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Zuckerberg defends not suspending ex-Trump aide Bannon from Facebook: recording
- tengbretson 6y agoAren't actual convicted murderers allowed to have Facebook accounts?
- recursive 6y agoProbably, but not if they threaten violence using them.
- travisoneill1 6y agoIt really pisses me off when companies don't decide for me what information I am allowed to see. They are obviously smarter than me, and only acting in my best interest rather than their own, so it's best that they do this for me.
- whymauri 6y agoBannon suggested that the White House should behead Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Chris Wray. He then suggested their severed heads be displayed on spikes, at the White House.
- imgabe 6y agoAnd I, a hapless plebe, am clearly unqualified to judge whether calling for beheading someone is reasonable. Only Facebook should be able to determine what is reasonable for the hoi polloi to hear. The general public, as we all know, are helpless infants who need Facebook and other tech companies to censor their media for them. You are missing the point. It is not about the content.
- sroussey 6y agoGo look at Parlor if you want see people inciting the death of all democrats, gays, and non-christians.
- imgabe 6y agoAnd here you touch on the real problem. By banning extreme people from the commons you send them all to cluster together somewhere else, where their views are met with support instead of derision, thus amplifying and intensifying the extremity of their views. Steve Bannon on Facebook gets called out and shouted down. Steve Bannon on Parlor gets praised and encouraged. People on Parlor get positive feedback and begin to think their views are mainstream and reasonable. People on Facebook get negative feedback and at least have a chance to think "Hmm, maybe if everyone says I'm wrong about this, I should rethink it". Yes, I know many people won't rethink it, but facing some opposition at least provides the possibility of that happening. Forcing everyone into a filter bubble of only their own views provides no possibility of that happening.
- sroussey 6y agoFacebook is already a filter bubble though. It is Facebook itself that can impose opposition.
- stevecalifornia 6y agohy·per·bo·le - noun - exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally. But, to tone down my own snarkiness-- in just a few months we have seen a dramatic increase in moderation in what people are allowed and not allowed to say. This is not going to end well, imo. We are just going to end up with the liberal equivalent of the oppressive religious right from the 80's.
- voxl 6y agoYeah germany is doing fine I don't think American exceptionalism extends to death threats. Hiding behind hyperbole doesn't make you snarky just idiotic.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- travisoneill1 6y agoAnd I am not capable of judging for myself whether or not that is a bad idea, so I am grateful for the Facebook moderators and their superior judgment in making sure I don't see this!
- e9 6y agoThere are plenty of officials on Twitter openly wished that Trump died when he got coronavirus. Both situations are disgusting but neither are real threats.
- draw_down 6y agoNo, see, that's different, because uhhh.... uhhmmmm....
- ghayes 6y agoPassive versus active would make a huge difference here, right? Even if it’s amoral to wish someone does not recover from an ailment, there’s no act involved or even promulgated in such a statement.
- stickfigure 6y agoDisgusting or not, there would have been delicious irony in Trump dying from a Democratic hoax.
- ZeteticElench 6y agoNo, there is a huge difference because Trump's death would be from the same disease he criminally downplayed.
- dang 6y agoWe've banned this account for using HN primarily for political battle. That's not allowed here, regardless of what you're battling for or against, because it destroys the intended use of the site. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0&query=primarily%20test%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
- ZeteticElench 6y agoI can't help it there are so many Trumptards saying really stupid things on here.
- cabaalis 6y agoUncool, but also political exaggeration. Burning an effigy of Donald Trump is an analogue. Nobody expects someone to catch Donald Trump on fire, and no one expects anyone to behead Anthony Fauci.
- AaronFriel 6y agoThen why did Steve Bannon's verified Facebook Page reiterate that he called for their execution without any of those caveats or counterfactuals or even the defense that it was hyperbole or parody? I am beyond tired of people making excuses for public threats of violence from authoritarian right-wing actors. It isn't helpful to any discourse to pretend words don't mean what they mean anymore. Facebook post here: https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 archive.org snapshot here: https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230/https://www.faceb https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230/https://www.faceb... Here's the text of that post in case it is removed: [BREAKING] On www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com - *Steve Bannon Under Massive Attack* - Steve Bannon Under Attack - Steve Bannon’s Twitter Account Suspended After Calling for Execution of Dr Fauci and FBI Director Wray Get your news NOW - Bookmark www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com
- googthrowaway42 6y agoYou keep posting this like it's a smoking gun but clearly whoever runs his Facebook page just copy posted some blurb from another website.
