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It's an interesting problem. Speech has never truly been free, sometimes and in some places its been regulated by government, but in modern liberal democracies

by darawk 8y ago

It's an interesting problem. Speech has never truly been free, sometimes and in some places its been regulated by government, but in modern liberal democracies its been regulated by culture. Polite society regulates speech by rejecting people who engage in whatever that society views as harmful speech. Social media platforms and the internet generally, substantially weaken the power of culture to regulate speech in the way that it used to. I don't know what we do about this. We don't want government regulating speech, and it doesn't seem like allowing social media platforms to regulate it arbitrarily is particularly good either. But the gates that culture and localism placed on speech in the past did, seemingly, serve some useful purpose. Do we want to live in a world where speech is truly unregulated, even by shame or culture? Maybe. It's possible that the answer here is yes we do, that sunlight is always the best disinfectant, and that the truth always emerges victorious in the end. But it's also possible that those things aren't true. I don't have an answer, but I don't think one way or the other is the obviously correct path forward either.

manfredo 8y ago
> Social media platforms and the internet generally, substantially weaken the power of culture to regulate speech in the way that it used to. I fail to see how this is the case. It does absolutely grant the power to regulate speech. What Social media platforms have changes is that the people who are carrying out the informal regulation of speech have shifted to being a very narrow subset of the population, and one that is overwhelmingly made up of one category of culture. Tech, especially in the Bay Area, is effectively a political monoculture. Support for Republicans is often in the single digits[0]. The evidence really does indicate that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Despite the constant concern over Trump's comments on immigrants, for example, support for immigration in the US is at record levels.[1][2] Despite the concern over explicitly fascist rallies at Charlottesville and DC, these rallies actually cased a significant drop in support for far-right.[3] And lastly, while the Republican has become a party of Trump and has adopted much of his rhetoric the result has been largely bad for the party. They lost over a dozen seats in the midterm election - surprising given that the midterms are when the Republicans tend to do well. Yes, sunlight is the best disinfectant, and the data demonstrates it. Ironic, then, that some would want to shield these views that they despise from said disinfectant. 0. https://www.recode.net/2018/10/31/18039528/tech-employees-politics-liberal-employers-candidates https://www.recode.net/2018/10/31/18039528/tech-employees-po... 1. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/us/immigration-polls-donald-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/us/immigration-polls-dona... 2. https://news.gallup.com/poll/235793/record-high-americans-say-immigration-good-thing.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/235793/record-high-americans-sa... 3. https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/09/alt-weakened-dead-charlottesville-170920081948414.html https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/09/alt-weake...
- darawk 8y ago
  > I fail to see how this is the case. It does absolutely grant the power to regulate speech. I didn't say it prevented speech regulation in general. I said that it attenuated the previous regime of speech regulation. It does so by replacing it with a new one, where speech norms are determined by a tiny group of people in unelected, unreviewable positions at private companies. > The evidence really does indicate that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Despite the constant concern over Trump's comments on immigrants, for example, support for immigration in the US is at record levels.[1][2] Despite the concern over explicitly fascist rallies at Charlottesville and DC, these rallies actually cased a significant drop in support for far-right.[3] And lastly, while the Republican has become a party of Trump and has adopted much of his rhetoric the result has been largely bad for the party. They lost over a dozen seats in the midterm election - surprising given that the midterms are when the Republicans tend to do well. You may be right. But the story is far more complex than you're letting on. If sunlight is always the best disinfectant, then why did these movements gain steam in the first place? Sure, after an adverse event like Charlottesville, support may drop. But these movements just elected a president. Where was the disinfectant then?
  - manfredo 8y ago
    Largely because the opposition did exactly that: they started deplatforming and attempting to more coercively prevent right wing views from speaking. Deplatforming grew in popularity around 2013 or 2014. Students at Brown shut down Ray Kelly's speech in 2014 [1]. We did prevent these groups from going out into the sunlight. That gave them the chance to grow in the shadows. Also, with regards to Trump, I largely see his election as happening despite his association with the alt right rather than because of it. It's a big liability not just for him, but the Republican party. Trump's biggest advantage wasn't anything to do with him, but the fact that Democrats had alienated manyc centrists in the leadup to the election, and fielded a candidate that lacked the enthusiasm to rally their base. 1. this is not to say that Ray Kelly is alt right. The fact that he got shut down despite not being nearly that extreme, though, is still demonstrative of my point.
    - 8y ago

