10 ms·

Saying racist stuff constantly but playing it off as "ironic" and wearing a suit doesn't make it less racist. Good, they should have kicked these guys off years

Saying racist stuff constantly but playing it off as "ironic" and wearing a suit doesn't make it less racist. Good, they should have kicked these guys off years ago.

WC3w6pXxgGd 7y ago
What has he said that's racist?
rayiner 7y ago
When you’re talking about someone like Farrakhan, and the explicit racial basis for slavery and segregation, is simply being “racist” sufficient justification for a ban? By that same token, can Facebook ban say Armenians for being racist against Turks? Should Facebook step blithely into these very complex issues?
- CamperBob2 7y ago
  My personal working definition of "racism" is any thought process that leads me to judge either an entire race or certain individuals within that race by the actions of other individuals within the race. That's no more justifiable if your name is Farrakhan than it is if your name is Yiannopoulos. I don't know much about either of those people, though, so I can't say whether or not Facebook should boot them off.
- rhizome 7y ago
  >is simply being “racist” sufficient justification for a ban It can be, if the site decides it is. Other places, it isn't!
  - vowelless 7y ago
    It’s great that the site decides. It is exerting editorial control in this case. Hence, they should be liable for the speech that they do allow. Which means, they should be sueable if a user does slander on their platform, posts copyrightable material, etc.
    - balfirevic 7y ago
      > It is exerting editorial control in this case. > Hence, they should be liable for the speech that they do allow. I see this sentiment often on HN, as if the latter somehow logically and necessarily follows from the former. It doesn't, and if that is what you advocate then you should justify it with proper arguments.
      - vowelless 7y ago
        The argument is about whether Facebook is a platform or a publisher. This discussion has been going on for years and not just on HN. Being a platform, like ATT telephone lines, bring certain protections from lawsuits of content. The core of net neutrality is also based on a similar idea; with net neutrality, platforms (cable companies) can not between distinguish services (like throttling Netflix). In the exact same vein, if Facebook is a platform, it cannot distinguish between the “services” (users producing the content) unless that content is federally criminally illegal. With this, they are not liable for civil matters like slander. However, if Facebook is a publisher, meaning it can editorialize the content (similar to att choosing to throttle Netflix ), then it will become liable just like every other publishing company (nytimes, nymag, Rolling Stones, you name it). Hope this helps. There is a lot more info about this on the internet. There were even House hearings on this topic. I encourage you to go look them up.
        threeseed 7y ago
        All manners of platforms have terms of services that you must comply with it to be allow you to use that platform. It's not like you are given full freedom to just do whatever you want. Facebook is no different in this respect. You make it sound like platforms are these wild west environments where anything goes. It's not like that.
        balfirevic 7y ago
        > Hope this helps. Thanks for the clarification, but I don't find it convincing. I disagree with the underlying premise that we should clump social media into (only) two categories (platforms and publishers) where if you exercise any editorial control you are immediately categorized as "publisher" (category that is appropriate for an entity that explicitly and deliberately chooses everything it publishes) and where only "platforms" are protected from lawsuit about their users' content.
- reissbaker 7y ago
  Farrakhan was banned for being a notorious anti-Semite; being black doesn't give you a free pass to incite hatred against Jews. This isn't a complex issue.
  - cat199 7y ago
    NOI (and by extension Farrakhan) is not simply 'anti semitic'. They are black supremacist.
    - reissbaker 7y ago
      Nope: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/individual/louis-farrakhan https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/indi... To quote: "Farrakhan blames Jews for the slave trade, plantation slavery, Jim Crow, sharecropping and general black oppression. Farrakhan’s tone grew more belligerent in June 2010, when he sent letters to several leaders of the Jewish community as well as the Southern Poverty Law Center demanding that they acknowledge the evils they have perpetrated and that they work to further Farrakhan’s goals. The letter ended with a threat to “ruin and destroy your power and influence here and throughout the world” if his terms were not met."
      - DuskStar 7y ago
        I think cat199's point was that Farrakhan isn't just 'anti semitic'. There's quite a lot wrong with the NOI besides that.
        reissbaker 7y ago
        Oh, I misunderstood then. Yeah, there's a lot there.
    - egwynn 7y ago
      Not sure why you’re getting downvoted. They don’t necessarily self-describe with those exact words, but it’s not by any means a stretch based on the org’s teachings.
- aeturnum 7y ago
  I think Farrakhan is a really tough case. First, he's cartoonishly anti-semitic and has been for years. He's as much of a hate monger as any of the other people who were banned and that's enough reason to ban him. That given, he has also materially supported vulnerable populations in a way that few organizations have. He has pushed very hard for black people to be proud of their blackness and to create narratives in which blackness is not looked down upon. This is good, needed work. Members of the black community have spoken about and wrestled with this difficulty. [1][2] I don't think I can add anything other than to agree his situation is more complicated, though I also agree that he should be excluded from the public square as long as he continues to promote hatred. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/nation-of-islam/555332/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/nation-... [2] https://www.theroot.com/a-word-about-louis-farrakhan-and-tamika-mallory-1823607435 https://www.theroot.com/a-word-about-louis-farrakhan-and-tam...
