7 ms·

It's not an abused substance, it's violence.

immibis 2y ago
This is not the first time I'm hearing someone say free speech is violence, but it is the first time they actually meant it about free speech and weren't covering up something else by calling it that.
- hn72774 2y ago
  Not who shared that but there's a concept of non-violent communication that they may be referring to. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication Coercion -> force -> violence Forcing ads onto kids = violence?
  - codr7 2y ago
    From my experience, that concept is mostly used as weapon and shield by the worst kind of people, to let them get away with their manipulative bs. Speaking clearly sometimes means saying things that are uncomfortable to hear.
    - hn72774 2y ago
      That sounds more like gaslighting. Non-violent communication isn't at all about manipulation. It's about discussing behaviors and their impact on the person vs attacking and defending in circles that go nowhere.
      - codr7 2y ago
        Yeah, I get the potential, and I'm not saying it's a bad idea. It's just that in practice I've only seen it used by morons to shut down discussions they don't feel like having.
      - whythre 2y ago
        One can couch their words in the language of nonviolence and still be manipulative, cruel or discriminatory. It can and does act as a form of social camouflage, because humans are shitty and a method of communication will not safeguard against predators. You can’t make people harmless, but you can force them to innovate different ways to harm others.
        codr7 2y ago
        Yeah, but that isn't it at all, I'm afraid. It's much darker. The fact is that exactly the same people who are pushing the idea, are the ones who we would need protection from. And they're not innovating much, it's the same bs over and over and over again.
        comfysocks 2y ago
        I don’t think the dynamic you are talking about has much to do with Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication. Perhaps a slightly reductive view, but I see “NVC” as basically saying that when people argue, emotions can sometimes overrule logic. When people get emotional, they sometimes plug their ears and start screaming into the void. NVC is then basically a bunch of tactics to circumvent the emotional aspect so that the discussion can get back to logical facts. It also tries to create a framework where the people arguing have to hear the other side’s arguments before making a counter argument. I think the book has some very useful ideas mixed in with some amount of self-promotion. I think the name “Nonviolent Communication” (which might throw some people off) is part of that self-promotion. Don’t let the name fool you.
        codr7 2y ago
        I don't think eliminating emotions from human interaction is a very smart thing to do, and certainly not the only alternative to screaming into the void. We're already at the point where we're almost not supposed to have emotions anymore, turning more into robots every day. Every single aspect of being human is emotional, every single decision you make is emotional, no matter how hard you work to justify it mentally. The idea is nice in theory, if it wasn't for all the humans involved it might actually work.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - guerrilla 2y ago
    Exactly this.
- Y_Y 2y ago
  Why is free speech free? If you think people (and by extension businesses) should be allowed to express themselves that's one thing, but advertising is importantly distinct from that. It's protected speech in most of the Anglosphere to say you don't like some person or group, but not to maliciously damage someone's reputation or incite hatred. I can imagine an analogous situation where you're free to express that you think your product is good, but not to incite irrational desire in consumers or try so place information about your product in places that are difficult to avoid, like public billboards.
- CuriousSkeptic 2y ago
  On free speech vs violent acts of speech (if we want to keep using that term) A possible compromise that might work is to protect _good faith_ speech while working against bad faith speech.
- smcin 2y ago
  Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff have been attacking that trope as factually incorrect and unhelpful for almost a decade now: "Why It's a Bad Idea to Tell Students Words Are Violence : A claim increasingly heard on campus will make them more anxious and more willing to justify physical harm." (2017) https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/07/why-its-a-bad-idea-to-tell-students-words-are-violence/533970/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/07/why-it...
spunker540 2y ago
You do a disservice to anyone actually exposed to real violence. I’m sure they’d prefer advertising to violence any day
- ssklash 2y ago
  Maybe not violence, but what word more accurately describes the non-consensual exploitation of human psychology for massive profit?
  - Nasrudith 2y ago
    Fraud is closer but still a massive reach.
    - kelnos 2y ago
      IMO advertising is worse than fraud. At least with fraud the impact is usually fairly clear, and not buried in our broken, manipulated, subconscious minds.
      - johnnyanmac 2y ago
        We know so little about out subconscious that this simply seems alarmist. Maybe TV really does rot our brain, maybe it's better to answer kids's questions about everything and expose them to it rather than set age restrictions. Until some substantial info of our brains occur, I can't say the ability to make people aware of products is worse than fraud.
        ssklash 2y ago
        If all ads did was make you aware of products, we would not be having this discussion. They attempt to hijack deep-seated human urges and tenancies in order to get you to buy their crap. Watch any perfume or cologne commercial and tell me they are simply making you aware that the product exists.
- deleted 2y ago
snapcaster 2y ago
I hate ads, but this is not a winning argument. Instead of winning people over to the sympathetic cause (nobody really LIKES ads besides google and meta employees) you alienate people
- sithlord 2y ago
  I would hazard a guess that no one likes ads except the likes of google and meta SHAREHOLDERS).
  - brigadier132 2y ago
    I was incredulous but many normal people actually enjoy ads.
    - dwayne_dibley 2y ago
      I mean they can often be useful.
    - ssklash 2y ago
      Many people have also never experienced a world where ads do not exist. I use so many layers of adblocking that whenever I use a vanilla VM or devices, I'm stunned at how shockingly bad the internet experience is for most people.
- randomdata 2y ago
  Ads can be likeable under the right conditions. Who doesn't want to learn about something that will actually improve their life? Which is also ideal for advertisers. Who wants to pay to advertise to an audience that doesn't want their product? Google and Facebook, in the early days, thought they could use copious amounts of data to tailor the ads to the user such that they would only be subjected to those which are likeable, but then the audience got skittish about having that much information collected on them. And so we now just get whatever random ad happens to be in the queue – which, indeed, is statistically unlikely to be in line with what you actually need, and therefore unlikable.