- AaronFriel 6y agoI think populist dot press might be Bannon's own site. It heavily promotes his content, his weekly live stream, and it ties in to his social media on other platforms. Even if it's not his own, this is his official Facebook page from which Bannon hosts his weekly live stream. Here, you can see his "War Room" video series in its entirety: https://populist.press/americas-voice-war-room/ https://populist.press/americas-voice-war-room/
- 6y ago
- googthrowaway42 6y agoJust to be clear you're lying about this. He never talked about "beheading" them. This is akin to what you're doing right now: "User whymauri makes allusions to beheading on tech forum known for promoting hacking"
- AnimalMuppet 6y agoFrom the article: > Bannon suggested in a video posted on Nov. 5 that FBI Director Christopher Wray and government infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci should be beheaded, saying they had been disloyal to U.S. President Donald Trump, who last week lost his re-election bid to Biden. So I'm not sure where you get your claim that whymauri is lying. Stronger: Even if whymauri is incorrect, lying is a whole different level. Can you prove whymauri had intent to tell something other than the truth? I'm pretty sure you can't. And if not, site guidelines call for a charitable interpretation of what others say. Your accusation of lying is completely out of bounds.
- googthrowaway42 6y agoI don't need to read any article. The video is up in multiple places and I've seen it multiple times. The word 'behead' in any of its tenses is never used.
- AnimalMuppet 6y agoYou may have watched the video an infinite number of times. That doesn't give you any grounds whatsoever for your claim that whymauri is lying. It also doesn't make your claim any less against the site guidelines.
- verdverm 6y agoA guillotine was set up outside of Bezos abode, in the spirit of actions speaking louder than words? https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2020/08/jeff-bezos-guillotine-protest-amazon-workers https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2020/08/jeff-bezos-guilloti...
- wavefunction 6y agoBan them from facebook then.
- wyldfire 6y agoI think that's too simplistic a take. But it's a fair point that we should be concerned about corporate censorship if people start to depend on private platforms for public speech. But oft-repeated falsehoods are harmful even if we know they're not true.
- travisoneill1 6y agoNo it's really not too simplistic. The only case where Facebook's censorship is a positive is if the following 2 statements are both true: - FB's moderators posses better judgment than me as to what is and isn't true - FB's moderators will always act in the best interest of the users and not the company when they come into conflict I would say that the first point is very unlikely to be true, and the second is certain not to be true. I'm not sure how a lie can be harmful if it is know to be a lie.
- AnimalMuppet 6y agoI mostly agree with your point here. But a lie can be very harmful, even if it is known to be a lie, if enough people either don't know it's a lie, or don't care. See "Blood libel" for perhaps the most extreme example.
- georgeecollins 6y agoFacebook decides what information you see every day. They decide to promote certain messages and suppress others, not editorially but with algorhythms.
- travisoneill1 6y agoTrue. It doesn't bother me that companies show me what they think I want to see based on a recommendation algorithm. It does bother me that they would decline to show me something that would otherwise be recommended because they, in their infinite wisdom, have deemed it bad.
- justaguyonline 6y agoI guess I don't see that much of a difference between someone picking what are the best articles, news and videos to show by hand and someone designing an algorithm to do the same function. Their organization still has responsibility every time they choose to show some content over others. I don't believe that when an algorithm is used, the output is suddenly not a function of human nature or human design. That suddenly no human has any responsibility for it.
- dimator 6y agoif facebook gave this post a score of -infinity, such that it is literally never recommended to anyone, doesn't show up on feeds, and you can only find it by typing in the URL, that would be fine with you?
- travisoneill1 6y agoIf it was because they predicted that no one would be interested, then yes. If it was because they disagreed with it, then no.
- cma 6y ago> It doesn't bother me that companies show me what they think I want to see based on a recommendation algorithm. It isn't a great choice for users to have to decide between debunking someone's Facebook thing in their post's comments and thereby boosting engagement and promoting it to all their friends, or just leaving it be unchallenged. Or for Youtube, do you watch a youtube video of a demagogue to prepare arguments against them, knowing that Youtube will promote it more because you watched it? We need some kind of way to interact with this stuff while getting the choice to not promote it as a result.
- standardUser 6y agoAs an alternative, we could allow all threats of physical violence to be shared freely across all platforms.
