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> The internet connects more than 3 billion people > and enables a grand diversity among them to speak, > if not yet to be heard. “Republics,” said the

> The internet connects more than 3 billion people > and enables a grand diversity among them to speak, > if not yet to be heard. “Republics,” said the late > Columbia University professor James Carey, “require > conversation, often cacophonous conversation, for > they should be noisy places.” That sound you hear, > which sometimes grates, is the racket of society > negotiating its norms and standards, its future. > It is the messy sound of democracy. Nope, you have trolls and extremist groups gleefully spraying toxic garbage over everything, until decent, mature people abandon the site. Sane people don't post on Youtube. Some sane people post on Twitter, etc... but they eventually give up. If graffiti on a toilet stall is the standard for online "democracy," we'll never solve any problems, and only the worst people among us will actually benefit from freedom of expression. Any site today that doesn't have iron-clad moderation (like this one!) devolves into an inhumane freak show.

aokiji 8y ago
(disclaimer: this is not an ad-hominem) charlesism, you are blatantly promoting an agenda of censorship. One should not behave well due to the threat of punishment but by virtue of virtue. You appear to stand against everything of value in the West. There are corporations and special interest groups trying to influence the narrative in reddit and even here in order to further reduce online freedoms and to establish the official list of forbidden thoughts. Furthermore, The Atlantic has a long number of articles promoting globalism and the destruction of nation-states. A true free market of ideas requires anonymity. Who is going to help you when rampant corruption emerges in organizations such as the United Nations (a known harbor for individuals involved in child traffic scandals)? Remember the gamergate fiasco? People all over the world are angry, and it is not their fault entirely - overpopulation and resource depletion need to be dealt with. But why doesn't anyone seem care about raising the bar on education, not just in terms of skill sets but also morality and long-term thinking?
- charlesism 8y ago
  > you are blatantly promoting an agenda of censorship. Private censorship? You bet! > You appear to stand against everything of value in the West Come back to earth, please. > The Atlantic has a long number of articles promoting globalism > and the destruction of nation-states. Good, I support that. > People all over the world are angry, and it is not their fault entirely I've lived long enough to see how all this came to pass. People are angry at the wrong people and the wrong things.
  - aokiji 8y ago
    It is an interesting train of thought on your behalf. Could you provide some more detail about what you have seen in your time? And by the way, are you familiar with the writings of Richard Coudenhove Kalergi, Practical Idealism ? http://balder.org/judea/Richard-Coudenhove-Kalergi-Practical-Idealism-Vienna-1925.php http://balder.org/judea/Richard-Coudenhove-Kalergi-Practical... EDIT: care to explain the downvotes?
    - charlesism 8y ago
      Sorry, we're done.
      - aokiji 8y ago
        How are we done? If you are going to provide absolutist statements at least please show us your reasoning.
  - jobigoud 8y ago
    Please put line breaks between what you quote and your comment. Sometimes it's confusing to parse what you wrote vs what they wrote.
  - kraken_cult 8y ago
    I'm curious, how does globalism benefit everyone, at all scales economically, equally?
    - charlesism 8y ago
      Each state of the USA is large enough to be its own country. It doesn't work equally well for all states, but there is a high degree of freedom of movement, and free trade between states. If every state were indeed its own country, it seems unlikely there would only have been one war between them since 1861.
- pavlov 8y ago
  I’m curious: how do you reconcile your support of nation states on one hand and a “free market of ideas” on the other? Nation states are built on a foundation of one idea — ethnicity derived from geography, language and racial perceptions — towering over all other ideas as an unquestionable absolute that affords sovereignty to those deemed worthy of membership. The greatest feature of the United States of America is that it was never a nation state.
  - 21 8y ago
    > ethnicity derived from geography, language and racial perceptions This cuts both ways. See what happens in states where the border does not respect these local realities, for example where you have sunni led by shia or the other way around. Or look at Africa where Western powers drew lines on maps without respecting ethnicity. Nation state is one form of decentralization, letting people govern themselves how they want. Though experiment: imagine that there was a single global state, with one set of laws and institutions. How do you think that would work out?
    - kraken_cult 8y ago
      And furthermore, how do we collectively decide which laws and institutions are codified and which ones are not? How do we ensure that the life and dignity of a rural fisherman is supported to the same degree as an ivy-league educated programmer?
