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I think the answer is fairly easy. If someone is an asshole online, you ban or ignore them. Free speech is the right to speak your mind without being prosecute

I think the answer is fairly easy. If someone is an asshole online, you ban or ignore them. Free speech is the right to speak your mind without being prosecuted by the government, it’s not the right to force your opinion on people who don’t want it.

xoa 8y ago
To call that "fairly easy" seems a little overly glib maybe? I mean just look at the HN comments on this, or the comments on the WSJ article or the Ars version. Lots of people have internalized that banning people is "censorship" and nearly always wrong, and that the "right answer" to bad information is more information. Of course that framework for dealing with info attacks doesn't really address what to do when the shear amount of information is the attack. As it stands though, within current speech norms and ideals of debate dating back to Athens at least, there are lot of people very angry about bans. And that matters to commercial entities in particular, which means banning isn't "easy" (even ignoring the lack of any time equivalency token system to deal with the economics of suspensions or bans better). >Free speech is the right to speak your mind without being prosecuted by the government, it’s not the right to force your opinion on people who don’t want it. You don't need to tell me that, I covered in the first paragraph of my post. But it's not unreasonable to talk about wider concepts for the "marketplace of ideas" as it serves society beyond the critical foundation of the 1A. I think we may need better norms and tools to help private entities in determining where lines should be and how to go about that. And I also think it's disingenuous to not address private entities that achieve levels of societal power that approach modern government even if they don't have armies of their own, particularly when there is in fact subtle government backing down the chain somewhere (DMCA for example).
- eksemplar 8y ago
  I think it’s fairly easy. It’s not my fault people have the wrong assumption that free speech meant you could say what you want without consequences. Part of why free speech work is because adults accept responsibility for their actions, and part of that is living with the consequences of how you behave. When you offend people for a living, people are going to get offended and then they genuinely won’t want to listen to what you have to say. Which is their right.
  - mistermann 8y ago
    He is very clearly talking about something broader and more nuanced/complex, a "marketplace of ideas", yet you've twice misinterpreted that as a simplistic appeal to a pedantic interpretation of "free speech as defined by the US Government". Dismissing any discussion on this topic as simply "you have the right to free speech, but you're not guaranteed a platform" in the age of the internet, with absolutely no consideration whatsoever for larger long term considerations and risks displays that the speaker is not righteously unbiased. Sure, they're undoubtedly more correct than Alex Jones and his ilk, but they're not fully willing to support a marketplace of ideas on principle. If your ideological team is winning, this is a natural tendency, but consider a scenario where your team isn't - then what? From where I sit, this is a good demonstration of the nature, difficulty, and importance of the problem we're dealing with in our complex societies.
    - eksemplar 8y ago
      It's not broader or more nuanced though, the first amendment is very clear. Apple is no more forced to include infowars on their platform, than inforwars is forced to post an article you sent them. It has nothing to do with free speech. I can see why inforwars readers aren't happy with this, but I don't really care what they think. People who send death threats to parents who lose children in school shootings because infowars labeled them as actors in false flag operations are assholes. Who wants to listen to them? And it's not like they're not allowed to say what they want, they absolutely are, they just can't force anyone to listen. Ironically, if you want the government to force private companies to include inforwars on their platforms, well, then you're really not very different from the left-leaning marxists who wants the government to force companies to hire 50/50 male/women directors. Equality of outcome is always evil, and there is nothing complicated or nuanced about it.
      - claytongulick 8y ago
        > If someone is an asshole online, you ban or ignore them. Who watches the watchmen?

xoa 8y ago

To call that "fairly easy" seems a little overly glib maybe? I mean just look at the HN comments on this, or the comments on the WSJ article or the Ars version. Lots of people have internalized that banning people is "censorship" and nearly always wrong, and that the "right answer" to bad information is more information. Of course that framework for dealing with info attacks doesn't really address what to do when the shear amount of information is the attack. As it stands though, within current speech norms and ideals of debate dating back to Athens at least, there are lot of people very angry about bans. And that matters to commercial entities in particular, which means banning isn't "easy" (even ignoring the lack of any time equivalency token system to deal with the economics of suspensions or bans better). >Free speech is the right to speak your mind without being prosecuted by the government, it’s not the right to force your opinion on people who don’t want it. You don't need to tell me that, I covered in the first paragraph of my post. But it's not unreasonable to talk about wider concepts for the "marketplace of ideas" as it serves society beyond the critical foundation of the 1A. I think we may need better norms and tools to help private entities in determining where lines should be and how to go about that. And I also think it's disingenuous to not address private entities that achieve levels of societal power that approach modern government even if they don't have armies of their own, particularly when there is in fact subtle government backing down the chain somewhere (DMCA for example).

eksemplar 8y ago
I think it’s fairly easy. It’s not my fault people have the wrong assumption that free speech meant you could say what you want without consequences. Part of why free speech work is because adults accept responsibility for their actions, and part of that is living with the consequences of how you behave. When you offend people for a living, people are going to get offended and then they genuinely won’t want to listen to what you have to say. Which is their right.
- mistermann 8y ago
  He is very clearly talking about something broader and more nuanced/complex, a "marketplace of ideas", yet you've twice misinterpreted that as a simplistic appeal to a pedantic interpretation of "free speech as defined by the US Government". Dismissing any discussion on this topic as simply "you have the right to free speech, but you're not guaranteed a platform" in the age of the internet, with absolutely no consideration whatsoever for larger long term considerations and risks displays that the speaker is not righteously unbiased. Sure, they're undoubtedly more correct than Alex Jones and his ilk, but they're not fully willing to support a marketplace of ideas on principle. If your ideological team is winning, this is a natural tendency, but consider a scenario where your team isn't - then what? From where I sit, this is a good demonstration of the nature, difficulty, and importance of the problem we're dealing with in our complex societies.
  - eksemplar 8y ago
    It's not broader or more nuanced though, the first amendment is very clear. Apple is no more forced to include infowars on their platform, than inforwars is forced to post an article you sent them. It has nothing to do with free speech. I can see why inforwars readers aren't happy with this, but I don't really care what they think. People who send death threats to parents who lose children in school shootings because infowars labeled them as actors in false flag operations are assholes. Who wants to listen to them? And it's not like they're not allowed to say what they want, they absolutely are, they just can't force anyone to listen. Ironically, if you want the government to force private companies to include inforwars on their platforms, well, then you're really not very different from the left-leaning marxists who wants the government to force companies to hire 50/50 male/women directors. Equality of outcome is always evil, and there is nothing complicated or nuanced about it.
    - claytongulick 8y ago
      > If someone is an asshole online, you ban or ignore them. Who watches the watchmen?