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> The company’s aggressive pursuit of growth, coupled with lack of moderation in the app, has already led Signal employees themselves to publicly question wheth

> The company’s aggressive pursuit of growth, coupled with lack of moderation in the app, has already led Signal employees themselves to publicly question whether growth might come from abusive users, such as far-right groups using Signal to organize. Lol what? What exactly does far-right mean in this case? Why intersperse irrelevant political digs at another ill-defined faction? Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative?

renewiltord 3y ago
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to be moderated.
AbrahamParangi 3y ago
The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the left has been written about extensively but I’d love to read a sympathetic, anthropological investigation into it. I say sympathetic because I don’t believe you can understand anything without really seeing how a reasonable person could come to those same conclusions.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- printforest 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - AbrahamParangi 3y ago
    I was more talking about this kind of reaction.
    - maxbond 3y ago
      If you say something incisive to piss people off and trigger a reaction, and you get the reaction you're looking for, what we've established is that you are willing to piss people off to serve your rhetorical ends. Nothing else. This of the "stop hitting yourself" form of argumentation.
      - generalizations 3y ago
        He observed an 'intolerance of wrongthink' and got a reaction where someone was, in fact, intolerant of wrongthink. I don't see how that's anything but a confirmation.
        maxbond 3y ago
        That's a mischaracterization, the comment was pointing out "intolerance of wrong think" on the right. There are other criticisms to be made of that comment (eg it violated the guidelines by devolving into personal attack), but "intolerance of wrong think" isn't one of them. Even if it were, it wouldn't matter. If I cared to I could construct an equivalent comment baiting right-wingers and declare victory when someone took issue with it. If you're going to take someone getting pissed off as proof of something, anyone willing to engage in such rhetoric will be able to convince you of anything.
- enragedcacti 3y ago
  The paradox of tolerance gets you a long way to understanding it, but you will also have to be far more specific if you want answers because practically everyone has limits to what they consider acceptable speech, even if they don't call it that. Beyond that, there is a pretty concerted effort to elevate minor grievances into the national spotlight to portray the left a certain way, e.g. the Oberlin Cafeteria scandal, where story in the college paper about the quality of the food in their college cafeteria became both a national news story and a symbol of just how deranged the left had become. Is that actually indicative of anything? Is it something the general public should actually care about? Does it even reflect "the left" as a political body? I think once you start asking those questions a lot of the "wrongthink" stories (not all!) start seeming a lot closer to college kids complaining about bad food than they are to the sands of politics and free speech shifting underfoot.
  - nostromo 3y ago
    People are constantly misapplying The Paradox of Tolerance - which is an argument for protecting free speech in all cases other than one: opposition of free speech. Somehow that got contorted by modern-day activists into "I can shout down or physically attack people I don't agree with" -- which is exactly opposite of what was being argued by Popper. It's an argument for more permissive expression, not less. He notes that the best path is nearly always rational argumentation of opposing views.
    - foldr 3y ago
      I can't find any textual support for that narrow interpretation of the Paradox of Tolerance in anything that Popper wrote. Where does he say that only opposition to freedom of speech counts as 'intolerance' in the relevant sense?
      - nostromo 3y ago
        You'll need to read the book -- if you're looking for a soundbite you're doing yourself a disservice -- it's short anyway. But note that he's talking specifically about argumentation. The book is a response to Plato, who generally opposed free speech for the masses. In general, Popper strongly disagrees with Plato. And it's important to note that he described of the paradox as he understood it from Plato, but does not necessarily endorse it. The people suddenly fond of this one footnote might take a moment and read his work anyway, as they may be surprised to read his views on socialism and Marx specifically.
- btreecat 3y ago
  You might be interested in "The paradox of tolerance" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance >Karl Popper described it as the seemingly self-contradictory idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.
- programmarchy 3y ago
  René Girard has done an anthropological investigation of this topic. The gist of it is through the psycho-social mechanism of scapegoating, opposing groups can simultaneously believe they are victims while acting as oppressors, often using their victim status as justification for their oppression of "the other". Girard explores this phenomenon of scapegoating and postulates it goes back to primitive humans e.g. during a drought tensions rise within a tribe, and a certain "witchy" tribe member is singled out to take the blame and either expelled or murdered. After this, social tensions in the tribe are relieved (even if the drought does not subside), and the scapegoat paradoxically becomes a sacred, or savior, figure. Through history, this develops into ritual and religion. It provides a useful lens to reason about messianic cults, as well as social power dynamics. There's a good overview on his Wikipedia page, but he delves into this particular topic in the book Violence and the Sacred. He also pioneered the field of Generative Anthropology, which other academics like Eric Gans have built upon, theorizing about the mechanism in much more detail, and using it to explain effects in modern culture.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
    Thank you for referencing Girard! Agreed that this is a compelling hypothesis Have you looked through “A thousand plateaus” from Deleuze/Guattari (I don’t know anyone who has actually read the whole thing)?
    - programmarchy 3y ago
      I timidly approached Deleuze a few years ago but didn't make it very far, haha. Should probably give it ago again... did you find it useful?
      - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
        Yes! Though if I could follow along for more than a few pages I would probably get more out of it. I’m going to actually restart with just Ch15 and see if that is a better approach
- f38zf5vdt 3y ago
  Yet, remarkably, many others will identify with: > The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the right has been written about extensively but I’d love to read a sympathetic, anthropological investigation into it. > I say sympathetic because I don’t believe you can understand anything without really seeing how a reasonable person could come to those same conclusions. We are diving deep into the irony of bifurcated political systems where the two groups simultaneously believe themselves to be victims of their opposing teams rather than circumstance and systemic failures.
- boplicity 3y ago
  > The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the left Basically, people are fed up with general bigotry, racism, misogyny, and the destruction of the environment -- all of which have real life and death consequences for many people. That, combined with polarization, has made people very reactive to which "side" they perceive things to be on.
  - ralusek 3y ago
    People are just now fed up with those things, at their lowest point in history?
    - boplicity 3y ago
      Of course people are fed up with those things. They also have the ability to organize and make noise about it. That, combined with polarization, as I've said, heightens both the activism and the perception of such activism.
      - ASalazarMX 3y ago
        I think polarization is the main cause. Demagogues love to craft an "us vs them" narrative, pose as heroes of the "us" side, and plenty of gullible people fall for it with gusto. Mentally, we're still monkeys who will follow a strong leader without questioning. Mind you, demagogues are not only politicians, they can be human rights activists, teachers, businessmen, neighbors, etc. Emotion managing should be a mandatory class at basic school, so many of us need to think with our heads instead of our guts.
- fluidcruft 3y ago
  I can't say that I have found the right to be any more accepting of wrongthink.
astrea 3y ago
[flagged]
FormerBandmate 3y ago
Theoretically Nazis could use signal. Nazis can also use any other technology, this justification is really stupid
- anonym29 3y ago
  Hitler drank water, ergo drinking water is bad! /s
danbruc 3y ago
[...] coupled with lack of moderation in the app [...] Where does Signal need moderation? Can you have public groups where anyone can join? EDIT: Just looked it up, there are now public groups. [1] Never noticed this despite using Signal as essentially the only messaging app for years. EDIT: Actually not, there seems to be nothing on that web page and it is certainly nothing official. [1] https://signal-groups.com/en/ https://signal-groups.com/en/
bagacrap 3y ago
Proud Boys would be a good example. Not sure why they have to single out the right though. I guess every periodical has to take a stance on politics. The original source just said: """ Employees worry that, should Signal fail to build policies and enforcement mechanisms to identify and remove bad actors, the fallout could bring more negative attention to encryption technologies from regulators at a time when their existence is threatened around the world. “The world needs products like Signal — but they also need Signal to be thoughtful,” said Gregg Bernstein, a former user researcher who left the organization this month over his concerns. “It’s not only that Signal doesn’t have these policies in place. But they’ve been resistant to even considering what a policy might look like.” """
- archontes 3y ago
  [flagged]
- hellojesus 3y ago
  > It’s not only that Signal doesn’t have these policies in place. But they’ve been resistant to even considering what a policy might look like. Could it be that Signal hadn't considered this type of policy because it's in exact opposition to e2e messaging? I swear these government propagandists don't even try to hide their intentions.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
  Is it not true in technology that either everyone has access to protected communications, or none do? If the world needs products like Signal, then we just have to accept the inevitable fact that everyone will get products like Signal, or none will. This isn't enriched uranium, it can't be restricted to the few approved.
  - hiatus 3y ago
    > This isn't enriched uranium, it can't be restricted to the few approved. You say this in jest but encryption was export-controlled under ITAR in my lifetime. With the persistent government attacks on encryption increasing in frequency around the world, I wouldn't be surprised if we see more attempts at containing it in ways not unlike the control of enriched uranium.
maxbond 3y ago
No, it is not an arbitrary politics dig. At this current moment in history, in the United States at least, there aren't a lot of armed left wing groups. But right wing paramilitary groups have been on the rise for years, and recently they tried to overturn an election by force. At a different time in history people would have fretted that the Weather Underground or Black Panthers would be using the app. But we're in 2023 and not 1970, and people are concerned about Proud Boys and Boogaloos.
stainablesteel 3y ago
[flagged]
kornhole 3y ago
Far-right or hard-right are terms often used nowadays to refer to any dissident who questions government leadership, the security apparatus, or the war machine. I have learned to ignore these and other labels from the MSM as meaningless. I am not denying that actual fascists exist, but these labels are used to scare us into believing or supporting particular positions such as cracking down on any dissidents.
- southerntofu 3y ago
  > Far-right (...) to refer to any dissident who questions government leadership, the security apparatus, or the war machine. That's factually incorrect. There's anti-authoritarian tendencies both on the right and the left, although right-wing anti-authoritarianism (also called libertarianism) is usually very inconsistent and leads to a paradox of "freedom of oppression/exploitation". Far right never meant anti-State capitalists. Far-right refers historically to conservative and reactionary political groups, in particular it referred to royalists when the left-right concept was invented after the French revolution. Nowadays, the term refers specifically to fascists, the political movements who believe in empowering the State to protect and develop Capital. Or as Mussolini put it, « Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power ». From a quick glance the Wikipedia looks very detailed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right > cracking down on any dissidents Well there is a huge crackdown on dissidents. However, except for the January 5th crew, it's very clearly not a crackdown against the right, but against the anti-authoritarian left (anarchists) and to some extent the authoritarian left (marxist-leninists) in the US context (see: COINTELPRO, Leonard Peltier, Mummia Abu Jamal...). With so many trials, arrests and physical assaults against militant ecologists, zadists and anti-racist activists such as in the NODAPL case or against Cop City in Atlanta, it's hard to say the far-left isn't concerned by political repression. On the other hand, with so many terrorist attacks committed by white supremacists on US soil and so little reaction from the establishment, it's very clear that the powers that be are very complacent with the far right. To go back to lands i know more about, in the EU, islamist attacks are only a few percents of all terrorists attacks. Yet the media only talks about those as if racist militias did not exist. On the other hand, eco-anarchists sabotaging ecocidal industrial projects such as in Notre-Dame-des-Landes or Sainte-Soline get called "eco-terrorists" on every media by the establishment, despite never spilling blood in their actions. And so many comrades rot in jail for daring to believe in a better world. I'm not saying the term "far-right" can't be misused to misrepresent various (moderate) conservative positions, but claiming it's a rhetorical trick used by those in power to prevent dissent is far from the truth.
freejazz 3y ago
> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? I don't see anyone asking that besides you, so it really begs the question why given all common sense and reasoning, you'd have to ask this.
chiefalchemist 3y ago
The use of anarchism in the title was the first tell. It's an often misused and misunderstood word. I'm confident Wired knows better, but used it because of the pop culture-y biases it is sure to trigger. This is why we can't have nice things. Why be rational and objective when there a clicks to bait?
- southerntofu 3y ago
  It's not clickbait if the actual Signal people claim the anarchist label, like m0xie does. Despite all my political and technical disagreements with him, i must recognize he is an anarchist and it's nice to see for once a press article not trying to wash his political engagement away.
  - chiefalchemist 3y ago
    The difference is the context. Signal's target is more likely to understand the more true and subtle aspects of the word. But most importantly, Signal doesn't make money from ads. Ads that need eye-balls. So in that context, the word is definitely bait-y.
    - southerntofu 3y ago
      I understand your point, but as i read the article from Tor Browser using safest mode i had no idea advertisement was involved. I tend to forget people actually place ads in places. Trying to refrain myself from using stronger, more judgy words.
foldr 3y ago
Hard to tell if you are asking in good faith, but the first paragraph of the Wikipedia page has a perfectly serviceable definition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right_politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right_politics >Far-right politics, or right-wing extremism, refers to a spectrum of political thought that tends to be radically conservative, ultra-nationalist, and authoritarian, often also including nativist tendencies. The name derives from the left–right political spectrum, with the "far right" considered further from center than the standard political right.
- WeylandYutani 3y ago
  Fascinating. By this measure de Santis and practically all Republican mainstream candidates would be considered far right.
  - foldr 3y ago
    Only if you agree that de Santis is, e.g., an ultra-nationalist. And if you do agree that all or most of those points apply to de Santis, then it's hard to see why you'd not agree that he's far right. I mean, who would be far right in that case? Only ultra-ultra-nationalists who are more-than-just-radically conservative? To be clear, I'm not expressing an opinion here as to whether de Santis is far right. I'm saying that anyone who disagrees that he is will probably also disagree that at least one component of Wikipedia's definition applies to him.
  - rhinoceraptor 3y ago
    There are certainly many issues where a conservative of fifty years ago would be considered much further left than modern day conservatives, if not actually further to the left than modern day liberals. Contrast this clip of the George H.W. Bush of 1980 [1], to the rhetoric DeSantis uses in regards to immigration[2]: 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsmgPp_nlok https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsmgPp_nlok 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_Y-CtN8Qi0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_Y-CtN8Qi0
- valval 3y ago
  [flagged]
digging 3y ago
> What exactly does far-right mean in this case? I thought, just maybe, they're referring to the groups of openly fascist Americans who attacked the US capitol and organized other violent events. But maybe you're right and "far-right" is meaningless. I don't know why you would be right - it doesn't even make sense to raise the questions you raised, but I supposed we should consider your opinion.
- 4bpp 3y ago
  In what sense were the capitol rioters "openly fascist"? I have not seen any meaningful political group in the US trying to own the label; it is only ever applied to political enemies.
  - digging 3y ago
    > In what sense were the capitol rioters "openly fascist"? In the sense that they are literally Nazi sympathizers who display Nazi imagery, talk about Nazi ideology, praise Hitler, and write/talk about their racist beliefs influencing their political beliefs. I am not going to dig through these articles for you now and I am not going to respond further because I do not believe you are posting in good faith, but this is for the readers. Look up, like, any article about fascists/Nazis at Jan 6.
JohnFen 3y ago
> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? Don't know what they mean, but to me, "far right" doesn't mean that. It means the most radical extreme of the right. Just like "far left" means the most radical extreme of the left. I'd even argue that the far right is not actually conservative, and the far left is not actually liberal.
- zo1 3y ago
  That's not how the media and most people see it, unfortunately. Anything remotely mean or intolerant that happens to not be left leaning is auto-labelled far right. It's what I would argue is the silent and unlabeled bias of the media against conservatism. Heck I'm labeled far-right just for suggesting that affirmative action is racist.
  - meowface 3y ago
    >Heck I'm labeled far-right just for suggesting that affirmative action is racist. By who / where?
TurkishPoptart 3y ago
Nobody asked for content moderation, why are they trying to create this complaint out of thin air? If there’s a channel I don’t like, I’ll leave it/unsubscribe.
- HDThoreaun 3y ago
  Many people are calling for moderation, just not the people in the groups to be moderated. The callers don't want to protect the people in the group, they want to protect people from the group they want to moderate.
southerntofu 3y ago
> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? It depends how far you go. Does far-left just mean non-conservative and progressive? There's of course a subjective element to the answer, but there's objective arguments to be had as well, but in a specific context and timeframe. For example, being opposed to abortion rights was once considered normal except in far-left circles where anarchists such as Emma Goldman or Émilie Lamotte organized clandestine courses and workshops. Half a century ago, it could have been considered mildly conservative to be against abortion rights. Nowadays, with many conservative right-wing voices standing for abortion rights, being against would place you immediately on the far-right ultra-conservative spectrum.
- celu 3y ago
  Excuse me, if being against abortion rights is far-right, most of the right is far-right
  - southerntofu 3y ago
    Note that i'm writing this from the french cultural/political context, but i don't think this is true. Or at least it's not universal. Here even most of the far right would not dare question reproductive/abortion rights. Even Marine Le Pen has proposed to make abortion a constitutional right. The only question on the conservative right here (except for marginal catholic sects such as La Manif Pour Tous) is to oppose extending the incubation period during which abortion is legal. In the United States the situation is different, mostly due to decades of political lobbying and public disinformation against abortion orchestrated by fascist billionaires associated with various christian churches. But still, i'm guessing some parts of the right wouldn't dare question abortion rights. Despite the democrats being from an outsider's perspective a right-wing party (capitalist and rather conservative), let's pretend for a second the republican party are the entirety of the right, it's still not clear that all democrats stand for abortion and all republicans against: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/17/a-closer-look-at-republicans-who-favor-legal-abortion-and-democrats-who-oppose-it/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/17/a-closer-... Still, i think there is truth in what you say. As much as some issues such as gay/trans rights have advanced in the past decades, the political spectrum has shifted massively to the right in the Global North. Anti-immigration doctrines are far more common, and abolition of capitalism and wage slavery has almost become a taboo even on the so-called left. It's always both funny and sad to see people call Mélenchon or Sanders "far-left" when their social program is rather centrist and not more ambitious/communist than historically very right-wing programs (such as De Gaulle's after WWII).
gfdsgvbcd 3y ago
today far right means anything that is not in alignment with the sanctioned corporate propaganda
throw10920 3y ago
Because Wired, and to a lesser extent some Signal employees, have a political agenda to push that they're willing to distort the truth for. There's zero evidence that Signal is being used for radical reactionary groups any more than radical progressive groups - and if there was evidence, the Signal employees would have very little additional knowledge due to app's design.

renewiltord 3y ago

I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to be moderated.

AbrahamParangi 3y ago

The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the left has been written about extensively but I’d love to read a sympathetic, anthropological investigation into it. I say sympathetic because I don’t believe you can understand anything without really seeing how a reasonable person could come to those same conclusions.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
printforest 3y ago
[flagged]
- AbrahamParangi 3y ago
  I was more talking about this kind of reaction.
  - maxbond 3y ago
    If you say something incisive to piss people off and trigger a reaction, and you get the reaction you're looking for, what we've established is that you are willing to piss people off to serve your rhetorical ends. Nothing else. This of the "stop hitting yourself" form of argumentation.
    - generalizations 3y ago
      He observed an 'intolerance of wrongthink' and got a reaction where someone was, in fact, intolerant of wrongthink. I don't see how that's anything but a confirmation.
      - maxbond 3y ago
        That's a mischaracterization, the comment was pointing out "intolerance of wrong think" on the right. There are other criticisms to be made of that comment (eg it violated the guidelines by devolving into personal attack), but "intolerance of wrong think" isn't one of them. Even if it were, it wouldn't matter. If I cared to I could construct an equivalent comment baiting right-wingers and declare victory when someone took issue with it. If you're going to take someone getting pissed off as proof of something, anyone willing to engage in such rhetoric will be able to convince you of anything.
enragedcacti 3y ago
The paradox of tolerance gets you a long way to understanding it, but you will also have to be far more specific if you want answers because practically everyone has limits to what they consider acceptable speech, even if they don't call it that. Beyond that, there is a pretty concerted effort to elevate minor grievances into the national spotlight to portray the left a certain way, e.g. the Oberlin Cafeteria scandal, where story in the college paper about the quality of the food in their college cafeteria became both a national news story and a symbol of just how deranged the left had become. Is that actually indicative of anything? Is it something the general public should actually care about? Does it even reflect "the left" as a political body? I think once you start asking those questions a lot of the "wrongthink" stories (not all!) start seeming a lot closer to college kids complaining about bad food than they are to the sands of politics and free speech shifting underfoot.
- nostromo 3y ago
  People are constantly misapplying The Paradox of Tolerance - which is an argument for protecting free speech in all cases other than one: opposition of free speech. Somehow that got contorted by modern-day activists into "I can shout down or physically attack people I don't agree with" -- which is exactly opposite of what was being argued by Popper. It's an argument for more permissive expression, not less. He notes that the best path is nearly always rational argumentation of opposing views.
  - foldr 3y ago
    I can't find any textual support for that narrow interpretation of the Paradox of Tolerance in anything that Popper wrote. Where does he say that only opposition to freedom of speech counts as 'intolerance' in the relevant sense?
    - nostromo 3y ago
      You'll need to read the book -- if you're looking for a soundbite you're doing yourself a disservice -- it's short anyway. But note that he's talking specifically about argumentation. The book is a response to Plato, who generally opposed free speech for the masses. In general, Popper strongly disagrees with Plato. And it's important to note that he described of the paradox as he understood it from Plato, but does not necessarily endorse it. The people suddenly fond of this one footnote might take a moment and read his work anyway, as they may be surprised to read his views on socialism and Marx specifically.
btreecat 3y ago
You might be interested in "The paradox of tolerance" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance >Karl Popper described it as the seemingly self-contradictory idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.
programmarchy 3y ago
René Girard has done an anthropological investigation of this topic. The gist of it is through the psycho-social mechanism of scapegoating, opposing groups can simultaneously believe they are victims while acting as oppressors, often using their victim status as justification for their oppression of "the other". Girard explores this phenomenon of scapegoating and postulates it goes back to primitive humans e.g. during a drought tensions rise within a tribe, and a certain "witchy" tribe member is singled out to take the blame and either expelled or murdered. After this, social tensions in the tribe are relieved (even if the drought does not subside), and the scapegoat paradoxically becomes a sacred, or savior, figure. Through history, this develops into ritual and religion. It provides a useful lens to reason about messianic cults, as well as social power dynamics. There's a good overview on his Wikipedia page, but he delves into this particular topic in the book Violence and the Sacred. He also pioneered the field of Generative Anthropology, which other academics like Eric Gans have built upon, theorizing about the mechanism in much more detail, and using it to explain effects in modern culture.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- AndrewKemendo 3y ago
  Thank you for referencing Girard! Agreed that this is a compelling hypothesis Have you looked through “A thousand plateaus” from Deleuze/Guattari (I don’t know anyone who has actually read the whole thing)?
  - programmarchy 3y ago
    I timidly approached Deleuze a few years ago but didn't make it very far, haha. Should probably give it ago again... did you find it useful?
    - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
      Yes! Though if I could follow along for more than a few pages I would probably get more out of it. I’m going to actually restart with just Ch15 and see if that is a better approach
f38zf5vdt 3y ago
Yet, remarkably, many others will identify with: > The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the right has been written about extensively but I’d love to read a sympathetic, anthropological investigation into it. > I say sympathetic because I don’t believe you can understand anything without really seeing how a reasonable person could come to those same conclusions. We are diving deep into the irony of bifurcated political systems where the two groups simultaneously believe themselves to be victims of their opposing teams rather than circumstance and systemic failures.
boplicity 3y ago
> The rising intolerance of wrongthink on the left Basically, people are fed up with general bigotry, racism, misogyny, and the destruction of the environment -- all of which have real life and death consequences for many people. That, combined with polarization, has made people very reactive to which "side" they perceive things to be on.
- ralusek 3y ago
  People are just now fed up with those things, at their lowest point in history?
  - boplicity 3y ago
    Of course people are fed up with those things. They also have the ability to organize and make noise about it. That, combined with polarization, as I've said, heightens both the activism and the perception of such activism.
    - ASalazarMX 3y ago
      I think polarization is the main cause. Demagogues love to craft an "us vs them" narrative, pose as heroes of the "us" side, and plenty of gullible people fall for it with gusto. Mentally, we're still monkeys who will follow a strong leader without questioning. Mind you, demagogues are not only politicians, they can be human rights activists, teachers, businessmen, neighbors, etc. Emotion managing should be a mandatory class at basic school, so many of us need to think with our heads instead of our guts.
fluidcruft 3y ago
I can't say that I have found the right to be any more accepting of wrongthink.

astrea 3y ago

[flagged]

FormerBandmate 3y ago

Theoretically Nazis could use signal. Nazis can also use any other technology, this justification is really stupid

anonym29 3y ago
Hitler drank water, ergo drinking water is bad! /s

danbruc 3y ago

[...] coupled with lack of moderation in the app [...] Where does Signal need moderation? Can you have public groups where anyone can join? EDIT: Just looked it up, there are now public groups. [1] Never noticed this despite using Signal as essentially the only messaging app for years. EDIT: Actually not, there seems to be nothing on that web page and it is certainly nothing official. [1] https://signal-groups.com/en/ https://signal-groups.com/en/

bagacrap 3y ago

Proud Boys would be a good example. Not sure why they have to single out the right though. I guess every periodical has to take a stance on politics. The original source just said: """ Employees worry that, should Signal fail to build policies and enforcement mechanisms to identify and remove bad actors, the fallout could bring more negative attention to encryption technologies from regulators at a time when their existence is threatened around the world. “The world needs products like Signal — but they also need Signal to be thoughtful,” said Gregg Bernstein, a former user researcher who left the organization this month over his concerns. “It’s not only that Signal doesn’t have these policies in place. But they’ve been resistant to even considering what a policy might look like.” """

archontes 3y ago
[flagged]
hellojesus 3y ago
> It’s not only that Signal doesn’t have these policies in place. But they’ve been resistant to even considering what a policy might look like. Could it be that Signal hadn't considered this type of policy because it's in exact opposition to e2e messaging? I swear these government propagandists don't even try to hide their intentions.
NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
Is it not true in technology that either everyone has access to protected communications, or none do? If the world needs products like Signal, then we just have to accept the inevitable fact that everyone will get products like Signal, or none will. This isn't enriched uranium, it can't be restricted to the few approved.
- hiatus 3y ago
  > This isn't enriched uranium, it can't be restricted to the few approved. You say this in jest but encryption was export-controlled under ITAR in my lifetime. With the persistent government attacks on encryption increasing in frequency around the world, I wouldn't be surprised if we see more attempts at containing it in ways not unlike the control of enriched uranium.

maxbond 3y ago

No, it is not an arbitrary politics dig. At this current moment in history, in the United States at least, there aren't a lot of armed left wing groups. But right wing paramilitary groups have been on the rise for years, and recently they tried to overturn an election by force. At a different time in history people would have fretted that the Weather Underground or Black Panthers would be using the app. But we're in 2023 and not 1970, and people are concerned about Proud Boys and Boogaloos.

