speech is almost always about fishing out intent that the speaker is very protective of.
Does this mean countries with nascent independence movements will be able to declare these movements "hate speech"? I don't see much difference. Let's say Chiapas rebels or Puerto Rico or Scotts’ Independence movement want to seek independence, can the government declare that hate speech and have all that taken down? If this argument sticks, I can’t see why the above isn’t in similar vein.
The distinguishing factor is the promotion of hatred and implied violence.
I remember when the UK banned Sinn Fein from appearing on TV, including their actual elected MPs, resulting in the ridiculous "words read by an actor" workaround.
Ok, looks like it’s a fascist group which engages in violence. It’s still tricky though because there are independence groups which while they have legitimate goals also engage in violence.
Or even AntiFa who bill themselves as anti fascists engage in violence, on occasion. Not sure they buy ads though.
SF/IRA were a lot of things, and undoubtedly violent, but they were never really fascist. Their only consistent position was Irish nationalism (continuation of the Irish war of independence) and Catholicism. At times they claimed to be Marxist, at other times they got Republican senators to raise money for them.
While I've had the pleasure of not interacting much with Britain First, and it's possible they do engage in "promotion of hatred" or "implied violence", really that could be anything these days. Like CNN's overreaction to a GIF/meme, or the internet reacting badly to an awful interview.
And talking about actual elected MPs being replaces by actors, this is a fairly common tactic since you can't use footage from the House of Commons for comedy or satire. So it's worth remembering censorship doesn't need a reason once rules or laws are put in place.
I think a more interesting question is what would Facebook do about the European countries where various aspects of Islam are already illegal.
France has banned the veil.
Switzerland banned the construction of minarets (not mosques) via popular referendum in 2009.
Austria bans mosques from receiving foreign funding.
It would appear that Facebook considers the majority of the populations of many important European countries to be engaged in hate speech, and presumably their governments too?
So I'm not sure we need to look to nascent independence movements to encounter difficulties with the consistency of Facebook's position although, it is an interesting thought experiment.
> Ads for a Britain First petition to stop a mosque being built in Maidstone, Kent, appeared on Facebook over the Christmas period, despite the group being banned by the social network.
> The three ads and the page on which they originated have now been removed, after BBC News contacted Facebook.
I think it’s safe to say that the “to stop a mosque being built” is the important phrase here.
You can be against the the faith tied to your ethnicity. So if you're ethnically Christian you can rail against the Catholic church specifically all day long. Not trying to say whether this is right or wrong, just that you can hate a particular religion with impunity as long as you're part of the in-group.
You can be against all of them I would think. I'm not trying to make a comment on whether any of this is 'right' just that there is an example where you can dislike a particular religion with impunity because you're part of the in-group.
that’s really racist. what race is associated with Islam? Only someone whose never traveled and been to malaysia or pakistan or iran or turkey could lump them all as one ethnic group.
Would you prefer the term culturally Muslim/Jewish/Christian? It's not that they're the same, it's that they share a lot of similar moral values, traditions, cultural elements, and have a shared ancestry. It is closely related to, but not defined by, their faith.
I mean the French, British, Russians, Spanish, Germans, Americans, Italians, etc. are all extremely different but they nonetheless get lumped into 'White (which is damn-near the same thing as ethnically Christian).
There's no such thing as culturally muslim or christian, you could argue about jewish faith sometimes since it's ethnocentric, but just because these are abrahamitic religions doesn't mean you could lump those together.
> nonetheless get lumped into 'White (which is damn-near the same thing as ethnically Christian).
you said it yourself, it's lumping everything together. This never leads to anything good, just look at Jugoslavian war, same people or at least closely related ethnically and nevertheless so atrocious; that's what religion, hate and envy for patches of lands could lead to.
How does that work? Russians are ethnically Christian I presume, but they are Orthodox Christians so do they get a license to rail against the Catholic church or would that be "hate speech". What about railing against Mormons? Or does that only extend to the religious sect that is traditionally associated with that ethnic group in that particular area?
I see the idea I think, but it seem it needs to be defined a bit more precisely to be useful.
Preventing the construction of mosques and churches does not actually help women and gay people. All it does is hurt their enemies, and that is not the same thing.
Depends. If they diddle kids behind closed doors it's very much the law's business (for example). I'm not saying that's happening here, I'm making an example. Churches are not exempt from the law, neither is any kind of private property for that matter.
Besides, there are valid reasons to be against the building of a church near your house - noise for example (church bells, prayer songs).
Objectively, lots of our business. Mainly because what is done behind closed doors rarely stays behind closed doors, and also because of said crimes that can occur behind closed doors.
Ie, I can't sit behind closed doors and commit horrible crimes against humans and then claim "What business is it of yours?".
That of course is not to say that we don't have some right to privacy, to independence and etc. Yet, standing behind a claim of "what happens behind closed doors is none of your business" seems to willfully ignore so much.
What people do behind closed doors tends to affect what they do openly.
Religion has historically always been used as a tool to assert political power. Mosques often get financed by undemocratic regimes, in particular Mohammad bin Salman's Saudi-Arabia, which most definitely funds Mosques in a political influence operation.
Explain to me why that is not something people can vote on?
What if I don't want Saudi funded mosques in particular, is there any nuance allowed. There is no racism or exclusion based on a person's ethnicity here.
Should we lock up Richard Dawkins for being anti catholic?
