5 ms·

To me the core of this issue is that sometimes government officials truly believe their missions are more important than free speech. They may think that their

by ilaksh 4y ago

To me the core of this issue is that sometimes government officials truly believe their missions are more important than free speech. They may think that their job is actually to suppress free speech unfortunately. Especially common is for national security to override free speech in the minds of government officials. They can easily convince themselves that they need to suppress certain viewpoints in order to save many lives. It just coincidentally also saves their own jobs. I think unfortunately that young people would prefer less free speech and for the government to enforce more confirming perspectives. One other core issue for people who want the tech companies to stop listening to government to consider is the fact that the government has police, guns, prisons, and legal sanctions available to enforce it's policy decisions.

themitigating 4y ago
It's possible that national security to be more important than free speech. Doesn't this happen all the time?
- linuxftw 4y ago
  > It's possible that national security to be more important than free speech. There is no national security without free speech. There might be oligarch security, but not security for the people.
  - themitigating 4y ago
    So troop movements should be public?
    - linuxftw 4y ago
      Definitely. If you're not fighting an unpopular war far overseas somewhere it's not really a problem.
      - themitigating 4y ago
        What about a popular war where a country invaded the US. What about the locations of nuclear weapons?
        bombcar 4y ago
        If the government can't keep its locations secret, that should be on them. Limiting their employees/military from blabbing the secrets is a separate issue.
        linuxftw 4y ago
        Who's going to invade the US? Much easier to buy the politicians like how it currently works. This would also require several years of naval and long range bombardments to even be a possibility. Just a non-factor if the planet looks anything like it does today. > What about the locations of nuclear weapons? Security through obscurity. I'm sure some of the US's adversaries know where at least some nuclear weapons are located, and it seems to have not been a problem so far. What's everybody so scared of? The US could cut its military by 75% overnight and little would change for the US itself. So-call 'allies' overseas might have to start footing their own bill for defense or attempt to make peace with their neighbors, but for the US nothing changes.
        themitigating 4y ago
        Why are you picking apart my hypothetical examples ? Is it your argument there is no reason ever for the government to censor information?
        linuxftw 4y ago
        I don't believe the government has any legitimate power that an individual does not have.
        muaytimbo 4y ago
        well said.
    - anon291 4y ago
      You should not be prosecuted for announcing troop movement data that you've lawfully acquired. If you burglarized an American government facility or hacked into a computer system or committed fraud to trick someone or drugged/tortured a government agent, you should be prosecuted for that. But if an agent leaves information somewhere, you read it, and publish it? No, you should not.
      - aerostable_slug 4y ago
        And that in fact is how the law works, with of course a couple of fringe cases [0]. If you're walking down the street and stumble over a folder of TS/SCI/SAP material, you can publish it all you want. The only time you have a duty to protect classified material is if you signed a non-disclosure agreement. [0] exceptions: nuclear secrets as outlined in the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, and the identities of intelligence officers acting clandestinely. The former is a wreck of a law (how would Grandma Smith know a document marked S/RD is special, plus there's the whole 'Born Secret' bit), and the latter hasn't been tried out that much in court.
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - themitigating 4y ago
        But you are now limiting your original argument
- anon291 4y ago
  If you define national security as preserving the American system of government, then no national security cannot be more important than free speech. There is no American system of government without free speech. Attempts to 'secure' the government by limiting free speech indicate the government we sought to protect no longer exists.
mistrial9 4y ago
basically agree as a US Citizen - let's think about the psychology of public policy just for a minute. When given an "order", upon hearing information that directs behavior that is not your choice or is new in some way, combined with restriction, inconvenience or most directly, feels threatening.. then a common personal reaction is to deny, disclaim, reject or attack the messenger and/or the message. Public policy is much older than the USA.. people with skills and methods in this area are not new to this reaction.. So the playing field is set. The age of Monarchy saw many obviously awful abuses of mono- or unilateral messaging.. "By decree of the King .. this that or the other" Certain religious groups in association with Monarchy did so even more.. into the private lives of people. So a founding principle of the purposefully diverse USA was.. free speech. You cannot be sent to prison for making fun of the King nor publicly defending prostitution .. for example. But here it gets difficult.. Obviously strong minds and wills have strong reactions. The social upheaval politically in 20th Century Europe had a high cost socially. But now, in the USA, we have credentialed experts in Science being silenced, not refuted. This is a new modern "low" and the use of technology to de-platform harkens directly back to ANATHEMA or ex-communication reaction.. it is very, very dark days for speech in the USA.
alexb_ 4y ago
>Especially common is for national security to override free speech in the minds of government officials. They can easily convince themselves that they need to suppress certain viewpoints in order to save many lives. It just coincidentally also saves their own jobs. Non-disclosure of secret information that you willingly make yourself privy to is not suppression of free speech.
- fallingknife 4y ago
  No it isn't. But OP is talking more about government suppressing public information. Like when the FBI told Zuckerberg to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story because it was Russian disinformation.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  Over-classification is a free speech issue. There's a moral difference between information being classified to protect the country, and information being classified to protect inept politicians and government officials from having to face the accountability of the public. For instance, the CIA spent the equivalent of several billion dollars trying to lift an obsolete Soviet submarine from the ocean floor, against the recommendations of the US Navy which thought they could recover the relevant materials using deep sea remote control 'drones' from a spy submarine, rather than using a surface ship to lift the whole sub, which they said would fail and risked discovery. Well it did fail, and they did get discovered and the US Government was forced to explain itself to the Soviet government. But in the aftermath of this boondoggle, the US government was more candid with the Soviets than with the American public. The rational for sharing information with the Soviets but not with the American public can only be to protect the CIA/etc from public accountability. They continue to use the ambiguity created by their secrecy to lead people to believe they were more successful than they actually were. The Soviets/Russians can get ground truth about this incident by sending their own drones down there to see what was left of the submarine. The CIA's classification of the incident serves to obscure the truth from the American public, not the Russians.
- falcrist 4y ago
  How is this not a limitation on freedom of speech? You have a piece of information that you aren't allowed to talk about. I think this is just a limitation that we're all mostly ok with.
hotpotamus 4y ago
Would you post here if people were allowed to say whatever they wanted?
- catiopatio 4y ago
  Absolutely. I post here now because the locally-enforced Overton window is much larger than alternative platforms, which makes conversations much more interesting, challenging, and productive. If people could say whatever they wanted here, I’d expect to see a lot more comments I wouldn’t bother engaging with at all, but that’s okay. I’m not a horse — I don’t need blinders to prevent me from getting spooked.
- r3trohack3r 4y ago
  This question seems disingenuous. Your comment equates the U.S. Government attempting to suppress speech critical of their own decisions with dang moderating an internet forum. These are not the same. The first amendment protects speech in the United States for good reason. There are bad people in the world. Those bad people can end up in government. The government wields incredible power. The three branches are meant to keep each other in check - but so are the citizens. The ability to vote in/out candidates is a balancing force. The humans in power being able to distort speech in the country to favor keeping them in power breaks that balancing force. This article is asking "did the government attempt to suppress speech." That has nothing to do with moderation on HN. dang is not a representative of a government. It's entirely reasonable (IMO) for the mods here to suppress speech critical of decisions a government is making - it's their site. It is entirely unreasonable for a government to suppress speech critical of decisions the government is making. Blurring that line is how you do a fascism.
  - hotpotamus 4y ago
    There's a lot there, but you know, I'm just tired of seeing people die from what are almost certainly (vaccine) preventable illnesses. I've stood in enough funeral processions. I wonder if there is any way for the government to try and prevent that? It seems like they attempted to work with private companies (and passed no laws to coerce them into it). And what about the companies? Perhaps they agreed with those in government they were in contact with and worked to police their platforms. Would that look much different from coercion?