- travisoneill1 6y agoThreats of violence are illegal. We could leave it to the police to handle this, as they always have until now.
- standardUser 6y agoRight, so we have a platform where tens of millions of posts are made every day, and we leave all of the threats of violence up for however long it takes the appropriate law enforcement agency to respond.
- umvi 6y agoWhy stop at companies? The government itself should decide everything for us. Can we really be trusted to think correct thoughts or do correct actions? Just look at covid - it's shown us that people don't voluntarily make the right choice at scale and that the government needs more power to force us to make correct choices so that lives can be saved.
- austhrow743 6y agoMaybe you should choose to use curated information services rather than ones that show you anything and everything people could think to post then. Might I suggest moving to Facebook rather than complaining that Voat doesnt fit your needs when it doesn’t claim it does?
- rainyMammoth 6y agoWe are getting into a dark era of humanity. Platforms with their corporate overlords now decide what I can and cannot see, because I'm too stupid to think for myself. This has always been a slippery slope and won't end well. Zuckerberg as it stands today got more power than the president of the united states. He can swing any election and push any level of propaganda. I really want to see some laws around what they can censor.
- sundvor 6y agoI would be ashamed to work as an engineer at Facebook today; they empower the proliferation of lies that undermine democracy and our common health, hiding behind the "oh we're just a platform" pretense. Yes, I know free speech. However, there's a responsibility here that needs to be filled when the information is so carefully crafted (actual facts be damned) towards people who haven't got the education to understand the manipulation that is happening. The big platforms are falling well short.
- CamperBob2 6y agoThat's one way to look at it. Another way is to ask how healthy it is for a society to allow such a powerful platform to be used to incite violence toward nonviolent parties.
- donkey-hotei 6y agoThe cries for large tech corporations to moderate their content in ways that would make them something like thought-police has always baffled me. Though I understand that it is unhealthy for society to give a platform for violent right-wing rhetoric as well. Was Bannon's comment hyperbolic or not? Did they ever come out and say so or did they double down on it?
- ghayes 6y agoOut of curiosity, do you believe the NYTimes should have the right to censor its own comments section? What about censorship in its op-ed section (if the Times decides to not, let’s say, publish your article in the Op-Ed). Facebook is not a public utility, so restricting how Facebook can moderate is, in fact, censorship (and potentially a violation of the prior restraint doctrine). Safe harbor is an odd work-around to this fundamental concern, in my opinion (that is, forcing a company to censor or not and otherwise holding it criminally liable for the all content, which could technically be posted maliciously by an aggrieved anonymous user).
- jMyles 6y agoIt's just more of the same (overly-)simplistic debate. Yes, Facebook is private property and can do what it wants. And yes, the rest of us are free to criticize Facebook whenever it attempts to play the role of thought-police (a role I think few of us actually want social media platforms to play).
- verdverm 6y agoFB may be considered private property today, but we may, through our elected officials, declare the private property as a place where the first amendment rights must still be upheld. There is precedent for this (malls and housing provided to employees)
- MontyCarloHall 6y agoThen someone posts that the real issue is the lack of robust anti-trust legislation leading to the absence of a free market for online media platforms; in a truly free market someone should be able to start their own competing platform whose defining characteristic is absolute free speech (or not), and people can choose to join it (or not) depending on their personal preference. Then someone else responds that network effects in social media make a truly free market impossible even with strong anti-trust legislation, and we’re back to square one.
- ghayes 6y agoDoesn’t this exist with Parler, Voat and maybe Mastodon? With Voat, at least, the lack of moderation caused the site to become a cesspool and quickly abandoned. I would argue the network effect is only one reason that unmoderated social networks have not reached mainstream.
- MontyCarloHall 6y agoI think network effects are much less pronounced with microblog platforms like Twitter, Parler, and Mastodon — most people sign up for these platforms to follow a few big accounts with orders of magnitude more followers than the average account. There’s no detriment to flipping between a Twitter and Mastondon/Parler account depending on which big accounts you want to read. Contrariwise, people sign up for Facebook to socialize with their friend group as a whole. An alternative platform with only a handful of your friends would be pretty useless. Worse, having your friend group split between platforms would completely prevent being able to socialize as a group, defeating the whole point of the platform.
- ogre_codes 6y agoOne convenient thing about Facebook, I don't have to remind myself why I quit since they refresh my memory every couple weeks.
