Top Tech Firms Urged To Step Up Online Abuse Fightback (theguardian.com) 247
An anonymous reader shares a report on The Guardian: Top tech companies are talking to grassroots organisations across the globe to organise a fightback on their platforms against online abuse, hate speech, misogyny and stalking. Facebook, Twitter and Google are reaching out to women's groups, NGOs and communities in Africa, America, India, Europe and the Middle East as the scale of abuse online continues to increase. But their attempts to foster a "counter-speech" movement to challenge the violent misogyny, racism, threats, intimidation and abuse that flood social media platforms have prompted some of the communities they are trying to empower to question whether they are ducking their own responsibilities. Sarah Green, of the End Violence against Women coalition, said: "Any moves by social media companies to support, encourage and empower individuals and groups to resist and counter abuse is very welcome."
You can call for gang rape of Sarah Palin though (Score:5, Insightful)
Azealia Banks gets to keep Twitter account after Wishing "Gang Rape" on Sarah Palin [inquisitr.com]
Azealia Banks is known for saying exactly what she thinks, and a lot of times, she can be pretty offensive. Even if you aren’t a Sarah Palin fan, Banks’ Twitter war with the former Alaska governor got pretty ugly. Despite the rapper telling her Twitter followers and everyone else watching that Palin should be “gang raped,” among other awful things, Twitter decided that she had not broken any rules and her account would not be suspended.
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Re:You can call for gang rape of Sarah Palin thoug (Score:5, Insightful)
Lets face its, the entire movement is about guilt and revenge. Those who we normally think of as privileged who support it can claim whatever they like but the truth is they do so out of sense of guilt, largely the result of decades of brain washing in public schools. The marginalized groups who support it do so out of a sense they are entitled to some kind of revenge, and they should have that revenge even if the people who really dealt them and their ancestry the wrongs are long dead or rotting in an old folks home some place ( or should be in the case Bill Clinton ).
Azealia Banks a black woman can say anything she wants under these new rules. She can even say the sort of thing that might be considered a personal threat an potentially expose "privileged group" to prosecution, without any fear or reprisal. Now ordinarily being woman would by Sara Palin some entitlement to protection under these new 'rules' but you she committed a mortal sin by espousing hatred for men, so has been excommunicated from the church of the victimized.
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Azealia Banks a black woman can say anything she wants under these new rules.
A lot of popular people, including Azealia Banks can say whatever they want not because of what they are but because they drive traffic to Twitter. Twitter is a business and that's all they really care about, never forget that.
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Those who we normally think of as privileged who support it can claim whatever they like but the truth is they do so out of sense of guilt
Nonsense.
Azealia Banks a black woman can say anything she wants under these new rules.
Also nonsense. ...
Really? Nonsense?!?!?!
Care to explain why Twitter has allowed her - a black woman - to keep her account after she called for the gang rape of woman?
Care to explain why Whoopi Goldberg - a black woman - still has a job on TV after saying what Roman Polanski did to a 13--year-old white girl "wasn't 'rape rape'"?
The only nonsense is what you posted.
Re:You can call for gang rape of Sarah Palin thoug (Score:4, Informative)
Right, because sexism/racism is power + prejudice. It's impossible to be sexist against men just like it is impossible to be racist against white.
The sad thing about your comment, MRA's do have valid legal grievances (divorce court, domestic disputes, child custody, bodily integrity, etc to name a few) . Compare that to man-spreading and patriarchy. As much bat shit crazy there is in the man-o-sphere there just as much bat shit in feminist circles.
You sound like Steve Shives who summarily dismisses the concerns of fathers that want to see their kids because of discriminatory child custody laws but think that the God-like Patriarchy is a real threat to everyone everywhere!
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Right, because sexism/racism is power + prejudice. It's impossible to be sexist against men just like it is impossible to be racist against white.
If you got all that from my comment, you're both paranoid and delusional. There's nothing I can do to help you. Good luck.
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If you got all that from my comment, you're both paranoid and delusional. There's nothing I can do to help you. Good luck.
You missed the point of his statement? He's echoing that your views are just a long the lines of the regressive left, and those who believe "they can do no wrong because reasons." And if you want to find the actual sexists, and the actual racists, they're the ones spouting that people can't be racist or sexist because of bullshit reasons.
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You're reading an awful lot in such a tiny amount of text. I'll stand by that paranoid and delusional bit.
