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If we were in a normal time period in history where "the left" was a lot closer to the classical liberal stance on speech (sort of an attitude of "I might hate

If we were in a normal time period in history where "the left" was a lot closer to the classical liberal stance on speech (sort of an attitude of "I might hate what you say, but I must defend your right to say it") then I don't think as many people would bring up the problem of censorship so aggressively and repeatedly as there'd be significant pushback in institutions against speech restrictions. But we're in an era where it certainly feels like some people are rushing to cheerlead censorship of all forms: whether from government or mega-corporation in concert with government. I view this as a really big problem for the world as some of the most important and life-changing issues are effectively shut down from discussion, which could lead to a great calamity. So what suggestions would you offer to somebody like me who sees this as a really gigantic problem?

xpe 4y ago
I probably don't share the degree to which you fear of censorship. I also find it intellectually problematic to emphasize censorship without also talking about the broader problems of manipulation occurring with too much centralized control over media. Censorship is just one particular form of manipulation -- and practically speaking, just the tip of the iceberg. Focusing on censorship to the exclusion of broader goals for a healthy population and society is too narrow and leads to poor policy. But since you asked for suggestions, I'll try. I don't have time to make this brief. Sorry! At the individual level: I think it's really important to educate and discuss the following with many people as you can -- when and how is the hard part! -- A. Personally, don't be too quick to shut the door on relationships. The default response to someone who offends you should not be to shout them down nor to cut all ties. Depending on the context, seek to understand, if possible, share your point of view, and in the rare cases where a real discussion happens, you might have a small impact. With enough of these interactions, we can stop demonizing each other. B. Understand what the First Amendment protects and does not protect. C. Understand the similarities and differences between censorship and moderation. There can be a fine line, and we need to talk about it more. D. Let's get clear on when censorship is appropriate. Little Malfoy wants to publish an article about torturing their pet dog in the school newsletter? No thanks. Yes, please censor him. E. If an organization controls a forum, it is its prerogative to shape its content according to the policies it sets and responsibility to comply with applicable laws. F. Let's get clear on why it is important for a government to protect freedom of expression. The primary reason is to protect citizen rights to criticize their government. G. Let's talk about employment contracts. Under what conditions would you sign a contract that prevents you from disparaging your employer? To step back to the legal policy level, when are these kind of contracts in the public interest? H. Let's talk about media ownership. What happens when one party exercises significant (direct or indirect) control over a media market? I. There are many forms of media manipulation that at times can be worse than censorship. Misinformation, conflicts of interest, outright lies, promotion of vice, and much more. J. How do you prove censorship? How do you prove media manipulation? K. What responsibility does a media outlet have to its audience? L. Let's talk about how many media outlets have shifted to caring more about {short term ratings and entertainment} and relatively less about investigative journalism. This may seem like a little bit of a tangent, but it explains what is actually happening without resorting to any conspiracy to censor. M. Understand why organizations sponsor celebrities. It is all about image. When that image is a liability, it is rational for a sponsorship to get cancelled. N. If you are a content producer and you are concerned that your media channel could drop you at any instant, look into alternative channels and contract protections. Lacking such protections, recognize that you better be careful with what you say. And if you do get canceled, don't go out and blame other people like it was some surprise. You probably knew it was coming. You may have even wanted the controversy. O. Understand that "being cancelled" largely falls into the same category as other "information cascades" (the term by James Surowiecki). This is the same dynamic that makes standing in line for an hour for a cupcake cool. There does not have to be any large political organization pulling strings for this to happen. All that is required is humanity's natural tendencies (status signaling, behavior emulation as a low information strategy); in other words, the proclivity to be lemmings. P. Now, if you are a private citizen, not a public figure, and something you do catches the public eye, and you feel the scathing judgment of the world, that sucks. Q. The above point (P) is probably what everyday people are most anxious of w.r.t. cancel culture. Such fear is stoked by many talking heads on the right; e.g. they will discuss a public figure who was making millions but "got canceled on Twitter", will muddle the facts and laws in play in order to pull at the heartstrings of individuals to generate fear that John Smith is going to become a pariah in their hometown for praying in the bleachers at a football game! R. To me, point P above, when