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What ideology is that? Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. Until now, I think Twitter's not-so-slight poli

What ideology is that? Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. Until now, I think Twitter's not-so-slight political lean has been viewed as detrimental to the company (and public discourse). I hope the people who work at Twitter and think it is OK to bring your politics to work go elsewhere. We would all benefit from platform where telling jokes that offend only the wokest doesn't get you banned and silenced.

wwweston 5y ago
> What ideology is that? Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. “the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes 'What the hell is water?'”
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  I take your (rather tired) point that for some sufficiently broad definition of "ideology", even moderate viewpoints are "ideologies". Even still, moderation should feel like water to a fish--it should be moderate, it should roughly represent the viewpoints of the people rather than trying to tug the Overton Window in any particular direction (that's activism, not moderation). And yes, this too is subjective--you could argue that moderation should be indistinguishable from far right or far left activism if you really want. EDIT: Seems like a lot of disagreement with this, but would love to hear some compelling arguments to justify activist moderation.
  - malermeister 5y ago
    Here's Žižek commenting better than I could: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIwMIrj5Ulo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIwMIrj5Ulo >I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology. The material force of ideology - makes me not see what I'm effectively eating. It's not only our reality which enslaves us. The tragedy of our predicament - when we are within ideology, is that - when we think that we escape it into our dreams - at that point we are within ideology. In other words, what you think of as moderate and not ideological is a result of your ideology itself. For a more thorough, very academic examination of ideology, I can recommend the book The Sublime Object of Ideology.
    - metoodv 5y ago
      Zizek, as usual, is saying something facile but with flowery language to make it seem insightful, but the idea that in order to understand his culture a man must leave it and view it from the outside, the same idea Zizek is sharing here (amid sniffs) is an idea that goes back at least as far as Buddhism, as it is present in the story of the youth of the Buddha. Zizek is very ironically an ideologue himself (a "Hegelian" in his words) and as such his version of the story only contains half the lesson -- that culture, which he calls ideology because he seemingly refuses to truly understand what ideology is, lest admit he is an ideologue, can blind members of that culture to certain things, but without addressing that culture and ideology have positive aspects as well. The man is a neverending font of faux insight and obscurantism posturing as wisdom and this quote is no different from any other.
      - malermeister 5y ago
        I think you thoroughly misunderstood his point. His point is that everything is ideology and that it's inescapable, that obviously includes him. Everyone is an ideologue if you will, some just think their ideology isn't ideology. (and it seems that includes you based on how you contrasted "status quo" and "ideology" in the other comment, as if the status quo were somehow unideological)
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        But you're missing the point of everyone who is saying "Twitter Inc is too ideological". The point isn't "Twitter should abstain from ideology" as though that's possible in a strict philosophical sense, the point is that they don't need to suffocate users with their ideology. Twitter Inc can remain devoutly woke without spamming user feeds with woke propo. Invariably, topics involving "ideology" are a trap for pedants. They think they're going to get a good "gotcha!" in, but they find themselves hoisted on their own petards.
        malermeister 5y ago
        But that in itself would also be an ideological act. As we've just established, there's no "non-ideological". People who want Twitter to be non-ideological in reality just want it to represent some other ideology instead, they don't get to hide behind some veil of neutrality.
  - metoodv 5y ago
    There is no justification, you're staking a position against radical politics, that is, politics that seeks to dismantle the current society and replace it with an ideological vision, and the agents of the dominant ideology which has no name (called Woke by its detractors) are mad that you are challenging one of their many parables from their scripture. Hence downvotes.
    - malermeister 5y ago
      What is the current society if not an ideological vision? Who says the status quo is not radical?
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        Whether or not the status quo is an "ideology" is a semantic distraction. For some strict technical definition of "ideology", it may well be, but the interesting question is whether or not it's radical. Since the status quo refers to mainstream, moderate attitudes, it can't be radical by definition (radical and moderate are antonyms).
        malermeister 5y ago
