7 ms·

Thankfully, as seen in Russia and India, those thousands of cultures have no wish to be moderated by the self-anointed SV elite.

ivan_gammel 6y ago
The moderation by Russian government isn’t something I would wish to any culture.
- offby37years 6y ago
  The US is already at Soviet levels: https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-sovietization-of-the-american https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-sovietization-of-the-ameri...
  - theamk 6y ago
    Ugh, no, this is simply not true. There is a wide spectrum of news you can trivially read, from Fox to BBC to tons of small blogs. If you want to be anywhere near Soviet levels, you want to eliminate all viewpoints except one. Until you do this, you are not even close.
  - why_Mr_Anderson 6y ago
    You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about? Soviet level? Not even close, not even in the same-universe-close. Please learn something about what the life in USSR was really like.
    - bzbarsky 6y ago
      You're right that on the specific topic of government censorship they are not nearly the same. Very different legal structures and all that. But from talking to people who were living in the USSR as adults through the 70s and 80s (and my own memories of the USSR in the 80s, though I was not an adult, and reading I have done, but I put more weight on the in-person conversations with people I know and who can give me direct first-hand comparisons), the US is certainly same-universe close at this point, and rapidly getting closer, in terms of things like public confessions, limiting acceptable points of view (in _parts_ of the US, segregated by culture) etc. In some aspect, "further along", heading for Cultural Revolution era China. The practical implications are unfortunately not as different as one might like. Maybe a clearer way to describe it is that the "lived experience" (again, limited to certain professions or locations in the US) is unfortunately far too similar, even while the legal and social structures that produce it are quite different in their details. And just make sure we're on the same page: the US now is nothing like _1930s_ USSR. We should make sure we mean the same thing when we say "life in the USSR", because it varied quite a bit over 70 years.
outside1234 6y ago
You should add China to your list of repressive government moderation - would be more complete that way.
- umeshunni 6y ago
  It's only repressive government moderation when someone else does it. When it happens in the US, it's "policing hate speech".
  - andybak 6y ago
    That's a fair argument but only if you embrace the logical conclusion of the stance you are taking. If you are arguing for unbridled free speech then fair enough (Personally I wouldn't but we can have that conversaion). If however you have your own feelings about sane limits on free speech - then you can't take this position without someone else using your argument against you. It's fine to make these kind of grand statements but I'd like you to clearly state that you're going all the way with it and not just being slightly less inconsistent than the person you're calling out.
    - edoceo 6y ago
      I think the parent might have been sarcastic. Hard to tell in text only. I read the last line as "pOlIcInG hAtE sPeEch" with USA being the butt of the joke.
      - umeshunni 6y ago
        Yes, I was being sarcastic. Missed adding a /s
        andybak 6y ago
        I think I was reacting to your sarcasm. I presumed you were arguing that it is a hypocricy to criticise "repressive government moderation" on one hand while supporting "policing hate speech" on the other. I would argue that it's possible to consistently support the latter whilst condemning the former. It's simply a debate about when a neccesary evil slips over the line into something worse.

ivan_gammel 6y ago

The moderation by Russian government isn’t something I would wish to any culture.

offby37years 6y ago
The US is already at Soviet levels: https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-sovietization-of-the-american https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-sovietization-of-the-ameri...
- theamk 6y ago
  Ugh, no, this is simply not true. There is a wide spectrum of news you can trivially read, from Fox to BBC to tons of small blogs. If you want to be anywhere near Soviet levels, you want to eliminate all viewpoints except one. Until you do this, you are not even close.
- why_Mr_Anderson 6y ago
  You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about? Soviet level? Not even close, not even in the same-universe-close. Please learn something about what the life in USSR was really like.
  - bzbarsky 6y ago
    You're right that on the specific topic of government censorship they are not nearly the same. Very different legal structures and all that. But from talking to people who were living in the USSR as adults through the 70s and 80s (and my own memories of the USSR in the 80s, though I was not an adult, and reading I have done, but I put more weight on the in-person conversations with people I know and who can give me direct first-hand comparisons), the US is certainly same-universe close at this point, and rapidly getting closer, in terms of things like public confessions, limiting acceptable points of view (in _parts_ of the US, segregated by culture) etc. In some aspect, "further along", heading for Cultural Revolution era China. The practical implications are unfortunately not as different as one might like. Maybe a clearer way to describe it is that the "lived experience" (again, limited to certain professions or locations in the US) is unfortunately far too similar, even while the legal and social structures that produce it are quite different in their details. And just make sure we're on the same page: the US now is nothing like _1930s_ USSR. We should make sure we mean the same thing when we say "life in the USSR", because it varied quite a bit over 70 years.

outside1234 6y ago

You should add China to your list of repressive government moderation - would be more complete that way.

umeshunni 6y ago
It's only repressive government moderation when someone else does it. When it happens in the US, it's "policing hate speech".
- andybak 6y ago
  That's a fair argument but only if you embrace the logical conclusion of the stance you are taking. If you are arguing for unbridled free speech then fair enough (Personally I wouldn't but we can have that conversaion). If however you have your own feelings about sane limits on free speech - then you can't take this position without someone else using your argument against you. It's fine to make these kind of grand statements but I'd like you to clearly state that you're going all the way with it and not just being slightly less inconsistent than the person you're calling out.
  - edoceo 6y ago
    I think the parent might have been sarcastic. Hard to tell in text only. I read the last line as "pOlIcInG hAtE sPeEch" with USA being the butt of the joke.
    - umeshunni 6y ago
      Yes, I was being sarcastic. Missed adding a /s
      - andybak 6y ago
        I think I was reacting to your sarcasm. I presumed you were arguing that it is a hypocricy to criticise "repressive government moderation" on one hand while supporting "policing hate speech" on the other. I would argue that it's possible to consistently support the latter whilst condemning the former. It's simply a debate about when a neccesary evil slips over the line into something worse.