3 ms·

The part that I concerned with has to do with discoverability. If you push these people underground they will not disappear. That has never happened in the hi

The part that I concerned with has to do with discoverability. If you push these people underground they will not disappear. That has never happened in the history of humanity. I would much rather the exist in plain view, free to voice their hatred in plain view. I would much rather the algorithms and people of sound mind monitor these individuals and groups in broad daylight than have them exist behind encrypted radicalization chat rooms. If the standard is to shutdown services that can lead to radicalization and, therefore, harm or death, then the government should shut down Facebook, Twitter, Google and maybe more. Why treat this any differently that 737 MAX crashes? The only reason I can see not to do this is to be able to keep an eye on people who self-radicalize. Sadly I have an example of this in my own family. We have an older relative (late 70’s) who, up until about two years ago, did not own a computer or use the Internet. He was given a computer by a family member so he could use FB to keep in touch with family in the US and abroad. We have been watching, in absolute horror, as he has been going down a path towards ever increasing hatred. No, not what you think. I won’t go into details other than to say that he had his political leanings a couple of years ago and FB turned them into nothing less than hatred, constant unrelenting hatred. No, he isn’t going to go hurt anyone. He is hurting himself. He is in a solid gradient descent into a sad existence and likely already very much in the grips if depression. I know it’s FB because that’s all he does with the computer. He is, otherwise, computer illiterate. He doesn’t have much if an education, which makes the constant stream of hateful memes, posts and articles impossible for him to filter. He is, effectively, mostly incapable of critical thinking now that he has been pulled down into this dark cave. Precisely because this is happening in plain sight, various members of our family, myself included, have been engaging with him to try and pull him out of Plato’s proverbial cave. This task is incredibly difficult. FB feeds him a constant stream of similar material and the world of reason evaporates behind a cloud of hatred. All he sees are shadows on the wall. We need this in the open in order to be able to help those we love as well as others. We also need FB and others to understand how much harm their algorithms seem to be causing.

anigbrowl 7y ago
Precisely because this is happening in plain sight, various members of our family, myself included, have been engaging with him to try and pull him out of Plato’s proverbial cave. This task is incredibly difficult. [...] It's enormously difficult to deal with even for a family member that you know fairly well. Now imagine trying to deal with it at scale where you're trying to reach (likely) complete strangers who are not confused, but actively engaged as conscious information and/or real world warriors and smart enough to anticipate, avoid, and deflect counter-arguments. There are already people who monitor these social groups but actively and algorithmically, and because of that are aware of where and how to locate them when a hub goes down.
- robomartin 7y ago
  I'm assuming you are echoing my case for making sure they do their business in the open. Or did I misread you? In our particular case there violence isn't of concern at all. It's just an older man getting pulled into a dark corner full of hateful messaging. This is having negative consequences as friends and some family don't want to be around that kind of negativity. In other words, our older family member's case is more about FB effectively destroying his quality of life than him becoming a problem for someone else. It's really sad to watch. With regards to your comment about it being harder to intercede in the case of complete strangers. Yes, absolutely agreed, it's nearly impossible with someone you've known your entire life I could not imagine what it might take to "reprogram" a complete stranger. My assumption, when it comes to the case of random strangers, wasn't that someone would necessarily intercede to try and play amateur psychologist. What I would expect is for law enforcement to become involved, bring experts into the fold and deal with each case as necessary. I am not a psychologist, so I can't even being to presume to know how or if this could be done. My other assumption is that the task is much easier when the conversations happen in the open. That said, I am not in law enforcement, I could be completely wrong, it might be the case that the various agencies can do a better job when these people think they are invisible. I don't know.

anigbrowl 7y ago

Precisely because this is happening in plain sight, various members of our family, myself included, have been engaging with him to try and pull him out of Plato’s proverbial cave. This task is incredibly difficult. [...] It's enormously difficult to deal with even for a family member that you know fairly well. Now imagine trying to deal with it at scale where you're trying to reach (likely) complete strangers who are not confused, but actively engaged as conscious information and/or real world warriors and smart enough to anticipate, avoid, and deflect counter-arguments. There are already people who monitor these social groups but actively and algorithmically, and because of that are aware of where and how to locate them when a hub goes down.

robomartin 7y ago
I'm assuming you are echoing my case for making sure they do their business in the open. Or did I misread you? In our particular case there violence isn't of concern at all. It's just an older man getting pulled into a dark corner full of hateful messaging. This is having negative consequences as friends and some family don't want to be around that kind of negativity. In other words, our older family member's case is more about FB effectively destroying his quality of life than him becoming a problem for someone else. It's really sad to watch. With regards to your comment about it being harder to intercede in the case of complete strangers. Yes, absolutely agreed, it's nearly impossible with someone you've known your entire life I could not imagine what it might take to "reprogram" a complete stranger. My assumption, when it comes to the case of random strangers, wasn't that someone would necessarily intercede to try and play amateur psychologist. What I would expect is for law enforcement to become involved, bring experts into the fold and deal with each case as necessary. I am not a psychologist, so I can't even being to presume to know how or if this could be done. My other assumption is that the task is much easier when the conversations happen in the open. That said, I am not in law enforcement, I could be completely wrong, it might be the case that the various agencies can do a better job when these people think they are invisible. I don't know.