  - aokiji 8y ago
    It is entirely possible. Consider how the United States have some of the best free speech laws in the world, and how that is now threatened with the control of the Internet being handed to the United Nations under Obama. An overreaching organization without a face for accountability is prone to disaster, as recent decades have shown. As a curiosity, the United Nations have had a former Nazi at its head. This situation was only rectified thanks to the United States. https://unbrigandage.wordpress.com/2013/12/16/nazi-at-the-un-kurt-waldheim/ https://unbrigandage.wordpress.com/2013/12/16/nazi-at-the-un...
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Nothing whatsoever to do with censorship. He's suggesting moderation. There is a very significant difference. The internet and Usenet did OK without moderation until Eternal September and the invention of SPAM, when internet culture started to die. RIP. Before that a new arrival was expected to figure out netiquette, and everyone else would behave accordingly. Ever since then there has been an fairly steady slide. The arrival of astroturfing corporate and special interest groups, trolls, and platforms that assist the amplification of effect by actively seeking to avoid any moderation has just intensified things. Those places without moderation deviate to lowest common denominator with astounding speed. We've seen it time and time again, and as a result many sites have closed down their discussion areas entirely. See reddit subs with and without active heavy moderation. Moderating does not rule out anonymity, nor should it. Without moderation commercial interests, political groups and trolls will ultimately ruin all locations that attempt to allow reasonable discussion as it is not in those group's interests to see a virtue in being virtuous. The few places left where you can have reasonable discussions, including on controversial topics, are those that moderate hard. They don't censor.
  - wu-ikkyu 8y ago
    It seems you are using "moderate" as a euphemism for "censor". The definitions are extremely similar. What do you see as being the key distinction between the two?
    - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
      Not at all. Moderation is keeping people on topic of the forum, killing spam, trolls and sockpuppets, removing abuse and so forth, and trying to keep things on the rails and civil. Including banning trouble makers. Rather like dang does around here. That's not censorship, it's attempting to avoid anarchy. Neither is limiting the range of topics the forum or platform wants. Standards and extent will vary depending on the aims of the site. Censorship is suppressing a view, even if it follows the standards and allowed topics of the forum. Legal censorship is a little more complex as standards vary between countries. Having a post removed because it's spam, abusive or is off-topic is not censorship, which was the point the GP was erroneously trying to make.
banku_brougham 8y ago
this site is the only one i use where i can expect consistently thoughtful and useful debate. so by my experience, i must generally agree with you.
wu-ikkyu 8y ago
>Any site today that doesn't have iron-clad moderation (like this one!) devolves into an inhumane freak show. It seems having a relatively small user base with specialized knowledge on selective topics on a site designed for balanced discussion (i.e. not twitter) is far more important to quality of discussion than moderators. Trying to discuss important things over Twitter and Youtube comments seems like trying to have a logical conversation in a riot/mob -- there's too much noise, too many people, and it was never designed for that in the first place.
aminotaa 8y ago
You are making a 2500 year-old argument against democracy. Democracy serves the interests of the needy. That's the whole catch with the democracy. If you don't want democracy, your options are monarchy, aristocracy, oligarchy or tyranny. There are two sides to every coin.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- watwut 8y ago
  Needy and toxic trolls are not identic groups. He did accurately described dynamic on youtube and some forums I used to read too. As in, that is literally how it played out. Just because someone 2500 years ago said something that could be framed as something sort of similar does not make his argument false. Besides, ancient societies did a lot of social controll too.
dwaltrip 8y ago
> Sane people don't post on Youtube This is false... There is tons of high quality content on YouTube. PBS digital studios, for example, has several fantastic channels. The comments on those videos are generally pretty good as well. That's not too say that much of YouTube isn't just utter crap or even sometimes harmful. But there is good content if you look in the right places and get the algorithms churning down the right paths.
- DmenshunlAnlsis 8y ago
  I could be wrong, but I took him to mean “post comments” and not “submit content” although I could be wrong. Obviously some great content exists on YouTube, but it’s been a given for years that the comments are incredibly awful and essentially unusable.