        Who says mainstream attitudes are moderate? To a devout Muslim, the amount of freedom of speech we have around the prophet is radical. To a leftist, the exploitation of laborers by the capitalist class is radical. To the religious right, LGBT rights are radical. To racists, race mixing is radical. The only thing that makes it seem moderate to you is your ideology.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        Mainstream attitudes are moderate by definition ("A moderate is considered someone occupying any mainstream position avoiding extreme views and major social change." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_moderate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_moderate). Both "mainstream" and "moderate" are relative terms with respect to some population. > To a devout Muslim, the amount of freedom of speech we have around the prophet is radical. To a leftist, the exploitation of laborers by the capitalist class is radical. To the religious right, LGBT rights are radical. To racists, race mixing is radical. Yep, you're observing that "moderate" is a relative term. Different groups have different Overton windows. > The only thing that makes it seem moderate to you is your ideology. No, it doesn't matter what my ideology is, it matters what context we're talking about. That context is often implicit, but that doesn't mean the notion of "moderate" is ideological. If someone says "Joe is of median height", do you leap out from behind the bushes and yell "gotcha! 'median' is an ideological term! In Nigeria Joe is tall!"? That doesn't mean "median" is an ideological term, it means that it's dependent on the context, in which case the context is probably something like "whatever country Joe lives in".
  - wwweston 5y ago
    To be much more specific: the idea that Twitter has a free speech problem is itself immoderate and ideological. There is an unquestionably huge range of ideas that can be not only freely but rather aggressively expressed on twitter. There is a very narrow range of speech that is disallowed and even a considerable amount of that actually gets through. To be concerned about the narrow range that is disallowed and see that as ideologically motivated is to swim in the waters of ones own unexamined ideological biases. And that’s being charitable, as many of those who complain about the bias of twitter know full well they’re actually remarkably privileged when it comes to not only freedom of speech but being heard and regarded, they just know that among a certain audience that shares the sense that their views/expressions should be privileged, the posture of loss of privilege as victimhood can be used as a tool of manipulation. Combine that with the culture that understands free speech issues in this way more generally: less from a regard for the value of liberal discourse and more for the privilege of indulgent speech, related to the idea “my ignorance is as good as your knowledge” but extended into the realm of stewardship or even ownership of an entire platform. This indulgent and degraded view of free speech is required in order to understand twitter as a repressive forum as a consequence of limits on things like some trans jokes and deadnaming or even advocacy of identity-focused violence, which can only feel like repression to someone who fundamentally has nothing else of value to say. If that seems tired to you, I’d be happy to inject more vigor.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      The "tired" bit that I was referring to is the popular compulsion to miss the point in order to score a "gotcha!" by invoking the strict philosophical definition when someone says something like, "Twitter Inc is too ideological". Of course, when people say things like this, they're not usually meaning "Twitter Inc" is too ideological, it's that they are too aggressive about pushing their ideology. They could remain devout leftists without spamming everyone's feeds with leftist propaganda, for example. > To be much more specific: the idea that Twitter has a free speech problem is itself immoderate and ideological. It's ideological in the sense that "free speech is desirable" is ideological. Arguing that it's "immoderate" implies that arguing for stronger free speech protections is radical, which is untrue. > There is an unquestionably huge range of ideas that can be not only freely but rather aggressively expressed on twitter. There is a very narrow range of speech that is disallowed and even a considerable amount of that actually gets through. I'm not going to die on the hill of "Twitter needs to be less censorious", but free speech proponents can still legitimately find Twitter problematic even if the censors allow a lot of wrongthink through. For example, Twitter can sort replies by ideology such that wrongthink is much less likely to be seen. It could hide wrongthink from various users altogether. Whether or not it actually does any of these is difficult to assess because there's no transparency. > Combine that with the culture that understands free speech issues in this way more generally: less from a regard for the value of liberal discourse and more for the privilege of indulgent speech, related to the idea “my ignorance is as good as your knowledge” but extended into the realm of stewardship or even ownership of an entire platform. Yes, we have a broken epistemology, but this is the result of the politicization of institutions (especially by the left wing). Specifically, the left wing argues that because perfect neutrality and objectivity are impossible thus we should wholesale abandon the pursuit thereof and instead be doggedly (and ideologically homogeneously) activist. This predictably damages trust in the institutions which in turn drives people toward other institutions, many of which are less savory.
