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Agreed. Read any periodical from the 1600s onwards and you’ll see a lot of pen names. And to people who think discourse was more civil back then (sort of assumi

Agreed. Read any periodical from the 1600s onwards and you’ll see a lot of pen names. And to people who think discourse was more civil back then (sort of assuming that people were more responsible when being anonyminity)— they’re wrong. some of the most vile filth, slander and gossip was published.

mjreacher 5y ago
Do you have any examples of such vile content that would be worse than what we see today?
- falcrist 5y ago
  There was a particular instance where Thomas Jefferson called John Adams a hermaphrodite (via a supporter with a newspaper) [0]. Adams apparently responded by spreading a rumor that Jefferson was dead. I believe that technique was learned from Benjamin Franklin, who "predicted" the death of a rival almanac publisher. [1] There's much more in the way of antics among the founders of the US, but this isn't unique to them. Classical antiquity even has stories of some of the childish stuff that politicians got up to. EDIT to add example: IIRC Cicero accused Clodius of incest and a number of other things [2]. Clodius responded by accusing Cicero of acting as a tyrannical king while he was consul. Some of the insults don't hit the same today, but this is supposed to be seriously petty stuff. The Cicero example wasn't anonymous, of course, but then again anonymity in classical antiquity would have been a good way to make sure your story didn't survive to the modern day. Having said that, there are stories about some of the stuff that was written in graffiti in Rome. I'm not sure if I'd call any of this stuff "worse" or not, though there was more political violence in the ancient world. I guess it depends on what you include under the term "discourse". For what it's worth, the origins of our word "invective" apparently come from Latin [3][4]. Apropos if true. [0] - https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/are-presidential-campaigns-getting-nastier-not-really/hermaphroditical https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/are-presidenti... [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_Leeds?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_Leeds?wprov=sfla1 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Clodius_Pulcher#Sex_and_politics_in_the_late_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Clodius_Pulcher#Sex_an... [3] - https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/invective https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/invective [4] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invective https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invective
froh 5y ago
Pen names are known to the publisher, though. They are pseudonyme s not complete anonymity. The current full anonymity of targeted taylored communication allows for unprecedented levels of deceit, systematic and controlled disinformation of the electorate, in unprecedented ways, leading to e.g. Brexit. This current systematic abuse of anonymity to deceive the people is not comparable to the pseudonyme books and articles and leaflets of the pre-facebook era.
- Gollapalli 5y ago
  You're just mad that the proles and rubes disagree with your politics.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- fallingknife 5y ago
  If disinformation is able to sway public opinion, and people are unable to distinguish it from the truth, which you clearly believe, then how do you know that your opinions are not also based on disinformation?
  - froh 5y ago
    Consult reputation based non-anonymous information if in doubt? Like scholar.google.com or dead-tree libraries?
- yanmaani 5y ago
  If people can't tell truth from lies, why even bother having elections? You mention Brexit. If it was a foregone conclusion that people weren't sharp enough to vote either way, why not just ask Queen Elizabeth whether they should stay or leave?
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    > why not just ask Queen Elizabeth whether they should stay or leave? There is an alternative, of course. The country could be mapped out as a few hundred distinct contiguous regions, and the people who live in each region could vote for one of their fellow inhabitants to represent them. So, rather than each individual having to weigh the complex arguments for and against Brexit, they could make a much more "human" decision of deciding whether a candidate seems honest and competent. To aid them in that decision, they can look at the candidate's past record, and the potential endorsement they may have from a political party (which itself will have a record of good or bad policies). Then the winning candidates (hopefully under some sensible voting system) can all get together and debate the issue, and commission reports from experts, then vote on the big question themselves. Of course there's still no guarantee that the right decision would be made, but, for the record, in the 2019 general election, 52% of the popular vote went to parties that were in favour of a second referendum (which could have had a better set of options on it). https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-result-boris-johnson-pro-brexit-referendum-voters-conservatives-a9245866.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-resu...

mjreacher 5y ago

Do you have any examples of such vile content that would be worse than what we see today?

falcrist 5y ago
There was a particular instance where Thomas Jefferson called John Adams a hermaphrodite (via a supporter with a newspaper) [0]. Adams apparently responded by spreading a rumor that Jefferson was dead. I believe that technique was learned from Benjamin Franklin, who "predicted" the death of a rival almanac publisher. [1] There's much more in the way of antics among the founders of the US, but this isn't unique to them. Classical antiquity even has stories of some of the childish stuff that politicians got up to. EDIT to add example: IIRC Cicero accused Clodius of incest and a number of other things [2]. Clodius responded by accusing Cicero of acting as a tyrannical king while he was consul. Some of the insults don't hit the same today, but this is supposed to be seriously petty stuff. The Cicero example wasn't anonymous, of course, but then again anonymity in classical antiquity would have been a good way to make sure your story didn't survive to the modern day. Having said that, there are stories about some of the stuff that was written in graffiti in Rome. I'm not sure if I'd call any of this stuff "worse" or not, though there was more political violence in the ancient world. I guess it depends on what you include under the term "discourse". For what it's worth, the origins of our word "invective" apparently come from Latin [3][4]. Apropos if true. [0] - https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/are-presidential-campaigns-getting-nastier-not-really/hermaphroditical https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/are-presidenti... [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_Leeds?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_Leeds?wprov=sfla1 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Clodius_Pulcher#Sex_and_politics_in_the_late_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Clodius_Pulcher#Sex_an... [3] - https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/invective https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/invective [4] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invective https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invective

froh 5y ago

Pen names are known to the publisher, though. They are pseudonyme s not complete anonymity. The current full anonymity of targeted taylored communication allows for unprecedented levels of deceit, systematic and controlled disinformation of the electorate, in unprecedented ways, leading to e.g. Brexit. This current systematic abuse of anonymity to deceive the people is not comparable to the pseudonyme books and articles and leaflets of the pre-facebook era.

Gollapalli 5y ago
You're just mad that the proles and rubes disagree with your politics.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
fallingknife 5y ago
If disinformation is able to sway public opinion, and people are unable to distinguish it from the truth, which you clearly believe, then how do you know that your opinions are not also based on disinformation?
- froh 5y ago
  Consult reputation based non-anonymous information if in doubt? Like scholar.google.com or dead-tree libraries?
yanmaani 5y ago
If people can't tell truth from lies, why even bother having elections? You mention Brexit. If it was a foregone conclusion that people weren't sharp enough to vote either way, why not just ask Queen Elizabeth whether they should stay or leave?
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  > why not just ask Queen Elizabeth whether they should stay or leave? There is an alternative, of course. The country could be mapped out as a few hundred distinct contiguous regions, and the people who live in each region could vote for one of their fellow inhabitants to represent them. So, rather than each individual having to weigh the complex arguments for and against Brexit, they could make a much more "human" decision of deciding whether a candidate seems honest and competent. To aid them in that decision, they can look at the candidate's past record, and the potential endorsement they may have from a political party (which itself will have a record of good or bad policies). Then the winning candidates (hopefully under some sensible voting system) can all get together and debate the issue, and commission reports from experts, then vote on the big question themselves. Of course there's still no guarantee that the right decision would be made, but, for the record, in the 2019 general election, 52% of the popular vote went to parties that were in favour of a second referendum (which could have had a better set of options on it). https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-result-boris-johnson-pro-brexit-referendum-voters-conservatives-a9245866.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-resu...