stainablesteel 3y ago

[flagged]

kornhole 3y ago

Far-right or hard-right are terms often used nowadays to refer to any dissident who questions government leadership, the security apparatus, or the war machine. I have learned to ignore these and other labels from the MSM as meaningless. I am not denying that actual fascists exist, but these labels are used to scare us into believing or supporting particular positions such as cracking down on any dissidents.

southerntofu 3y ago
> Far-right (...) to refer to any dissident who questions government leadership, the security apparatus, or the war machine. That's factually incorrect. There's anti-authoritarian tendencies both on the right and the left, although right-wing anti-authoritarianism (also called libertarianism) is usually very inconsistent and leads to a paradox of "freedom of oppression/exploitation". Far right never meant anti-State capitalists. Far-right refers historically to conservative and reactionary political groups, in particular it referred to royalists when the left-right concept was invented after the French revolution. Nowadays, the term refers specifically to fascists, the political movements who believe in empowering the State to protect and develop Capital. Or as Mussolini put it, « Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power ». From a quick glance the Wikipedia looks very detailed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right > cracking down on any dissidents Well there is a huge crackdown on dissidents. However, except for the January 5th crew, it's very clearly not a crackdown against the right, but against the anti-authoritarian left (anarchists) and to some extent the authoritarian left (marxist-leninists) in the US context (see: COINTELPRO, Leonard Peltier, Mummia Abu Jamal...). With so many trials, arrests and physical assaults against militant ecologists, zadists and anti-racist activists such as in the NODAPL case or against Cop City in Atlanta, it's hard to say the far-left isn't concerned by political repression. On the other hand, with so many terrorist attacks committed by white supremacists on US soil and so little reaction from the establishment, it's very clear that the powers that be are very complacent with the far right. To go back to lands i know more about, in the EU, islamist attacks are only a few percents of all terrorists attacks. Yet the media only talks about those as if racist militias did not exist. On the other hand, eco-anarchists sabotaging ecocidal industrial projects such as in Notre-Dame-des-Landes or Sainte-Soline get called "eco-terrorists" on every media by the establishment, despite never spilling blood in their actions. And so many comrades rot in jail for daring to believe in a better world. I'm not saying the term "far-right" can't be misused to misrepresent various (moderate) conservative positions, but claiming it's a rhetorical trick used by those in power to prevent dissent is far from the truth.

freejazz 3y ago

> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? I don't see anyone asking that besides you, so it really begs the question why given all common sense and reasoning, you'd have to ask this.

chiefalchemist 3y ago

The use of anarchism in the title was the first tell. It's an often misused and misunderstood word. I'm confident Wired knows better, but used it because of the pop culture-y biases it is sure to trigger. This is why we can't have nice things. Why be rational and objective when there a clicks to bait?

southerntofu 3y ago
It's not clickbait if the actual Signal people claim the anarchist label, like m0xie does. Despite all my political and technical disagreements with him, i must recognize he is an anarchist and it's nice to see for once a press article not trying to wash his political engagement away.
- chiefalchemist 3y ago
  The difference is the context. Signal's target is more likely to understand the more true and subtle aspects of the word. But most importantly, Signal doesn't make money from ads. Ads that need eye-balls. So in that context, the word is definitely bait-y.
  - southerntofu 3y ago
    I understand your point, but as i read the article from Tor Browser using safest mode i had no idea advertisement was involved. I tend to forget people actually place ads in places. Trying to refrain myself from using stronger, more judgy words.

foldr 3y ago

Hard to tell if you are asking in good faith, but the first paragraph of the Wikipedia page has a perfectly serviceable definition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right_politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far-right_politics >Far-right politics, or right-wing extremism, refers to a spectrum of political thought that tends to be radically conservative, ultra-nationalist, and authoritarian, often also including nativist tendencies. The name derives from the left–right political spectrum, with the "far right" considered further from center than the standard political right.

WeylandYutani 3y ago
Fascinating. By this measure de Santis and practically all Republican mainstream candidates would be considered far right.
- foldr 3y ago
  Only if you agree that de Santis is, e.g., an ultra-nationalist. And if you do agree that all or most of those points apply to de Santis, then it's hard to see why you'd not agree that he's far right. I mean, who would be far right in that case? Only ultra-ultra-nationalists who are more-than-just-radically conservative? To be clear, I'm not expressing an opinion here as to whether de Santis is far right. I'm saying that anyone who disagrees that he is will probably also disagree that at least one component of Wikipedia's definition applies to him.
- rhinoceraptor 3y ago
  There are certainly many issues where a conservative of fifty years ago would be considered much further left than modern day conservatives, if not actually further to the left than modern day liberals. Contrast this clip of the George H.W. Bush of 1980 [1], to the rhetoric DeSantis uses in regards to immigration[2]: 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsmgPp_nlok https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsmgPp_nlok 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_Y-CtN8Qi0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_Y-CtN8Qi0
valval 3y ago
[flagged]

digging 3y ago

> What exactly does far-right mean in this case? I thought, just maybe, they're referring to the groups of openly fascist Americans who attacked the US capitol and organized other violent events. But maybe you're right and "far-right" is meaningless. I don't know why you would be right - it doesn't even make sense to raise the questions you raised, but I supposed we should consider your opinion.