smachiz 5y ago
This post tells me more about your political/ideological views than it does illustrating Twitter's alleged ideology, or what problems that has caused.
- 1337shadow 5y ago
  Come on, you almost can't view any conservative candidate's picture in france without having to "view sensitive contents", it's ridiculous.
  - colpabar 5y ago
    The last time I tried creating a twitter account, I was immediately presented with a set of recommended people to follow, which included Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden. I'm sure there were more, but those were the first three it showed me, and I did not bother to look at any more. I don't want to follow any politicians, but that seems pretty obviously one sided. I wish people would just recognize that, and recognize that it isn't "right-wing" to do so. It twitter recommended new users to follow Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, and those were the only recommendations they saw without clicking "view more", would anyone question whether that was biased or not?
    - beaconstudios 5y ago
      presumably this recommendation is based on who most other people follow. That's a systemic effect.
      - 1337shadow 5y ago
        Not with the French liberals, they are really not popular, but still they are suggested for no reason.
        beaconstudios 5y ago
        they are really not popular in France, or on twitter? Presumably, twitter promotes content that's popular on twitter, and twitter skews liberal.
lovich 5y ago
Since when has musk believed in free speech(as a universal constant, not as in the right protected in the US from government action) other than when it’s to his benefit? He’s on record for retaliating against people who criticize him. He only wants free speech when it’s to his benefit
- IgorPartola 5y ago
  Not defending Musk, but I am just curious: what does free speech mean to you here? How would it work?
  - lovich 5y ago
    Does what I think of free speech matter in this conversation or does what musk thinks matters? He talks about censoring as a violation of free speech and then engages in the same sort of behavior when he does things like canceling the Tesla order of a reporter who said things he doesn’t like. He’s an inconsistent hypocrite and there’s zero evidence that’s been presented to make me believe this move is coming from a sincerely held belief that isn’t “what’s best for Elon is the right thing” Edit: fixed autocorrect of “and” back to “an”
    - emteycz 5y ago
      Free speech does not mean "free of consequences", it means nobody deletes it or jails you for it. Forcing you [within legal/moral limits] to delete it yourself is not against free speech.
      - lovich 5y ago
        Then what is musk asking about in terms of free speech since no one is going to jail when Twitter or other social media sites ban people or censor their tweets? While I am not claiming that you personally are guilty of this, musk stans always seem like they are talking out of both sides of their mouth whenever they defend musk’s comments on free speech and jump back and forth on whether they are using the “protection from government action” definition or the “protection from condemnation of other private individuals and companies” definition
whymauri 5y ago
Freedom for me, not for thee. https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-elon-musk-ruthlessly-fired-anyone-who-disagreed-spacex-report-2021-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-elon-musk-ruthlessly-f... https://www.businessinsider.com/free-speech-absolutist-elon-musk-censors-employees-critics-2022-3 https://www.businessinsider.com/free-speech-absolutist-elon-... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/musk-labor-board.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/musk-labor-board... Edit: not all of these are about employees. He has attempted to get an anonymous stock analyst fired from their job due to a negative evaluation of Tesla stock.
- bequanna 5y ago
  Ah, all super balanced sources, but I'll bite. So your logic here is that because he fired subversive or insubordinate employees he will do the same on Twitter?
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    framing criticism as subversion or insubordination is pretty telling. this is the behaviour of a free speech absolutist? https://www.fastcompany.com/90208132/elon-musk-allegedly-silenced-an-online-critic-with-peter-thiels-playbook https://www.fastcompany.com/90208132/elon-musk-allegedly-sil... I don't doubt that if he thinks he can get away with it, he'll censor information on twitter that is harmful to the finely-crafted PR narratives he likes to make about himself and his companies. Like those battery fires and autopilot unforced/spontaneous crashes.
    - awb 5y ago
      > this is the behaviour of a free speech absolutist? Because it’s just a catchy phrase that sounds good on paper. What’s a “free speech absolutist” position on spam, NDAs, calls to violence, libel, national security, fraud, false advertising, copyright infringement, personal privacy, etc.? I don’t know of any country, platform or person that follows an “absolutist” philosophy on free speech within any reasonable definition of the word “absolute”. Everyone is a “free speech exceptionist”, it’s just varying degrees of exceptions.
faeriechangling 5y ago
Public forums tend to be subject to rules and regulation, enforced by authorities, which Elon Musk does not seem to be very fond of. His ideology in the context of social media is a bit more anarchic and sceptical of the imperiality and morality of said authorities. No comment on how much of a free speech warrior he is when he's dealing with employees or reporters or cavers that he dislikes.
vkou 5y ago
> What ideology is that? The ideology in question is "Anything that is good for Elon Musk is good." That's pretty much all there is to it. There's no rigour to it, there's no intellectually sound foundation, there are just things that serve his bottom line, and those that hurt it.
syngrog66 5y ago
democracy is in dire danger from lies and adversarial propaganda crafted by traitors and hostile nation states jokes which offend the Woke liberals is not a problem on the same scale, though it is certainly annoying. there is a censor-leaning thoughtcrime segment among some liberals but again, that is NOT an imminent danger to democracy, humanity, climate etc
fivea 5y ago
> Until now, I think Twitter's not-so-slight political lean has been viewed as detrimental to the company (and public discourse). Can you point out what is, in your personal opinion, the best example you have of Twitter's "not-so-slight political lean" and how you interpret it as "detrimental to the company (and public discourse)"?
mdoms 5y ago
Musk is famous for aggressively silencing his opponents when he has the power to do so (or thinks he does).
drewrv 5y ago
Who has been banned from Twitter for a joke that offended "only the wokest"? Dave Chapelle still has a twitter account. As does Louis CK.
qiskit 5y ago
> Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. Nobody spends $4 billion to create a public forum or to defend free speech. You spend that kind of money for influence or to push an agenda. What his agenda is, who knows. I'm a fan of elon and maybe he is an outlier, but I'm not holding my breath. There was a time when everyone from google to facebook to reddit and even twitter all supported free speech. People forget that twitter was once a very pro-free speech platform. Everything from war footage to politics of all sides was available on twitter at one point. > I hope the people who work at Twitter and think it is OK to bring your politics to work go elsewhere. It's generally not the employees. Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. It's just that C-suite/HR gives protection to the tiny vocal minority espousing politics at work. > We would all benefit from platform where telling jokes that offend only the wokest doesn't get you banned and silenced. We would all benefit if every platform allowed people to have their say. Regardless of how "offensive" you find them to be.
- datavirtue 5y ago
  "It's generally not the employees. Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. It's just that C-suite/HR gives protection to the tiny vocal minority espousing politics at work." This is going in my childrens' book: "Why high paid employees need a union!"
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. sed -e 's/tech//' -e 's/or against/and could not begin to define what is meant by/' -e 's/woke culture/"woke culture"/g'
- astrange 5y ago
  > Nobody spends $4 billion to create a public forum or to defend free speech. Well, Twitter's stock price has already gone up, so in a way he hasn't spent anything. Getting the cash to buy the shares in the first place probably involved a lot of capital gains though.
madeofpalk 5y ago
This all sounds very ideological. > We would all benefit from platform where telling jokes that offend only the wokest doesn't get you banned and silenced. Bring action items. Who was banned for "telling a joke". Bring something substantial to the conversation to discuss.
- bequanna 5y ago
  It is trivial to do a google search to find examples. A couple recent and high profile would be accounts locked because they tweeted "learn to code" which was, of course a joke at the expense of the (very sensitive and unemployed) journalists. Another example of bans would be sharing any satire that goes against the extreme left view that it is perfectly OK to allow biological men in women's sports.
axlee 5y ago
Historically, the right wing believes in free speech until they have the keys to the public discourse, then it radically changes.
tobr 5y ago
> What ideology is that? There’s a quite good podcast about this exact question, Elon Musk: The Evening Rocket. https://www.pushkin.fm/show/elon-musk-the-evening-rocket/ https://www.pushkin.fm/show/elon-musk-the-evening-rocket/
MereInterest 5y ago
> Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. That's an ideology. Whether or not it's a good one can be a topic of debate, but phrasing it as not being an ideology puts a finger on the scale of the debate right from the start.
deleted 5y ago
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judge2020 5y ago
Moderating like a public forum is easier said than done. Is labeling flat earthers as incorrect wrong? What about banning people spreading covid misinformation? What if there are true american citizens pushing KGB / russian propaganda, they have every legal right to do so, but will Twitter still allow it? At what point does a policy like "respect peoples' free speech" end with the specific reviewer's moral compass determining if something is targeted hate speech or just satire?

wwweston 5y ago

> What ideology is that? Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. “the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes 'What the hell is water?'”

throwaway894345 5y ago
I take your (rather tired) point that for some sufficiently broad definition of "ideology", even moderate viewpoints are "ideologies". Even still, moderation should feel like water to a fish--it should be moderate, it should roughly represent the viewpoints of the people rather than trying to tug the Overton Window in any particular direction (that's activism, not moderation). And yes, this too is subjective--you could argue that moderation should be indistinguishable from far right or far left activism if you really want. EDIT: Seems like a lot of disagreement with this, but would love to hear some compelling arguments to justify activist moderation.
- malermeister 5y ago
  Here's Žižek commenting better than I could: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIwMIrj5Ulo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIwMIrj5Ulo >I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology. The material force of ideology - makes me not see what I'm effectively eating. It's not only our reality which enslaves us. The tragedy of our predicament - when we are within ideology, is that - when we think that we escape it into our dreams - at that point we are within ideology. In other words, what you think of as moderate and not ideological is a result of your ideology itself. For a more thorough, very academic examination of ideology, I can recommend the book The Sublime Object of Ideology.
  - metoodv 5y ago
    Zizek, as usual, is saying something facile but with flowery language to make it seem insightful, but the idea that in order to understand his culture a man must leave it and view it from the outside, the same idea Zizek is sharing here (amid sniffs) is an idea that goes back at least as far as Buddhism, as it is present in the story of the youth of the Buddha. Zizek is very ironically an ideologue himself (a "Hegelian" in his words) and as such his version of the story only contains half the lesson -- that culture, which he calls ideology because he seemingly refuses to truly understand what ideology is, lest admit he is an ideologue, can blind members of that culture to certain things, but without addressing that culture and ideology have positive aspects as well. The man is a neverending font of faux insight and obscurantism posturing as wisdom and this quote is no different from any other.
    - malermeister 5y ago
      I think you thoroughly misunderstood his point. His point is that everything is ideology and that it's inescapable, that obviously includes him. Everyone is an ideologue if you will, some just think their ideology isn't ideology. (and it seems that includes you based on how you contrasted "status quo" and "ideology" in the other comment, as if the status quo were somehow unideological)
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        But you're missing the point of everyone who is saying "Twitter Inc is too ideological". The point isn't "Twitter should abstain from ideology" as though that's possible in a strict philosophical sense, the point is that they don't need to suffocate users with their ideology. Twitter Inc can remain devoutly woke without spamming user feeds with woke propo. Invariably, topics involving "ideology" are a trap for pedants. They think they're going to get a good "gotcha!" in, but they find themselves hoisted on their own petards.
        malermeister 5y ago
        But that in itself would also be an ideological act. As we've just established, there's no "non-ideological". People who want Twitter to be non-ideological in reality just want it to represent some other ideology instead, they don't get to hide behind some veil of neutrality.
- metoodv 5y ago
  There is no justification, you're staking a position against radical politics, that is, politics that seeks to dismantle the current society and replace it with an ideological vision, and the agents of the dominant ideology which has no name (called Woke by its detractors) are mad that you are challenging one of their many parables from their scripture. Hence downvotes.
  - malermeister 5y ago
    What is the current society if not an ideological vision? Who says the status quo is not radical?
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      Whether or not the status quo is an "ideology" is a semantic distraction. For some strict technical definition of "ideology", it may well be, but the interesting question is whether or not it's radical. Since the status quo refers to mainstream, moderate attitudes, it can't be radical by definition (radical and moderate are antonyms).
      - malermeister 5y ago
        Who says mainstream attitudes are moderate? To a devout Muslim, the amount of freedom of speech we have around the prophet is radical. To a leftist, the exploitation of laborers by the capitalist class is radical. To the religious right, LGBT rights are radical. To racists, race mixing is radical. The only thing that makes it seem moderate to you is your ideology.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        Mainstream attitudes are moderate by definition ("A moderate is considered someone occupying any mainstream position avoiding extreme views and major social change." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_moderate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_moderate). Both "mainstream" and "moderate" are relative terms with respect to some population. > To a devout Muslim, the amount of freedom of speech we have around the prophet is radical. To a leftist, the exploitation of laborers by the capitalist class is radical. To the religious right, LGBT rights are radical. To racists, race mixing is radical. Yep, you're observing that "moderate" is a relative term. Different groups have different Overton windows. > The only thing that makes it seem moderate to you is your ideology. No, it doesn't matter what my ideology is, it matters what context we're talking about. That context is often implicit, but that doesn't mean the notion of "moderate" is ideological. If someone says "Joe is of median height", do you leap out from behind the bushes and yell "gotcha! 'median' is an ideological term! In Nigeria Joe is tall!"? That doesn't mean "median" is an ideological term, it means that it's dependent on the context, in which case the context is probably something like "whatever country Joe lives in".
- wwweston 5y ago
  To be much more specific: the idea that Twitter has a free speech problem is itself immoderate and ideological. There is an unquestionably huge range of ideas that can be not only freely but rather aggressively expressed on twitter. There is a very narrow range of speech that is disallowed and even a considerable amount of that actually gets through. To be concerned about the narrow range that is disallowed and see that as ideologically motivated is to swim in the waters of ones own unexamined ideological biases. And that’s being charitable, as many of those who complain about the bias of twitter know full well they’re actually remarkably privileged when it comes to not only freedom of speech but being heard and regarded, they just know that among a certain audience that shares the sense that their views/expressions should be privileged, the posture of loss of privilege as victimhood can be used as a tool of manipulation. Combine that with the culture that understands free speech issues in this way more generally: less from a regard for the value of liberal discourse and more for the privilege of indulgent speech, related to the idea “my ignorance is as good as your knowledge” but extended into the realm of stewardship or even ownership of an entire platform. This indulgent and degraded view of free speech is required in order to understand twitter as a repressive forum as a consequence of limits on things like some trans jokes and deadnaming or even advocacy of identity-focused violence, which can only feel like repression to someone who fundamentally has nothing else of value to say. If that seems tired to you, I’d be happy to inject more vigor.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    The "tired" bit that I was referring to is the popular compulsion to miss the point in order to score a "gotcha!" by invoking the strict philosophical definition when someone says something like, "Twitter Inc is too ideological". Of course, when people say things like this, they're not usually meaning "Twitter Inc" is too ideological, it's that they are too aggressive about pushing their ideology. They could remain devout leftists without spamming everyone's feeds with leftist propaganda, for example. > To be much more specific: the idea that Twitter has a free speech problem is itself immoderate and ideological. It's ideological in the sense that "free speech is desirable" is ideological. Arguing that it's "immoderate" implies that arguing for stronger free speech protections is radical, which is untrue. > There is an unquestionably huge range of ideas that can be not only freely but rather aggressively expressed on twitter. There is a very narrow range of speech that is disallowed and even a considerable amount of that actually gets through. I'm not going to die on the hill of "Twitter needs to be less censorious", but free speech proponents can still legitimately find Twitter problematic even if the censors allow a lot of wrongthink through. For example, Twitter can sort replies by ideology such that wrongthink is much less likely to be seen. It could hide wrongthink from various users altogether. Whether or not it actually does any of these is difficult to assess because there's no transparency. > Combine that with the culture that understands free speech issues in this way more generally: less from a regard for the value of liberal discourse and more for the privilege of indulgent speech, related to the idea “my ignorance is as good as your knowledge” but extended into the realm of stewardship or even ownership of an entire platform. Yes, we have a broken epistemology, but this is the result of the politicization of institutions (especially by the left wing). Specifically, the left wing argues that because perfect neutrality and objectivity are impossible thus we should wholesale abandon the pursuit thereof and instead be doggedly (and ideologically homogeneously) activist. This predictably damages trust in the institutions which in turn drives people toward other institutions, many of which are less savory.

smachiz 5y ago

This post tells me more about your political/ideological views than it does illustrating Twitter's alleged ideology, or what problems that has caused.

1337shadow 5y ago
Come on, you almost can't view any conservative candidate's picture in france without having to "view sensitive contents", it's ridiculous.
- colpabar 5y ago
  The last time I tried creating a twitter account, I was immediately presented with a set of recommended people to follow, which included Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden. I'm sure there were more, but those were the first three it showed me, and I did not bother to look at any more. I don't want to follow any politicians, but that seems pretty obviously one sided. I wish people would just recognize that, and recognize that it isn't "right-wing" to do so. It twitter recommended new users to follow Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, and those were the only recommendations they saw without clicking "view more", would anyone question whether that was biased or not?
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    presumably this recommendation is based on who most other people follow. That's a systemic effect.
    - 1337shadow 5y ago
      Not with the French liberals, they are really not popular, but still they are suggested for no reason.
      - beaconstudios 5y ago
        they are really not popular in France, or on twitter? Presumably, twitter promotes content that's popular on twitter, and twitter skews liberal.

lovich 5y ago

Since when has musk believed in free speech(as a universal constant, not as in the right protected in the US from government action) other than when it’s to his benefit? He’s on record for retaliating against people who criticize him. He only wants free speech when it’s to his benefit

IgorPartola 5y ago
Not defending Musk, but I am just curious: what does free speech mean to you here? How would it work?
- lovich 5y ago
  Does what I think of free speech matter in this conversation or does what musk thinks matters? He talks about censoring as a violation of free speech and then engages in the same sort of behavior when he does things like canceling the Tesla order of a reporter who said things he doesn’t like. He’s an inconsistent hypocrite and there’s zero evidence that’s been presented to make me believe this move is coming from a sincerely held belief that isn’t “what’s best for Elon is the right thing” Edit: fixed autocorrect of “and” back to “an”
  - emteycz 5y ago
    Free speech does not mean "free of consequences", it means nobody deletes it or jails you for it. Forcing you [within legal/moral limits] to delete it yourself is not against free speech.
    - lovich 5y ago
      Then what is musk asking about in terms of free speech since no one is going to jail when Twitter or other social media sites ban people or censor their tweets? While I am not claiming that you personally are guilty of this, musk stans always seem like they are talking out of both sides of their mouth whenever they defend musk’s comments on free speech and jump back and forth on whether they are using the “protection from government action” definition or the “protection from condemnation of other private individuals and companies” definition

whymauri 5y ago

Freedom for me, not for thee. https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-elon-musk-ruthlessly-fired-anyone-who-disagreed-spacex-report-2021-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-elon-musk-ruthlessly-f... https://www.businessinsider.com/free-speech-absolutist-elon-musk-censors-employees-critics-2022-3 https://www.businessinsider.com/free-speech-absolutist-elon-... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/musk-labor-board.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/musk-labor-board... Edit: not all of these are about employees. He has attempted to get an anonymous stock analyst fired from their job due to a negative evaluation of Tesla stock.

bequanna 5y ago
Ah, all super balanced sources, but I'll bite. So your logic here is that because he fired subversive or insubordinate employees he will do the same on Twitter?
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  framing criticism as subversion or insubordination is pretty telling. this is the behaviour of a free speech absolutist? https://www.fastcompany.com/90208132/elon-musk-allegedly-silenced-an-online-critic-with-peter-thiels-playbook https://www.fastcompany.com/90208132/elon-musk-allegedly-sil... I don't doubt that if he thinks he can get away with it, he'll censor information on twitter that is harmful to the finely-crafted PR narratives he likes to make about himself and his companies. Like those battery fires and autopilot unforced/spontaneous crashes.
  - awb 5y ago
    > this is the behaviour of a free speech absolutist? Because it’s just a catchy phrase that sounds good on paper. What’s a “free speech absolutist” position on spam, NDAs, calls to violence, libel, national security, fraud, false advertising, copyright infringement, personal privacy, etc.? I don’t know of any country, platform or person that follows an “absolutist” philosophy on free speech within any reasonable definition of the word “absolute”. Everyone is a “free speech exceptionist”, it’s just varying degrees of exceptions.

faeriechangling 5y ago

Public forums tend to be subject to rules and regulation, enforced by authorities, which Elon Musk does not seem to be very fond of. His ideology in the context of social media is a bit more anarchic and sceptical of the imperiality and morality of said authorities. No comment on how much of a free speech warrior he is when he's dealing with employees or reporters or cavers that he dislikes.

vkou 5y ago

> What ideology is that? The ideology in question is "Anything that is good for Elon Musk is good." That's pretty much all there is to it. There's no rigour to it, there's no intellectually sound foundation, there are just things that serve his bottom line, and those that hurt it.

syngrog66 5y ago

democracy is in dire danger from lies and adversarial propaganda crafted by traitors and hostile nation states jokes which offend the Woke liberals is not a problem on the same scale, though it is certainly annoying. there is a censor-leaning thoughtcrime segment among some liberals but again, that is NOT an imminent danger to democracy, humanity, climate etc

fivea 5y ago

> Until now, I think Twitter's not-so-slight political lean has been viewed as detrimental to the company (and public discourse). Can you point out what is, in your personal opinion, the best example you have of Twitter's "not-so-slight political lean" and how you interpret it as "detrimental to the company (and public discourse)"?

mdoms 5y ago

Musk is famous for aggressively silencing his opponents when he has the power to do so (or thinks he does).

drewrv 5y ago

Who has been banned from Twitter for a joke that offended "only the wokest"? Dave Chapelle still has a twitter account. As does Louis CK.

qiskit 5y ago

> Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. Nobody spends $4 billion to create a public forum or to defend free speech. You spend that kind of money for influence or to push an agenda. What his agenda is, who knows. I'm a fan of elon and maybe he is an outlier, but I'm not holding my breath. There was a time when everyone from google to facebook to reddit and even twitter all supported free speech. People forget that twitter was once a very pro-free speech platform. Everything from war footage to politics of all sides was available on twitter at one point. > I hope the people who work at Twitter and think it is OK to bring your politics to work go elsewhere. It's generally not the employees. Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. It's just that C-suite/HR gives protection to the tiny vocal minority espousing politics at work. > We would all benefit from platform where telling jokes that offend only the wokest doesn't get you banned and silenced. We would all benefit if every platform allowed people to have their say. Regardless of how "offensive" you find them to be.

datavirtue 5y ago
"It's generally not the employees. Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. It's just that C-suite/HR gives protection to the tiny vocal minority espousing politics at work." This is going in my childrens' book: "Why high paid employees need a union!"
PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
> Most tech employees are apolitical at work or against the woke culture. sed -e 's/tech//' -e 's/or against/and could not begin to define what is meant by/' -e 's/woke culture/"woke culture"/g'
astrange 5y ago
> Nobody spends $4 billion to create a public forum or to defend free speech. Well, Twitter's stock price has already gone up, so in a way he hasn't spent anything. Getting the cash to buy the shares in the first place probably involved a lot of capital gains though.

madeofpalk 5y ago

This all sounds very ideological. > We would all benefit from platform where telling jokes that offend only the wokest doesn't get you banned and silenced. Bring action items. Who was banned for "telling a joke". Bring something substantial to the conversation to discuss.

bequanna 5y ago
It is trivial to do a google search to find examples. A couple recent and high profile would be accounts locked because they tweeted "learn to code" which was, of course a joke at the expense of the (very sensitive and unemployed) journalists. Another example of bans would be sharing any satire that goes against the extreme left view that it is perfectly OK to allow biological men in women's sports.

axlee 5y ago

Historically, the right wing believes in free speech until they have the keys to the public discourse, then it radically changes.

tobr 5y ago

> What ideology is that? There’s a quite good podcast about this exact question, Elon Musk: The Evening Rocket. https://www.pushkin.fm/show/elon-musk-the-evening-rocket/ https://www.pushkin.fm/show/elon-musk-the-evening-rocket/

MereInterest 5y ago

> Musk has hinted that he views Twitter as a public forum and should be moderated as such. That's an ideology. Whether or not it's a good one can be a topic of debate, but phrasing it as not being an ideology puts a finger on the scale of the debate right from the start.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

judge2020 5y ago

Moderating like a public forum is easier said than done. Is labeling flat earthers as incorrect wrong? What about banning people spreading covid misinformation? What if there are true american citizens pushing KGB / russian propaganda, they have every legal right to do so, but will Twitter still allow it? At what point does a policy like "respect peoples' free speech" end with the specific reviewer's moral compass determining if something is targeted hate speech or just satire?