genuinely in play, is probably the most vexing policy debate in this whole forest of issues. I don't feel comfortable that there are effective ways to protect these kinds of victims. Such scenarios seem like crowdsourced hypocritical, unjust, punishments exacted on an unlucky individual who probably behaves mostly like everyone else. They just found themselves under the microscope. Perhaps we need some kind of anti-stalking law, when the stalker is an angry public? S. Understand that many people complaining about "woke culture" are often parroting talking points. These are not usually people who are pausing think about the issue deeply. Such people are upset and have plenty to be upset about. Much of their discomfort comes from disagreeing with how the world is changing. Unfortunately, their understanding of causality for these changes is very much unexamined. So personally, I can relate to the discomfort and respect people's desire to see a better world, but unfortunately many are just stumbling around looking for one villain. It is kind of sad, up until the point that their anger boils over and makes the situation even worse. T. If you are a professional attending a conference (where you will interact with people), you definitely should read the terms carefully. You don't want to attend a conference where you can easily be accused but not properly defend yourself. Such situations create an unfair dynamic. U. I think the technology community has some reflection to do with regards to (U). It is not fair nor just to damage someone's career for something they said in a private conversation. V. Now if someone does a clearly inappropriate thing -- saying a racist or sexist comment -- we should not assume they do this repeatedly. We should treat them as irredeemable. We should not pretend like "we" have always been perfect either. W. We also have to recognize reasonable people can disagree on the gray areas. X. We must recognize that someone can feel hurt even if the speaker did not intend it. Y. It is not a sufficient criteria to punish someone only because someone else feels offense. We need to rely on stronger principles than that. Z. All things in proportion. We need to factor in uncertainty in our assessments. ## Closing So in a nutshell, if I could have a really substantive conversation about claimed censorship in the US (for example), I would be interested to see what the definition of censorship actually is. - Do they understand the First Amendment? - Is the other party talking about legal or illegal censorship? - Are they talking about cultural shifts that are uncomfortable? Make sure they recognize this -- don't gloss over it. What makes this particular discomfort different than other shifts which are mere annoyances? - Do they have the relevant facts at hand? - Do they understand how and why organizations function? - My sense is that most people see something they dislike, get angry about it, and that's the end of it. Most people don't really want to get into it. - Of the people that do want to get into it, most of them just want to convince you of what they're saying. - In the rare case that you find someone with a curious mind, critical thinking skills, the ability to recognize one's personal emotional involvement, and perhaps some background in philosophy, only then is it feasible to get into the deeper aspects of freedom of expression, identity, chilling effects of censorship, the advantages of diversity over conformity, and so on.
- logicalmonster 4y ago
  Thank you for your thoughtful feedback. My suggestion would be to write a book (you sort of already did) because you seem to want to dive deep into some of these issues and a non-HN format might give you a better platform for that. Lacking the time to more fully respond, I'll just give my quick thoughts on 3 quick points. > J. How do you prove censorship? How do you prove media manipulation? The current business model of the media guarantees bad behavior. Once the technology was invented to "count clicks" and directly see what caused somebody to visit them, the media figured out a way to drive their own profit. This makes it impossible to not have unethical behavior. I don't really need to prove anything when the system guarantees bad behavior. You don't need to have a formal scientific study and citations to know that an ice cream cone left outside on a hot day will melt. The environment its in guarantees it. > S. Understand that many people complaining about "woke culture" are often parroting talking points. These are not usually people who are pausing think about the issue deeply. Such people are upset and have plenty to be upset about. Much of their discomfort comes from disagreeing with how the world is changing. I'd just like to point out that the people who are complaining about woke culture are caught in a very painful situation. They see the world changing, but then the censorship largely forbids them to fully complain about that. And the world only ever responds by wanting to minimize their voice, firing them from their job, and calling them names like racist. Whatever you want to say about the ethics of this situation, this is not a recipe for a good social outcome. If you want to create a pile of socially alienated people with nothing left to lose (never a good outcome) the current course we're on is the perfect trajectory for that. > V. Now if someone does a clearly inappropriate thing -- saying a racist or sexist comment -- we should not assume they do this repeatedly. We should treat them as irredeemable. We should not pretend like "we" have always been perfect either. Did you mean to say "We should not treat them as irredeemable"?
