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Regardless of my opinion on holocaust denialism, I'll never be comfortable with such a large communications platform having the power to decide what ideas are a

by kypro 6y ago

Regardless of my opinion on holocaust denialism, I'll never be comfortable with such a large communications platform having the power to decide what ideas are acceptable and unacceptable to discuss. Like all of us, I hold a number of opinions that many believe are incorrect or harmful so I feel the need to defend the principles of freedom of speech regardless of the issue at hand. As for this policy change, I wonder what the limits will be here? Holocaust denialism isn't something I know much about, but my understanding is that there are different categories of holocaust denialism. A lot of holocaust "denialism" isn't strictly denial of the holocaust, but more the extent to which it happened. Many will argue that there were far less than 6 million deaths – which as I understand it isn't supported by the majority of academics. However I do believe some denialism is academic in the same way a small handful of scientists disagree about climate change, there is also some academic disagreement about the treatment of Jews during holocaust and the total number of Jews killed. Are these kinds of discussions also off limits? Would I be allowed to share academic research which suggest 8 million Jews died, but not 4 million? Or is only discussion that centres on the 6 million number acceptable? I suspect as usual any legitimate discussion that happens to fall outside the bounds of what's socially acceptable to those enforcing this policy will be removed and the bounds of what's acceptable will continue to shrink. I know Twitter and Reddit ban people for having the wrong academic views on race and gender these days so I assume this policy will be enforced similarly. It does seem going forward only those with the correct views on race, gender, global warming, COVID-19, history, and social issues will be permitted access to digital communication platforms. I'm just thankful Facebook and Twitter weren't around to police wrong think during the gay and civil rights movements tbh.

AnimalMuppet 6y ago
> I'm just thankful Facebook and Twitter weren't around to police wrong think during the gay and civil rights movements tbh. But during that time, there were mass media. They didn't allow the now-considered-right-thinking viewpoint (in the case of gays) or were not consistent in support of it (civil rights). Those who were pro-gay and pro-civil-rights needed alternate means of communication. The same may be true today. Fortunately, we have such means - email, phone, text, snail mail. You don't have to talk to people who think like you on Facebook or Twitter. If the mainstream media becomes too censorious, talk somewhere else. Note well: This does not mean that I am in favor of Facebook censoring, especially if it goes several steps further than just holocaust denial. But if they do, it's not the end of dissent. Dissent just grows underground.
- asah 6y ago
  Please pick another example: these movements were never calling for genocide.
  - AnimalMuppet 6y ago
    Yeah, see, that's kind of the point. You censor a movement calling for genocide (or, more precisely, denying a genocide in the past). But if you're going to do that, do all of them. Censor Turkey denying the Armenian genocide. Censor those who sweep Stalin's crimes under the rug. Censor those who try to minimize the death toll of the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap forward. Censor those who say that the Europeans' conquest of the Americas was anything other than a genocide. And, if we were 50 years ago, censor the communists calling for global revolution. That's not a call for genocide, exactly, but it's a call for a lot of death, and for destruction of a class of people, which is in the same camp. But the problem is, once you do that, do you stop there? Or do you say, well, the Soviets are behind this "civil rights" agitation, so we have to censor that, too? And this "gay rights" stuff is corrupting the morals of our youth, so we have to censor that? And even if you say, no, violence only, don't censor anything else, somebody else is going to push for it to go further. How do you know that your viewpoint (violence only) is going to win? You don't. So be very careful about calling for censorship, even of things that you are sure are wrong. Soon enough it will be applied to things you're sure are right.
glasss 6y ago
> I'll never be comfortable with such a large communications platform having the power... It's their platform, they have the power to do whatever they want with it.
- 3np 6y ago
  Those two points aren't contradictory. No company should be in the position Facebook is in.

by kypro 6y ago

AnimalMuppet 6y ago

> I'm just thankful Facebook and Twitter weren't around to police wrong think during the gay and civil rights movements tbh. But during that time, there were mass media. They didn't allow the now-considered-right-thinking viewpoint (in the case of gays) or were not consistent in support of it (civil rights). Those who were pro-gay and pro-civil-rights needed alternate means of communication. The same may be true today. Fortunately, we have such means - email, phone, text, snail mail. You don't have to talk to people who think like you on Facebook or Twitter. If the mainstream media becomes too censorious, talk somewhere else. Note well: This does not mean that I am in favor of Facebook censoring, especially if it goes several steps further than just holocaust denial. But if they do, it's not the end of dissent. Dissent just grows underground.

asah 6y ago
Please pick another example: these movements were never calling for genocide.
- AnimalMuppet 6y ago
  Yeah, see, that's kind of the point. You censor a movement calling for genocide (or, more precisely, denying a genocide in the past). But if you're going to do that, do all of them. Censor Turkey denying the Armenian genocide. Censor those who sweep Stalin's crimes under the rug. Censor those who try to minimize the death toll of the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap forward. Censor those who say that the Europeans' conquest of the Americas was anything other than a genocide. And, if we were 50 years ago, censor the communists calling for global revolution. That's not a call for genocide, exactly, but it's a call for a lot of death, and for destruction of a class of people, which is in the same camp. But the problem is, once you do that, do you stop there? Or do you say, well, the Soviets are behind this "civil rights" agitation, so we have to censor that, too? And this "gay rights" stuff is corrupting the morals of our youth, so we have to censor that? And even if you say, no, violence only, don't censor anything else, somebody else is going to push for it to go further. How do you know that your viewpoint (violence only) is going to win? You don't. So be very careful about calling for censorship, even of things that you are sure are wrong. Soon enough it will be applied to things you're sure are right.

glasss 6y ago

> I'll never be comfortable with such a large communications platform having the power... It's their platform, they have the power to do whatever they want with it.

3np 6y ago
Those two points aren't contradictory. No company should be in the position Facebook is in.