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I don't like how "I'm a free speech absolutist" has become "I want to force you to read my toxic rants, even when you try to get away from me." You yourself say

I don't like how "I'm a free speech absolutist" has become "I want to force you to read my toxic rants, even when you try to get away from me." You yourself say 4chan is "barely bearable." What free speech has meant historically is "I don't believe the government should be able to criminalize certain kinds of speech." It never meant "I am entitled to insert garbage into someone else's newspaper or book" until people started misappropriating the term.

stale2002 4y ago
That is what the block button is for. Most people who are in favor of free speech, are perfectly fine with you personally clicking the block button. Instead, what they don't want, is a centralized platform preventing consenting parties from engaging with each other. See the difference?
- fzeroracer 4y ago
  What exactly is the difference, again? A block button is prone to breaking thru numerical power. If enough people are responding to you and or harassing you there is no manageable way to block all of them, especially without first passively engaging with their posts in the first place. So instead people build addons and blocklists to manage all of that for them. Now you have a separate centralized platform for dealing with a certain subset of users. And if that doesn't work or if they don't want to put in that effort they just leave the platform instead. They go to somewhere else where the social agreement with the platform is to automatically filter out or remove those users. Hence why few people actually use the free speech platforms like Gab, Parker etc.
  - stale2002 4y ago
    > What exactly is the difference, again? Think about 2 situations. Person A, wants to see the content of Person B. So person A voluntarily chooses to see the content. And the other situation is Person C, does not want to see the content of person B, so chooses not to do so. > there is no manageable way to block all of them Yes there is. Someone could choose to allow an automated method of blocking people that they don't want to see. As long as nobody is forced to use this automated moderation, or can change it, while still having access to that platform, then it is fine. > Now you have a separate centralized platform for dealing with a certain subset of users. No actually, it is quite a bit different. The difference being that a person could chose to modify this blocking authority. It is all fine and well to have blocking authorities, as long as I, the user can turn it off, if I choose to do so, on that platform, or otherwise modify my own blocklist, or add a white list. So that is the solution. Feel free to have blocklists. Just let me change the blocklist, for myself, if I disagree with it. There, everyone gets what they want.
- x86_64Ubuntu 4y ago
  >...Instead, what they don't want, is a centralized platform preventing consenting parties from engaging with each other Who doesn't want that? The billions of people that interact with Twitter and Facebook, or the people who are sympathetic to the fringe racist beliefs that dominate "free speech" sites?
Dylan16807 4y ago
It's more that "absolutism" tends to be bad, no matter what you apply it to.
coinbasetwwa 4y ago
This is a weird take. Most folks are old enough to remember the pre trump-era internet and society where alternating views were allowed and engaged with as opposed to leading to bans and social cancellation. Conflating that with allowing people to shove views in your face is odd, your ability to tune out is distinctly different from one’s ability to broadcast.

stale2002 4y ago

That is what the block button is for. Most people who are in favor of free speech, are perfectly fine with you personally clicking the block button. Instead, what they don't want, is a centralized platform preventing consenting parties from engaging with each other. See the difference?

fzeroracer 4y ago
What exactly is the difference, again? A block button is prone to breaking thru numerical power. If enough people are responding to you and or harassing you there is no manageable way to block all of them, especially without first passively engaging with their posts in the first place. So instead people build addons and blocklists to manage all of that for them. Now you have a separate centralized platform for dealing with a certain subset of users. And if that doesn't work or if they don't want to put in that effort they just leave the platform instead. They go to somewhere else where the social agreement with the platform is to automatically filter out or remove those users. Hence why few people actually use the free speech platforms like Gab, Parker etc.
- stale2002 4y ago
  > What exactly is the difference, again? Think about 2 situations. Person A, wants to see the content of Person B. So person A voluntarily chooses to see the content. And the other situation is Person C, does not want to see the content of person B, so chooses not to do so. > there is no manageable way to block all of them Yes there is. Someone could choose to allow an automated method of blocking people that they don't want to see. As long as nobody is forced to use this automated moderation, or can change it, while still having access to that platform, then it is fine. > Now you have a separate centralized platform for dealing with a certain subset of users. No actually, it is quite a bit different. The difference being that a person could chose to modify this blocking authority. It is all fine and well to have blocking authorities, as long as I, the user can turn it off, if I choose to do so, on that platform, or otherwise modify my own blocklist, or add a white list. So that is the solution. Feel free to have blocklists. Just let me change the blocklist, for myself, if I disagree with it. There, everyone gets what they want.
x86_64Ubuntu 4y ago
>...Instead, what they don't want, is a centralized platform preventing consenting parties from engaging with each other Who doesn't want that? The billions of people that interact with Twitter and Facebook, or the people who are sympathetic to the fringe racist beliefs that dominate "free speech" sites?

Dylan16807 4y ago

It's more that "absolutism" tends to be bad, no matter what you apply it to.

coinbasetwwa 4y ago

This is a weird take. Most folks are old enough to remember the pre trump-era internet and society where alternating views were allowed and engaged with as opposed to leading to bans and social cancellation. Conflating that with allowing people to shove views in your face is odd, your ability to tune out is distinctly different from one’s ability to broadcast.