"this social program will be an unqualified good" (Score:2)
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If assholery is outlawed, only criminals will have assholes.
But how can you talk shit if you don't have an asshole?
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Now you know why so many people are full of it. It's a good day when you learn something new.
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Without a doubt, you win the thread!
Seriously, your logic IS bullet proof.
counter-speech == flamewar driving ad revenue (Score:3)
Nice way to drive page-view revenue with a veneer of social responsibility. Now I can be socially responsible from the comfort of my own living-room, I just have to watch this banner ad first.
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I would almost guess that from an ad revenue perspective, controversial posters are more valuable than uncontroversial posters.
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I would almost guess that from an ad revenue perspective, controversial posters are more valuable than uncontroversial posters.
Yeah, except controversy is pretty much "the internet". Right now the good money is on pro-SJW initiatives and blog posts which are often times where the real controversy (read: pageviews/ad revenue) is. Just look at the post counts Slashdot and hacker news gets on a good SJW story. How much money did Anita Sarkeesian make on her kickstarter again? Hell, I'm thinking about doing some keyword research, finding a high PR expired domain and starting some kind of anti-bullying/hate speech/whatever blog myself.
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Talk is cheap, which is why this "easy money" point was, is, and always will be bullshit.
Yep. It sure is. Which is why you should never try it yourself.
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"Follow the money," says man who seems conveniently unable and unwilling to follow the money.
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> .. which are often times where the real controversy (read: pageviews/ad revenue) is. Just look at the post counts Slashdot and hacker news gets on a good SJW story. How much money did Anita Sarkeesian make on her kickstarter again? Hell, I'm thinking about doing some keyword research, finding a high PR expired domain and starting some kind of anti-bullying/hate speech/whatever blog myself.
Learn to read.
It's better to keep abuse in the virtual world (Score:2)
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Keeping it "sandboxed" in the virtual world implies speech is not that important.
If speech is not important, then why is it good to keep it free and why do people keep trying to clamp down on it? If it's unimportant, then why does anyone care?
Free speech cannot be simultaneously so important that it must be protected depsite serious costs, yet so unimportant that it can be considered inconsequential.
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I don't think that's a very compelling argument, for two reasons:
1) The virtual and physical worlds are highly intertwined in the age of social "media."
2) Verbal/emotional abuse still affects people, regardless of the medium.
The real problem with these initiatives isn't that they're stomping out abuse, but that they are labeling things as abuse that aren't; namely things like insults made in passing, not being nice enough, etc. These things may be problems for people who wished to feel more welcome, or f
Re:It's better to keep abuse in the virtual world (Score:4, Insightful)
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http://www.healthguidance.org/... [healthguidance.org]
If viewpoints, even if heinous, get blocked. . . (Score:3, Interesting)
. . . . how does that effect the "Common Carrier"-type protections of the admittedly-hated Communications Decency Act ? As I recall, acting as a de-facto common carrier prevented liability for content.
So, if providers start discriminating on content, do they not also lose the immunity from liability ?
I'm not really sure where the line is on this, so ask the question here on Slashdot. . .
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This was my first thought as well.
This may invite massive lawsuits on any cooperating company that isn't 100.0000% effective is policing badthought. Which will, of course, include allowing all goodthought to pass unmolested.
So, going along with this idea may very well do nothing but enrich lawyers....
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Common carrier doesn't protect those companies unless they act when notified of behaviour that is criminal or legally actionable. So they can ignore it until it's pointed out to them, at which point they have to act.
That's not really the issue here though. These companies want to shut down harassment, because it's bad for business. Places like Reddit suffered because of the bad reputation they got. Same with YouTube, years ago when I dealt with the public (ugh) I used to hear the same line from parents all
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And what happens if the speech is legal, but offensive ? That's the issue. But, somehow, people seem to believe that there's a right to Not Be Offended. . .
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My house, my rules and if you show up doing or even saying something offensive, I can decide to kick you out.
My business, mostly my rules and if I post a list of things I don't allow, such as swearing, well I can kick you out.
Here we're talking about private businesses (not common carriers, who can still have rules like no explosives on the railroad or only so much voltage on the phone line), who while more limited then a private residence, are still within their rights to kick you out for many types of off
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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The English language is somewhat lacking in this area. Other languages, such as Japanese, have the concept of complete and incomplete lists. Essentially, when listing things there are two different words for "and", one implying you listed everything and the other that there can be more items you didn't mention.