by ilaksh 4y ago

themitigating 4y ago

It's possible that national security to be more important than free speech. Doesn't this happen all the time?

linuxftw 4y ago
> It's possible that national security to be more important than free speech. There is no national security without free speech. There might be oligarch security, but not security for the people.
- themitigating 4y ago
  So troop movements should be public?
  - linuxftw 4y ago
    Definitely. If you're not fighting an unpopular war far overseas somewhere it's not really a problem.
    - themitigating 4y ago
      What about a popular war where a country invaded the US. What about the locations of nuclear weapons?
      - bombcar 4y ago
        If the government can't keep its locations secret, that should be on them. Limiting their employees/military from blabbing the secrets is a separate issue.
      - linuxftw 4y ago
        Who's going to invade the US? Much easier to buy the politicians like how it currently works. This would also require several years of naval and long range bombardments to even be a possibility. Just a non-factor if the planet looks anything like it does today. > What about the locations of nuclear weapons? Security through obscurity. I'm sure some of the US's adversaries know where at least some nuclear weapons are located, and it seems to have not been a problem so far. What's everybody so scared of? The US could cut its military by 75% overnight and little would change for the US itself. So-call 'allies' overseas might have to start footing their own bill for defense or attempt to make peace with their neighbors, but for the US nothing changes.
        themitigating 4y ago
        Why are you picking apart my hypothetical examples ? Is it your argument there is no reason ever for the government to censor information?
        linuxftw 4y ago
        I don't believe the government has any legitimate power that an individual does not have.
        muaytimbo 4y ago
        well said.
  - anon291 4y ago
    You should not be prosecuted for announcing troop movement data that you've lawfully acquired. If you burglarized an American government facility or hacked into a computer system or committed fraud to trick someone or drugged/tortured a government agent, you should be prosecuted for that. But if an agent leaves information somewhere, you read it, and publish it? No, you should not.
    - aerostable_slug 4y ago
      And that in fact is how the law works, with of course a couple of fringe cases [0]. If you're walking down the street and stumble over a folder of TS/SCI/SAP material, you can publish it all you want. The only time you have a duty to protect classified material is if you signed a non-disclosure agreement. [0] exceptions: nuclear secrets as outlined in the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, and the identities of intelligence officers acting clandestinely. The former is a wreck of a law (how would Grandma Smith know a document marked S/RD is special, plus there's the whole 'Born Secret' bit), and the latter hasn't been tried out that much in court.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    - themitigating 4y ago
      But you are now limiting your original argument
anon291 4y ago
If you define national security as preserving the American system of government, then no national security cannot be more important than free speech. There is no American system of government without free speech. Attempts to 'secure' the government by limiting free speech indicate the government we sought to protect no longer exists.