4bpp 3y ago
In what sense were the capitol rioters "openly fascist"? I have not seen any meaningful political group in the US trying to own the label; it is only ever applied to political enemies.
- digging 3y ago
  > In what sense were the capitol rioters "openly fascist"? In the sense that they are literally Nazi sympathizers who display Nazi imagery, talk about Nazi ideology, praise Hitler, and write/talk about their racist beliefs influencing their political beliefs. I am not going to dig through these articles for you now and I am not going to respond further because I do not believe you are posting in good faith, but this is for the readers. Look up, like, any article about fascists/Nazis at Jan 6.

JohnFen 3y ago

> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? Don't know what they mean, but to me, "far right" doesn't mean that. It means the most radical extreme of the right. Just like "far left" means the most radical extreme of the left. I'd even argue that the far right is not actually conservative, and the far left is not actually liberal.

zo1 3y ago
That's not how the media and most people see it, unfortunately. Anything remotely mean or intolerant that happens to not be left leaning is auto-labelled far right. It's what I would argue is the silent and unlabeled bias of the media against conservatism. Heck I'm labeled far-right just for suggesting that affirmative action is racist.
- meowface 3y ago
  >Heck I'm labeled far-right just for suggesting that affirmative action is racist. By who / where?

TurkishPoptart 3y ago

Nobody asked for content moderation, why are they trying to create this complaint out of thin air? If there’s a channel I don’t like, I’ll leave it/unsubscribe.

HDThoreaun 3y ago
Many people are calling for moderation, just not the people in the groups to be moderated. The callers don't want to protect the people in the group, they want to protect people from the group they want to moderate.

southerntofu 3y ago

> Does far-right just mean non-progressive and conservative? It depends how far you go. Does far-left just mean non-conservative and progressive? There's of course a subjective element to the answer, but there's objective arguments to be had as well, but in a specific context and timeframe. For example, being opposed to abortion rights was once considered normal except in far-left circles where anarchists such as Emma Goldman or Émilie Lamotte organized clandestine courses and workshops. Half a century ago, it could have been considered mildly conservative to be against abortion rights. Nowadays, with many conservative right-wing voices standing for abortion rights, being against would place you immediately on the far-right ultra-conservative spectrum.

celu 3y ago
Excuse me, if being against abortion rights is far-right, most of the right is far-right
- southerntofu 3y ago
  Note that i'm writing this from the french cultural/political context, but i don't think this is true. Or at least it's not universal. Here even most of the far right would not dare question reproductive/abortion rights. Even Marine Le Pen has proposed to make abortion a constitutional right. The only question on the conservative right here (except for marginal catholic sects such as La Manif Pour Tous) is to oppose extending the incubation period during which abortion is legal. In the United States the situation is different, mostly due to decades of political lobbying and public disinformation against abortion orchestrated by fascist billionaires associated with various christian churches. But still, i'm guessing some parts of the right wouldn't dare question abortion rights. Despite the democrats being from an outsider's perspective a right-wing party (capitalist and rather conservative), let's pretend for a second the republican party are the entirety of the right, it's still not clear that all democrats stand for abortion and all republicans against: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/17/a-closer-look-at-republicans-who-favor-legal-abortion-and-democrats-who-oppose-it/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/17/a-closer-... Still, i think there is truth in what you say. As much as some issues such as gay/trans rights have advanced in the past decades, the political spectrum has shifted massively to the right in the Global North. Anti-immigration doctrines are far more common, and abolition of capitalism and wage slavery has almost become a taboo even on the so-called left. It's always both funny and sad to see people call Mélenchon or Sanders "far-left" when their social program is rather centrist and not more ambitious/communist than historically very right-wing programs (such as De Gaulle's after WWII).

gfdsgvbcd 3y ago

today far right means anything that is not in alignment with the sanctioned corporate propaganda

throw10920 3y ago

Because Wired, and to a lesser extent some Signal employees, have a political agenda to push that they're willing to distort the truth for. There's zero evidence that Signal is being used for radical reactionary groups any more than radical progressive groups - and if there was evidence, the Signal employees would have very little additional knowledge due to app's design.