Of course there's nuance allowed. We're talking about human speech, it's basically all nuance.
If you say that Saudi funding churches, businesses, housing, etc. is not good for Britain for a reason other than you have something against Saudis as a people then you're fine.
If you say you're against all churches because you're an anti-theist then you're fine.
There is absolutely exclusion based on ethnicity. It's extremely important to recognize that there is a difference between someone who is religiously Muslim and ethnically Muslim -- same with Judaism -- and same with Christianity too as well but we don't call it that because we're the default in the West. Saying there is no such thing ignores the dominating cultural impact of religious institutions.
What's wrong about being against one religion in particular. I think it's very reasonable to be against Islam because of its stance on gay rights, women rights, penalty for apostasy and their holy book which if interpretet literally (which is how vast majority of Muslims believe it should be interpreted) is full of hate and calls for violence.
Not wanting any more of that or institutions promoting that is reasonable political view.
What's wrong about being against one religion in particular.
You can be "against" a particular religion all you want.
But you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it. Including the "practice" of getting together with friends in a room or a building, and posting a sign outside the door saying this is what you do.
Churches have special status given by the government. This means I should absolutely have a say how many, what kind and where they are built. It's not about home meetings to read the Bible after dinner. It's about special status institutions which influencen the areas they are built in.
Churches have special status given by the government.
Then maybe the problem is the messed up laws providing that "special status" then. But that doesn't mean you can (even under those laws) category ban a certain group from building any churches, anywhere.
Which is exactly what Britain First is advocating.
Plenty of countries regulate public religious practice. Take France, for instance, which even regulates public display of religious symbols . Does it follow that it is hate speech to say, "the government should handle religion more like France."?
Note that while France is a secular country, secularism is not the same thing as freedom of religion. Plenty of secular countries seek freedom from religion. This can entail restrictions that prevent people from practicing religious customs, like the burka ban. The degree of magnitude between something like that and halting the construction of mosques is debatable. A good argument can be made that the former is more restrictive than the latter: the former actually prevents people from practicing religious customs, the latter only prevents formal religious establishments. In other words, banning mosques means people can be practicing Muslims that pray in their home, while the latter prevents people from being practicing Muslims at all (if adhering to dress codes is considered part of practicing the religion).
The point I'm ultimately making is that the statement:
> But you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it.
Is demonstrably incorrect. Relatively liberal and progressive countries at times do prohibit people from practicing their religion, and France's restrictions serve as an example.
Relatively liberal and progressive countries at times do prohibit people from practicing their religion, and France's restrictions serve as an example.
It's a question of "restrict expression to some extent" v. "prohibit outright". When I said "no right to prohibit" -- it's the latter form that I meant.
France does restrict some aspects of religious expression (such as wearing the burka in public). But this is very far from an outright prohibition of that religion (which we both seem to agree a ban on mosques would basically amount to).
> It's a question of "restrict expression to some extent" v. "prohibit outright". When I said "no right to prohibit" -- it's the latter form that I meant.
Then banning mosques is not in the scope of your statement. Muslims can practice their religion without the presence of a mosque. Many do pray in the privacy of their homes or somewhere other than a mosque. Like France's face covering restrictions, it is only a restriction of a specific aspect of the religion. Such a ban does not, in your own words, "prohibit outright" the ability to practice Islam.
Do Muslims that don't live within commuting distance of a mosque cease to be Muslims? Of course not, they pray in their homes. The existence of Muslims that practice religions without mosques makes the claim that a ban on mosques prohibits the practice of Islam outright an objectively false statement. You're the one that put the threshold at "prohibit outright".
US courts would likely agree that it is unjustly curbing religion - they'd find the bans on head coverings unlawful as well.
Do gay couples that aren't allowed to be married cease to be gay? Of course not, they keep their sexuality in the privacy of their own homes. The existence of gays that live without recognition and rights by the state makes the claim that a ban on gay marriage prohibites homosexuality an objectively false statement...
Like yes you're technically right but only by seemingly purposely missing the point -- that having a community center to gather and worship is central to most religions. The times when chruchmembers gather in housechurches are typically times when they're being opressed.
I'm not missing any point, I'm well aware of the fact that centers of worship are important to many, or even most, religions. You've jumped into this comment chain pretty late, and the original point I'm making is probably difficult to glean from these later comments. My whole point is that the above poster's claim that
> you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it.
is just straight up not true. Several countries, including liberal democracies such as France with its laws that prohibit face coverings even when worn for religious purposes, do indeed prohibit religious practices. Attire and appearance is important to many religions, and liberal democracies do indeed prohibit those. drugme's claim that people (I assume people in liberal democracies is what's being referenced here) do not have the right to prohibit anyone from practicing religion is not correct. There are plenty of instances were people's religious practice is restricted by law.
Then the commenter tried to pull a pretty blatant moat and bailey by trying to claim that their comments only referred to those that want to "prohibit [a religion] outright" as opposed to only prohibiting certain aspects. In response to which, I pointed out that a ban on religious centers is does not "prohibit outright" a religion either.
> It's extremely important to recognize that there is a difference between someone who is religiously Muslim and ethnically Muslim
You mean arab right? Not all arabs are muslims so please stop this bs spreading. Yes christian arabs and jews from middle east have a lot in common (culturally) with their neighbors who are predominantly muslim. Saying that one could be ethnically muslim means you are expressing support for religious (as well as ehtnic) cleansing that has been going on in the middle east for decades. I did say ethnic because there has been some other ethnicities (non-arabs) that suffered tremendously as well.
