HN Explorer

Tech Sanctions: Companies like Disqus should revoke licenses for RT.com

4 points by PolandKid ↗ HN
Sites like RussiaToday (RT.com) have become filled with racist, anti-Semitic and misinformation comments - tacitly supporting Russian disinfo interests in the Western media sphere.

When will this change?

https://imgur.com/a/sSOghYC

4 comments

[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 21.9 ms ] thread
linkdd
Please refrain from advocating for censorship, political agenda, or any other crap of that kind.

Fighting misinformation is not done by shutting up every one you deem (rightfully or not, this is not the subject) inappropriate.

And HackerNews should not be a place to spread political views. And if it is, I might as well go find another place then.

PolandKid
It sort of is, though. For this Ukrainian war, it's plain to see how they've turned the hose of misinformation on full blast. There's no reason for a company that wants to be in good standing to support that. Youtube has already cut ties with them.

And political posts and comments on HN are everywhere, with little ability to report misinformation and blatant influence campaigns, so maybe you should start looking for that next place.

linkdd
I support free speech. I will fight misinformation with facts and argumentation. Not with censorship.

If a media of any kind starts to filter what I can see, I will loose trust in that media. Being blind to the opposing side, and being stuck in a bubble where everyone agrees with me is the perfect place for misinformation to spread.

> And political posts and comments on HN are everywhere

There is a difference between "i think that ... because ..." (expressing yourself) and "we should censor/attack/cancel ... because they are the bad guys" (propaganda).

PolandKid
It's good to support free speech, but this is not a case where free speech is being limited.

What we have here is bots utilizing platforms with a specific aim. In this case, it's a specific comment plugin (Disqus) on specific government-related site (RT.com) that's being used to facilitate a firehose of propaganda.

As Garry Kasparov says: "The point of modern propaganda isn't only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth."