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It absolutely is a straw man. There are many ways to combat something without resorting to —as you strawmanned their comment with–“authoritarian means.” We co
by toofy 5y ago
It absolutely is a straw man. There are many ways to combat something without resorting to —as you strawmanned their comment with–“authoritarian means.”
We combatted the ridiculous notion when masses of people thought they could cure diseases by burying a rotten fig under a dogwood tree on the 13th tuesday of the year if it was raining, and we did this by teaching people why that is ridiculous.
Understanding how and which absurd ideas enter people’s heads is incredibly important. And for many reasons that have nothing to do with “authoritarianism.”
- chroem- 5y agoThe researchers we're talking about are in a spat with Facebook over the notion that Facebook isn't doing enough to censor ideas they disagree with. You're projecting your own bad faith arguments onto other people: we're not talking about burying figs under trees. We're talking about the kind of "misinformation" that includes the covid-19 lab leak or the current predident's son moonlighting for oil and gas companies in eastern Europe. You can't have institutions deliberately trying to narrow the window of acceptable discourse in a free society because there is nobody who will be able to watch the watchers make sure that they're not abusing their authority.