- guantanamo_bob 6y agoI don’t understand how they still hire talented people (who have plenty of employment options). I will think very carefully before hiring someone who previously worked at FB.
- stevecalifornia 6y agoDo we all really believe that Bannon was actually, literally saying he would be-head these people and put their heads on spikes...or as adults do we realize he was using hyperbole? How many times have you said something along the lines of "I will kill you if you put that picture of me on Instagram!"
- cool_dude85 6y agoDo we all really believe that if you or I said this, rather than a famous white nationalist, that Facebook would give us the benefit of the doubt? Or would our accounts be immediately banned, no questions asked, please do not attempt to contact a human being for an appeal?
- googthrowaway42 6y agoSteve Bannon isn't a white nationalist and you would know this if you listened to even 5 seconds of his show. Why engage in such lying?
- TameAntelope 6y agoI actually don't say stuff like that because I think it's inappropriate and way too aggressive.
- sumedh 6y agoHow many followers do you have that will listen to you when you make that statement? People like Bannon and Trump have lots of followers and someone of them do end up doing things like attempting to kill politicians or trying to kidnap them. > or as adults do we realize he was using hyperbole or as adults Bannon and Trump should realize that their words have consequences and some of their followers wont know if its hyperbole. You can still make your point without the violent language.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- standardUser 6y agoA friend saying "I'll kill you" to your face is slightly different than a person saying "I'll kill these specific high-profile government officials" to an audience of millions.
- codevark 6y agoTurds of a feather stick together.
- aaron695 6y ago> "should be beheaded" No, he didn't say that. He said - "I’d put the heads on pikes" There's a big difference between saying something more along the lines of present day ISIS than the Tudor England we associate with movies. But that's how fake news works. Why not just quote him directly, why not give the exact truth? I wonder.... https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/bannon-fauci-wray-head-pikes/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/bannon-fauci-wray-head-pik...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- Jordrok 6y agoAre you seriously trying to make the argument that it's ok to threaten to decapitate someone as long as you do it in the good old fashioned European way, rather than like ISIS?
- aaron695 6y agoNo
- Jordrok 6y agoIf that's the case, then I'm honestly curious what point you were trying to make, because I see no other way to interpret it. How is saying "put the heads on pikes" substantially different than "should be beheaded"? Are you suggesting that there's some way to "put them at the two corners of the White House" without any beheading? Is this really an example of the "fake news" you love to demonize, or are you just arguing in bad faith because the truth makes you look bad?
- aaron695 6y ago> or are you just arguing in bad faith because the truth makes you look bad? It's cute trolling when you are 17, not so much as an adult. It's up to you where you are in your life. Clearly people say things like a "head on a pike" or "rape and pillage" in regular speech. "Head on a pike" is a well know idiom. They are clearly different to saying "I want to behead someone", "I want to rape someone" They changed the quote from a well know idiom. There was no need to change the quote. My point was clear.
- AaronFriel 6y agoAt issue is that Steve Bannon used the Facebook platform to call for the execution and public display of the corpses of two public officials, NIAID Director Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Chris Wray. This is unambiguously true, Steve Bannon's Facebook page reiterated the claims the same day, and may this cursed, bad-faith argument about whether he meant what he said be over and done with. Steve Bannon knows what words he said, he used the Facebook platform to repeat those words, and he is not a nobody but an individual who rose to prominence and is a former senior White House official, in fact, he was among the most senior one can be, on par with the chief of staff with privileged access to the President and the National Security Council. Whatever you think of him and how he may have fallen, he has a platform and he speaks to many millions of people and his words carry weight. I am reminded yet again of a Jean-Paul Sartre quote from Anti-Semite and Jew: "Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. "They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past." Here are the receipts: Facebook post here: https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 archive.org snapshot here: https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230/https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230/https://www.faceb... Here's the text of that post in case it is removed: [BREAKING] On www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com - *Steve Bannon Under Massive Attack* - Steve Bannon Under Attack - Steve Bannon’s Twitter Account Suspended After Calling for Execution of Dr Fauci and FBI Director Wray Get your news NOW - Bookmark www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com
- jonstewart 6y agoYes, the right to play, great point. That’s similar to yesterday when Pompeo made the “joke” that there’d be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration. “Just joking” for me but not for thee.
- aazaa 6y ago> “I’d put the heads on pikes. Right. I’d put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats. You either get with the program or you are gone,” Bannon said in the video. Zuckerberg's argument appears to be that Bannon didn't say the head-on-a-pike stuff enough to trigger suspension. What Zuckerberg isn't considering is Bannon's past. He's not just some sleazy media wannabe - he's a former staff member of the Executive Office of the President. Nor is this the only thing. Consider Charlotsville: https://www.newsweek.com/steve-bannon-support-trump-charlottesville-violence-1056590 https://www.newsweek.com/steve-bannon-support-trump-charlott... If a former high-ranking member of the president's staff calls for heads on pikes and and that's not enough to trigger suspension, I can only conclude that the process is more or less arbitrary, or completely borked.
- lmeyerov 6y agoLess of individual message and more about total number of violations. Given this has been his day job, e.g., he ran breitbart, that says a lot about how tolerant facebook is to abusive community members. He and his audience make facebook employees a lot of money and give them air cover in DC, and are a public bellweather for facebook, so not surprising to see the CEO+employees keep giving a free pass. Advertisers only protested for ~1 month and Biden needs to focus on basics like COVID death rate, so I'm not expecting externally-triggered change for 2021.
- jjones2 6y agoEvery single one of these fuckers is corrupt to the core. Really makes me think twice about following laws I don't like. I have started truly not caring.
- justinsaccount 6y ago> We have specific rules around how many times you need to violate certain policies before we will deactivate your account completely That is pretty hilarious if you look at that next to the reports of people who have had their FB accounts permanently banned without recourse after trying to link it to their Oculus account for "violating community standards"
- ceejayoz 6y agoOne wonders if death threats directed at Zuckerberg would get the three strikes approach.
- wavefunction 6y agoI think the best thing that American civil society could do is force some changes legislatively at Facebook so that Zuckerberg isn't shielded from answering to a Board of Directors and share-holders. He's just another example of why dictatorial personalities with no accountability are deeply problematic for a free and more decent American society for the rest of us.
- goodside 6y agoBannon’s actual quote: > I’d put the heads on pikes. Right. I’d put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats. You either get with the program or you are gone. It’s silly to summarize this as Bannon urging Fauci to literally be beheaded. To “put [someone’s] head on a pike” is a figure of speech meaning to punish someone publicly as a warning to others, and the next line corroborates that intent.
- wavefunction 6y ago>I’d put them at the two corners of the White House That's not a figure of speech though.
- AaronFriel 6y agoWhich part of the sentence "Calling for Execution of Dr Fauci and FBI Director Wray" is a silly figure of speech? That's how Steve Bannon's Facebook page reported on his banning. That's a verbatim quote. Which part of the words "Calling for Execution" is a playful, fun idiom that former White House officials get to use?
- chrisco255 6y agoIt's not the middle ages any more, no one puts heads on a pike, literally. It's a figure of speech. Just like "getting the axe" is a figure of speech for getting fired.
- AaronFriel 6y agoIs "Calling for Execution" a figure of speech for something?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- alessivs 6y agoDo we rely on Bannon's account (which is available, and different from these three words that keep being repeated, as stated by others), or the choice of words of a click-baity editorial summary of the Fan Page, or Reuters' alternative choice: "urged beheading"? EDIT: As noticed below, I have edited this comment to include Reuters.
- m0zg 6y agoSo what do we do about folks who chanted "fry 'em like bacon", and "death to America" in the streets just a few weeks ago? Any punitive measures there, or nah?
- nemothekid 6y agoAny punitive measures there, or nah? I can't speak to Facebook, because I don't use Facebook, but Twitter will apply punitive measures if you incite violence for a specific person on the platform. You are making a case for whataboutism that doesn't exist.
- m0zg 6y agoSuch as this: https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/831483401467265024 https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/831483401467265024 ?
- nemothekid 6y agoIs the nytimes calling for Stephen miller’s head on a pike here? Do you truly believe that? Or is this a bad faith example? Do you think I’m also arguing Twitter should also remove all tweets that reference what Bannon has said?
- m0zg 6y agoBannon isn't calling for their literal decapitation either. "Head on a pike" is an euphemism for getting fired. Another way to say this is "heads should roll" which also does not mean decapitation. Also, when someone "eviscerates" someone, that doesn't mean literal disembowelment, just so we're clear. Nor does "raking over coals" or "drawing and quartering" mean literal torture. But people here just pretend to be obtuse and feign outrage instead. Zuck chooses not to do that because he's an adult. Kudos to Zuck.
