2 ms·

"Fake news" is the ultimate new-speak Anecdote is not proof, but please recall the gentleman that brought an assault rifle to a pizzeria to investigate (widely

"Fake news" is the ultimate new-speak Anecdote is not proof, but please recall the gentleman that brought an assault rifle to a pizzeria to investigate (widely circulated, even by the son of President-elect Trump's National Security Avisor [1]) claims that Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring out of the back of it [2]. It should be obvious to the stupidest person that Hillary Clinton is not running a child sex ring, let alone out of the back of some random DC pizzeria. How is it, then, that this person came to believe that and acted on it? 1: http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/05/politics/mike-flynn-jr-son-pizza-gate-conspiracy-theory-donald-trump/ http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/05/politics/mike-flynn-jr-son-piz... 2: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2016/12/04/d-c-police-respond-to-report-of-a-man-with-a-gun-at-comet-ping-pong-restaurant/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2016/12/04/d-c-... edit: don't particularly care about downvotes, but to those of your downvoting this, you may want to introspect why you did so.

bluecalm 10y ago
I think the answer to that is extending slander and libel laws. If someone is spreading information about Hillary Clinton running a child sex ring she should be able to sue for damages. I think that's the right way because people spreading those rumors are the one doing the damage not the people who run a platform which allows for sharing of information.
- throwaway5752 10y ago
  Perhaps. You replied to my earlier comment, too, so let me answer that first. Your example was an excellent example of how many people can interpret the same event in multiple ways. I think that is fair. However, I think it's fair to subject that to the standard of deductive reasoning and prepositional logic (not all interpretations are valid). Ie, in your example, it's possible to ascribe differing motives to the UN vote since it's unknowable on some level... but it's not valid to deduce from it that Obama is a secret Muslim that wants to destroy America. Specifically to the point I was making, Bannon has spoken and written publically (as a sibling comment mentioned) about his objectives. It is knowable and not subject to unlimited speculation. To this comment, we've digressed from the Facebook/Germany point. It's complicated. To your point, was Clinton supposed to pursue libel across ten thousand fly-by-night websites cross-sourcing libel (sometimes across jurisdictions where it was not practical to pursue them)? It is a judicial DoS, in a sense. A legal system is a hackable set of rules, and someone did that in the US election, and I think Germany is smart to try to prevent a similar result domestically (though I am not sure if fining FB $.5M per incident is effective or ethical).

bluecalm 10y ago

I think the answer to that is extending slander and libel laws. If someone is spreading information about Hillary Clinton running a child sex ring she should be able to sue for damages. I think that's the right way because people spreading those rumors are the one doing the damage not the people who run a platform which allows for sharing of information.

throwaway5752 10y ago
Perhaps. You replied to my earlier comment, too, so let me answer that first. Your example was an excellent example of how many people can interpret the same event in multiple ways. I think that is fair. However, I think it's fair to subject that to the standard of deductive reasoning and prepositional logic (not all interpretations are valid). Ie, in your example, it's possible to ascribe differing motives to the UN vote since it's unknowable on some level... but it's not valid to deduce from it that Obama is a secret Muslim that wants to destroy America. Specifically to the point I was making, Bannon has spoken and written publically (as a sibling comment mentioned) about his objectives. It is knowable and not subject to unlimited speculation. To this comment, we've digressed from the Facebook/Germany point. It's complicated. To your point, was Clinton supposed to pursue libel across ten thousand fly-by-night websites cross-sourcing libel (sometimes across jurisdictions where it was not practical to pursue them)? It is a judicial DoS, in a sense. A legal system is a hackable set of rules, and someone did that in the US election, and I think Germany is smart to try to prevent a similar result domestically (though I am not sure if fining FB $.5M per incident is effective or ethical).