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I see a lot of outrage in here and I truly love that. Honest question: would you express the same level of outrage, if the service in question was primarily a

I see a lot of outrage in here and I truly love that. Honest question: would you express the same level of outrage, if the service in question was primarily a purveyor of political content that you disagreed with, or "hate speech"? I see a lot of libertarian-minded comments whenever the service in question is some form of file sharing/hacker related service, but I don't really see much outrage when the same culprits use their weight to censor political content, and / or wrong think. PayPal, Visa, YouTube, Amazon, all of these big companies have been engaging in censorship. Too many seem to be OK with others' rights being taken away, as long as they disagree with those who are losing their rights. How is that any different than what happened to this Tor supporter?

teddyh 5y ago
As long as there’s some ‘other’ group that’s designated “bad” by the zeitgeist, it’s acceptable, even commended, to punish that group with whatever you have at hand.
pitay 5y ago
Well as someone who does that on occasion, not very often, far more on this site than real life, the answer is fear. If I was to do argue for free speech, I'd think twice because from experience I know that I will get called names and have terrible arguments against me that sound good but don't apply to what I said. In the IRL space (the actual like 2 times I've done this rather than the who knows how many times I have remained silent) it has been people who are absolutely fine with whatever horrible things happening to other people as long as those people are the ones the media has told them to hate. The funny thing about these people is that you know they will scream if this was applied to groups that they support or are part of, the hypocrisy is lost on them. In the online space, I think it is a mix of the former people I have mentioned and actual malicious people working for powerful groups destroying peoples ability to talk about important things. So in the end do I want to get into arguments with either malicious people or people who already have their mind set, get called names, have people deliberately portray what I am saying as something else and call it stupid when that was not what I said at all. Most of the time I really don't want to deal with that BS. Most of the people want to post about this are reluctant to do so and in many times don't, this is not just extrapolating from my experience, but what I have observed from other sources as well (such as asking whether they agreed with something shown, seeing no hands go up, then asking whether the didn't put there hands up because they were afraid and seeing almost all the hands go up).
- gonational 5y ago
  If fear is the poison, then courage is the antidote. You're right, 100%, but it's easy to lose sight of the fact that bullies, especially in this modern era, are the weak ones, and when you stand up for yourself you'll be surprised at how many of them cower in fear. You'll also be surprised to see how many more you inspire to stand up next to you. Everybody is waiting for somebody else to stand up. Be that person and you'll soon be addicted to the results. One example, and of course this is controversial these days and itself, is that once we reached the point in the "pandemic" where it was obvious that the virus wasn't the real threat, I decided to go grocery shopping with no mask. I expected to be screamed at, but not one person said anything in a gigantic store filled with dozens of people. Not only that, but by the time I got to the front of the store there were two other people whom I encountered in the isles, who also had no mask on, but who did have a mask on while in the isles. I know this sounds made up. It's the honest to God truth. So I did it again in Home Depot, and it had the exact same affect. For those who disagree with my mindset about masks (which have been clinically proven to be ineffective), this sounds like an asshole move, but regardless of whether or not you agree with the principle behind the move, the methodology was effective. It's the same thing that triggers riots; people see others doing what they want to do and they are inspired to do it themselves. Why not use the same principle to inspire things that are not distractive?
BelenusMordred 5y ago
> Too many seem to be OK with others' rights being taken away, as long as they disagree with those who are losing their rights It's human tribalism in a nutshell. They'll argue until they are blue in the face for their team to not be persecuted but the moment it's "the others" they cheer it on.

teddyh 5y ago

As long as there’s some ‘other’ group that’s designated “bad” by the zeitgeist, it’s acceptable, even commended, to punish that group with whatever you have at hand.

pitay 5y ago

Well as someone who does that on occasion, not very often, far more on this site than real life, the answer is fear. If I was to do argue for free speech, I'd think twice because from experience I know that I will get called names and have terrible arguments against me that sound good but don't apply to what I said. In the IRL space (the actual like 2 times I've done this rather than the who knows how many times I have remained silent) it has been people who are absolutely fine with whatever horrible things happening to other people as long as those people are the ones the media has told them to hate. The funny thing about these people is that you know they will scream if this was applied to groups that they support or are part of, the hypocrisy is lost on them. In the online space, I think it is a mix of the former people I have mentioned and actual malicious people working for powerful groups destroying peoples ability to talk about important things. So in the end do I want to get into arguments with either malicious people or people who already have their mind set, get called names, have people deliberately portray what I am saying as something else and call it stupid when that was not what I said at all. Most of the time I really don't want to deal with that BS. Most of the people want to post about this are reluctant to do so and in many times don't, this is not just extrapolating from my experience, but what I have observed from other sources as well (such as asking whether they agreed with something shown, seeing no hands go up, then asking whether the didn't put there hands up because they were afraid and seeing almost all the hands go up).

gonational 5y ago
If fear is the poison, then courage is the antidote. You're right, 100%, but it's easy to lose sight of the fact that bullies, especially in this modern era, are the weak ones, and when you stand up for yourself you'll be surprised at how many of them cower in fear. You'll also be surprised to see how many more you inspire to stand up next to you. Everybody is waiting for somebody else to stand up. Be that person and you'll soon be addicted to the results. One example, and of course this is controversial these days and itself, is that once we reached the point in the "pandemic" where it was obvious that the virus wasn't the real threat, I decided to go grocery shopping with no mask. I expected to be screamed at, but not one person said anything in a gigantic store filled with dozens of people. Not only that, but by the time I got to the front of the store there were two other people whom I encountered in the isles, who also had no mask on, but who did have a mask on while in the isles. I know this sounds made up. It's the honest to God truth. So I did it again in Home Depot, and it had the exact same affect. For those who disagree with my mindset about masks (which have been clinically proven to be ineffective), this sounds like an asshole move, but regardless of whether or not you agree with the principle behind the move, the methodology was effective. It's the same thing that triggers riots; people see others doing what they want to do and they are inspired to do it themselves. Why not use the same principle to inspire things that are not distractive?

BelenusMordred 5y ago

> Too many seem to be OK with others' rights being taken away, as long as they disagree with those who are losing their rights It's human tribalism in a nutshell. They'll argue until they are blue in the face for their team to not be persecuted but the moment it's "the others" they cheer it on.