- nemothekid 6y agoThe next thing Bannon said he would like to return to Tudor England. Was “head on a pike” a euphemism in 14th century British politics? Then Jack goes into a quip about how people used to hang traitors. Did you not hear the rest of the conversation? You are bending so far incredibly backwards for a guy with an incredibly poor moral compass that’s slinging death threats at a public servant who already has to hire body guards.
- trynewideas 6y agoCool, let's put Mark Zuckerberg's head on a pike
- tinalumfoil 6y ago> Cool, let's put Mark Zuckerberg's head on a pike It does seem a bit crazy that you should be banned anywhere for this comment.
- AnimalMuppet 6y ago> Facebook FB.O Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg told an all-staff meeting on Thursday that former Trump White House adviser Steve Bannon had not violated enough of the company's policies to justify his suspension when he urged beheading two senior U.S. officials, according to a recording heard by Reuters. Because, apparently, he didn't do it enough times. I mean, I guess it's good that they have a policy, and they stick to their policy even when it's politically inconvenient. But maybe there ought to be some kind of sliding scale or something. Publicly calling for someone to be beheaded is egregious enough that it might belong in a more severe category.
- tooscared 6y agoThis discussion is pointless because it's just a proxy war. Everyone's position is completely determined by what they think of Bannon (or Trump really), so no information is exchanged. Here's a thought anyway though. The image he used (heads on pikes) is gruesome and is also a common metaphor for doing something dramatic to deter unwanted behavior, also known as pour encourager les autres. In my mind that usage tilts the remark away from "let's literally put their heads on pikes" to the more metaphoric. Now try this thought experiment: come up with some new grisly image of a way to murder someone, without any history of being used as a metaphor, and imagine Bannon had used that image instead. That would tilt the remark more towards being an actual threat. Other people in this thread have made a similar better point. If he had said "heads should roll", that's not a call for decapitation. Another obvious point is that he's being an edgelord, going too far but not exactly all the way, in order to get attention. Edgy references to civil war are the same. That's not starting a war, but it's not totally not starting a war either. There aren't precise lines to draw here, probably on purpose.
- AaronFriel 6y agoWhich is why his Facebook page later posted that he specifically called for those individuals' execution?
- tooscared 6y agoI assume you mean https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230if_/https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776 https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230if_/https://www.fa... because you've brought this up like six times already, but I think you're overinterpreting it. To me it looks like someone pasted a headline from some news story reporting the heads-on-pikes comment. Probably some intern, as I doubt that Bannon is pasting things into Facebook, he is surely too vain for that.
- AaronFriel 6y agoThat's the same verified Facebook page that hosts his weekly live stream. You can say that those aren't his words, but... his platform again states he's calling for the President to execute two people.
- koolba 6y agoIt’s sad that trust and civility has devolved so low that nothing but the direct meaning of words and phrases is what’s considered incendiary. Clearly the expression “head on a pike” has historic metaphorical significance in the English language. I’d argue that comments like this Maxine Waters gem instructing the general public to harass Trump administration officials in all manner of their public and private lives are much more dangerous yet they get a pass from 90% of the media and 100% of social media: “Let's make sure we show up wherever we have to show up. And if you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd. And you push back on them. And you tell them they're not welcome anymore, anywhere.”
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- Koshkin 6y ago“ex-Trump”?
- saeranv 6y agoI know the HN crowd is going to make a number of posts making the argument that any moderation by social platforms is a slippery slope towards authoritarianism. I used to be one of these people, so understand the appeal of this argument to those of us that have libertarian inclinations. However, I think it's an argument that's easily made in theory, but doesn't hold up when tested against its actual consequences. Specifically, I have consistently made the point that this argument is appealing due to it's simplicity and purity, but doesn't grapple with the actual consequences of allowing bad-faith actors to flood platforms with propaganda. Here are links to news stories that show how Facebook has been used by the Myanmar military, and by Sinhalese nationalists in Sri Lanka to incite genocide and anti-muslim violence: - https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-facebook-genocide.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-facebo... - https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/13/sri-lanka-facebook-apologises-for-role-in-2018-anti-muslim-riots/ https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/13/sri-lanka-facebook... I have updated my prior beliefs in free speech absolutism in the light of such events - some moderation is necessary due to the way social networks lends itself to exponentially amplify propaganda and disinformation in ways that, principled debate and discourse don't. I would love to hear what the posters arguing about censorship think we should do about these specific instances.