aokiji 8y ago

(disclaimer: this is not an ad-hominem) charlesism, you are blatantly promoting an agenda of censorship. One should not behave well due to the threat of punishment but by virtue of virtue. You appear to stand against everything of value in the West. There are corporations and special interest groups trying to influence the narrative in reddit and even here in order to further reduce online freedoms and to establish the official list of forbidden thoughts. Furthermore, The Atlantic has a long number of articles promoting globalism and the destruction of nation-states. A true free market of ideas requires anonymity. Who is going to help you when rampant corruption emerges in organizations such as the United Nations (a known harbor for individuals involved in child traffic scandals)? Remember the gamergate fiasco? People all over the world are angry, and it is not their fault entirely - overpopulation and resource depletion need to be dealt with. But why doesn't anyone seem care about raising the bar on education, not just in terms of skill sets but also morality and long-term thinking?

charlesism 8y ago
> you are blatantly promoting an agenda of censorship. Private censorship? You bet! > You appear to stand against everything of value in the West Come back to earth, please. > The Atlantic has a long number of articles promoting globalism > and the destruction of nation-states. Good, I support that. > People all over the world are angry, and it is not their fault entirely I've lived long enough to see how all this came to pass. People are angry at the wrong people and the wrong things.
- aokiji 8y ago
  It is an interesting train of thought on your behalf. Could you provide some more detail about what you have seen in your time? And by the way, are you familiar with the writings of Richard Coudenhove Kalergi, Practical Idealism ? http://balder.org/judea/Richard-Coudenhove-Kalergi-Practical-Idealism-Vienna-1925.php http://balder.org/judea/Richard-Coudenhove-Kalergi-Practical... EDIT: care to explain the downvotes?
  - charlesism 8y ago
    Sorry, we're done.
    - aokiji 8y ago
      How are we done? If you are going to provide absolutist statements at least please show us your reasoning.
- jobigoud 8y ago
  Please put line breaks between what you quote and your comment. Sometimes it's confusing to parse what you wrote vs what they wrote.
- kraken_cult 8y ago
  I'm curious, how does globalism benefit everyone, at all scales economically, equally?
  - charlesism 8y ago
    Each state of the USA is large enough to be its own country. It doesn't work equally well for all states, but there is a high degree of freedom of movement, and free trade between states. If every state were indeed its own country, it seems unlikely there would only have been one war between them since 1861.
pavlov 8y ago
I’m curious: how do you reconcile your support of nation states on one hand and a “free market of ideas” on the other? Nation states are built on a foundation of one idea — ethnicity derived from geography, language and racial perceptions — towering over all other ideas as an unquestionable absolute that affords sovereignty to those deemed worthy of membership. The greatest feature of the United States of America is that it was never a nation state.
- 21 8y ago
  > ethnicity derived from geography, language and racial perceptions This cuts both ways. See what happens in states where the border does not respect these local realities, for example where you have sunni led by shia or the other way around. Or look at Africa where Western powers drew lines on maps without respecting ethnicity. Nation state is one form of decentralization, letting people govern themselves how they want. Though experiment: imagine that there was a single global state, with one set of laws and institutions. How do you think that would work out?
  - kraken_cult 8y ago
    And furthermore, how do we collectively decide which laws and institutions are codified and which ones are not? How do we ensure that the life and dignity of a rural fisherman is supported to the same degree as an ivy-league educated programmer?
- aokiji 8y ago
  It is entirely possible. Consider how the United States have some of the best free speech laws in the world, and how that is now threatened with the control of the Internet being handed to the United Nations under Obama. An overreaching organization without a face for accountability is prone to disaster, as recent decades have shown. As a curiosity, the United Nations have had a former Nazi at its head. This situation was only rectified thanks to the United States. https://unbrigandage.wordpress.com/2013/12/16/nazi-at-the-un-kurt-waldheim/ https://unbrigandage.wordpress.com/2013/12/16/nazi-at-the-un...
NeedMoreTea 8y ago
Nothing whatsoever to do with censorship. He's suggesting moderation. There is a very significant difference. The internet and Usenet did OK without moderation until Eternal September and the invention of SPAM, when internet culture started to die. RIP. Before that a new arrival was expected to figure out netiquette, and everyone else would behave accordingly. Ever since then there has been an fairly steady slide. The arrival of astroturfing corporate and special interest groups, trolls, and platforms that assist the amplification of effect by actively seeking to avoid any moderation has just intensified things. Those places without moderation deviate to lowest common denominator with astounding speed. We've seen it time and time again, and as a result many sites have closed down their discussion areas entirely. See reddit subs with and without active heavy moderation. Moderating does not rule out anonymity, nor should it. Without moderation commercial interests, political groups and trolls will ultimately ruin all locations that attempt to allow reasonable discussion as it is not in those group's interests to see a virtue in being virtuous. The few places left where you can have reasonable discussions, including on controversial topics, are those that moderate hard. They don't censor.
- wu-ikkyu 8y ago
  It seems you are using "moderate" as a euphemism for "censor". The definitions are extremely similar. What do you see as being the key distinction between the two?
  - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
    Not at all. Moderation is keeping people on topic of the forum, killing spam, trolls and sockpuppets, removing abuse and so forth, and trying to keep things on the rails and civil. Including banning trouble makers. Rather like dang does around here. That's not censorship, it's attempting to avoid anarchy. Neither is limiting the range of topics the forum or platform wants. Standards and extent will vary depending on the aims of the site. Censorship is suppressing a view, even if it follows the standards and allowed topics of the forum. Legal censorship is a little more complex as standards vary between countries. Having a post removed because it's spam, abusive or is off-topic is not censorship, which was the point the GP was erroneously trying to make.

