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"When asked, Facebook officials told us only immutable characteristics and traits that people are born with warrant special protection. Being a migrant is not s

by megous 8y ago

"When asked, Facebook officials told us only immutable characteristics and traits that people are born with warrant special protection. Being a migrant is not such a trait, therefore freedom of speech takes priority." What about forced displacement? There are 10s of milions of forcibly displaced people around the world. It's not a small group compared to some other mentioned protected groups. If the basic idea is that you can't attack people for things they didn't choose, this would match too. Anyway why it's ok to attack someone for something he chose and not ok for something he didn't choose? Choice is often based on intellect and education, and many people don't really choose that either, even if you accept the basic premise of choice being the main differentiator.

tomp 8y ago
Almost noone in Europe is “forced displaced” as they would need to cross many fairly safe countries to get to the EU. So that’s their choice (a logical one, of course, as they’re pursuing a better standard of living, but a choice nevertheless). The quote by Facebook is a big fat lie anyways. Protection of religion is a generally supported concept, even though it’s very much a choice, not fixed from birth.
- megous 8y ago
  > Almost noone in Europe is “forced displaced” You are wrong. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Asylum_statistics http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/... "538 000 asylum seekers were granted protection status in the Member States of the EU in 2017" These have gained refugee status, which is a subset for the forcibly displaced persons category. That's quite a bit more than noone. Fairly safe "closer" countries may not accept you, or be much safer to the particular individual. It may still be too close so that people affiliated with your tormentor may be able tro track you down there and harm you. So it may make sense to try to get as far as possible. Also "farther" countries may have offered to accept you, so while you're crossing many coutries you may be doing it on the offer of a remoter country.
ryandrake 8y ago
> “When asked, Facebook officials told us only immutable characteristics and traits that people are born with warrant special protection. Being a migrant is not such a trait, therefore freedom of speech takes priority." Oddly, to illustrate this, the article compared the words “Muslim” with “Migrant” noting one word is protected and one not. How is someone’s religious choice considered an immutable and “born with” trait? EDIT This is the trouble when you start to try to “moderate” content according to some moral, as opposed to legal, standard: you inevitably end up creating this huge, complicated tree of rules that are often inconsistent and conflict with themselves, need to be interpreted and argued about, and frequently require escalation to more senior people when there is disagreement. I’d love to see the financial justification for all this expensive moderation.
- 1996 8y ago
  Good catch! Beliefs are mutable. Financial justification: people who believe in $deity are probably over 80% of the facebook userbase. Can't make money with angry users, so they consider beliefs immutable.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > This is the trouble when you start to try to “moderate” content according to some moral, as opposed to legal, standard: you inevitably end up creating this huge, complicated tree of rules that are often inconsistent and conflict with themselves, need to be interpreted and argued about, and frequently require escalation to more senior people when there is disagreement. That's absolutely not a result of using a moral standard as opposed to a legal standard. I mean, that description is word-for-word applicable to legal standards, too.
- Viliam1234 8y ago
  > How is someone’s religious choice considered an immutable and “born with” trait? If the penalty for changing your religion is death, then it is almost immutable. And children usually don't have much choice about the religion, so it is almost as if they were born with it. Just playing a Devil's advocate.
  - 8y ago
lmm 8y ago
> What about forced displacement? There are 10s of milions of forcibly displaced people around the world. It's not a small group compared to some other mentioned protected groups. People who were forcibly displaced apply for asylum and (if the system works right) eventually become refugees. AIUI the overwhelming majority of the migrants in question are not seeking asylum. > Anyway why it's ok to attack someone for something he chose and not ok for something he didn't choose? Because that's most people's moral instinct, even across different cultures?
- megous 8y ago
  > Because that's most people's moral instinct, even across different cultures? Yes, perhaps if the choice harms someone. But otherwise?

by megous 8y ago

tomp 8y ago

Almost noone in Europe is “forced displaced” as they would need to cross many fairly safe countries to get to the EU. So that’s their choice (a logical one, of course, as they’re pursuing a better standard of living, but a choice nevertheless). The quote by Facebook is a big fat lie anyways. Protection of religion is a generally supported concept, even though it’s very much a choice, not fixed from birth.

megous 8y ago
> Almost noone in Europe is “forced displaced” You are wrong. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Asylum_statistics http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/... "538 000 asylum seekers were granted protection status in the Member States of the EU in 2017" These have gained refugee status, which is a subset for the forcibly displaced persons category. That's quite a bit more than noone. Fairly safe "closer" countries may not accept you, or be much safer to the particular individual. It may still be too close so that people affiliated with your tormentor may be able tro track you down there and harm you. So it may make sense to try to get as far as possible. Also "farther" countries may have offered to accept you, so while you're crossing many coutries you may be doing it on the offer of a remoter country.

ryandrake 8y ago

> “When asked, Facebook officials told us only immutable characteristics and traits that people are born with warrant special protection. Being a migrant is not such a trait, therefore freedom of speech takes priority." Oddly, to illustrate this, the article compared the words “Muslim” with “Migrant” noting one word is protected and one not. How is someone’s religious choice considered an immutable and “born with” trait? EDIT This is the trouble when you start to try to “moderate” content according to some moral, as opposed to legal, standard: you inevitably end up creating this huge, complicated tree of rules that are often inconsistent and conflict with themselves, need to be interpreted and argued about, and frequently require escalation to more senior people when there is disagreement. I’d love to see the financial justification for all this expensive moderation.

1996 8y ago
Good catch! Beliefs are mutable. Financial justification: people who believe in $deity are probably over 80% of the facebook userbase. Can't make money with angry users, so they consider beliefs immutable.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> This is the trouble when you start to try to “moderate” content according to some moral, as opposed to legal, standard: you inevitably end up creating this huge, complicated tree of rules that are often inconsistent and conflict with themselves, need to be interpreted and argued about, and frequently require escalation to more senior people when there is disagreement. That's absolutely not a result of using a moral standard as opposed to a legal standard. I mean, that description is word-for-word applicable to legal standards, too.
Viliam1234 8y ago
> How is someone’s religious choice considered an immutable and “born with” trait? If the penalty for changing your religion is death, then it is almost immutable. And children usually don't have much choice about the religion, so it is almost as if they were born with it. Just playing a Devil's advocate.
- 8y ago

lmm 8y ago

> What about forced displacement? There are 10s of milions of forcibly displaced people around the world. It's not a small group compared to some other mentioned protected groups. People who were forcibly displaced apply for asylum and (if the system works right) eventually become refugees. AIUI the overwhelming majority of the migrants in question are not seeking asylum. > Anyway why it's ok to attack someone for something he chose and not ok for something he didn't choose? Because that's most people's moral instinct, even across different cultures?

megous 8y ago
> Because that's most people's moral instinct, even across different cultures? Yes, perhaps if the choice harms someone. But otherwise?