6 ms·

I think this is a bit hyperbolic language. It's not 'cruel' for any administration to indicate basic realities without some arbitrary historical and legal cont

by jasmer 4y ago

I think this is a bit hyperbolic language. It's not 'cruel' for any administration to indicate basic realities without some arbitrary historical and legal context. While we should be eternally vigilant and skeptical, the lack of very specific context in this case is nowhere near a blatant manipulation. In fact, I would say the 'problem' is maybe the opposite - I am somewhat more skeptical that this is a 'Musk led personal intervention' to draw arbitrary cynicism towards a political entity he does not like - playing 'moral equivalence' games with people who say "The economy is doing good!" (without nuanced context) and "I won the election!" (without the obvious 'context' that the statement is literally false, or blatantly misleading). That said, it's just skepticism, I really can't say one way or the other obviously. There's clearly a grey threshold in what we can tolerate from government and political statements, and it's very hard to fathom where that line is - but this one is not near that line. If any administration wants to claim "Lowest unemployment ever!" in a Tweet, well then that's fine. They can say that as long as it's true, a history lesson is not needed in this case. In any case, if they are going to do this, they need a set of publicly stated criteria for it, and they need to apply the criteria objectively and consistently.

kaimalcolm 4y ago
My question then is, would/will the same fact-checking apply to a different government that Musk does support? He’s been pushing for this equal fact checking and equal platform for both parties, but as far as I can tell we’re not seeing these banners anywhere on politics Twitter besides official government accounts.
TimTheTinker 4y ago
> It's not 'cruel' for any administration to indicate the obvious facts without some arbitrary historical and legal context. Yes, it is. A leader's first responsibility is to tell the truth -- and citing misleading statistics is worse than an outright lie. It is cruel to lie to people in a way that causes them harm.
- gleenn 4y ago
  Unless I'm not understanding the article, it seems like the tweet was truthful, the payout is the highest it's been. Is that entirely due to Biden, less clear. Could also be just adjusting to inflation, also true. But how many things are not adjusted to inflation, so even if the only reason the payout is highest is because of inflation, well at least they are making it match and not ignoring it like a million other things. There are no lies here, only things which might be hard to attribute. And I think it's reasonable to attribute this to Biden in all but the most narrow of interpretations.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    > Could also be just adjusting to inflation Could also be? You definitely are not understanding the article.
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
      For anyone else that didn't read the first paragraph of the article, here it is: > The White House deleted a Twitter post on Wednesday touting an increase in Social Security benefits for seniors after the social media platform added a “context” note pointing out that the increase was tied to a 1972 law requiring automatic increases based on cost of living changes. Emphasis is mine; added for "context". :)
- jasmer 4y ago
  You really are having a hard time with the words 'cruel' and 'harm'. The WH statements are not misleading, and they definitely do not cause 'harm'. You're using the language of post-modern/post-reality hyperbole politics which frankly, might be our greatest scourge at the moment. When Donald Trump Tweeted that "The US had the lowest unemployment rate for African Americans" during his tenure, one could argue that's a bit of a stretch in terms of him taking credit. The press had a lot to say about it. But it's fully within his purview to say that even if it really does require contextualization. There's no need to 'fix' a Tweet or statement like that. When people say things like 'XYZ cures cancer!' - or 'XYZ politician is secretly abusing children in the basement of a restaurant' - then there's a moderation issue.
lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
> "Lowest unemployment ever!" This is a different kind of statement when it's not hedged in any way as compared to the tweet as quoted in the article. > “Seniors are getting the biggest increase in their Social Security checks in 10 years through President Biden’s leadership” (emphasis mine) Of course it's easy to assume that they said "the biggest increase" to make it sound as good as possible and it's easy to assume that they said "in 10 years" because they didn't want to just lie. But then, why did they need to include "through President Biden's leadership"? Isn't that technically false if it happened "through 50-year-old legislation"? That being said, why do you think that statement isn't intentionally misleading? Or if you do think it's intentionally misleading, why do you think the context shouldn't be added? I don't buy that it's arbitrary; it's clearly relevant to the statement that was made. Certainly I'd agree that this policy is absolutely ripe for abuse (through arbitrary application) but so far I haven't seen a reason for people to think that it will be or has been abused, barring the assumptions they choose to make.
- treeman79 4y ago
  Over spending / printing money by the government is the cause of inflation. So if Biden wants to take credit for that. Let him.
  - zwily 4y ago
    My reaction when I saw that tweet was “is the White House seriously blaming our record inflation on Biden’s leadership?”
  - EricDeb 4y ago
    partially, it is happening worldwide though
- jasmer 4y ago
  The statement "Lowest unemployment ever!" is definitely 'hedged' in the same manner as this Tweet about benefits. Taking credit for the 'lowest employment' especially using the term 'ever' would require an hour of debatable qualifications to make it entirely clear. Would the President make this statement in his 1st month in office, make this a bit of a nonrepresentational statement? Well, probably. But it's still true. This understanding that somehow this specific WH statement is hedged or loaded in some kind of special manner just isn't correct. In fact, you could likely delve a bit deeper into it as well to find even more relevant nuance. "Why do you think that statement isn't intentionally misleading?" It's true, and it doesn't require any more context than any other statement, so it's fine. I think it would be naive of us to expect that the statement by the WH or any political body is going to run us down on the details and caveats of their statements unless they are hugely relevant. Some of the language used here that this causes 'cruelty and harm' etc. is ridiculous. This language within the scope of normal communications enough that we would not even be having this discussion were Twitter to not have initially marked the Tweet. The so called 'cruelty and harm' would have gone entirely unnoticed. And finally, this is not a threshold of content moderation for arbitrary 3rd parties to make arbitrary corrections. I'd love a feature that allowed me to add my favourite 'truthy-meter' to Twitter statements, but I'd loathe to trust Twitter specifically for things that are so mundane. They have a responsibility to call out hard misinformation, such as vaccine or election lies - but not arbitrary quips.
pastacacioepepe 4y ago
> the lack of very specific context in this case is nowhere near a blatant manipulation I disagree. First of all the increase wasn't Biden's administration merit and that's one blatant lie. Then if the social security benefits have increased only to keep up with inflation, to celebrate this as positive is clearly misinformation. Those receiving the benefits are as poor as they were before, while society as a whole becomes poorer. Nothing to celebrate here.

