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And your argument is that if the venues hosting Hitler's speeches had Reddit's moderation policies then Hitler would not have been elected?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
fighterpilot 5y ago
You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square. You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand. I provided examples of speech in the old town square leading to pathological outcomes, but we are in a very different regime now and analogizing too much isn't helpful.
- notchFilter54 5y ago
  So who should decide what moderation policies we have for the public? The general populace, who as you say would elect literally Hitler, or the government itself of which Hitler was once a part and used these very moderation mechanisms to suppress the Jews? The tyranny of a minority of special moderators like perhaps a nominally communist censor committee may have? We allow Naziist speech to exist precisely because we don't want the government or the tyranny of the majority or minority choosing what political speech is allowed, such as outlawing speech that doesn't promote Naziism. >You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square. No I'm trying to find out how you want to apply moderation strategies to "reduce the likelihood" (my apologies if I misquoted your deleted comment) of democratic election of those who some censors decide have the wrong political views or speech. >You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand. Are you also one of those that thinks the first amendment doesn't apply to the internet because the founders never imagined something that distributes so much faster than the printing press could exist? I know this is a straw man but I can't help but think this is where this is leading. >And your argument is that if the venues hosting Hitler's speeches had Reddit's moderation policies then Hitler would not have been elected? The fact that you didn't answer this question (well you did, but you deleted it) really is an damning answer of itself.
  - fighterpilot 5y ago
    > So who should decide what moderation policies we have for the public? There's three possibilities: (1) No moderation at all, beyond what's illegal. (2) Private voluntary self-regulation. (3) Government censorship. In my opinion, (2) is the lesser evil, which isn't to say that it doesn't have its own pitfalls. (1) is infeasible due to the 8chan experience, and our understanding of social contagion and human tribalism. (3) has a much bigger slippery slope risk. > The fact that you didn't answer this question I deleted my answer because these analogies are too tenuous. You're trying to compare modern social media with how information spread 90 years ago. How can I map "Reddit's moderation policies" onto 1920s beer halls and Der Sturmer and newspapers? You can't do it. We're in a new regime and we need to reason about this new regime from first principles.
    - notchFilter54 5y ago
      We're in agreement, although I might add (2) is essentially the same as the censorship policy in the Weimar Republic under which Hitler was elected, where public censorship was nominally and constitutionally illegal [1] (except in narrow circumstances, such as anti-Semetic expression) and any censorship essentially relegated to private and/or voluntary regulation > How can I map "Reddit's moderation policies" onto 1920s beer halls and Der Sturmer and newspapers? The same way the first amendment is applied to both beer halls and the internet. There's not a single rule in Reddit's content policy that cannot be applied to a beer hall [0]. If you fail to find a way to apply these rules you're either not putting in any effort or you're a lot dumber than you sound (methinks the former). Given that what you advocate for is virtually identical to that under the Weimar Republic, I assert your chosen policies would have little to no effect on the election of Hitler. [0] https://www.redditinc.com/policies/content-policy https://www.redditinc.com/policies/content-policy [1] Ritzheimer, Kara L (2016). 'Trash,' Censorship, and National Identity in Early Twentieth-Century Germany. Cambridge University Press.
      - fighterpilot 5y ago
        I know that the Weimar Republic had anti-semitic censorship laws. I made almost the same argument that you are making just 2 months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27865484 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27865484 "My understanding is that pre-Nazi Germany had hate speech laws, and it didn't seem to work there?" I abandoned my views on this question for a few reasons: - The Weimar Republic laws either weren't effective at preventing distribution or they weren't actually enforced. The continued circulation of Der Sturmer is evidence of this. The judiciary was known to be heavily biased in favor of the far-right, where less than 10% of far-right political killers were convicted and the majority of far-left political killers were convicted. - Online censorship is far less likely to create martyrs than the visual/emotional imagery of imprisoning people. - Online censorship is far more effective at preventing distribution. - Failing to censor online leads to automatic mass-distribution due to the consolidation of eyeballs in a small number of venues. Failing to censor offline does not. There is less scale to be had offline. - Online censorship that we're talking about is private and voluntary. It is not in the same category as government censorship as far as downside risk is concerned. > Given that what you advocate for is virtually identical It is not "virtually identical". As I've said, the context is extremely different. You can't draw an analogy as much as you keep trying.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

fighterpilot 5y ago

You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square. You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand. I provided examples of speech in the old town square leading to pathological outcomes, but we are in a very different regime now and analogizing too much isn't helpful.