In this case, for the sake of brevity only the most common issues were listed. They are damned if the do, damned if they don't. List some items and people will both complain that something was missed
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If you really think misogyny and misandry are in any way on un-equal footing you haven't been out much.
FTFY
It's hard to go out in public in some cities and not be glared at for being male. Then there's the whole 'You aren't qualified to speak about it because you're so ignorant of the patriarchy'. Or the very blatant 'all men must die' feminists.
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It's hard to go out in public in some cities and not be glared at for being male.
I have a sneaking suspicion that the glares you claim to receive are completely unrelated to you being male.
I'm not sure how to feel about this. On one hand, you suffer personally. That's unfair. On the other hand, keeping you shut-in may very well benefit your community.
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It's hard to describe. I consider myself fairly normal, I wear professional casual attire most of the time with Sandals on my feet and I have a well trimmed goatee and a buzz-cutt. No tats, ear-rings or strange attire. I don't even smoke.
The glares I get are of the disgust with my presence why don't you die variety to such a degree I refuse to go anywhere near Portland if I don't have to anymore.
I *may* be over-sensitive being aware of the animosity towards males in some liberal environments but it's really
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You're the only person I've ever encountered who claims to have difficult going out because of perceived animosity toward males. I'm having a lot of trouble trying to even imagine what that would be like. The image I have in my head is a sea of women wandering the streets of Portland, nary a man in sight -- I doubt that's terribly accurate. Needless to say, it's not a problem I've run across personally, or heard about from others.
Perhaps someone else could chime in who's had a similar experience and offe
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Your mental visual is entertaining. It's not like you describe it but does indeed happen that I am looked askance as I described.
My worry is that the activities mentioned in OPs post will serve to magnify this effect into something that has more of a detrimental impact on individuals innocent of wrong-doing other than being born male.
As another sonewhat related example, women are parading through city streets with nothing but tape on their nipples and being applauded as heros, while a man that helped land a
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Nipple hair hurts when you pull the tape off. The women around here wouldn't dare put tape on their nipples.
As for your persecution complex, I'm not sure if you need drugs or take too many. I know when I was young and smoked a lot of weed, I started imagining that everyone was staring at me.
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persecution complex
I considered this. But no, it's real.
I'm not sure if you need drugs or take too many.
It would have been more entertaining if you had just left it at that.
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Well if it's not an imagined persecution complex nor a problem with drugs, perhaps it's just your looks. You did mention that you have a goatee, the classic beard of evil overlords.
I find the trick with strange women who look at me weirdly, or rather don't look at me weirdly but put out vibes (I do look scary) is to smile and say hi casually while keeping on going and often their attitude changes. Many women just seem to be walking around defensively and talking to my wife and to female friends, it is somew
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Stick to the subject.
We are talking about what constitutes abuse by government legislation that's driven by a political populace terrified to upset the LGBT / Snowflake Community.
What could possibly go wrong?
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I have a sneaking suspicion that the glares you claim to receive are completely unrelated to you being male.
Well if you're a minority, go walk out in Toronto with one of your white friends in one of the trendy hipster areas where the "social justice" brigades like to hang out. You'd almost think that they could hear some silent REEEEEEEEEEEEing going on. [youtu.be] Because there's two different raced people walking around, and patriarchy...always patriarchy.
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I'm deeply skeptical. It's obviously outside my personal experience, and this is the first time I've seen anyone report feeling unsafe because they were male -- terrified of ... something? ... roving bands of violent misandrists?
Are you also afraid of ghosts and UFO's?
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I'm deeply skeptical. It's obviously outside my personal experience, and this is the first time I've seen anyone report feeling unsafe because they were male -- terrified of ... something? ... roving bands of violent misandrists?
Well I wouldn't know, since I'm not white. I am male though. Then again I don't think I've said anything about being terrified over something, I'm sure some men are when they're suddenly ganged up on by 15 women who are all coming to the defense of another women because she claimed "xyz thing."
Are you also afraid of ghosts and UFO's?
No I'm afraid of rational things, like being jumped by some crazy SJW's partner or getting sucker punched(by the same group) because I said the wrong thing(in their eyes) in public.