  - xpe 4y ago
    Excellent point about how people feel trapped where they can't say what they feel. This gets overlooked. Yes, media dynamics are predictably dysfunctional. Thanks for discussing. I'll try to write more. Yes, I got (V) wrong. Whoops. I meant that we should view people as redeemable. On a second look, I don't like my word choice of "redeemable" ... the word itself suggests that a wrong belief or statement by a person makes them less worthy of respect. I don't mean that.

xpe 4y ago

I probably don't share the degree to which you fear of censorship. I also find it intellectually problematic to emphasize censorship without also talking about the broader problems of manipulation occurring with too much centralized control over media. Censorship is just one particular form of manipulation -- and practically speaking, just the tip of the iceberg. Focusing on censorship to the exclusion of broader goals for a healthy population and society is too narrow and leads to poor policy. But since you asked for suggestions, I'll try. I don't have time to make this brief. Sorry! At the individual level: I think it's really important to educate and discuss the following with many people as you can -- when and how is the hard part! -- A. Personally, don't be too quick to shut the door on relationships. The default response to someone who offends you should not be to shout them down nor to cut all ties. Depending on the context, seek to understand, if possible, share your point of view, and in the rare cases where a real discussion happens, you might have a small impact. With enough of these interactions, we can stop demonizing each other. B. Understand what the First Amendment protects and does not protect. C. Understand the similarities and differences between censorship and moderation. There can be a fine line, and we need to talk about it more. D. Let's get clear on when censorship is appropriate. Little Malfoy wants to publish an article about torturing their pet dog in the school newsletter? No thanks. Yes, please censor him. E. If an organization controls a forum, it is its prerogative to shape its content according to the policies it sets and responsibility to comply with applicable laws. F. Let's get clear on why it is important for a government to protect freedom of expression. The primary reason is to protect citizen rights to criticize their government. G. Let's talk about employment contracts. Under what conditions would you sign a contract that prevents you from disparaging your employer? To step back to the legal policy level, when are these kind of contracts in the public interest? H. Let's talk about media ownership. What happens when one party exercises significant (direct or indirect) control over a media market? I. There are many forms of media manipulation that at times can be worse than censorship. Misinformation, conflicts of interest, outright lies, promotion of vice, and much more. J. How do you prove censorship? How do you prove media manipulation? K. What responsibility does a media outlet have to its audience? L. Let's talk about how many media outlets have shifted to caring more about {short term ratings and entertainment} and relatively less about investigative journalism. This may seem like a little bit of a tangent, but it explains what is actually happening without resorting to any conspiracy to censor. M. Understand why organizations sponsor celebrities. It is all about image. When that image is a liability, it is rational for a sponsorship to get cancelled. N. If you are a content producer and you are concerned that your media channel could drop you at any instant, look into alternative channels and contract protections. Lacking such protections, recognize that you better be careful with what you say. And if you do get canceled, don't go out and blame other people like it was some surprise. You probably knew it was coming. You may have even wanted the controversy. O. Understand that "being cancelled" largely falls into the same category as other "information cascades" (the term by James Surowiecki). This is the same dynamic that makes standing in line for an hour for a cupcake cool. There does not have to be any large political organization pulling strings for this to happen. All that is required is humanity's natural tendencies (status signaling, behavior emulation as a low information strategy); in other words, the proclivity to be lemmings. P. Now, if you are a private citizen, not a public figure, and something you do catches the public eye, and you feel the scathing judgment of the world, that sucks. Q. The above point (P) is probably what everyday people are most anxious of w.r.t. cancel culture. Such fear is stoked by many talking heads on the right; e.g. they will discuss a public figure who was making millions but "got canceled on Twitter", will muddle the facts and laws in play in order to pull at the heartstrings of individuals to generate fear that John Smith is going to become a pariah in their hometown for praying in the bleachers at a football game! R. To me, point P above, when genuinely in play, is probably the most vexing policy debate in this whole forest of issues. I don't feel comfortable that there are effective ways to protect these kinds of victims. Such scenarios seem like crowdsourced hypocritical, unjust, punishments exacted on an unlucky individual who probably behaves mostly like everyone else. They just found themselves under the microscope. Perhaps we need some kind of anti-stalking law, when the stalker is an angry public? S. Understand that many people complaining about "woke culture" are