Explain to me why that is not something people can vote on?
Because there's this thing known as "freedom of religion" which is recognized both in UK and European law (to which the UK is still bound) as fundamental and inviolable.
Meaning: no you can not "vote" on the question of whether a certain group is allowed to practice their religion (yes, in your neighborhood) -- and advertise this fact. The size of the building, or the width of the signage can be regulated perhaps... but the very fact of that house of worship being built -- sorry, no.
What if I don't want Saudi funded mosques in particular, is there any nuance allowed?
The "No More Mosques!" campaign clearly is not limited to foreign-funded mosques (or those funded by nasty regimes); it is explicitly aimed against building mosques in general.
That's why there's basically no way to look at it as fundamentally anti-Muslim.
Should we lock up Richard Dawkins for being anti-Catholic?
No, and no one is saying anyone should be "locked up" for carrying those banners, or running those ads.
please the muslims are reverting it back a 1000 years with all their acid attacks and stabby-ness. y'all be praying to the east soon enough at this rate.
Anyone remembers how the internet was going to liberate the expression, instead we got two, three bottlenecks manned (or is it personed?) by censors actively supported by the MSM and virtually the entire university system.
Facebook is a private entity and they can do with their software what they want. If that drives away users then that’s their problem. You can set up a server or a static page and disseminate your opinions more easily now than ever. No one ever promised the ability to say whatever you want without response or repurcusion from individuals, corporations, charities, political parties or interest groups.
Facebook executives are disrespectful and duplicitous but this is hardly an existential contradiction of the concept of the free and open web. If people choose a corporate platform with corporate censorship then the real problem is that no one is offering a better alternative.
Also censored by payment processors and Big Tech collusion. Collusion met with indefensibly weak arguments of “just build your own”.
Build your own = shovel, lay cable, and found a bank before you get to your project, because Big Tech and Big Payment will cut you down if you say something they don’t like.
That is absolutely not the fault of the Internet and entirely the fault of the people using the Internet. Every time I hear this complaint on a forum other than Facebook or Reddit or Twitter I laugh because if it was true, HN wouldn't exist. The millions of independent phpBB forums wouldn't exist. I wouldn't be allowed to write my own HTML and Javascript if this was true.
Some people willingly put themselves into buckets, yes. It's always been that, it will always be that way. But don't pretend for a second that this is the death of the Internet or a lack of free expression or censorship or any of that nonsense until you can't buy an IP address and host a web server on your own hardware. The web is free and open, and the existence of non-free and non-open parts of the Internet does not negate that in any way.
Domain providers are beginning to police content they deem as unacceptable speech or ideas. Are you going to remember IP addresses when the DNS system itself polices thought?
The problem is, tech companies are beginning to behave like a cartel when it comes to free expression. We don’t just see it in Facebook, we see it across all facets of the digital economy, from payment providers to hosting providers to DNS services themselves.
If your solution for someone getting the scarlet letter is to say they are free to build their own network, then we are approaching a major problem.
The slope is not nearly as slippery as you're imagining it to be. I'm not sure literal white supremecists are the shining beacon upon which you want to hang your argument (if I'm wrong on this, you don't need to read any further). We're not talking about a controversial political opinion, we're not talking about coastal liberals shutting down good American conservative free speech, we're talking about white supremecists who refer to themselves as genocidal. People who want to murder (and have done so) non-white people just for the crime of having a different skin color.
But beyond that absolutely ridiculous argument, yes. The Internet is free-as-in-freedom as long as you have an IP address. If you want to start your own competitor to the World Wide Web because a few private companies exercise their right to not to business with you, you can do that. The Web and the Internet work without domain names, and if you really need your message out there and your followers really need to hear it, is typing in an IP address too much work? If it is, then your message might not be as convincing as you think it is. But even still, you can host your own website or Internet service regardless. And you can start your own registrar and host your own servers and make your own payment processor. That is entirely possible and at that point only the government can stop you (and even then, you can choose your own government like The Pirate Bay did). If your movement is stopped by a lack of convenience, that's not Facebook's problem.
Saying "but Facebook banned me" as if Facebook was the entire Internet or even the entire Web doesn't fly. Only you can give them that power, and you can take that power from them whenever you want to. Being banned from Twitter/Facebook/YouTube is only a problem if you honestly believe that Twitter/Facebook/YouTube owns the entire Internet. But they don't. You're free to start a competitor any time you want.
Do you have a source to back up your claim that Britain First have "referred to themselves as genocidal"? Extreme claims require extreme evidence, and I have not been able to find instances where they have referred to themselves as such. You're making a very significant claim when you say that Britian First has described themselves as genocidal (as opposed to being described as such by others).
While it may be tempting to reach for the most extreme label one can think of to try and inspire others to reject something that seriously distresses you, when it goes into the realm of hyperbole it mostly functions to decrease the crediblility of the point you're making and lessens the significance of the label you're using.
I was responding to the link that spaginal had posted about Daily Stormer. In that article, it says "[Daily Stormer] calls itself “The World’s Most Genocidal Republican Website.”"
I am not referring to Britain First at all, and there is no hyperbole or reaching for extreme labels involved with my comment.
Thanks for clarifying, as your previous post did not specify what group is being referred (and also talked about being banned from Facebook, which is why I inferred you were writing about Britian First).