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No I'm afraid of rational things
Do you have an example? Ah, there it is!
like being jumped by some crazy SJW's partner or getting sucker punched(by the same group) because I said the wrong thing(in their eyes) in public.
No, no. An example of a rational fear. This isn't any different than being terrified to go out for fear you'll be abducted by hostile aliens.
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Do you have an example? Ah, there it is!
Glad I proved my point.
No, no. An example of a rational fear. This isn't any different than being terrified to go out for fear you'll be abducted by hostile aliens.
That is a rational fear. Or have you been missing sjw groups like BLM, or various racists in toronto saying "kill all men." Perhaps you'd just like to say "that's just hyperbole..." or perhaps, just perhaps you don't spend as much time outside. You should go look up those assault statistics here in Canada.
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If you really think misogyny and misandry are in any way on equal footing you haven't been out much.
Well I can't go sit at the park, or go to the zoo by myself, without getting the glaring evil eye from women who think I'm there to kidnap their kids. When I tried to attend my nephew's birthday party at Chuckie Cheese, they wouldn't let me in the building until I called my sister in law and she came outside to escort me in. Meanwhile women were walking in, un-challenged, their policy is men by themselves cannot enter.
But there's no misandry going on, keep telling yourself that.
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I don't. Too much man hating.
+1
Getting so it's not safe in public anymore. Forget the evening scene.
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Getting so it's not safe in public anymore. Forget the evening scene.
What? You mean you don't like being accused of rape after a one night stand and the women decides to try and say it wasn't consensual 9-15 months later, because she feels guilty.
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Or the Ex Wife that will sleep with other men then say it was rape when she gets caught by their wives.
I had one of those.
Citation Needed (Score:4, Informative)
the scale of abuse online continues to increase
I didn't see any evidence for this statement. I suppose it is reasonable to assume that if the Internet gains one million users, some small percentage of them will be jerks. But TFA also says:
She said the evidence from the meetings was that social media was overwhelmingly positive for the women and girls
Subtext (Score:3, Insightful)
the scale of abuse online continues to increase
I didn't see any evidence for this statement. I suppose it is reasonable to assume that if the Internet gains one million users, some small percentage of them will be jerks. But TFA also says:
Read the subtext.
It says: "People don't think this is important, so we'll frame it as "growing". Maybe this will get them to do something."
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Relevant XCKD [xkcd.com], perhaps?
How true. All people around me suck at math these days. Males are no exception. (Except the uni teachers I know, but that's logical.)
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Facebook, Twitter and Google are all applications in which you arent the consumer, but the product. Poultry farms routinely de-beak their chickens in order to prevent them from harming other birds or their handlers. Pig farms will remove the teeth of aggressive hogs to ensure the productive health of their herd. cattle farms will often segregate and destroy downed or overaggressive bovine.
Facebook and Twitter will remove shitposts and cull aggressive users to ensure their cattle remain copacetic and the product --you-- performs to the liking of their consumers.
I don't personally give a shit about Facebook and Twitter since I don't use those platforms for anything but I do use Google and I make a lot of money from Google these days.
The way I see it is this, Google spends a lot of time de-indexing shit websites. Duplicate content, link farms, spam, so on and so forth. What they typically don't get rid of is original editorial content because that is the stuff that is the most valuable to their users. It stands to reason that a place like Stormfront is chock full of
Shorter Summary (Score:5, Interesting)
Wrongthink is doublepus ungood, must be banned.
Private Enterprise vs The State (Score:2)
Private companies like facebook or twitter are not required to pay for your microphone that's not what freedom of speech is about. If the government bans you from speaking that is bad. If Facebook pulls your page thats their editorial discretion(also part of the first amendment) then you can move over to reddit or myspace or whatever.
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Private companies like facebook or twitter are not required to pay for your microphone that's not what freedom of speech is about. If the government bans you from speaking that is bad. If Facebook pulls your page thats their editorial discretion(also part of the first amendment) then you can move over to reddit or myspace or whatever.
Yeah the only problem for facebook is when they end up policing content to the point that people just give up, say fuck it and en masse go somewhere else. Facebook knows this which is why they are taking a very careful approach to this whole thing. We'll see how it goes. Same for Twitter and Google and whever else.
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Nobody Likes Abusers (Score:2, Interesting)
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not convinced that anti-abuse laws have not... Too many negatives!