banku_brougham 8y ago

this site is the only one i use where i can expect consistently thoughtful and useful debate. so by my experience, i must generally agree with you.

wu-ikkyu 8y ago

>Any site today that doesn't have iron-clad moderation (like this one!) devolves into an inhumane freak show. It seems having a relatively small user base with specialized knowledge on selective topics on a site designed for balanced discussion (i.e. not twitter) is far more important to quality of discussion than moderators. Trying to discuss important things over Twitter and Youtube comments seems like trying to have a logical conversation in a riot/mob -- there's too much noise, too many people, and it was never designed for that in the first place.

aminotaa 8y ago

You are making a 2500 year-old argument against democracy. Democracy serves the interests of the needy. That's the whole catch with the democracy. If you don't want democracy, your options are monarchy, aristocracy, oligarchy or tyranny. There are two sides to every coin.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
watwut 8y ago
Needy and toxic trolls are not identic groups. He did accurately described dynamic on youtube and some forums I used to read too. As in, that is literally how it played out. Just because someone 2500 years ago said something that could be framed as something sort of similar does not make his argument false. Besides, ancient societies did a lot of social controll too.

dwaltrip 8y ago

> Sane people don't post on Youtube This is false... There is tons of high quality content on YouTube. PBS digital studios, for example, has several fantastic channels. The comments on those videos are generally pretty good as well. That's not too say that much of YouTube isn't just utter crap or even sometimes harmful. But there is good content if you look in the right places and get the algorithms churning down the right paths.

DmenshunlAnlsis 8y ago
I could be wrong, but I took him to mean “post comments” and not “submit content” although I could be wrong. Obviously some great content exists on YouTube, but it’s been a given for years that the comments are incredibly awful and essentially unusable.