Is the only food store in town, who is ran by a racist, allowed to starve black families by refusing them service because of their skin color?
Are tech companies across the board allowed to shut down, disenfranchise, silence, and marginalize people and businesses because they simply disagree with their lawful politics and ideas?
>Is a store allowed to refuse service to customers because of their skin color?
In the US, no. Title III of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race (among other things).
>Are tech companies allowed ban users because they disagree with their politics?
Yes. Political ideology is not a protected class the US. The government can't tell you what you can and can't say, but private businesses are completely free to moderate content hosted on their platforms.
But again, if you don't like the rules of Facebook/GoDaddy/Twitter/etc, of these private non-governmental for-profit businesses, you're free to start your own. You're making it sound like a global conspiracy when in reality it's more likely that Daily Stormer's talk of white supremacy and genocide is so distasteful across the board that major tech companies independently and simultaneously decided that these people were not welcome.
>Are tech companies across the board allowed to shut down, disenfranchise, silence, and marginalize people and businesses because they simply disagree with their lawful politics and ideas?
What if those politics and incitements aren't legal (or ethical) because, at a general level, they violate the law specifically but the harm principle more generally?
Maybe it's time to realize that it's very hard to be objective and neutral. In this case, being objective and neutral is just giving the extremes a platform to promote themselves.
Maybe sites like Facebook should try taking a "no politics" policy, or a policy where a political ad is always placed next to a free ad from the opposing side?
Then you have to come up with a definition of what is and isn't politics - is a poll about whether you do or do not want a mosque built political? Is paying for an advertisement to sign a petition (about not building a mosque) political?
> a political ad is always placed next to a free ad from the opposing side?
This is obviously a disaster, as it gives free rein to put lies on the same footing as truth. But adopting local rules on electoral advertising is a really good idea - UK print political adverts must have an imprint saying who's paid for them, for example.
Agreed, but Facebook can't solve this. They have created the biggest echo chamber that has ever existed. The algorithms designed to show people more of what they like combined with political discourse has given rise to something ugly.
To undo all that partisanship and try to pull people out of their comfortable bubbles would hurt FB's bottom line. They are simply not incentivized.
It is concerning that Britain First exist and have the support they do.
It's also concerning that Facebook has the power to decide who is right and wrong when it comes to the most popular form of free speech we have in the world today.
These aren't mutually exclusive facts- they can both be true or false and you can agree or disagree with them to different levels. And I don't have an answer. I'm not even sure any answer the majority would agree with exists. This is the great problem our generation must answer as a society, or destroy everything great we have achieved for having not solved it.
(Sometimes people claim they were added to the group without their knowledge or consent, which FB lets you do - this is a massive misfeature of the system!)
I feel like this corporate censorship is awful for free speech. Specifically, because dividing people by beliefs/demographics increases tribalistic behaviour and the spread of misinformation.
I foresee a situation where we have multiple social networks, each with radically different social/political slants. Similar to what we've seen with things like Reddit and Voat.
HN is great partly because it has excellent mods, and removes quite a lot of stuff between moderation and flagging. Perhaps a bit overzealous on flagging sometimes though.
I think the fact that I've not encountered an "evergreen" community (i.e. one that doesn't go the way of Digg, Reddit eventually) gives me a lot of anxiety with regards to my day to day online community usage.
Online communities often feel ephemeral, but maybe that's healthy in the grand scheme of the internet?
I'm really thankful that we have good mods here on HN.
I don't think it is! Major social networks behave more similarly to magazines, newspapers, publishing networks than they do communication protocols that put you directly in touch with someone else (email, phone, letters).
I think a lot of people hold this philosophical belief that social networks have some sort of responsibility to be fair on everyone all of the time, but I don't really see how companies are incentivised towards that in any way.
There is a sort of ethical question, that in the same way that in theory news organisations should be honest, diligent and accurate that social networks do have some sort of responsibility to be fair on everyone.
It's just not enforceable currently, and I feel like trying to force that sort of integrity onto social networks isn't currently viable.
Because news papers and magazines review all their content by hand (and usually make that content themselves). The comparison you're making is like seeing a weekly neighborhood get together where everyone joins in except the black family which is excluded and saying "Well what about all the other private homes that black people never enter?". Those other homes aren't having a neighborhood get together, it's a different thing.
Free speech on the internet is a dream. Look at what happened while Reddit tried to advocate it - shitholes like coontown, dead girl fetishes, and a lot of other shit. That's "free speech" too. Everyone has their own standards at what is acceptable in online communities.
I agree completely! I don't expect free speech as a must for online communities. When it comes down to it, these are private companies, and not public services.
Most of the time when I see people advocating for free speech, it's to be allowed to give controversial opinions, or say things that would otherwise be seen as totally unacceptable.
Any social media site that I'd personally like to be a part of would ideally be "intolerant to intolerance, although I cannot stress enough how I think that people with intolerant opinions shouldn't be restricted from voicing their opinion. At least not at a political level.
I've seen Britain First ads. While I disagree with their fearmongering, I think they went to great lengths to portray things in a nonviolent and "we Christians just want to make sure our children can still practice Christianity" way.
Really, though, this is beside the point. Just like whether the Internet should be regulated under Title I or Title II was beside the point. The point is that, when you're at a point where it's one or the other one-size-fits-all policy, it's a symptom of too much consolidation: the telcos / banks / platforms / whatever have become too big. It's a cartel.
