12 ms·

Self-preservation was certainly a part of why there was inaction, as was financial motive. I also think they were rather naïve about their roles & responsibilit

by npunt 6y ago

Self-preservation was certainly a part of why there was inaction, as was financial motive. I also think they were rather naïve about their roles & responsibilities and the real world consequence of their own platforms, as well as lacking in a sophisticated understanding of how to do content moderation or even politics. These topics are both very old (social organizing, radicalization, usenet), and very new (primary medium for global discussion, recommendation algorithms, etc). This is definitely a moment that will define social media specifically and tech more broadly. Before Wednesday, social media was one thing, and after, it will be another. This is also a bit of a backlog being flushed; many of these decisions were likely made months or years ago, and only accelerated by Wednesday's events. I see this a little like safety regulations - every regulation is written in blood. Perhaps soon so will every major shift in the tech landscape.

systemvoltage 6y ago
In their defense, I agree with you that this is a first time when global internet connectivity + social media + hatespeech cocktail has become poisonous to our societal health. We need to deeply think about all this - allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project) while condemning hate speech, violence, white supremacy and other racist behavior. "He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee. " - Nietzsche.
- npunt 6y ago
  100%. I’m worried we have a sort of Patriot Act overreach response to this event, rather than a recognition and diagnosis of broad institutional failure that led to this and a set of reforms of those institutions, be they private or public.
- cwperkins 6y ago
  We really do because our discourse is being dominated by crazy voices. What do you think about this? Minority, Women-Owned Businesses Get First Bid on New PPP Loans - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-07/minority-women-owned-businesses-get-first-bid-on-new-ppp-loans https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-07/minority-... What about voices like James Lindsay and Christopher Rufo? We are doubling down on this new era where we are experimenting with the thesis that Discrimination can and will create (long-lasting) Equity. With policies in place for decades like Affirmative Action in the US and BEE in South Africa I'm not convinced in the thesis. Corporations in the US have now went further with more Corporate Affirmative Action programs like Microsofts commitment to hire more Black employees which is being looked into by the Department of Labor as Discrimination (https://abcnews.go.com/Business/department-labor-investigating-microsofts-pledge-hire-black-workers/story?id=73472488 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/department-labor-investigati...). Microsoft is 4.5% Black employees so they are underrepresented as it is. How do we have discussions on Race? Can Discrimination create Equity? “The defining question is whether the discrimination is creating equity or inequity. If discrimination is creating equity, then it is antiracist. If discrimination is creating inequity, then it is racist.” ― Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist
- lsiebert 6y ago
  I think if you look into the history of hate speech, the internet and social media (defined broadly to include BBS systems and internet forums), you'll see this has been a constant problem. One that groups like the NAACP and others have been warning about for years if not decades.
- rayiner 6y ago
  > We need to deeply think about all this - allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project) while condemning hate speech, violence, white supremacy and other racist behavior. But that’s the problem. Nobody trusts people in Silicon Valley or New York City to decide what those things are. These are people who have internalized ideas like “you can’t be racist against white people” which the vast majority of the country doesn’t share. And they certainly will not apply the same standards to people on the left glorifying violent radicals like Angela Davis. We just saw this happen this summer where the center-left media pretended for months that American cities weren’t on fire. Your example proves the point. The Lincoln Project are basically fiscally conservative Democrats at this point. They’re not meaningfully conservative on any of the issues that matter to conservatives today: religious liberty, preservation of history, immigration, etc. And it’s not just an American thing. These issues are actually where the US right is increasingly aligned with the European center-right. Censors in NYC and SF would have censored a bunch of stuff people like France’s Macron have been saying lately.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., not "Build a wall and Mexico will pay for it" or outright banning people based on religion (remember Muslim ban?). The problem is that these are not conservative principles. This is just hate spewing, plain and straight.
    - rayiner 6y ago
      > There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., The idea that immigration is solely about “cost/benefit” and “talent, policies, etc.” is an inherently liberal, and indeed quite radically liberal framing of the issue. The International Convention on Civil and Political rights recognizes that distinct “peoples’” have a human right to self determination: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination. That is, distinct identifiable groups have a right right to self-governance. That is the basis for national borders as we know them today. But if distinct people have a right to self governance, it follows that nations have a right to control immigration for whatever reason they want, including the characteristics that make them distinct. It’s wholly legitimate for a country not to take immigrants who they think might change the culture of the country, or not fit in, or simply because they don’t want to. It doesn’t have to be justified with some sort of economic analysis. It’s not “hate spewing” when the Japanese refuse to accept immigrants for no reason other than large scale immigration would change Japan’s culture. It’s likewise not “hate spewing” for someone in Boise Idaho to say “I like my society the way it is, and I don’t want people here who have a different history, political tradition, etc., especially when they’ll be voting on the laws that govern me.” My family is from Bangladesh. My parents are fairly Americanized, but they really don’t understand some of the subtler things about American culture, like our anti-elitism and love of guns. In Bangladesh, the elite govern and there is no “glorification of the common man.” It was also disarmed by the British, so there is no gun culture. This results in hilarious arguments between my dad and my wife, whose family populated the Oregon coast on the wagon trails, who still hunt for food and hate the government for taking their homestead to build the pacific coast highway. Immigration inherently changes the culture and people are fully entitled to support it or oppose it, or support slowing it or increasing it on that basis. But liberals usually can’t even see that dimension of the issue because they’ve internalized cultural relativism.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  > allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project Lol the same lincoln project that said on Twitter they are now building a database of all republicans to chastise them forever? Thats peaceful all right.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    I've seen some of their hateful ads. Not cool. There is more to it though: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/opinion/lincoln-project.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/opinion/lincoln-project.h...
  - croon 6y ago
    Holding people accountable to their actions? I fail to see the dark path we're walking down unless you think they're suggesting public lynching.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  > In their defense, I agree with you that this is a first time when global internet connectivity + social media + hatespeech cocktail has become poisonous to our societal health. The exact same thing happened when radio was first invented, Nazism rose to power in tandem with mass media that allowed for direct manipulation of people's emotions on a scale that was impossible prior to that.

