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Still ironic. Twitter had rolled out the "government-affiliated media" tag as a panic signal to mark -adversary- states' media, on the old chestnut of "other go
by bigger_inside 3y ago
Still ironic. Twitter had rolled out the "government-affiliated media" tag as a panic signal to mark -adversary- states' media, on the old chestnut of "other governments do propaganda, Western governments are honest!", combined with "governments lie, corporations are trustworthy!" - nobody ever labeled anything as "profit-driven corporation that will boost any foolish moral panic to make money off off you".
Nobody in their right mind should ever have fallen for this in the first place, but here we are. It made the "government-affiliated" tag toxic. If you want to right this ship somehow, two options for immediate first steps: Leave this foolishness completely. No labels by the platform.
Or add other tags, like they do now; but then you just add to the bezzle, why are profit media still not labeled? Why .. not a million other things you could? who would even decide what the labels are? With what justification? Labeling by a central authority is bound to be a joke.
Elon went for option two, which makes the joke that are labels obvious. This is, of course, the social function trolling has always had (there's a great study by Whitney Phillips, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, which emphasizes this: On the surface, trolling is just silly, perhaps "dirty"; but it also reveals the foolishness behind the outrage machine.)