Look, Facebook is becoming something much different than college social networks, or a "utility". Isn't it time for open source software that we can all move to, like the Web instead of AOL, or like Wordpress instead of Blogger.com ?
> Why are we, in 2018, still relying on giant centralized corporations to connect us and "allow" us to have our own (shocker) chatroom on their servers?
We're not though, but why are you posting this in a centralized, censored / managed comment section while you could go to one of the decentralized open source alternatives currently being worked on? It's not about options, it's about what everyone wants - engagement, being where the crowds are, being heard, reading other people's opinions. As long as they align enough with your own, of course.
Actually HN built their own software for their own forum, and I think even released it. They aren't hosted on some huge centralized site. This is exactly what I'm talking about.
Would you also say "it's not about options" in other areas like net neutrality, telcos or banking?
I never think ads have been fair or 100% free speech. If I own a web site with ads I very much get to pick which organizations can use my platform for getting out their message. And they are free to start other web pages with their own content. Also if I am a billionarie I can make my voice heard a billion times louder than a poor person, how democratic is that? When Facebook bans actual accounts or pages, I think that is a bit different. You could still argue that they could start their own web page, but I think that is murkier territory when they limit non-paid free speech.
Edit: Would be great to get a reply on why I'm being downvoted?
> The ads were first spotted and reported to Facebook as hate speech by user [real name!] on 2 January and he received a standard response from Facebook saying that the page in question did not "go against one of our specific community standards".
They published the real name of the person who made the complaint! That's just asking for him to get death threats. This is one of those moments where "normal journalism" covers things which would be banned from most forums, in this case as "doxxing".
> A day later, when the BBC got in touch, it had changed its mind.
This happens a lot. They'll routinely leave terrible violent rhetoric up while censoring anything that looks like a female-presenting nipple.
The question is, how would Facebook treat reverse bigotry that aligns with their personal biases and values? Would it recieve the same hate speech designation, or does “hate speech” end where your own personal politics begin?
That’s my issue with corporations and media playing speech cop. Free speech wasn’t supposed to have carve outs. As long as you are not committing an actual crime, and not just a thought crime, put every vile idea out in the public and let people discuss it.
Censorship is never a sound policy, the scales slide, when old ideas are squashed, what happens when the victors of censorship disagree with eachother? Is their first impulse to actually debate or just continue designating more ideas as hate speech?
Sorry to be a stickler, but what exactly are you referring to here?
This statement is demonstrably false at the principle level, even in Mills' work, let alone in the enabling constitutional, legislative, or treaty-based implementations of Free Speech.
We can have a sound discussion about the optimal place a society should land upon on the more restrictions vs. less restrictions spectrum, but to pretend that the only way the system works is at precisely zero limits warps the conversation and prevents us from taking a deep look into the issue.
OK so let's assume for a moment that those people neither have a problem with the religious part of Islam nor the fact that it's usually practiced by foreigners but only have a problem with the political part. Then let's apply it to something else to see how it feels:
"Facebook removes petition against Communist youth center"
It has a kind of 1950's ring to it and it still doesn't totally remove the smell of stupidity, but this once was a very common stance not only in the US but in most western countries.
"We want Britain to stay capitalist" is absolutely not a strange slogan.
I still think anybody should be able to be a Communist in a free society, as long as they don't plan a violent guerrilla or want to overthrow democracy with some kind of idealistic planned economy dictatorship.
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[ 4.6 ms ] story [ 215 ms ] threadThat’s because Cambridge Analytical was the instruction manual
All the hearings and dockets are better free content than any marketing guru’s online course
https://www.fastcompany.com/40546816/obama-campaigns-targete...
Zuckerberg and Sandberg hosted events to raise money for Obama
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-harnessing-facebooks-soci...
The media called it genius and a good thing when obama used data and social media to win. Those dumb dinosaur conservatives were being left behind by tech savvy democrats. Now it's portrayed as evil when the reverse happened. Pure propaganda
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/business/media/10carr.htm...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/17/obama-digital-...
1. The Obama for America campaign directly asked users permission to access their friend graph, which was allowed and stated in the permissions at the time before FB reduced app permission scope.
2. The action taken on that data was to cross reference publicly available voter registration lists to suggest those most likely to respond to an invitation to join the campaign sent by the first user. No consent was missed here either.
Whereas Cambridge Analytica:
1. Bought the data from a third party, who had slurped it down under the pretenses of "academic research" in a random quiz app. Already a couple layers of misdirection here. This was after FB had tightened up their data usage policy
2. Peddled the data for targeted harassment and voter manipulation with false or misleading info. The leadership pitched services such as staging blackmail by spreading rumors about an opponents sexuality, targeting them with prostitutes and then disseminating that info.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/ex-trump-consultant-and-cambri...
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-campaign-use-tactics...
Cambridge Analytica is still the instruction manual
Its almost like your response was on your clipboard for anytime you saw CA in a sentence
How would you expect me to respond to that.. sorry that Obama’s team isnt getting credit?
"We don't hire ethnic Muslims" vs. "We don't think you're a good culture-fit for this company."
I remember when the UK banned Sinn Fein from appearing on TV, including their actual elected MPs, resulting in the ridiculous "words read by an actor" workaround.
parodied beautifully by Steve Coogan in The Day Today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOUeauLWEaE
Or even AntiFa who bill themselves as anti fascists engage in violence, on occasion. Not sure they buy ads though.