mistrial9 4y ago

basically agree as a US Citizen - let's think about the psychology of public policy just for a minute. When given an "order", upon hearing information that directs behavior that is not your choice or is new in some way, combined with restriction, inconvenience or most directly, feels threatening.. then a common personal reaction is to deny, disclaim, reject or attack the messenger and/or the message. Public policy is much older than the USA.. people with skills and methods in this area are not new to this reaction.. So the playing field is set. The age of Monarchy saw many obviously awful abuses of mono- or unilateral messaging.. "By decree of the King .. this that or the other" Certain religious groups in association with Monarchy did so even more.. into the private lives of people. So a founding principle of the purposefully diverse USA was.. free speech. You cannot be sent to prison for making fun of the King nor publicly defending prostitution .. for example. But here it gets difficult.. Obviously strong minds and wills have strong reactions. The social upheaval politically in 20th Century Europe had a high cost socially. But now, in the USA, we have credentialed experts in Science being silenced, not refuted. This is a new modern "low" and the use of technology to de-platform harkens directly back to ANATHEMA or ex-communication reaction.. it is very, very dark days for speech in the USA.

alexb_ 4y ago

>Especially common is for national security to override free speech in the minds of government officials. They can easily convince themselves that they need to suppress certain viewpoints in order to save many lives. It just coincidentally also saves their own jobs. Non-disclosure of secret information that you willingly make yourself privy to is not suppression of free speech.

fallingknife 4y ago
No it isn't. But OP is talking more about government suppressing public information. Like when the FBI told Zuckerberg to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story because it was Russian disinformation.
MichaelCollins 4y ago
Over-classification is a free speech issue. There's a moral difference between information being classified to protect the country, and information being classified to protect inept politicians and government officials from having to face the accountability of the public. For instance, the CIA spent the equivalent of several billion dollars trying to lift an obsolete Soviet submarine from the ocean floor, against the recommendations of the US Navy which thought they could recover the relevant materials using deep sea remote control 'drones' from a spy submarine, rather than using a surface ship to lift the whole sub, which they said would fail and risked discovery. Well it did fail, and they did get discovered and the US Government was forced to explain itself to the Soviet government. But in the aftermath of this boondoggle, the US government was more candid with the Soviets than with the American public. The rational for sharing information with the Soviets but not with the American public can only be to protect the CIA/etc from public accountability. They continue to use the ambiguity created by their secrecy to lead people to believe they were more successful than they actually were. The Soviets/Russians can get ground truth about this incident by sending their own drones down there to see what was left of the submarine. The CIA's classification of the incident serves to obscure the truth from the American public, not the Russians.
falcrist 4y ago
How is this not a limitation on freedom of speech? You have a piece of information that you aren't allowed to talk about. I think this is just a limitation that we're all mostly ok with.

hotpotamus 4y ago

Would you post here if people were allowed to say whatever they wanted?

catiopatio 4y ago
Absolutely. I post here now because the locally-enforced Overton window is much larger than alternative platforms, which makes conversations much more interesting, challenging, and productive. If people could say whatever they wanted here, I’d expect to see a lot more comments I wouldn’t bother engaging with at all, but that’s okay. I’m not a horse — I don’t need blinders to prevent me from getting spooked.
r3trohack3r 4y ago
This question seems disingenuous. Your comment equates the U.S. Government attempting to suppress speech critical of their own decisions with dang moderating an internet forum. These are not the same. The first amendment protects speech in the United States for good reason. There are bad people in the world. Those bad people can end up in government. The government wields incredible power. The three branches are meant to keep each other in check - but so are the citizens. The ability to vote in/out candidates is a balancing force. The humans in power being able to distort speech in the country to favor keeping them in power breaks that balancing force. This article is asking "did the government attempt to suppress speech." That has nothing to do with moderation on HN. dang is not a representative of a government. It's entirely reasonable (IMO) for the mods here to suppress speech critical of decisions a government is making - it's their site. It is entirely unreasonable for a government to suppress speech critical of decisions the government is making. Blurring that line is how you do a fascism.
- hotpotamus 4y ago
  There's a lot there, but you know, I'm just tired of seeing people die from what are almost certainly (vaccine) preventable illnesses. I've stood in enough funeral processions. I wonder if there is any way for the government to try and prevent that? It seems like they attempted to work with private companies (and passed no laws to coerce them into it). And what about the companies? Perhaps they agreed with those in government they were in contact with and worked to police their platforms. Would that look much different from coercion?