  - cat199 7y ago
    > to create narratives in which blackness is not looked down upon. This is good, needed work. so like: In the Nation of Islam, both God and the devil are human beings. Elijah Muhammad identified the devil as the white man, the Caucasian race. According to Elijah, though the black race is many trillions of years old, the white race began a mere six thousand years ago with Yakub, one of the Black Gods of this time cycle.[15] Elijah explained, "The white race is not equal with darker people because the white race was not created by the God of Righteousness. . . . They were made by Yakub, an original Black Man—who is from the Creator. Yakub, the father of the devil, made the white race, a race of devils—enemies of the darker people of the earth. The white race is not made by nature to accept righteousness."[16] is 'good, needed work'?? https://www.answering-islam.org/NoI/noi2.html https://www.answering-islam.org/NoI/noi2.html
    - aeturnum 7y ago
      Hah, no, I would not say that's the "good" part of the the Nation of Islam. However, just like Christianity has been able to do some amount of "good work" while insisting that "Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says"[1], the Nation is not "all bad." I personally would judge its good works to be more crippled by its doctrine than most faiths. If you want to read a good thinking wrestling with the Nation of Islam I recommend The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin. I think he does a good job of capturing the contradictions and attractions of Elijah Muhammad (another undeniably hateful man) in the flesh. [1] 1 Corinthians 14:34, NIV
- faissaloo 7y ago
  >Should Facebook step blithely into these very complex issues? The trick here is that you don't needlessly overcomplicate the issue. People promoting 'race realism' as a theory we should base society around, yeah those people should definitely go.
- tptacek 7y ago
  Yes? Facebook should ban racism against Turkish people? I'm not sure I see how that's an interesting or difficult call to make.
  - rayiner 7y ago
    I don’t know if I agree with that. The Turkish ethnostate tried to wipe Armenians off the map. Who is Facebook to tell Armenians how they can express their response to that?
    - tptacek 7y ago
      They're Facebook. They run Facebook. That is the source from which they draw their authority to ban racism against the 80 million men, women, and children who inhabit Turkey. On Facebook, I mean. I take your point and am not trying to be snarky. I just don't see the problem here. The legitimate historical grievances of Armenians are orthogonal to what Facebook should allow to happen on their platform.
- smazero 7y ago
  They shouldn't "blithely step into these very complex issues" but I'd argue they have a moral and societal responsibility to address them seriously and responsibly somehow. I think this means spending money on teams with the linguistic and cultural skills to be able to understand complex and disparate cultures, and empowering those teams to be able to act to enforce rules around content. I think it also means having some sort of overarching ethical policy framework coming from the leaders of the company to shape those rules and guide the teams. Doing this properly would be complicated, messy and expensive but if Facebook is going to be part of our society going forward I think its something they will have to deal with somehow or some other change will be forced upon them. As I write this I realise that perhaps the ruthless arithmetic of a publicly traded company whose business model is web advertising, with shareholders to endlessly appease is probably by definition an entity that is fundamentally unable to make the above choices in the same way that I couldn't just decide to breath underwater.
bartimus 7y ago
Any examples of Milo making a racist remark? Afaik his criticism is mainly towards certain cultures. Not races.
- threeseed 7y ago
  Given that there is such a high correlation between religion, race and cultural background I don't think it's always possible to say that racism is fine but bigotry and xenophobia aren't. They are all inextricably linked.
  - colordrops 7y ago
    We need to be able to criticize cultures, as they are choices and not unchangeable traits at birth, and some cultural behaviors are absolutely unhealthy. Your premise opens up certain cultures to be immune to criticism, which is a terrible thing.
  - bartimus 7y ago
    You choose your beliefs. Not your genes. That's the problem with racism. Genes are not a thing you can hold someone accountable for.
  - tathougies 7y ago
    In America, there isn't really. For the most part, immigrant groups have adopted a culture completely or substantially different than the one from which their ancestors came.
- kevincrane 7y ago
  The reason he was (finally) banned from Twitter was for encouraging his racist supporters to harass Leslie Jones and send her gorilla memes (a wildly racist trope, as you know). So yes, he's racist.
  - maximus1983 7y ago
    He didn't encourage any of his fans to harass Leslie Jones. That is misinformation. Leslie Jones was making quite a number of remarks about people that were criticising the Ghostbuster movie trailer. Milo made one comment saying she looked like a dude (which is quite rude). Most of the other comments towards her were made hours before he retweeted her.