(or are we talking about Britain First? They are sort of associated with the murder of Jo Cox: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/jo-cox-murde... - while they denied responsibility there's a stochastic terrorism thing going on there, and related group National action is on the ban list: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... )
And talking about actual elected MPs being replaces by actors, this is a fairly common tactic since you can't use footage from the House of Commons for comedy or satire. So it's worth remembering censorship doesn't need a reason once rules or laws are put in place.
France has banned the veil.
Switzerland banned the construction of minarets (not mosques) via popular referendum in 2009.
Austria bans mosques from receiving foreign funding.
It would appear that Facebook considers the majority of the populations of many important European countries to be engaged in hate speech, and presumably their governments too?
So I'm not sure we need to look to nascent independence movements to encounter difficulties with the consistency of Facebook's position although, it is an interesting thought experiment.
> The three ads and the page on which they originated have now been removed, after BBC News contacted Facebook.
I think it’s safe to say that the “to stop a mosque being built” is the important phrase here.
They got banned a while back, not relating to this specific advert.
Because it's a Muslim church and you don't like them?
Because you're an anti-theist?
Because you don't like the noise?
Because you think their application for a zoning exception is shaky?
I mean the French, British, Russians, Spanish, Germans, Americans, Italians, etc. are all extremely different but they nonetheless get lumped into 'White (which is damn-near the same thing as ethnically Christian).
> nonetheless get lumped into 'White (which is damn-near the same thing as ethnically Christian).
you said it yourself, it's lumping everything together. This never leads to anything good, just look at Jugoslavian war, same people or at least closely related ethnically and nevertheless so atrocious; that's what religion, hate and envy for patches of lands could lead to.
How does that work? Russians are ethnically Christian I presume, but they are Orthodox Christians so do they get a license to rail against the Catholic church or would that be "hate speech". What about railing against Mormons? Or does that only extend to the religious sect that is traditionally associated with that ethnic group in that particular area?
I see the idea I think, but it seem it needs to be defined a bit more precisely to be useful.
They should be allowed to speak but they ain't borrowing my megaphone. Good on Facebook for feeling the same (at last).
I don't agree with islam's stance on gays and women and adultery. Hence no more mosques.
Am I a hater?
No, you are intolerant of hate and prioritize human rights about superstition, custom, and tribalism.
Preventing the construction of mosques and churches does not actually help women and gay people. All it does is hurt their enemies, and that is not the same thing.
Yes. What business is it of yours what people do behind closed doors?
(EDIT: assuming that behavior is otherwise law-abiding, in compliance with building codes, etc).
Besides, there are valid reasons to be against the building of a church near your house - noise for example (church bells, prayer songs).
Ie, I can't sit behind closed doors and commit horrible crimes against humans and then claim "What business is it of yours?".
That of course is not to say that we don't have some right to privacy, to independence and etc. Yet, standing behind a claim of "what happens behind closed doors is none of your business" seems to willfully ignore so much.
Religion has historically always been used as a tool to assert political power. Mosques often get financed by undemocratic regimes, in particular Mohammad bin Salman's Saudi-Arabia, which most definitely funds Mosques in a political influence operation.
Why do you think it's that and not the fact they were banned before?
I agree with the point about state religion though.
In what way?
A quick look at their "No More Mosques!" campaign should suffice to provide the insight you seek.
What if I don't want Saudi funded mosques in particular, is there any nuance allowed. There is no racism or exclusion based on a person's ethnicity here.
Should we lock up Richard Dawkins for being anti catholic?
If you say that Saudi funding churches, businesses, housing, etc. is not good for Britain for a reason other than you have something against Saudis as a people then you're fine.
If you say you're against all churches because you're an anti-theist then you're fine.
There is absolutely exclusion based on ethnicity. It's extremely important to recognize that there is a difference between someone who is religiously Muslim and ethnically Muslim -- same with Judaism -- and same with Christianity too as well but we don't call it that because we're the default in the West. Saying there is no such thing ignores the dominating cultural impact of religious institutions.
Not wanting any more of that or institutions promoting that is reasonable political view.
You can be "against" a particular religion all you want.
But you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it. Including the "practice" of getting together with friends in a room or a building, and posting a sign outside the door saying this is what you do.
Then maybe the problem is the messed up laws providing that "special status" then. But that doesn't mean you can (even under those laws) category ban a certain group from building any churches, anywhere.
Which is exactly what Britain First is advocating.
You'll note that France does not, by any stretch, attempt to ban mosques outright.
So obviously there's not much of a comparison here.
The point I'm ultimately making is that the statement:
> But you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it.
Is demonstrably incorrect. Relatively liberal and progressive countries at times do prohibit people from practicing their religion, and France's restrictions serve as an example.
It's a question of "restrict expression to some extent" v. "prohibit outright". When I said "no right to prohibit" -- it's the latter form that I meant.
France does restrict some aspects of religious expression (such as wearing the burka in public). But this is very far from an outright prohibition of that religion (which we both seem to agree a ban on mosques would basically amount to).
Then banning mosques is not in the scope of your statement. Muslims can practice their religion without the presence of a mosque. Many do pray in the privacy of their homes or somewhere other than a mosque. Like France's face covering restrictions, it is only a restriction of a specific aspect of the religion. Such a ban does not, in your own words, "prohibit outright" the ability to practice Islam.
