The Liberal party disputes it and says that their video accurately depicted what the candidate "meant." Are they right, are they wrong, whatever, it is the sovereign right of the Canadian people to decide what they think if they choose to care enough about a tweet to think anything.
The most significant thing here is how Twitter is now getting involved in no-i-meant-this no-you-meant-that arguments between politicians who aren't even in its own country.
Yeah his answer was a couple minutes and they edited it into a 35 second clip highlighting the parts they disagree with. It is quite literally "manipulated media".
On the other hand, it wasn't "manipulated" in the sense that his direct answer to the question was changed. I don't think the party shared this with an intent to mislead. She even shared a link to a video of the full response in the thread. I imagine this was shortened because social media attention span is low, but Twitter's label is also fair in some literal sense because they removed important nuance.
Hm, I think that might be a bit too charitable - for what he actually said, 'yes, in addition to', there's not really a reason for an opposing party to share that? Waste of time? Class divide? I don't know what the angle would be. I think it's clearly supposed to sound like 'no more state healthcare'.
In the UK we have the NHS of course, but also people (or particularly companies) can opt to pay for private health insurance from the likes of Bupa. As far as I know the Labour (main left-wing pro-NHS) party has never opposed the option. Discounting national insurance contributions or diverting funds to subsidise it (so as to avoid 'double paying' for the NHS you don't then use) is a relatively popular Conservative idea that they probably would oppose - it's also probably way too complicated to ever make it even as far as a manifesto.
Ah, interesting! I guess it depends on your familiarity with Canadian politics. I don't think anyone who is following policies would think any of the parties are genuinely suggesting getting rid of public health care. That's just not really on the table.
The current system here does not allow private health care for things that are covered by public health care (in most provinces), along with a bunch of other policies that effectively make private medical care less than 1% of critical medical care, and changing that is the controversial bit. Though, we do have private care for things not covered by public health ("extended medical") and private insurance for that.
Though, not every voter pays attention or really knows the details of how the system works. A charitable, as you said, interpretation is that someone embedded in policy thought that part was not relevant. A less charitable take is that they are misrepresenting the issue hoping to mislead voters.
Perhaps because "universal access" is a piece of pablum that doesn't really mean anything, and certainly doesn't exculpate against the charge that someone wants to open the healthcare industry to private profits. For Twitter to suggest that it is exculpatory is quite a large editorial leap and brings in all sorts of ideological baggage.
Here he means universal healthcare. In Canada, private healthcare is de facto banned (details are complex but it's the effective outcome). The current CPC policy goal is to introduce private health care in addition to the public system, so that those with money can receive better care, but to maintain at least the bottom standard for everyone through the public system.
At least that's the idea... it is controversial as the original tweet indicates and many believe it'd be a slippery slope or that it will drain talent + resources from the (already overstretched) public health system.
The hospitals and doctors offices are run privately in Canada. Health insurance is what is run publicly. But you can still pay out of pocket if you wanted to for a family doctor.
The Tweet suggests its a purely private vs public debate which misrepresents the positions being taken. This debate is about extending the current system to be a total government monopoly on paying for a family doctor vs just having nationalized insurance as it already is. Two degrees of public.
I'm not even sure the Liberals are trying to make this a policy position anyway. Most likely it's about spinning the oppositions character.
In reality it's a minor problem. If you prevent a tiny subset of doctors from accepting voluntary payments they can just move to the US, like plenty of them already do every year. The argument that people are currently being deprived of something is pretty weak which is why hardly anyone cares.
> Health insurance is what is run publicly at a provincial level. But you can still pay out of pocket if you wanted to for a family doctor.
I don't think this is true. For e.g. in BC, clinics cannot sell medical procedures to a BC resident if the procedure could be covered by MSP. Several other provinces have similar laws. I agree with your phrasing of _what_ is up for debate, but the _current_ state is essentially a total gov monopoly on paying for health care rather than vice versa.
Yeah true, it's really only about family doctors. Medical procedures, specialists, and hospital bills are a different matter entirely.
If you think your current family doctor is not diagnosing you properly you can already go get multiple opinions for free. And with more and more family doctors being accessible by phone and video chat (covered by the province) the benefits of a private doctor are pretty limited.
At time of writing, the title is "Twitter adds warning label to tweet from Liberal candidate Chrystia Freeland", and the subtitle is "Liberal party says it disagrees with label and is seeking explanation from Twitter". That seems like a pretty neutral tone to me, unless I'm misunderstanding something.
I suppose it's just that 'Twitter adds warning label' was the focus (Twitter the subject) that made me remark on that.
Versus, say:
> Freeland tweets video altering O'Toole message
(Twitter warning a minor detail, or subheading perhaps.)
Or even just changing the subject:
> Freeland promotes video mischaracterising O'Toole message, Twitter alleges
I suppose my point is if Twitter's the subject, it seems like a story 'about Twitter', which makes it read like it shouldn't have done what it did, to me at least.
(I said elsewhere but just to reiterate, no agenda or bias here - I'm British, live in the UK, I don't really care much who said what or wins this election. I clicked in to the submission because of the Twitter angle, which as commented just seemed fine and not particularly newsworthy.)
