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I have a very low opinion of twitter and certainly wish they'd do a better job. But the premise of twitter as a shield against state-sponsored kidnapping or mu

I have a very low opinion of twitter and certainly wish they'd do a better job. But the premise of twitter as a shield against state-sponsored kidnapping or murder seems flimsy at best.

DoreenMichele 4y ago
That's not the premise. This kind of bullshit is exactly how disempowered groups get painted into a corner. Sexual assault doesn't typically begin with violent rape. It ends there. It begins with a million small forms of disrespect. Political crap follows the same pattern. If you think it doesn't fucking matter, what the hell do you care how this goes? It matters to him. If you don't care, what's wrong with saying "Twitter should simply do its job, man!"
- dcow 4y ago
  I think you're applying too much nuance to this. Reading all the comments, I think everyone generally wants good for the author. There are just a few different ways to communicating that. Roughly they seem to be: 1. epmathy and twitter do better 2. empathy and this is what you get with twitter 3. empath and practical advice You seem to be railing against (2). Personally I find the bone you're picking to really be besides the point. Most everyone is empathizing with the author's struggle. Nobody here is telling the author to go fuck themselves. Nobody is condoning what Twitter is doing. And certainly nobody is disrespecting the author or supporting the misinformation. So your comment really feels like a non sequitur.
- Bakary 4y ago
  The premise is that the guy lacks power. Twitter has very little incentive to help him, and a strong disincentive to piss off the Pakistani government. Wallowing in outrage is pointless as they have to cynically maneuver until they have results. Part of that strategy might involve stirring up people emotionally towards action, but internalizing the martyrdom doesn't achieve anything on its own. Ironically, this is precisely the type of martyrdom that helps these tech companies strategically in the long term. From their POV, all they have to do is throw a performative bone once in a while and wait for people's outrage rush to ebb away.
- notch656a 4y ago
  Lol, disrespect is the beginning of rape? By that logic, twitter should censor anyone who says anything someone could interpret anything as disrespectful. Criticizing a bad government could be considered disrespectful by the government officials, would you call that starting a rape? And by that same logic, if someone just grabs someone and goes for it, previously being respectful in every way, somehow it isn't rape because it didn't begin with these lesser acts of disrespect.
- bakugo 4y ago
  > Sexual assault doesn't typically begin with violent rape. It ends there. > It begins with a million small forms of disrespect. And? Are you suggesting that "small forms of disrespect" should be treated like violent rape because there's a very vague chance that it might lead there?
didibus 4y ago
The premise seems more about how easily Twitter can be used to support a coup, suppress journalistic voice, oppress people, and push propaganda. I don't know if without Twitter all this would be just as easy, through state controlled media, but what I do know is that Twitter could actually be a tool against this, but is failing to be. Having a popular media outlet that cannot be coopted for propaganda and used for oppression or harm would be a great thing. Twitter clearly failed to be this, and maybe fails really bad at it where it seems like it could easily be a bit better at it.
- fluoridation 4y ago
  I dispute that Twitter could be a tool against those things, because that implies that it's within Twitter's capabilities to know everything that is going on in the world in order to distinguish between true and untrue tweets. Given that limitation, I would argue that the ideal communication medium simply conveys the messages it's given without regard for their contents. What people do with those messages is something that the medium has no power over.
  - didibus 4y ago
    I don't think Twitter needs to assess what is true or not, but it can try to find ways to know the source and make sure they're not bad actors, paid agents, state sponsors, etc. For example, OP mentions how they never allowed him to have a verified badge even though he tried. This very much seems like something Twitter could have done. Now to anyone else, his account seems just as fake as any other impersonating him. It could also put more effort behind investigating reports like the OP did. And it could also have detection and review processes for any kind of tweet that could be defaming. Accusation of criminal acts, labeling of people, mention of violence, arrest, etc. Finally, this is the Web 3 era, who knows what mechanism it could find to innovate on that front. The issue I have with what you say is the ideal communication medium ignores the issues with Twitter, such that it doesn't just simply convey content without regard. It selectively prioritizes, automatically suggests, and promotes certain tweets over others. It also gives very little recourse to people receiving the content to do their own due diligence, or to people who are targeted by the tweets to have a means to provide their counterpoint to the same audience, unless they themselves are just as powerful an actor. You could imagine a relatively simple feature, any Tweet that mentions someone else by name or Twitter alias, that person should be able to attach a response to them that is shown under those tweets automatically. Twitter wouldn't need to choose the truth, but it gives recourse and mechanisms for the process of truth seeking to take place and for the people being shown the tweet more context and therefore better means to make up their own mind.
QuantumGood 4y ago
Isn't there a word for the fallacy that something can improve a situation and should, but because it can't solve it we should ignore that it's improvement is important ethically?
- thewebcount 4y ago
  The nirvana fallacy [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy
  - QuantumGood 4y ago
    Right. "The perfect is the enemy of the good".
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  > we should ignore that [twitters] improvement is important ethically I have not said this, and I do not think it. What I actually said is that I wish twitter would do a better job, you've managed to somehow invert that.
hackerlight 4y ago
Total strawman. Nobody is saying Twitter should act as a shield. They're saying Twitter shouldn't actively facilitate that outcome by providing a platform for targeted harassment and lies. Nobody wanted Facebook to stop a genocide in Myanmar. They just wanted Facebook to not serve the role of actively encourage that outcome.