Hmm - I disagree, and I suspect most courts in the kinds of countries we're talking about would also.
US courts would likely agree that it is unjustly curbing religion - they'd find the bans on head coverings unlawful as well.
Like yes you're technically right but only by seemingly purposely missing the point -- that having a community center to gather and worship is central to most religions. The times when chruchmembers gather in housechurches are typically times when they're being opressed.
> you have absolutely no right to prohibit anyone from practicing that religion simply because you don't like it.
is just straight up not true. Several countries, including liberal democracies such as France with its laws that prohibit face coverings even when worn for religious purposes, do indeed prohibit religious practices. Attire and appearance is important to many religions, and liberal democracies do indeed prohibit those. drugme's claim that people (I assume people in liberal democracies is what's being referenced here) do not have the right to prohibit anyone from practicing religion is not correct. There are plenty of instances were people's religious practice is restricted by law.
Then the commenter tried to pull a pretty blatant moat and bailey by trying to claim that their comments only referred to those that want to "prohibit [a religion] outright" as opposed to only prohibiting certain aspects. In response to which, I pointed out that a ban on religious centers is does not "prohibit outright" a religion either.
You mean arab right? Not all arabs are muslims so please stop this bs spreading. Yes christian arabs and jews from middle east have a lot in common (culturally) with their neighbors who are predominantly muslim. Saying that one could be ethnically muslim means you are expressing support for religious (as well as ehtnic) cleansing that has been going on in the middle east for decades. I did say ethnic because there has been some other ethnicities (non-arabs) that suffered tremendously as well.
Because there's this thing known as "freedom of religion" which is recognized both in UK and European law (to which the UK is still bound) as fundamental and inviolable.
Meaning: no you can not "vote" on the question of whether a certain group is allowed to practice their religion (yes, in your neighborhood) -- and advertise this fact. The size of the building, or the width of the signage can be regulated perhaps... but the very fact of that house of worship being built -- sorry, no.
What if I don't want Saudi funded mosques in particular, is there any nuance allowed?
The "No More Mosques!" campaign clearly is not limited to foreign-funded mosques (or those funded by nasty regimes); it is explicitly aimed against building mosques in general. That's why there's basically no way to look at it as fundamentally anti-Muslim.
Should we lock up Richard Dawkins for being anti-Catholic?
No, and no one is saying anyone should be "locked up" for carrying those banners, or running those ads.
There’s more to it than open sourcing something.
Facebook executives are disrespectful and duplicitous but this is hardly an existential contradiction of the concept of the free and open web. If people choose a corporate platform with corporate censorship then the real problem is that no one is offering a better alternative.
Build your own = shovel, lay cable, and found a bank before you get to your project, because Big Tech and Big Payment will cut you down if you say something they don’t like.
“Staffed”
Some people willingly put themselves into buckets, yes. It's always been that, it will always be that way. But don't pretend for a second that this is the death of the Internet or a lack of free expression or censorship or any of that nonsense until you can't buy an IP address and host a web server on your own hardware. The web is free and open, and the existence of non-free and non-open parts of the Internet does not negate that in any way.
Domain providers are beginning to police content they deem as unacceptable speech or ideas. Are you going to remember IP addresses when the DNS system itself polices thought?
The problem is, tech companies are beginning to behave like a cartel when it comes to free expression. We don’t just see it in Facebook, we see it across all facets of the digital economy, from payment providers to hosting providers to DNS services themselves.
If your solution for someone getting the scarlet letter is to say they are free to build their own network, then we are approaching a major problem.
But beyond that absolutely ridiculous argument, yes. The Internet is free-as-in-freedom as long as you have an IP address. If you want to start your own competitor to the World Wide Web because a few private companies exercise their right to not to business with you, you can do that. The Web and the Internet work without domain names, and if you really need your message out there and your followers really need to hear it, is typing in an IP address too much work? If it is, then your message might not be as convincing as you think it is. But even still, you can host your own website or Internet service regardless. And you can start your own registrar and host your own servers and make your own payment processor. That is entirely possible and at that point only the government can stop you (and even then, you can choose your own government like The Pirate Bay did). If your movement is stopped by a lack of convenience, that's not Facebook's problem.
Saying "but Facebook banned me" as if Facebook was the entire Internet or even the entire Web doesn't fly. Only you can give them that power, and you can take that power from them whenever you want to. Being banned from Twitter/Facebook/YouTube is only a problem if you honestly believe that Twitter/Facebook/YouTube owns the entire Internet. But they don't. You're free to start a competitor any time you want.
While it may be tempting to reach for the most extreme label one can think of to try and inspire others to reject something that seriously distresses you, when it goes into the realm of hyperbole it mostly functions to decrease the crediblility of the point you're making and lessens the significance of the label you're using.
I am not referring to Britain First at all, and there is no hyperbole or reaching for extreme labels involved with my comment.
Gab was deplatformed amongst others in the same manner.
Are tech companies across the board allowed to shut down, disenfranchise, silence, and marginalize people and businesses because they simply disagree with their lawful politics and ideas?
In the US, no. Title III of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race (among other things).
>Are tech companies allowed ban users because they disagree with their politics?
Yes. Political ideology is not a protected class the US. The government can't tell you what you can and can't say, but private businesses are completely free to moderate content hosted on their platforms.