Saying racist stuff constantly but playing it off as "ironic" and wearing a suit doesn't make it less racist. Good, they should have kicked these guys off years ago.

WC3w6pXxgGd 7y ago

What has he said that's racist?

rayiner 7y ago

When you’re talking about someone like Farrakhan, and the explicit racial basis for slavery and segregation, is simply being “racist” sufficient justification for a ban? By that same token, can Facebook ban say Armenians for being racist against Turks? Should Facebook step blithely into these very complex issues?

CamperBob2 7y ago
My personal working definition of "racism" is any thought process that leads me to judge either an entire race or certain individuals within that race by the actions of other individuals within the race. That's no more justifiable if your name is Farrakhan than it is if your name is Yiannopoulos. I don't know much about either of those people, though, so I can't say whether or not Facebook should boot them off.
rhizome 7y ago
>is simply being “racist” sufficient justification for a ban It can be, if the site decides it is. Other places, it isn't!
- vowelless 7y ago
  It’s great that the site decides. It is exerting editorial control in this case. Hence, they should be liable for the speech that they do allow. Which means, they should be sueable if a user does slander on their platform, posts copyrightable material, etc.
  - balfirevic 7y ago
    > It is exerting editorial control in this case. > Hence, they should be liable for the speech that they do allow. I see this sentiment often on HN, as if the latter somehow logically and necessarily follows from the former. It doesn't, and if that is what you advocate then you should justify it with proper arguments.
    - vowelless 7y ago
      The argument is about whether Facebook is a platform or a publisher. This discussion has been going on for years and not just on HN. Being a platform, like ATT telephone lines, bring certain protections from lawsuits of content. The core of net neutrality is also based on a similar idea; with net neutrality, platforms (cable companies) can not between distinguish services (like throttling Netflix). In the exact same vein, if Facebook is a platform, it cannot distinguish between the “services” (users producing the content) unless that content is federally criminally illegal. With this, they are not liable for civil matters like slander. However, if Facebook is a publisher, meaning it can editorialize the content (similar to att choosing to throttle Netflix ), then it will become liable just like every other publishing company (nytimes, nymag, Rolling Stones, you name it). Hope this helps. There is a lot more info about this on the internet. There were even House hearings on this topic. I encourage you to go look them up.
      - threeseed 7y ago
        All manners of platforms have terms of services that you must comply with it to be allow you to use that platform. It's not like you are given full freedom to just do whatever you want. Facebook is no different in this respect. You make it sound like platforms are these wild west environments where anything goes. It's not like that.
      - balfirevic 7y ago
        > Hope this helps. Thanks for the clarification, but I don't find it convincing. I disagree with the underlying premise that we should clump social media into (only) two categories (platforms and publishers) where if you exercise any editorial control you are immediately categorized as "publisher" (category that is appropriate for an entity that explicitly and deliberately chooses everything it publishes) and where only "platforms" are protected from lawsuit about their users' content.
reissbaker 7y ago
Farrakhan was banned for being a notorious anti-Semite; being black doesn't give you a free pass to incite hatred against Jews. This isn't a complex issue.
- cat199 7y ago
  NOI (and by extension Farrakhan) is not simply 'anti semitic'. They are black supremacist.
  - reissbaker 7y ago
    Nope: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/individual/louis-farrakhan https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/indi... To quote: "Farrakhan blames Jews for the slave trade, plantation slavery, Jim Crow, sharecropping and general black oppression. Farrakhan’s tone grew more belligerent in June 2010, when he sent letters to several leaders of the Jewish community as well as the Southern Poverty Law Center demanding that they acknowledge the evils they have perpetrated and that they work to further Farrakhan’s goals. The letter ended with a threat to “ruin and destroy your power and influence here and throughout the world” if his terms were not met."
    - DuskStar 7y ago
      I think cat199's point was that Farrakhan isn't just 'anti semitic'. There's quite a lot wrong with the NOI besides that.
      - reissbaker 7y ago
        Oh, I misunderstood then. Yeah, there's a lot there.
  - egwynn 7y ago
    Not sure why you’re getting downvoted. They don’t necessarily self-describe with those exact words, but it’s not by any means a stretch based on the org’s teachings.
aeturnum 7y ago
I think Farrakhan is a really tough case. First, he's cartoonishly anti-semitic and has been for years. He's as much of a hate monger as any of the other people who were banned and that's enough reason to ban him. That given, he has also materially supported vulnerable populations in a way that few organizations have. He has pushed very hard for black people to be proud of their blackness and to create narratives in which blackness is not looked down upon. This is good, needed work. Members of the black community have spoken about and wrestled with this difficulty. [1][2] I don't think I can add anything other than to agree his situation is more complicated, though I also agree that he should be excluded from the public square as long as he continues to promote hatred. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/nation-of-islam/555332/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/nation-... [2] https://www.theroot.com/a-word-about-louis-farrakhan-and-tamika-mallory-1823607435 https://www.theroot.com/a-word-about-louis-farrakhan-and-tam...
- cat199 7y ago
  > to create narratives in which blackness is not looked down upon. This is good, needed work. so like: In the Nation of Islam, both God and the devil are human beings. Elijah Muhammad identified the devil as the white man, the Caucasian race. According to Elijah, though the black race is many trillions of years old, the white race began a mere six thousand years ago with Yakub, one of the Black Gods of this time cycle.[15] Elijah explained, "The white race is not equal with darker people because the white race was not created by the God of Righteousness. . . . They were made by Yakub, an original Black Man—who is from the Creator. Yakub, the father of the devil, made the white race, a race of devils—enemies of the darker people of the earth. The white race is not made by nature to accept righteousness."[16] is 'good, needed work'?? https://www.answering-islam.org/NoI/noi2.html https://www.answering-islam.org/NoI/noi2.html
  - aeturnum 7y ago
    Hah, no, I would not say that's the "good" part of the the Nation of Islam. However, just like Christianity has been able to do some amount of "good work" while insisting that "Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says"[1], the Nation is not "all bad." I personally would judge its good works to be more crippled by its doctrine than most faiths. If you want to read a good thinking wrestling with the Nation of Islam I recommend The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin. I think he does a good job of capturing the contradictions and attractions of Elijah Muhammad (another undeniably hateful man) in the flesh. [1] 1 Corinthians 14:34, NIV
faissaloo 7y ago
>Should Facebook step blithely into these very complex issues? The trick here is that you don't needlessly overcomplicate the issue. People promoting 'race realism' as a theory we should base society around, yeah those people should definitely go.
tptacek 7y ago
Yes? Facebook should ban racism against Turkish people? I'm not sure I see how that's an interesting or difficult call to make.
- rayiner 7y ago
  I don’t know if I agree with that. The Turkish ethnostate tried to wipe Armenians off the map. Who is Facebook to tell Armenians how they can express their response to that?
  - tptacek 7y ago
    They're Facebook. They run Facebook. That is the source from which they draw their authority to ban racism against the 80 million men, women, and children who inhabit Turkey. On Facebook, I mean. I take your point and am not trying to be snarky. I just don't see the problem here. The legitimate historical grievances of Armenians are orthogonal to what Facebook should allow to happen on their platform.
smazero 7y ago
They shouldn't "blithely step into these very complex issues" but I'd argue they have a moral and societal responsibility to address them seriously and responsibly somehow. I think this means spending money on teams with the linguistic and cultural skills to be able to understand complex and disparate cultures, and empowering those teams to be able to act to enforce rules around content. I think it also means having some sort of overarching ethical policy framework coming from the leaders of the company to shape those rules and guide the teams. Doing this properly would be complicated, messy and expensive but if Facebook is going to be part of our society going forward I think its something they will have to deal with somehow or some other change will be forced upon them. As I write this I realise that perhaps the ruthless arithmetic of a publicly traded company whose business model is web advertising, with shareholders to endlessly appease is probably by definition an entity that is fundamentally unable to make the above choices in the same way that I couldn't just decide to breath underwater.