often parroting talking points. These are not usually people who are pausing think about the issue deeply. Such people are upset and have plenty to be upset about. Much of their discomfort comes from disagreeing with how the world is changing. Unfortunately, their understanding of causality for these changes is very much unexamined. So personally, I can relate to the discomfort and respect people's desire to see a better world, but unfortunately many are just stumbling around looking for one villain. It is kind of sad, up until the point that their anger boils over and makes the situation even worse. T. If you are a professional attending a conference (where you will interact with people), you definitely should read the terms carefully. You don't want to attend a conference where you can easily be accused but not properly defend yourself. Such situations create an unfair dynamic. U. I think the technology community has some reflection to do with regards to (U). It is not fair nor just to damage someone's career for something they said in a private conversation. V. Now if someone does a clearly inappropriate thing -- saying a racist or sexist comment -- we should not assume they do this repeatedly. We should treat them as irredeemable. We should not pretend like "we" have always been perfect either. W. We also have to recognize reasonable people can disagree on the gray areas. X. We must recognize that someone can feel hurt even if the speaker did not intend it. Y. It is not a sufficient criteria to punish someone only because someone else feels offense. We need to rely on stronger principles than that. Z. All things in proportion. We need to factor in uncertainty in our assessments. ## Closing So in a nutshell, if I could have a really substantive conversation about claimed censorship in the US (for example), I would be interested to see what the definition of censorship actually is. - Do they understand the First Amendment? - Is the other party talking about legal or illegal censorship? - Are they talking about cultural shifts that are uncomfortable? Make sure they recognize this -- don't gloss over it. What makes this particular discomfort different than other shifts which are mere annoyances? - Do they have the relevant facts at hand? - Do they understand how and why organizations function? - My sense is that most people see something they dislike, get angry about it, and that's the end of it. Most people don't really want to get into it. - Of the people that do want to get into it, most of them just want to convince you of what they're saying. - In the rare case that you find someone with a curious mind, critical thinking skills, the ability to recognize one's personal emotional involvement, and perhaps some background in philosophy, only then is it feasible to get into the deeper aspects of freedom of expression, identity, chilling effects of censorship, the advantages of diversity over conformity, and so on.

logicalmonster 4y ago
Thank you for your thoughtful feedback. My suggestion would be to write a book (you sort of already did) because you seem to want to dive deep into some of these issues and a non-HN format might give you a better platform for that. Lacking the time to more fully respond, I'll just give my quick thoughts on 3 quick points. > J. How do you prove censorship? How do you prove media manipulation? The current business model of the media guarantees bad behavior. Once the technology was invented to "count clicks" and directly see what caused somebody to visit them, the media figured out a way to drive their own profit. This makes it impossible to not have unethical behavior. I don't really need to prove anything when the system guarantees bad behavior. You don't need to have a formal scientific study and citations to know that an ice cream cone left outside on a hot day will melt. The environment its in guarantees it. > S. Understand that many people complaining about "woke culture" are often parroting talking points. These are not usually people who are pausing think about the issue deeply. Such people are upset and have plenty to be upset about. Much of their discomfort comes from disagreeing with how the world is changing. I'd just like to point out that the people who are complaining about woke culture are caught in a very painful situation. They see the world changing, but then the censorship largely forbids them to fully complain about that. And the world only ever responds by wanting to minimize their voice, firing them from their job, and calling them names like racist. Whatever you want to say about the ethics of this situation, this is not a recipe for a good social outcome. If you want to create a pile of socially alienated people with nothing left to lose (never a good outcome) the current course we're on is the perfect trajectory for that. > V. Now if someone does a clearly inappropriate thing -- saying a racist or sexist comment -- we should not assume they do this repeatedly. We should treat them as irredeemable. We should not pretend like "we" have always been perfect either. Did you mean to say "We should not treat them as irredeemable"?
- xpe 4y ago
  Excellent point about how people feel trapped where they can't say what they feel. This gets overlooked. Yes, media dynamics are predictably dysfunctional. Thanks for discussing. I'll try to write more. Yes, I got (V) wrong. Whoops. I meant that we should view people as redeemable. On a second look, I don't like my word choice of "redeemable" ... the word itself suggests that a wrong belief or statement by a person makes them less worthy of respect. I don't mean that.