The way I look at it when I see that and other, similar labels on a tweet is that Twitter is just distancing themselves from whatever is happening there. They don't really bother me any more than the EU cookie popups. Both of those things are essentially handrails for those who'd rather not observe, think, and then judge for themselves, but prefer institutions (public or private) to do that for them.
Some people use these labels as proof of their point or proof against someone else's point. I think that put's Twitter in an awkward position and it a bit abusive of Twitter's moderation. I truly feel for Twitter's moderation staff.
Removing context from words seems to be in vogue these days. Having nuanced positions is the riskiest thing for politicians to do... you must take extreme positions on something or you risk being purposefully misrepresented by soundbites.
I can see why this party is upset such behaviour is being questioned. Its activist Twitter strategy 101.
20 comments
[ 4.0 ms ] story [ 48.2 ms ] thread> The tweet shows O'Toole being asked if he would bring private, "for-profit" health care to Canada. He quickly responds: "yes."
> However, in the original recording [...] the Conservative leader also noted that universal access remains paramount.
> Trudeau retweeted the video and drew on it during a speech Sunday to attack O'Toole on the campaign trail
It's perhaps going further than I'd expect Twitter to (be able to at scale) - but it seems absolutely correct!
(Maybe I should disclaim: not Canadian, no particular interest in its politics or outcomes of this campaign.)
The most significant thing here is how Twitter is now getting involved in no-i-meant-this no-you-meant-that arguments between politicians who aren't even in its own country.
On the other hand, it wasn't "manipulated" in the sense that his direct answer to the question was changed. I don't think the party shared this with an intent to mislead. She even shared a link to a video of the full response in the thread. I imagine this was shortened because social media attention span is low, but Twitter's label is also fair in some literal sense because they removed important nuance.
In the UK we have the NHS of course, but also people (or particularly companies) can opt to pay for private health insurance from the likes of Bupa. As far as I know the Labour (main left-wing pro-NHS) party has never opposed the option. Discounting national insurance contributions or diverting funds to subsidise it (so as to avoid 'double paying' for the NHS you don't then use) is a relatively popular Conservative idea that they probably would oppose - it's also probably way too complicated to ever make it even as far as a manifesto.
The current system here does not allow private health care for things that are covered by public health care (in most provinces), along with a bunch of other policies that effectively make private medical care less than 1% of critical medical care, and changing that is the controversial bit. Though, we do have private care for things not covered by public health ("extended medical") and private insurance for that.
Though, not every voter pays attention or really knows the details of how the system works. A charitable, as you said, interpretation is that someone embedded in policy thought that part was not relevant. A less charitable take is that they are misrepresenting the issue hoping to mislead voters.
That's how the term is used in the US
At least that's the idea... it is controversial as the original tweet indicates and many believe it'd be a slippery slope or that it will drain talent + resources from the (already overstretched) public health system.
The Tweet suggests its a purely private vs public debate which misrepresents the positions being taken. This debate is about extending the current system to be a total government monopoly on paying for a family doctor vs just having nationalized insurance as it already is. Two degrees of public.
I'm not even sure the Liberals are trying to make this a policy position anyway. Most likely it's about spinning the oppositions character.
In reality it's a minor problem. If you prevent a tiny subset of doctors from accepting voluntary payments they can just move to the US, like plenty of them already do every year. The argument that people are currently being deprived of something is pretty weak which is why hardly anyone cares.
I don't think this is true. For e.g. in BC, clinics cannot sell medical procedures to a BC resident if the procedure could be covered by MSP. Several other provinces have similar laws. I agree with your phrasing of _what_ is up for debate, but the _current_ state is essentially a total gov monopoly on paying for health care rather than vice versa.
If you think your current family doctor is not diagnosing you properly you can already go get multiple opinions for free. And with more and more family doctors being accessible by phone and video chat (covered by the province) the benefits of a private doctor are pretty limited.
At time of writing, the title is "Twitter adds warning label to tweet from Liberal candidate Chrystia Freeland", and the subtitle is "Liberal party says it disagrees with label and is seeking explanation from Twitter". That seems like a pretty neutral tone to me, unless I'm misunderstanding something.
I suppose it's just that 'Twitter adds warning label' was the focus (Twitter the subject) that made me remark on that.
Versus, say:
> Freeland tweets video altering O'Toole message
(Twitter warning a minor detail, or subheading perhaps.)
Or even just changing the subject:
> Freeland promotes video mischaracterising O'Toole message, Twitter alleges
I suppose my point is if Twitter's the subject, it seems like a story 'about Twitter', which makes it read like it shouldn't have done what it did, to me at least.
(I said elsewhere but just to reiterate, no agenda or bias here - I'm British, live in the UK, I don't really care much who said what or wins this election. I clicked in to the submission because of the Twitter angle, which as commented just seemed fine and not particularly newsworthy.)
Some people use these labels as proof of their point or proof against someone else's point. I think that put's Twitter in an awkward position and it a bit abusive of Twitter's moderation. I truly feel for Twitter's moderation staff.
I can see why this party is upset such behaviour is being questioned. Its activist Twitter strategy 101.