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Cool story, bro. Just one problem: it had absolutely nothing to do with "anti-abuse laws".
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Correction - please correct summary. (Score:2)
"Any [money] by social media companies to support, encourage and empower individuals and groups to resist and counter abuse is very welcome."
Standards? (Score:2)
Re:Standards? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not "some" corporation, it's thousands of corporations, and if you don't like them, you can add another one that censors your way at next to no cost.
Yes, welcome to the real world, where different people actually make different choices.
There is no "stopping" abuse of any kind... (Score:5, Insightful)
The prohibition of alcohol came from a good place. Homes and lives were ruined because of absolutely rampant alcoholism. But when the fight for absolute abolition took to banning every single alcoholic beverage, an illicit trade formed and with it came a different kind of harm.
Zero tolerance policies as they pertain to gang violence in schools was amazingly effective... until all the horrible things were appropriately reduced. After that, the books were thrown at minor offenders (https://goo.gl/4DQdKR).
The strong prosecution of hate crimes is a good thing. But what happens when a younger generation who has never actually experienced hate crimes (such as being physically assaulted for being a particular religion or race) seeks to re-define what is considered hate? Or racism. Or sexism? What happens when they lower the bar so that a previously welcoming phrase like "America is a melting pot" is redefined as offensive, potentially hateful, speech? We see that today when "microaggressions" are now 'a concern' and how the offended (not *harmed*) are asserting some sort of power for their being offended.
When you seek to "stop" any harm outright and completely, you inevitably come to the point where the harm is so rare, infrequent, or of immeasurably small effect that the ongoing effort begins to victimize people instead of protect them.
But what do you do instead? Actual harm is happening-- how do you stop that harm? The answer is simple, but not easy: hard work. When someone does something harmful, find that person and punish that person. Yes, that's a lot of work, but the punishment is targeted and the restrictions on non-harmful actions are non-existent. Target genuinely harmful actions with strong enforcement and leave the rest to personal control (facilitating visible blocking & ignoring with the option to report) and community moderation (like Slashdot). The aim should always be to reduce harm, but never to eliminate offense.
Lastly, as it is common with the current wave of activism, I will assume that someone will say, "But no one should have to see written abuse online to the point where someone then has to hit an ignore/block button!" to which I respond, "Yes, they should. For the same of protecting the free exchange of ideas (good, bad, and infuriating) and for the protection of people against prejudicial reactions. Without the risk for online abuse, there would be no disagreement and discussion online could only be the repetition of a single idea over and over again."
Don't forget.. (Score:2)
Talking about corruption schemes, oppression and slavery those companies commit is also harassing the company, so obviously those have to be removed.
when truth is no defense (Score:3)
"Good guy" mobs online are of more concern (Score:5, Insightful)
There are things to be offended about (Score:3)
Right, I guess you remember the days when people communicated by stone tablets and people had thick enough skin to simply shrug off threats of death/rape/etc.
Are many people being offended by things they should just deal with? Sure.
Are you right to dismiss all forms of online harassment as people being thin-skinned whiners who are perpetually offended? Absolutely not.
There are some real issues here that should not be willfully ignored.
Re:There are things to be offended about (Score:5, Informative)
Exactly. I think there is some "thin-skinedness" in some of these claims of abuse, but at the same time there have been people that have been threatened with death. Even I was once, a long time ago, threatened with physical injury by someone who was losing an online debate and who was clearly coming undone by it. I never actually worried that it would happen as the fellow, so far as I gathered, was a Briton living in Poland, but I admit I was disconcerted by someone on a public Usenet group telling me he was going to come to my house and punch me in the head.
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I got a death threat in a Y2K newsgroup once. After I told him my roommates got into an argument about it - about which one of them got to shoot him if he showed up and I wasn't there - he stopped posting.
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My solution is simple. If an online forum becomes too restrictive, I don't post there anymore. For me, if Facebook and Twitter want to restrict posts based on abusive or threatening language, that's their prerogative.
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Unfortunately, those real issues get hijacked by passive/aggressive whiners.
There's more than one side responsible for the real issues being ignored.
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Unlike the people who complain every single day about PC culture, SJWs, and "perpetually offended" people.
They are totally not being perpetually offended or thin-skinned at all.
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Offended, how about exercising your freedom of choice and avoiding parts of the Intertubes that Perpetually Offend you?