I have a very low opinion of twitter and certainly wish they'd do a better job. But the premise of twitter as a shield against state-sponsored kidnapping or murder seems flimsy at best.

DoreenMichele 4y ago

That's not the premise. This kind of bullshit is exactly how disempowered groups get painted into a corner. Sexual assault doesn't typically begin with violent rape. It ends there. It begins with a million small forms of disrespect. Political crap follows the same pattern. If you think it doesn't fucking matter, what the hell do you care how this goes? It matters to him. If you don't care, what's wrong with saying "Twitter should simply do its job, man!"

dcow 4y ago
I think you're applying too much nuance to this. Reading all the comments, I think everyone generally wants good for the author. There are just a few different ways to communicating that. Roughly they seem to be: 1. epmathy and twitter do better 2. empathy and this is what you get with twitter 3. empath and practical advice You seem to be railing against (2). Personally I find the bone you're picking to really be besides the point. Most everyone is empathizing with the author's struggle. Nobody here is telling the author to go fuck themselves. Nobody is condoning what Twitter is doing. And certainly nobody is disrespecting the author or supporting the misinformation. So your comment really feels like a non sequitur.
Bakary 4y ago
The premise is that the guy lacks power. Twitter has very little incentive to help him, and a strong disincentive to piss off the Pakistani government. Wallowing in outrage is pointless as they have to cynically maneuver until they have results. Part of that strategy might involve stirring up people emotionally towards action, but internalizing the martyrdom doesn't achieve anything on its own. Ironically, this is precisely the type of martyrdom that helps these tech companies strategically in the long term. From their POV, all they have to do is throw a performative bone once in a while and wait for people's outrage rush to ebb away.
notch656a 4y ago
Lol, disrespect is the beginning of rape? By that logic, twitter should censor anyone who says anything someone could interpret anything as disrespectful. Criticizing a bad government could be considered disrespectful by the government officials, would you call that starting a rape? And by that same logic, if someone just grabs someone and goes for it, previously being respectful in every way, somehow it isn't rape because it didn't begin with these lesser acts of disrespect.
bakugo 4y ago
> Sexual assault doesn't typically begin with violent rape. It ends there. > It begins with a million small forms of disrespect. And? Are you suggesting that "small forms of disrespect" should be treated like violent rape because there's a very vague chance that it might lead there?

didibus 4y ago

The premise seems more about how easily Twitter can be used to support a coup, suppress journalistic voice, oppress people, and push propaganda. I don't know if without Twitter all this would be just as easy, through state controlled media, but what I do know is that Twitter could actually be a tool against this, but is failing to be. Having a popular media outlet that cannot be coopted for propaganda and used for oppression or harm would be a great thing. Twitter clearly failed to be this, and maybe fails really bad at it where it seems like it could easily be a bit better at it.

fluoridation 4y ago
I dispute that Twitter could be a tool against those things, because that implies that it's within Twitter's capabilities to know everything that is going on in the world in order to distinguish between true and untrue tweets. Given that limitation, I would argue that the ideal communication medium simply conveys the messages it's given without regard for their contents. What people do with those messages is something that the medium has no power over.
- didibus 4y ago
  I don't think Twitter needs to assess what is true or not, but it can try to find ways to know the source and make sure they're not bad actors, paid agents, state sponsors, etc. For example, OP mentions how they never allowed him to have a verified badge even though he tried. This very much seems like something Twitter could have done. Now to anyone else, his account seems just as fake as any other impersonating him. It could also put more effort behind investigating reports like the OP did. And it could also have detection and review processes for any kind of tweet that could be defaming. Accusation of criminal acts, labeling of people, mention of violence, arrest, etc. Finally, this is the Web 3 era, who knows what mechanism it could find to innovate on that front. The issue I have with what you say is the ideal communication medium ignores the issues with Twitter, such that it doesn't just simply convey content without regard. It selectively prioritizes, automatically suggests, and promotes certain tweets over others. It also gives very little recourse to people receiving the content to do their own due diligence, or to people who are targeted by the tweets to have a means to provide their counterpoint to the same audience, unless they themselves are just as powerful an actor. You could imagine a relatively simple feature, any Tweet that mentions someone else by name or Twitter alias, that person should be able to attach a response to them that is shown under those tweets automatically. Twitter wouldn't need to choose the truth, but it gives recourse and mechanisms for the process of truth seeking to take place and for the people being shown the tweet more context and therefore better means to make up their own mind.

QuantumGood 4y ago

Isn't there a word for the fallacy that something can improve a situation and should, but because it can't solve it we should ignore that it's improvement is important ethically?

thewebcount 4y ago
The nirvana fallacy [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy
- QuantumGood 4y ago
  Right. "The perfect is the enemy of the good".
MichaelCollins 4y ago
> we should ignore that [twitters] improvement is important ethically I have not said this, and I do not think it. What I actually said is that I wish twitter would do a better job, you've managed to somehow invert that.

hackerlight 4y ago

Total strawman. Nobody is saying Twitter should act as a shield. They're saying Twitter shouldn't actively facilitate that outcome by providing a platform for targeted harassment and lies. Nobody wanted Facebook to stop a genocide in Myanmar. They just wanted Facebook to not serve the role of actively encourage that outcome.