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Its trivial to devise rules of a discourse that selectively lock out certain ideologies from participating. You can easily use such a system to suppress speech

• thenewnewguy 7y ago
  It may be trivial to do so, but is Twitter doing it? Skimming their ToS I see no instances of such rules.
  • blfr 7y ago
    Twitter has considered "learn to code" harassment. Of course they are.
• DonHopkins 7y ago
  If "certain ideologies" promote lies and violence, then it's a good thing that Twitter locks them out, don't you agree?
  • wolco 7y ago
    Until twitter decides to censor something important to you. Perhaps the Hong Kong protesters opinions should be fall under this new rule. Because of violence and everything.
    • DonHopkins 7y ago
      If their ideology promotes lies and violence, then yes. But what evidence do you have that their ideology promotes doing that, or are you just making a false equivalence?
      • wolco 7y ago
        China has made these claims. Turkey has called the Kurds terrorists. America may view them differently.
        • deleted 7y ago
          [deleted]
        • pluma 7y ago
          I mean, China's influence was enough for companies like Activision Blizzard to clamp down on people expressing support for Hong Kong, so it's entirely credible. Turkey's president literally just ran an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal defending his invasion of Syria and telling tall tales of Turkey's humanitarian mission and unique effort to fix migration, violence and instability. Twitter is swamped with "bots" (be they actual automated accounts, throwaways, state actors or regime-friendly humans) posting and re-posting fraudulent news stories, lies and plain old propaganda in favor of all kinds of national interests and political leanings. I wouldn't be surprised if Twitter in an attempt at "corporate impartiality" would be more inclined to go after the Kurds or Hong Kong protesters than Turkish and Chinese slurs, dehumanisation and calls for violence. After all, there are probably more "people" reporting these accounts than reporting the various propaganda outlets.
      • rjf72 7y ago
        What would you suggest is the minimum evidence necessary to support the view that an ideology promotes violence? - Isolated incidents of violence on behalf of the ideology? - A "sufficiently large" number of incidents on behalf of the ideology? If so, could you elaborate on "sufficiently large" as you see it? - A general tacit approval of violence? - An explicit approval of violence? - Something else? The problem I think that many see is there tends to be extensive cognitive dissonance. People apply one set of standards to groups they like, and another to ones that they don't. I think you'll find that in trying to answer my above question it becomes quite difficult to include the groups you don't like, while excluding the groups you do like. That's even when my framing above which is unrealistically softball. For instance I didn't even mention things like harassment, destruction of property, etc which I think we should also generally be intolerant of - even when it's a group we like engaging in such things.
  • rndgermandude 7y ago
    I don't agree. I want these ideologies in the open, where I can see them, examine them, fight them. I do not want them to go "underground" where they can fester and grow uninterrupted and unobserved by the larger society, until they have grown enough to burst and soak society in puss. Also, I do not want twitter, a private company, to be the gatekeeper, a gatekeeper we cannot observe or control. Especially not then the Saudis invested $300m in that company (or a reddit which had an $150m investment by essentially China). Freedom of speech is not absolute, but the limits shouldn't be set by some corporation, but by the People.
    • wtallis 7y ago
      > I want these ideologies in the open, where I can see them, examine them, fight them. I do not want them to go "underground" where they can fester and grow uninterrupted and unobserved by the larger society, until they have grown enough to burst and soak society in puss. Keeping hate groups off of Twitter does more to inhibit their growth than your attempts to debate them.
      • rndgermandude 7y ago
        Prove it. We saw exactly the opposite in Germany when they tried to ban the neo-nazis. Or the RAF. Or ask the Brits how banning the IRA went for them.
        • DonHopkins 7y ago
          You prove your point by debating the neo-nazis on twitter, winning the argument with facts, and shutting them up. Report back here when you've solved the problem.
