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If I'm not mistaken the NZ killer was on 8chan? It's the same argument with serial killer movies (at the risk of showing my age there was a strong controversy

If I'm not mistaken the NZ killer was on 8chan? It's the same argument with serial killer movies (at the risk of showing my age there was a strong controversy with "Natural Born Killers" at the time): you don't kill people because you chatted on the internet or watched a movie. You kill people because you had it in you. The things you were exposed before might color your act but that's it.

dragontamer 6y ago
> It's the same argument with serial killer movies Hollywood is infamous for misunderstanding psychology. At best, Hollywood has outdated notions of psychology (favoring long outdated ideas like Freud, because such ideas are exciting). Hollywood sells movies, not understanding. What we're discovering today is that there's a "pathway to radicalization". People are NOT born radical, they realign themselves as radical over time.
- formerly_proven 6y ago
  Yes, so how is giving internet trash cans like QAnon huge amounts of exposure and thus free advertisement supposed to help?
  - dragontamer 6y ago
    With QAnon politicians reaching mainstream status (Jo Rae Perkins), we're long past that point. QAnon is reaching mainstream, the question is what do we do about indicating that its message should not be tolerated.
- deleted 6y ago
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- deleted 6y ago
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- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  > What we're discovering today We who? This was known at least as far back as since Scientology and Holocaust.
gameswithgo 6y ago
> you don't kill people because you chatted on the internet or watched a movie. There is this pervasive idea lately a crazy youtube video or text can't actually be harmful, which just isn't true. Ideas can inspire wars, murder, revolution, they can warp minds. People previously productive can end up obsessed with crazy junk. It is important to protect each other and ourselves from bad ideas. The question is how, of course. Some people violently oppose any form of curation, whether it be censorship by government, or choices made by companies like facebook. Others insist the solution to bad speech is good speech, but I've been seeing that fail on the internet for 30 years. Perhaps higher quality education can help, perhaps improving economic inequity can help. Other ideas are welcome!
- IngvarLynn 6y ago
  Could not disagree more. Pure information is harmless, beliefs are not. Crazy beliefs emerge from the lack of critical thinking, not from the "dangerous information". Therefore censorship is only good as part of "divide and conquer" strategy.
swebs 6y ago
He was on Facebook too.
watwut 6y ago
You can get radicalized by people you communicate with via internet. Especially when you are isolated irl.
pjc50 6y ago
He left a manifesto which explained why he did it, citing both racist conspiracy theory from chan culture and "mainstream" racist Melanie Phillips.
Jetrel 6y ago
I've long been sympathetic to ideas like this - I remember as a little kid, blowing off the big stigma around the (then-novel) 3d shooters that had just come out, like Doom. Ironically I agree with exactly what you said, but simultaneously think you might miss something in the analysis. I think that maybe a better way to phrase the idea is: In the rare case that you're positive for a trait, you can be incited to it by stimuli. For example, if you have an anger-management problem, you can live quite peacefully, left alone, but you are uniquely dangerous to provoke. Behaviors and stimuli that are harmless to other people cause a violent outburst from you. Same thing with alcoholics and, for example, pedophiles - stimuli that provoke no negative behavior from other people will provoke it in someone positive for a trait. Violent media left us with a tiny driblet of actual killers because only a tiny fraction of people are positive for a trait of being stone-cold killers. -- So what are we afraid of? We have barely any actual killers. We're afraid of enablers. We have a tiny, tiny group of people that will dare to do crimes (say, shooting up a synagogue) when there are clear and present consequences for it. I'm quite sure, however, we have a still small, but much, much larger group that are "latent" trait-positive for violence. They'd do it - if they could get away with it. What we're really scared of is a third group - which might be a group so large that it could be anywhere from 30-60% of our society. People who could be coerced into not caring about the violence. That third group is the people who are trait-positive for gullibility (and several other related traits). I think it could very well be "most people" - a plurality if not a majority. These are what enable horrible things. People who have bought into propaganda really don't do anything, and that's exactly what's so horrible about them; because they don't express some sort of obvious, negative externality in their neighbors and coworker's lives, nobody really cares if they believe horrible things. Because they don't really "act on" those beliefs - they don't go out and do things that hurt people. But they also don't intervene when a crime aligning with their beliefs is perpetrated. And that's what's so scary. When a black man would get lynched in the old south, the real thing that made it possible was the hundreds of other bystanders who felt like the black guy deserved it. If they didn't exist, such a killer would rapidly be brought to justice. But instead, since so many were okay with it (and even cheered it on), not only would the killer get away with the act, but quite a few much more "minor" trait-positive people participated in it - people much less naturally driven to kill, but who could work up the courage to do so if they could get away with it.