by jasmer 4y ago

kaimalcolm 4y ago

My question then is, would/will the same fact-checking apply to a different government that Musk does support? He’s been pushing for this equal fact checking and equal platform for both parties, but as far as I can tell we’re not seeing these banners anywhere on politics Twitter besides official government accounts.

TimTheTinker 4y ago

> It's not 'cruel' for any administration to indicate the obvious facts without some arbitrary historical and legal context. Yes, it is. A leader's first responsibility is to tell the truth -- and citing misleading statistics is worse than an outright lie. It is cruel to lie to people in a way that causes them harm.

gleenn 4y ago
Unless I'm not understanding the article, it seems like the tweet was truthful, the payout is the highest it's been. Is that entirely due to Biden, less clear. Could also be just adjusting to inflation, also true. But how many things are not adjusted to inflation, so even if the only reason the payout is highest is because of inflation, well at least they are making it match and not ignoring it like a million other things. There are no lies here, only things which might be hard to attribute. And I think it's reasonable to attribute this to Biden in all but the most narrow of interpretations.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > Could also be just adjusting to inflation Could also be? You definitely are not understanding the article.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    For anyone else that didn't read the first paragraph of the article, here it is: > The White House deleted a Twitter post on Wednesday touting an increase in Social Security benefits for seniors after the social media platform added a “context” note pointing out that the increase was tied to a 1972 law requiring automatic increases based on cost of living changes. Emphasis is mine; added for "context". :)
jasmer 4y ago
You really are having a hard time with the words 'cruel' and 'harm'. The WH statements are not misleading, and they definitely do not cause 'harm'. You're using the language of post-modern/post-reality hyperbole politics which frankly, might be our greatest scourge at the moment. When Donald Trump Tweeted that "The US had the lowest unemployment rate for African Americans" during his tenure, one could argue that's a bit of a stretch in terms of him taking credit. The press had a lot to say about it. But it's fully within his purview to say that even if it really does require contextualization. There's no need to 'fix' a Tweet or statement like that. When people say things like 'XYZ cures cancer!' - or 'XYZ politician is secretly abusing children in the basement of a restaurant' - then there's a moderation issue.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago

> "Lowest unemployment ever!" This is a different kind of statement when it's not hedged in any way as compared to the tweet as quoted in the article. > “Seniors are getting the biggest increase in their Social Security checks in 10 years through President Biden’s leadership” (emphasis mine) Of course it's easy to assume that they said "the biggest increase" to make it sound as good as possible and it's easy to assume that they said "in 10 years" because they didn't want to just lie. But then, why did they need to include "through President Biden's leadership"? Isn't that technically false if it happened "through 50-year-old legislation"? That being said, why do you think that statement isn't intentionally misleading? Or if you do think it's intentionally misleading, why do you think the context shouldn't be added? I don't buy that it's arbitrary; it's clearly relevant to the statement that was made. Certainly I'd agree that this policy is absolutely ripe for abuse (through arbitrary application) but so far I haven't seen a reason for people to think that it will be or has been abused, barring the assumptions they choose to make.

treeman79 4y ago
Over spending / printing money by the government is the cause of inflation. So if Biden wants to take credit for that. Let him.
- zwily 4y ago
  My reaction when I saw that tweet was “is the White House seriously blaming our record inflation on Biden’s leadership?”
- EricDeb 4y ago
  partially, it is happening worldwide though
jasmer 4y ago
The statement "Lowest unemployment ever!" is definitely 'hedged' in the same manner as this Tweet about benefits. Taking credit for the 'lowest employment' especially using the term 'ever' would require an hour of debatable qualifications to make it entirely clear. Would the President make this statement in his 1st month in office, make this a bit of a nonrepresentational statement? Well, probably. But it's still true. This understanding that somehow this specific WH statement is hedged or loaded in some kind of special manner just isn't correct. In fact, you could likely delve a bit deeper into it as well to find even more relevant nuance. "Why do you think that statement isn't intentionally misleading?" It's true, and it doesn't require any more context than any other statement, so it's fine. I think it would be naive of us to expect that the statement by the WH or any political body is going to run us down on the details and caveats of their statements unless they are hugely relevant. Some of the language used here that this causes 'cruelty and harm' etc. is ridiculous. This language within the scope of normal communications enough that we would not even be having this discussion were Twitter to not have initially marked the Tweet. The so called 'cruelty and harm' would have gone entirely unnoticed. And finally, this is not a threshold of content moderation for arbitrary 3rd parties to make arbitrary corrections. I'd love a feature that allowed me to add my favourite 'truthy-meter' to Twitter statements, but I'd loathe to trust Twitter specifically for things that are so mundane. They have a responsibility to call out hard misinformation, such as vaccine or election lies - but not arbitrary quips.

pastacacioepepe 4y ago

> the lack of very specific context in this case is nowhere near a blatant manipulation I disagree. First of all the increase wasn't Biden's administration merit and that's one blatant lie. Then if the social security benefits have increased only to keep up with inflation, to celebrate this as positive is clearly misinformation. Those receiving the benefits are as poor as they were before, while society as a whole becomes poorer. Nothing to celebrate here.