Many people, left and right are perpetually offended. So they look for things to validate their offendedness. Which is pretty offensive, all in all.
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Re:So, when is /. going to participate... (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude has a point. For example, what defines 'racism' - according to many people, the term includes anyone who disagrees with the 'Black Lives Matter' movement in any aspect. Threats? Of course there's the obvious stuff, like 'I'm going to come to your house and kill you' stuff (though deletion of same may constitute tampering with evidence, eh?) But on the other hand we have overly-coddled snowflakes who claim there's somehow a credible threat from some idiot scrawling "Trump 2016" in chalk on their college campus.
I'm also curious to see a complete list of these groups... mostly because there are quite a few groups out there who you definitely do not want setting definitions here.
There is a danger in this, after all - the danger being that political speech is stifled if the hoi polloi decide that something is 'hate' or 'racist' merely because they disagree with it. The two examples I listed up top are true stories, so it's not like GP's post is paranoia...
Re:So, when is /. going to participate... (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude has a point. For example, what defines 'racism' - according to many people, the term includes anyone who disagrees with the 'Black Lives Matter' movement in any aspect.
It's a big world, with whackos on both left and right. I've been told to go die in a fire for asking what a regular person is going to use an assault rifle for.
So there are going to be people on the left who are just as nuts.
But what we do in polarized America has turned into people taking the most extreme elements left or right, and using a really broad brush to paint anyone they don't agree with as whoever it is they hate. That's how left wingers can paint every conservative as Ted Cruz Dominionists, and right wingers can paint anyone who disagrees with them as Chanty Binx acolytes.
When in fact, not many Republicans believe in shutting down the Government or America becoming a Dominionist nation as Cruz wishes, or that whatever the hell Chanty Binx is is representative of all Democrats.
But in modern day America, we have been programmed to paint anyone who disagrees with us as not human, therefore not worthy of humane treatment.
Hell, I enjoy arguing with people in here, It doesn't make me disrespect their selfhood. But that paints me as inhuman on both sides.
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I'm under the impression that it's the nuts that have the loudest voices or get the most attention. It's almost as if the media intentional seeks them out to plaster all over national news, I'm not even sure it's news any more it's like shock reporting where they find the craziest thing to air just to bring in viewers it might as well be News at 10 with Howard Stern.
There has not been a presidential candidate worth voting for since before I was old enough to vote your choices are... let me see which is less
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I'm under the impression that it's the nuts that have the loudest voices or get the most attention. It's almost as if the media intentional seeks them out to plaster all over national news, I'm not even sure it's news any more it's like shock reporting where they find the craziest thing to air just to bring in viewers it might as well be News at 10 with Howard Stern.
Bill Maher had an interesting insight into some of what what you are talking about https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
At the present time, there is a lot of SJW stuff in the news. Partly because they are kooks, bent on whining about everything, and partly because people expect kookhattery from the right wing, so it isn't really news when one of them gets caught in the Restroom at Denny's giving Oral sex to some random dude stranger before going to a fundraising dinner to make Gay marriage illegal again. K
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>Slashdot is far and away the most repressive leftist forum I have ever seen, with mods absusing their power to censor literally anything but the hard-left party line.
You don't get out much.
Slashdot is not the hard-left (Score:4, Informative)
>Slashdot is far and away the most repressive leftist forum I have ever seen, with mods absusing their power to censor literally anything but the hard-left party line.
You don't get out much.
Or understand the word "left" in a political context.
There is something like a slashdot party line, without a party--there are a lot of core groupthink ideas you come across here. Open Source Good, Microsoft Bad, People (Other than us) Stupid, Anyone trying to tell other people what to do bad, Social Justice bad, Overt racism bad, cool tech toys good, Star Trek good, Lorf of the Rings (the book) good, etc...
It's still OK (you won't get booted) to challenge any of those positions with logic and reason, but you generally have to make a much more cogent post and still risk more downmodding.
But that line is WAY out-of-sync with the extreme political left, and there's no "party" leadership or organization coordinating talking points and power struggles.
Re:So, when is /. going to participate... (Score:5, Insightful)
I am sure that would be a very clever and apt comment, if I could make *any* sense out of it.
Near as I can tell, you advocate censorship. Who decides what is acceptable and not? Here on slashdot, its the mods, who mod everything to the right of Mao Tse Tung and Castro into oblivion.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and lefties think the same thing in the opposite direction.