But again, if you don't like the rules of Facebook/GoDaddy/Twitter/etc, of these private non-governmental for-profit businesses, you're free to start your own. You're making it sound like a global conspiracy when in reality it's more likely that Daily Stormer's talk of white supremacy and genocide is so distasteful across the board that major tech companies independently and simultaneously decided that these people were not welcome.
What if those politics and incitements aren't legal (or ethical) because, at a general level, they violate the law specifically but the harm principle more generally?
Would you be okay with taking action then?
Maybe sites like Facebook should try taking a "no politics" policy, or a policy where a political ad is always placed next to a free ad from the opposing side?
This is obviously a disaster, as it gives free rein to put lies on the same footing as truth. But adopting local rules on electoral advertising is a really good idea - UK print political adverts must have an imprint saying who's paid for them, for example.
To undo all that partisanship and try to pull people out of their comfortable bubbles would hurt FB's bottom line. They are simply not incentivized.
It's also concerning that Facebook has the power to decide who is right and wrong when it comes to the most popular form of free speech we have in the world today.
These aren't mutually exclusive facts- they can both be true or false and you can agree or disagree with them to different levels. And I don't have an answer. I'm not even sure any answer the majority would agree with exists. This is the great problem our generation must answer as a society, or destroy everything great we have achieved for having not solved it.
The EDL was the real worry with membership peaking at 184,000 but today virtually none existent.
The majority of both groups appears to have merged into UKIP.
https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/zm8zb3/tory-mp-with-histo...
(Sometimes people claim they were added to the group without their knowledge or consent, which FB lets you do - this is a massive misfeature of the system!)
I foresee a situation where we have multiple social networks, each with radically different social/political slants. Similar to what we've seen with things like Reddit and Voat.
They are new and don't understand- Its time to move off facebook.
Same reason I'm here instead of reddit.
Online communities often feel ephemeral, but maybe that's healthy in the grand scheme of the internet?
I'm really thankful that we have good mods here on HN.
I think a certain amount of churn is unavoidable in this accelerated 21st century life, sadly.
I think a lot of people hold this philosophical belief that social networks have some sort of responsibility to be fair on everyone all of the time, but I don't really see how companies are incentivised towards that in any way.
There is a sort of ethical question, that in the same way that in theory news organisations should be honest, diligent and accurate that social networks do have some sort of responsibility to be fair on everyone.
It's just not enforceable currently, and I feel like trying to force that sort of integrity onto social networks isn't currently viable.
Most of the time when I see people advocating for free speech, it's to be allowed to give controversial opinions, or say things that would otherwise be seen as totally unacceptable.
Any social media site that I'd personally like to be a part of would ideally be "intolerant to intolerance, although I cannot stress enough how I think that people with intolerant opinions shouldn't be restricted from voicing their opinion. At least not at a political level.
Really, though, this is beside the point. Just like whether the Internet should be regulated under Title I or Title II was beside the point. The point is that, when you're at a point where it's one or the other one-size-fits-all policy, it's a symptom of too much consolidation: the telcos / banks / platforms / whatever have become too big. It's a cartel.
Look, Facebook is becoming something much different than college social networks, or a "utility". Isn't it time for open source software that we can all move to, like the Web instead of AOL, or like Wordpress instead of Blogger.com ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1O_gmPneI
Why are we, in 2018, still relying on giant centralized corporations to connect us and "allow" us to have our own (shocker) chatroom on their servers?
We're not though, but why are you posting this in a centralized, censored / managed comment section while you could go to one of the decentralized open source alternatives currently being worked on? It's not about options, it's about what everyone wants - engagement, being where the crowds are, being heard, reading other people's opinions. As long as they align enough with your own, of course.
Would you also say "it's not about options" in other areas like net neutrality, telcos or banking?
And why is BBC trying to portray that a canned email response is an official statement?
I don't doubt the matter at hand, but this is very sloppy journalism.
Edit: Would be great to get a reply on why I'm being downvoted?
They published the real name of the person who made the complaint! That's just asking for him to get death threats. This is one of those moments where "normal journalism" covers things which would be banned from most forums, in this case as "doxxing".
> A day later, when the BBC got in touch, it had changed its mind.
This happens a lot. They'll routinely leave terrible violent rhetoric up while censoring anything that looks like a female-presenting nipple.
That’s my issue with corporations and media playing speech cop. Free speech wasn’t supposed to have carve outs. As long as you are not committing an actual crime, and not just a thought crime, put every vile idea out in the public and let people discuss it.
Censorship is never a sound policy, the scales slide, when old ideas are squashed, what happens when the victors of censorship disagree with eachother? Is their first impulse to actually debate or just continue designating more ideas as hate speech?
Sorry to be a stickler, but what exactly are you referring to here?
This statement is demonstrably false at the principle level, even in Mills' work, let alone in the enabling constitutional, legislative, or treaty-based implementations of Free Speech.
We can have a sound discussion about the optimal place a society should land upon on the more restrictions vs. less restrictions spectrum, but to pretend that the only way the system works is at precisely zero limits warps the conversation and prevents us from taking a deep look into the issue.
"Facebook removes petition against Communist youth center"
It has a kind of 1950's ring to it and it still doesn't totally remove the smell of stupidity, but this once was a very common stance not only in the US but in most western countries.
"We want Britain to stay capitalist" is absolutely not a strange slogan.
I still think anybody should be able to be a Communist in a free society, as long as they don't plan a violent guerrilla or want to overthrow democracy with some kind of idealistic planned economy dictatorship.