by npunt 6y ago

systemvoltage 6y ago

In their defense, I agree with you that this is a first time when global internet connectivity + social media + hatespeech cocktail has become poisonous to our societal health. We need to deeply think about all this - allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project) while condemning hate speech, violence, white supremacy and other racist behavior. "He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee. " - Nietzsche.

npunt 6y ago
100%. I’m worried we have a sort of Patriot Act overreach response to this event, rather than a recognition and diagnosis of broad institutional failure that led to this and a set of reforms of those institutions, be they private or public.
cwperkins 6y ago
We really do because our discourse is being dominated by crazy voices. What do you think about this? Minority, Women-Owned Businesses Get First Bid on New PPP Loans - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-07/minority-women-owned-businesses-get-first-bid-on-new-ppp-loans https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-07/minority-... What about voices like James Lindsay and Christopher Rufo? We are doubling down on this new era where we are experimenting with the thesis that Discrimination can and will create (long-lasting) Equity. With policies in place for decades like Affirmative Action in the US and BEE in South Africa I'm not convinced in the thesis. Corporations in the US have now went further with more Corporate Affirmative Action programs like Microsofts commitment to hire more Black employees which is being looked into by the Department of Labor as Discrimination (https://abcnews.go.com/Business/department-labor-investigating-microsofts-pledge-hire-black-workers/story?id=73472488 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/department-labor-investigati...). Microsoft is 4.5% Black employees so they are underrepresented as it is. How do we have discussions on Race? Can Discrimination create Equity? “The defining question is whether the discrimination is creating equity or inequity. If discrimination is creating equity, then it is antiracist. If discrimination is creating inequity, then it is racist.” ― Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist
lsiebert 6y ago
I think if you look into the history of hate speech, the internet and social media (defined broadly to include BBS systems and internet forums), you'll see this has been a constant problem. One that groups like the NAACP and others have been warning about for years if not decades.
rayiner 6y ago
> We need to deeply think about all this - allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project) while condemning hate speech, violence, white supremacy and other racist behavior. But that’s the problem. Nobody trusts people in Silicon Valley or New York City to decide what those things are. These are people who have internalized ideas like “you can’t be racist against white people” which the vast majority of the country doesn’t share. And they certainly will not apply the same standards to people on the left glorifying violent radicals like Angela Davis. We just saw this happen this summer where the center-left media pretended for months that American cities weren’t on fire. Your example proves the point. The Lincoln Project are basically fiscally conservative Democrats at this point. They’re not meaningfully conservative on any of the issues that matter to conservatives today: religious liberty, preservation of history, immigration, etc. And it’s not just an American thing. These issues are actually where the US right is increasingly aligned with the European center-right. Censors in NYC and SF would have censored a bunch of stuff people like France’s Macron have been saying lately.
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., not "Build a wall and Mexico will pay for it" or outright banning people based on religion (remember Muslim ban?). The problem is that these are not conservative principles. This is just hate spewing, plain and straight.
  - rayiner 6y ago
    > There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., The idea that immigration is solely about “cost/benefit” and “talent, policies, etc.” is an inherently liberal, and indeed quite radically liberal framing of the issue. The International Convention on Civil and Political rights recognizes that distinct “peoples’” have a human right to self determination: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination. That is, distinct identifiable groups have a right right to self-governance. That is the basis for national borders as we know them today. But if distinct people have a right to self governance, it follows that nations have a right to control immigration for whatever reason they want, including the characteristics that make them distinct. It’s wholly legitimate for a country not to take immigrants who they think might change the culture of the country, or not fit in, or simply because they don’t want to. It doesn’t have to be justified with some sort of economic analysis. It’s not “hate spewing” when the Japanese refuse to accept immigrants for no reason other than large scale immigration would change Japan’s culture. It’s likewise not “hate spewing” for someone in Boise Idaho to say “I like my society the way it is, and I don’t want people here who have a different history, political tradition, etc., especially when they’ll be voting on the laws that govern me.” My family is from Bangladesh. My parents are fairly Americanized, but they really don’t understand some of the subtler things about American culture, like our anti-elitism and love of guns. In Bangladesh, the elite govern and there is no “glorification of the common man.” It was also disarmed by the British, so there is no gun culture. This results in hilarious arguments between my dad and my wife, whose family populated the Oregon coast on the wagon trails, who still hunt for food and hate the government for taking their homestead to build the pacific coast highway. Immigration inherently changes the culture and people are fully entitled to support it or oppose it, or support slowing it or increasing it on that basis. But liberals usually can’t even see that dimension of the issue because they’ve internalized cultural relativism.
ekianjo 6y ago
> allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project Lol the same lincoln project that said on Twitter they are now building a database of all republicans to chastise them forever? Thats peaceful all right.
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  I've seen some of their hateful ads. Not cool. There is more to it though: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/opinion/lincoln-project.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/opinion/lincoln-project.h...
- croon 6y ago
  Holding people accountable to their actions? I fail to see the dark path we're walking down unless you think they're suggesting public lynching.
jacquesm 6y ago
> In their defense, I agree with you that this is a first time when global internet connectivity + social media + hatespeech cocktail has become poisonous to our societal health. The exact same thing happened when radio was first invented, Nazism rose to power in tandem with mass media that allowed for direct manipulation of people's emotions on a scale that was impossible prior to that.