bartimus 7y ago

Any examples of Milo making a racist remark? Afaik his criticism is mainly towards certain cultures. Not races.

threeseed 7y ago
Given that there is such a high correlation between religion, race and cultural background I don't think it's always possible to say that racism is fine but bigotry and xenophobia aren't. They are all inextricably linked.
- colordrops 7y ago
  We need to be able to criticize cultures, as they are choices and not unchangeable traits at birth, and some cultural behaviors are absolutely unhealthy. Your premise opens up certain cultures to be immune to criticism, which is a terrible thing.
- bartimus 7y ago
  You choose your beliefs. Not your genes. That's the problem with racism. Genes are not a thing you can hold someone accountable for.
- tathougies 7y ago
  In America, there isn't really. For the most part, immigrant groups have adopted a culture completely or substantially different than the one from which their ancestors came.
kevincrane 7y ago
The reason he was (finally) banned from Twitter was for encouraging his racist supporters to harass Leslie Jones and send her gorilla memes (a wildly racist trope, as you know). So yes, he's racist.
- maximus1983 7y ago
  He didn't encourage any of his fans to harass Leslie Jones. That is misinformation. Leslie Jones was making quite a number of remarks about people that were criticising the Ghostbuster movie trailer. Milo made one comment saying she looked like a dude (which is quite rude). Most of the other comments towards her were made hours before he retweeted her.