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It's a neo-nazi/white nationalist forum. It's still active I believe behind Tor, but not nearly as accessible, far fewer people actually participating. We're

It's a neo-nazi/white nationalist forum. It's still active I believe behind Tor, but not nearly as accessible, far fewer people actually participating. We're in an era where young men radicalize each other on message boards like these until one of the truly unhinged members heads to a synagogue to murder people worshiping. As we've seen so many times in the past year, they'll often post before they do it, leaving behind a manifesto and a crowd egging them on to get a "high score." I wish this was actually an outlier and not very common, but unfortunately if you monitor these forums you'll see men working up the courage to commit a mass murder of their own every single day. In my opinion we should try to put as many barriers we can in front of these types of communities, and it sucks that cloudflare is still working with some of them.

cobbzilla 7y ago
yeah that is pretty controversial stuff! I guess for me this falls into that fringe category of stuff that really should best be only found by those truly seeking it, so I’m morally OK with barriers without total censorship. But I’d also like to think more about how to help those people who get sucked into such things. The more private it becomes, maybe the harder it is to see & help? All that said I still stand by my original comment, there is a chilling effect on free speech, not to be so glibly dismissed.
- anarchodev 7y ago
  So first of all yes, free speech is important. If it were to be curtailed along political lines, my work would be cut long before any of these platforms. But free speech isn't quite relevant here. The first amendment does not provide a right to a platform or an audience. Would they eventually find other outlets? Of course. But if your ideology is regularly getting people killed I absolutely want you to be handing out fliers at the mall, not sending out links to your anonymous discord or 8chan. Getting help for these troubled men is a priority, but right now there simply isn't a mechanism for it -- we help those who seek it in America. Finding out who these posters are in the first place is a chore on its own and has been more effectively accomplished by networks of antifascists than by our well-funded intelligence departments, to give you some perspective. So I think that goal will come with more resource allocation to this particular problem, once it's acknowledged. And the current administration does not acknowledge it.

cobbzilla 7y ago

yeah that is pretty controversial stuff! I guess for me this falls into that fringe category of stuff that really should best be only found by those truly seeking it, so I’m morally OK with barriers without total censorship. But I’d also like to think more about how to help those people who get sucked into such things. The more private it becomes, maybe the harder it is to see & help? All that said I still stand by my original comment, there is a chilling effect on free speech, not to be so glibly dismissed.

anarchodev 7y ago
So first of all yes, free speech is important. If it were to be curtailed along political lines, my work would be cut long before any of these platforms. But free speech isn't quite relevant here. The first amendment does not provide a right to a platform or an audience. Would they eventually find other outlets? Of course. But if your ideology is regularly getting people killed I absolutely want you to be handing out fliers at the mall, not sending out links to your anonymous discord or 8chan. Getting help for these troubled men is a priority, but right now there simply isn't a mechanism for it -- we help those who seek it in America. Finding out who these posters are in the first place is a chore on its own and has been more effectively accomplished by networks of antifascists than by our well-funded intelligence departments, to give you some perspective. So I think that goal will come with more resource allocation to this particular problem, once it's acknowledged. And the current administration does not acknowledge it.