dragontamer 6y ago

> It's the same argument with serial killer movies Hollywood is infamous for misunderstanding psychology. At best, Hollywood has outdated notions of psychology (favoring long outdated ideas like Freud, because such ideas are exciting). Hollywood sells movies, not understanding. What we're discovering today is that there's a "pathway to radicalization". People are NOT born radical, they realign themselves as radical over time.

formerly_proven 6y ago
Yes, so how is giving internet trash cans like QAnon huge amounts of exposure and thus free advertisement supposed to help?
- dragontamer 6y ago
  With QAnon politicians reaching mainstream status (Jo Rae Perkins), we're long past that point. QAnon is reaching mainstream, the question is what do we do about indicating that its message should not be tolerated.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
srtjstjsj 6y ago
> What we're discovering today We who? This was known at least as far back as since Scientology and Holocaust.

gameswithgo 6y ago

> you don't kill people because you chatted on the internet or watched a movie. There is this pervasive idea lately a crazy youtube video or text can't actually be harmful, which just isn't true. Ideas can inspire wars, murder, revolution, they can warp minds. People previously productive can end up obsessed with crazy junk. It is important to protect each other and ourselves from bad ideas. The question is how, of course. Some people violently oppose any form of curation, whether it be censorship by government, or choices made by companies like facebook. Others insist the solution to bad speech is good speech, but I've been seeing that fail on the internet for 30 years. Perhaps higher quality education can help, perhaps improving economic inequity can help. Other ideas are welcome!

IngvarLynn 6y ago
Could not disagree more. Pure information is harmless, beliefs are not. Crazy beliefs emerge from the lack of critical thinking, not from the "dangerous information". Therefore censorship is only good as part of "divide and conquer" strategy.

swebs 6y ago

He was on Facebook too.

watwut 6y ago

You can get radicalized by people you communicate with via internet. Especially when you are isolated irl.

pjc50 6y ago

He left a manifesto which explained why he did it, citing both racist conspiracy theory from chan culture and "mainstream" racist Melanie Phillips.

Jetrel 6y ago

I've long been sympathetic to ideas like this - I remember as a little kid, blowing off the big stigma around the (then-novel) 3d shooters that had just come out, like Doom. Ironically I agree with exactly what you said, but simultaneously think you might miss something in the analysis. I think that maybe a better way to phrase the idea is: In the rare case that you're positive for a trait, you can be incited to it by stimuli. For example, if you have an anger-management problem, you can live quite peacefully, left alone, but you are uniquely dangerous to provoke. Behaviors and stimuli that are harmless to other people cause a violent outburst from you. Same thing with alcoholics and, for example, pedophiles - stimuli that provoke no negative behavior from other people will provoke it in someone positive for a trait. Violent media left us with a tiny driblet of actual killers because only a tiny fraction of people are positive for a trait of being stone-cold killers. -- So what are we afraid of? We have barely any actual killers. We're afraid of enablers. We have a tiny, tiny group of people that will dare to do crimes (say, shooting up a synagogue) when there are clear and present consequences for it. I'm quite sure, however, we have a still small, but much, much larger group that are "latent" trait-positive for violence. They'd do it - if they could get away with it. What we're really scared of is a third group - which might be a group so large that it could be anywhere from 30-60% of our society. People who could be coerced into not caring about the violence. That third group is the people who are trait-positive for gullibility (and several other related traits). I think it could very well be "most people" - a plurality if not a majority. These are what enable horrible things. People who have bought into propaganda really don't do anything, and that's exactly what's so horrible about them; because they don't express some sort of obvious, negative externality in their neighbors and coworker's lives, nobody really cares if they believe horrible things. Because they don't really "act on" those beliefs - they don't go out and do things that hurt people. But they also don't intervene when a crime aligning with their beliefs is perpetrated. And that's what's so scary. When a black man would get lynched in the old south, the real thing that made it possible was the hundreds of other bystanders who felt like the black guy deserved it. If they didn't exist, such a killer would rapidly be brought to justice. But instead, since so many were okay with it (and even cheered it on), not only would the killer get away with the act, but quite a few much more "minor" trait-positive people participated in it - people much less naturally driven to kill, but who could work up the courage to do so if they could get away with it.