I've had lots of posts modded in a battle between one group calling it a troll, and the other calling it insightful. opinion tug-a-war.
And if you think it's just left wingers, perform an experiment. Post a message asking "Why would someone even want an assualt rifle?" It will hit -1 troll with a bullet (that's a joke son)
That's just how it is man, people have different opinions.
Even more importantly, posts do not get "modded into oblivion". All you have to do is change the level at which you browse Slashdot. You can see everything posted, not a bit of censorship.
Slashdot is far and away the most repressive leftist forum I have ever seen, with mods absusing their power to censor literally anything but the hard-left party line.
Don't get out much, eh? Aside from no censorship taking place at all, you can't really be saying that everyone has to march in lockstep agreement with everything you post.
That's not even how life works, unless you are in an echo chamber where no one can express anything but approval for your opinion. The bubble gets lonely. Accept that not everyone will agree with you.
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The sad thing is, the bubble *doesn't* get lonely. Not any more. No matter how stupid your opinion, it's not hard on the Internet to find a place where pretty much everyone agrees with you, and then you think you're mainstream.
That's one big reason why the American right has spun so far out of reality.
Yes, it is. Down in Texas, there are lot of people who think that Ted Cruz iz da shitz. Since they only talk to each other, they do then to think they have the only correct idas, and every other American is their enemy. Ted certainly does, as a Dominionist.
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Slashdot is far and away...
Have you seen reddit? I've never had anything censored here.
Nothing is censored here. It just gets modded up or down. Brett Buck just cannot handle anyone who doesn't totally agree with him, and lables anyone who disagrees with him as a leftist.
Slashdot has Soft Censorship (Score:2)
Nothing is censored here. It just gets modded up or down. Brett Buck just cannot handle anyone who doesn't totally agree with him, and lables anyone who disagrees with him as a leftist.
Modding up and down is sort of a "soft" censorship. It does run the risk of promoting groupthink and it does hide positions contrary to majority opinion. Both of these are things slashdot has a problem with.
But it also hides the spam. Yay for hiding spam.
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Riiight, another blinding insight from the resident genius.
You provide a hallmark example of presuming you are intelligent because you're a lefty nutcase, and the nuttier you get the smarter you think you are.
Thin skinned little snowflake arent ya?
While I'm not actually a lefty (except by wingnut standards) It's so interesting that people who castigate anyone who doesn't agree with them as a lefty or socialists are...
so.. damn.. sensitive. I mean sweet jeebus on a hallmark card, once upon a time a right winger was considered the strong silent type, a Waynesque individual, who rode out the ups and downs of life with aplomb.
Now it's getting hard to tell you all from SJW's, everything upsets y'all so badly
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Facebook has that mechanism already, as do most other public fora. It's usually called "Block" or "Ignore".
Of course, I suspect that the actual goal of many of these organizations is not to merely block/ignore folks they disagree with...
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Nice Spin. Now please sit and do that for a bit.
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A long time ago, in the back woods far, far away, I was taught as a wee lad that sticks and stones would break my bones, but words will never hurt me. I believe some of may have missed that lesson.
That's because it's a stupid lesson.
With force, you can hit someone over the head with a rock. With speech you can lead an entire nation to war. Which of those do you think is more powerful?
Anyone trying to control someone else's speech is a fucking asshole and needs to be sent to a small island with other simila
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Please name 1 war that arose from a speech.
You mean apart from literally every war ever?
For example, did Hitler invade Poland all by himself, or did he convince an entire country to rally behind him?
What about George Washington? Did he wage a one man campaign against the British, or did he convince people to join him?
Did the Pope personally go and attack the holy land, or did he tell a bunch of people to go and crusade on his behalf?
You are a control freak who thinks peoples feelings are more important tha
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Right because the bet way to promote free speech is to have all the people who actually understand WHY it's important jump off cliffs. Instead we'll be left with a bunch of droolers yelling "freeze peach is unimportant gimme mah freeze peach!".
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Any ideas on how this could be done?
I can't speak on Twitter or Facebook but Google could do it pretty easily as they have a process to de-index that works fairly well for them. People report sites and when Google gets enough reports it triggers a manual review. Some drone looks at the site and if they don't like it, the sites no longer comes up in the search results. Happens thousands of times a day.
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