- triceratops 6y ago> understand the appeal of this argument to those of us that have libertarian inclinations I actually don't. Aren't property rights also important to libertarians? Shouldn't the idea that someone is entitled by law to use your property in a way you dislike be anathema to a libertarian?
- saeranv 6y agoExcellent point. That's a vector of attack I chose not to include since I wanted to just focus on free speech, but yes, that is a valid argument. Unfortunately it looks like my comment and yours is getting downvoted without any engagement, but hopefully the people that seem to disagree will make their rebuttals.
- jeffbee 6y agoMore disturbing to me than Facebook, since I do not use it, is the visible subset of HN users who express complete solidarity with Trump-Bannon brand authoritarianism.
- amadeuspagel 6y agoWhen I was a kid, I was once shocked to overhear my parents talking about someone getting fired, thinking that that meant literally setting him on fire.
- s9w 6y ago> he urged the beheading of two senior U.S. officials that's a lie
- alblue 6y agoIn this instance, Bannon gets away with it because he is white and shares political views of Zuckerberg. If an (e.g.) Muslim had said the same thing about a high profile (far)-right candidate, many of the people who supported his post would be calling it a terrorist threat. In this case Zuckerberg is defending the terrorist calls to arms of those who think, and look, like him.
- apsec112 6y agoI really, really don't think Zuckerberg shares Bannon's political views. Almost nobody in Silicon Valley supports Trump.
- threesmegiste 6y agoYet another facebook article yafa :) There is always some article about facebook on media. What about alphabet, apple, amazon, twitter, netflix a few maybe. Sorry they are angels This doesnt seem correct. I dont believe any facebook article anymore. There is a clear disinformation in these news.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoWhile Bannon’s comments were unnecessary and overly graphic, I seriously question the idea that he meant them literally. The fact that many people seem to think that an aging political media personality would call for the beheading of a government worker is absurd. Unfortunately the declining educational levels in this country mean that you’d best avoid any sort of nuance, metaphor, or figure of speech - because believe you me, if your words can be misinterpreted, they absolutely will be. Newspeak, here we come.
- scandox 6y agoI am surprised that you think what's important is whether he meant them literally. Isn't it a very bad thing to write down in black and white about another human being even as a figure of speech or whatever it qualifies as? I think it's reasonable to want people to be moderate in their public discourse. Do you think so?
- ceilingcorner 6y agoSure, as I said, the comments were unnecessary, especially in this difficult political situation. Bannon is not dumb and should know better than to use graphic metaphors. I’m more concerned that people following this story think Steve Bannon literally called for Fauci to be beheaded. That’s how it is being reported and that’s how numerous comments in this thread are interpreting it. I don’t know if people genuinely believe this, or if they simply pretend to be offended because it’s politically expedient. I’m afraid the gap between the two is rapidly shrinking, and that worries me.
- scandox 6y agoI think most people know he doesn't literally mean it, but many people fear that he uses language like this to create a world in which he could actually mean it. That I think is why violent language upsets people: he's floating a wild idea, of course it's just a metaphor and ten years later it's just business as usual at the guillotine.
- bJGVygG7MQVF8c 6y agoBannon: "Keep it coming, stay on 'em — taking flak means you're over the target" NY Times: "Breaking: Steve Bannon calls for aerial bombardment of Democrat homes" Clueless. There's an interesting cultural difference at work here. Once we reinstate the draft and the whole world plunges into total war again (soon, Inshallah), episodes like this will be like tears in the rain.
- annadane 6y agoTo me it's not even in a vacuum about whether Bannon meant it jokingly or seriously, it's how this all fits in with the rest of FB's behavior. Like Zuckerberg speaking to right wing politicians exclusively, or throttling traffic to Mother Jones, or the fact some people get banned (I think Christopher Wylie still is...) and not others... it's a real bad look and it should make people question whose side Facebook/Zuckerberg are on Not even to mention other predatory practices like Whatsapp (Onavo) or Oculus (hey we know we said you didn't need a Facebook account for it but oh well, we lied)
- alessivs 6y agoAnd now Steve Bannon is back on YouTube, though the live stream where these expressions were emitted was removed. Unlike the Facebook fan page, it is clear that in that channel he represents himself, as you can see and hear him. YouTube took action regarding the content in discussion, and...he's back. Shaming platform owners for not completely deplatforming pages and individuals who may proffer expressions found to be uncomfortable, may not always be effective in the long run.