by darawk 8y ago

manfredo 8y ago

> Social media platforms and the internet generally, substantially weaken the power of culture to regulate speech in the way that it used to. I fail to see how this is the case. It does absolutely grant the power to regulate speech. What Social media platforms have changes is that the people who are carrying out the informal regulation of speech have shifted to being a very narrow subset of the population, and one that is overwhelmingly made up of one category of culture. Tech, especially in the Bay Area, is effectively a political monoculture. Support for Republicans is often in the single digits[0]. The evidence really does indicate that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Despite the constant concern over Trump's comments on immigrants, for example, support for immigration in the US is at record levels.[1][2] Despite the concern over explicitly fascist rallies at Charlottesville and DC, these rallies actually cased a significant drop in support for far-right.[3] And lastly, while the Republican has become a party of Trump and has adopted much of his rhetoric the result has been largely bad for the party. They lost over a dozen seats in the midterm election - surprising given that the midterms are when the Republicans tend to do well. Yes, sunlight is the best disinfectant, and the data demonstrates it. Ironic, then, that some would want to shield these views that they despise from said disinfectant. 0. https://www.recode.net/2018/10/31/18039528/tech-employees-politics-liberal-employers-candidates https://www.recode.net/2018/10/31/18039528/tech-employees-po... 1. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/us/immigration-polls-donald-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/us/immigration-polls-dona... 2. https://news.gallup.com/poll/235793/record-high-americans-say-immigration-good-thing.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/235793/record-high-americans-sa... 3. https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/09/alt-weakened-dead-charlottesville-170920081948414.html https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/09/alt-weake...

darawk 8y ago
> I fail to see how this is the case. It does absolutely grant the power to regulate speech. I didn't say it prevented speech regulation in general. I said that it attenuated the previous regime of speech regulation. It does so by replacing it with a new one, where speech norms are determined by a tiny group of people in unelected, unreviewable positions at private companies. > The evidence really does indicate that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Despite the constant concern over Trump's comments on immigrants, for example, support for immigration in the US is at record levels.[1][2] Despite the concern over explicitly fascist rallies at Charlottesville and DC, these rallies actually cased a significant drop in support for far-right.[3] And lastly, while the Republican has become a party of Trump and has adopted much of his rhetoric the result has been largely bad for the party. They lost over a dozen seats in the midterm election - surprising given that the midterms are when the Republicans tend to do well. You may be right. But the story is far more complex than you're letting on. If sunlight is always the best disinfectant, then why did these movements gain steam in the first place? Sure, after an adverse event like Charlottesville, support may drop. But these movements just elected a president. Where was the disinfectant then?
- manfredo 8y ago
  Largely because the opposition did exactly that: they started deplatforming and attempting to more coercively prevent right wing views from speaking. Deplatforming grew in popularity around 2013 or 2014. Students at Brown shut down Ray Kelly's speech in 2014 [1]. We did prevent these groups from going out into the sunlight. That gave them the chance to grow in the shadows. Also, with regards to Trump, I largely see his election as happening despite his association with the alt right rather than because of it. It's a big liability not just for him, but the Republican party. Trump's biggest advantage wasn't anything to do with him, but the fact that Democrats had alienated manyc centrists in the leadup to the election, and fielded a candidate that lacked the enthusiasm to rally their base. 1. this is not to say that Ray Kelly is alt right. The fact that he got shut down despite not being nearly that extreme, though, is still demonstrative of my point.
  - 8y ago