notchFilter54 5y ago
So who should decide what moderation policies we have for the public? The general populace, who as you say would elect literally Hitler, or the government itself of which Hitler was once a part and used these very moderation mechanisms to suppress the Jews? The tyranny of a minority of special moderators like perhaps a nominally communist censor committee may have? We allow Naziist speech to exist precisely because we don't want the government or the tyranny of the majority or minority choosing what political speech is allowed, such as outlawing speech that doesn't promote Naziism. >You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square. No I'm trying to find out how you want to apply moderation strategies to "reduce the likelihood" (my apologies if I misquoted your deleted comment) of democratic election of those who some censors decide have the wrong political views or speech. >You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand. Are you also one of those that thinks the first amendment doesn't apply to the internet because the founders never imagined something that distributes so much faster than the printing press could exist? I know this is a straw man but I can't help but think this is where this is leading. >And your argument is that if the venues hosting Hitler's speeches had Reddit's moderation policies then Hitler would not have been elected? The fact that you didn't answer this question (well you did, but you deleted it) really is an damning answer of itself.
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  > So who should decide what moderation policies we have for the public? There's three possibilities: (1) No moderation at all, beyond what's illegal. (2) Private voluntary self-regulation. (3) Government censorship. In my opinion, (2) is the lesser evil, which isn't to say that it doesn't have its own pitfalls. (1) is infeasible due to the 8chan experience, and our understanding of social contagion and human tribalism. (3) has a much bigger slippery slope risk. > The fact that you didn't answer this question I deleted my answer because these analogies are too tenuous. You're trying to compare modern social media with how information spread 90 years ago. How can I map "Reddit's moderation policies" onto 1920s beer halls and Der Sturmer and newspapers? You can't do it. We're in a new regime and we need to reason about this new regime from first principles.
  - notchFilter54 5y ago
    We're in agreement, although I might add (2) is essentially the same as the censorship policy in the Weimar Republic under which Hitler was elected, where public censorship was nominally and constitutionally illegal [1] (except in narrow circumstances, such as anti-Semetic expression) and any censorship essentially relegated to private and/or voluntary regulation > How can I map "Reddit's moderation policies" onto 1920s beer halls and Der Sturmer and newspapers? The same way the first amendment is applied to both beer halls and the internet. There's not a single rule in Reddit's content policy that cannot be applied to a beer hall [0]. If you fail to find a way to apply these rules you're either not putting in any effort or you're a lot dumber than you sound (methinks the former). Given that what you advocate for is virtually identical to that under the Weimar Republic, I assert your chosen policies would have little to no effect on the election of Hitler. [0] https://www.redditinc.com/policies/content-policy https://www.redditinc.com/policies/content-policy [1] Ritzheimer, Kara L (2016). 'Trash,' Censorship, and National Identity in Early Twentieth-Century Germany. Cambridge University Press.
    - fighterpilot 5y ago
      I know that the Weimar Republic had anti-semitic censorship laws. I made almost the same argument that you are making just 2 months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27865484 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27865484 "My understanding is that pre-Nazi Germany had hate speech laws, and it didn't seem to work there?" I abandoned my views on this question for a few reasons: - The Weimar Republic laws either weren't effective at preventing distribution or they weren't actually enforced. The continued circulation of Der Sturmer is evidence of this. The judiciary was known to be heavily biased in favor of the far-right, where less than 10% of far-right political killers were convicted and the majority of far-left political killers were convicted. - Online censorship is far less likely to create martyrs than the visual/emotional imagery of imprisoning people. - Online censorship is far more effective at preventing distribution. - Failing to censor online leads to automatic mass-distribution due to the consolidation of eyeballs in a small number of venues. Failing to censor offline does not. There is less scale to be had offline. - Online censorship that we're talking about is private and voluntary. It is not in the same category as government censorship as far as downside risk is concerned. > Given that what you advocate for is virtually identical It is not "virtually identical". As I've said, the context is extremely different. You can't draw an analogy as much as you keep trying.