          • rndgermandude 7y ago
            The point is not to win stupid internet arguments with people so deeply caught in their cognitive dissonance there is no escaping for them anymore anyway. The point is to prevent them feeling victimized and recruiting other people by stating they are victimized and censored. Do not underestimate the underdog effect. The point is to engage them, debunk them, as thoroughly and publicly as possible to disinfect people who are on the verge of being recruited. The point is not to insult and belittle and censor that blue collar worker deplorable because that person voiced some concerns about immigration for example (even misguided or even racist), because when you do, you create another Trump voter who might even go to a White Supremacists rally later, because at least those people take that person "seriously" (or at least pretend they do) instead of throwing a wave of name calling and open hatred. The point is to have give the nazis and also the disenfranchised but usually also very hateful and misguided young, mostly white, mostly male fellow human being some people so eagerly call "incels" a place where they can vent their bullshit instead of venting it on the 8ch clones populated only with like-minded people pushing each other further and further, and also keep to an eye on them. And maybe, just maybe, by not always being a total asshole to them (even tho they are total assholes to other people), not going for the easy "you're an incel nazi scum" kill, you will brick by brick dismantle their wall of mouthfoaming ideology. Like this guy does rather successfully: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryl_Davis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryl_Davis You might know him already; he is a the black musician who went out and actually talked to KKK members and now has a nice collection of KKK robes from people he convinced to quit.
  • deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  • TeMPOraL 7y ago
    If it gets impartially applied to all such ideologies, then sure, that would be a good thing.
  • dragonsngoblins 7y ago
    Honestly no I don't. Locking them out will just lead to false positives and a forever shifting window of what is acceptable. Obviously acceptability shifts with time but if the response to someone genuinely saying "Wait but what about X? Don't BAD PEOPLE hve a point about X?" gets banned for it they are more likely to side with said BAD PEOPLE
• jacobolus 7y ago
  You mean “certain ideologies” like targeted harassment on the basis of race gender or religion, threats/incitement to violence, support of terrorism or genocide, child sexual exploitation, etc.? I guess that’s true... but such ideologies have no place in a modern society. If your ideology can only be expressed using hate, get your own platform. Nobody has a responsibility to amplify such messages.
  • wolco 7y ago
    How do you deal with Twitter's middle east division labeling certain speech terrorism when Twitter San Francisco would have a different opinion?
  • notzuck 7y ago
    That's very simplistic thinking. The rules could say absolutely no racism which sounds reasonable but then the definition might get blown wide open when a liberal Gov say they need to restrict immigration, if you don't agree with that person that said it you could easily spin that they broke the TOS. Why do I even have to try and explain this?
    • jacobolus 7y ago
      “We should restrict immigration to limit labor supply so that the native born can earn better wages” is not the same type of message as “immigrants are cockroaches and we should shoot refugees as they cross the border.” “We should reject colonial oppression of our country” is not the same type of message as “we must wage religious war against our oppressors, and it is righteous to for young men to be suicide bombers”. “We should end affirmative action on the basis of race because it isn’t fair to individual members of the majority group” is not the same type of message as “all members of X minority are inherently worthless, and we should purge them”. “Rape accusations should be handled by law enforcement professionals rather than by school administrators, and the evidence should need to meet a high legal standard to be actionable” is not the same type of message as “X person claims they were raped but everyone knows they are a lying slut and were asking for it.” Etc. Why do I even have to try and explain this? > The rules could say absolutely no racism This is not what the rules do say. What they “could say” is not relevant here. The rules say: “Hateful conduct: You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.” This is elaborated here if you want to read about it https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/hateful-conduct-policy https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/hateful-condu... Specifically disallowed are (1) violent threats, (2) wishing, hoping or calling for serious harm on a person or group of people, (3) references to mass murder, violent events, or specific means of violence where protected groups have been the primary targets or victims, (4) inciting fear about a protected category, (5) repeated and/or non-consensual slurs, epithets, racist and sexist tropes, or other content that degrades someone, (6) hateful imagery