This is not the first time I'm hearing someone say free speech is violence, but it is the first time they actually meant it about free speech and weren't covering up something else by calling it that.

hn72774 2y ago
Not who shared that but there's a concept of non-violent communication that they may be referring to. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication Coercion -> force -> violence Forcing ads onto kids = violence?
- codr7 2y ago
  From my experience, that concept is mostly used as weapon and shield by the worst kind of people, to let them get away with their manipulative bs. Speaking clearly sometimes means saying things that are uncomfortable to hear.
  - hn72774 2y ago
    That sounds more like gaslighting. Non-violent communication isn't at all about manipulation. It's about discussing behaviors and their impact on the person vs attacking and defending in circles that go nowhere.
    - codr7 2y ago
      Yeah, I get the potential, and I'm not saying it's a bad idea. It's just that in practice I've only seen it used by morons to shut down discussions they don't feel like having.
    - whythre 2y ago
      One can couch their words in the language of nonviolence and still be manipulative, cruel or discriminatory. It can and does act as a form of social camouflage, because humans are shitty and a method of communication will not safeguard against predators. You can’t make people harmless, but you can force them to innovate different ways to harm others.
      - codr7 2y ago
        Yeah, but that isn't it at all, I'm afraid. It's much darker. The fact is that exactly the same people who are pushing the idea, are the ones who we would need protection from. And they're not innovating much, it's the same bs over and over and over again.
        comfysocks 2y ago
        I don’t think the dynamic you are talking about has much to do with Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication. Perhaps a slightly reductive view, but I see “NVC” as basically saying that when people argue, emotions can sometimes overrule logic. When people get emotional, they sometimes plug their ears and start screaming into the void. NVC is then basically a bunch of tactics to circumvent the emotional aspect so that the discussion can get back to logical facts. It also tries to create a framework where the people arguing have to hear the other side’s arguments before making a counter argument. I think the book has some very useful ideas mixed in with some amount of self-promotion. I think the name “Nonviolent Communication” (which might throw some people off) is part of that self-promotion. Don’t let the name fool you.
        codr7 2y ago
        I don't think eliminating emotions from human interaction is a very smart thing to do, and certainly not the only alternative to screaming into the void. We're already at the point where we're almost not supposed to have emotions anymore, turning more into robots every day. Every single aspect of being human is emotional, every single decision you make is emotional, no matter how hard you work to justify it mentally. The idea is nice in theory, if it wasn't for all the humans involved it might actually work.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- guerrilla 2y ago
  Exactly this.
Y_Y 2y ago
Why is free speech free? If you think people (and by extension businesses) should be allowed to express themselves that's one thing, but advertising is importantly distinct from that. It's protected speech in most of the Anglosphere to say you don't like some person or group, but not to maliciously damage someone's reputation or incite hatred. I can imagine an analogous situation where you're free to express that you think your product is good, but not to incite irrational desire in consumers or try so place information about your product in places that are difficult to avoid, like public billboards.
CuriousSkeptic 2y ago
On free speech vs violent acts of speech (if we want to keep using that term) A possible compromise that might work is to protect _good faith_ speech while working against bad faith speech.
smcin 2y ago
Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff have been attacking that trope as factually incorrect and unhelpful for almost a decade now: "Why It's a Bad Idea to Tell Students Words Are Violence : A claim increasingly heard on campus will make them more anxious and more willing to justify physical harm." (2017) https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/07/why-its-a-bad-idea-to-tell-students-words-are-violence/533970/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/07/why-it...

spunker540 2y ago

You do a disservice to anyone actually exposed to real violence. I’m sure they’d prefer advertising to violence any day

ssklash 2y ago
Maybe not violence, but what word more accurately describes the non-consensual exploitation of human psychology for massive profit?
- Nasrudith 2y ago
  Fraud is closer but still a massive reach.
  - kelnos 2y ago
    IMO advertising is worse than fraud. At least with fraud the impact is usually fairly clear, and not buried in our broken, manipulated, subconscious minds.
    - johnnyanmac 2y ago
      We know so little about out subconscious that this simply seems alarmist. Maybe TV really does rot our brain, maybe it's better to answer kids's questions about everything and expose them to it rather than set age restrictions. Until some substantial info of our brains occur, I can't say the ability to make people aware of products is worse than fraud.
      - ssklash 2y ago
        If all ads did was make you aware of products, we would not be having this discussion. They attempt to hijack deep-seated human urges and tenancies in order to get you to buy their crap. Watch any perfume or cologne commercial and tell me they are simply making you aware that the product exists.
deleted 2y ago

snapcaster 2y ago

I hate ads, but this is not a winning argument. Instead of winning people over to the sympathetic cause (nobody really LIKES ads besides google and meta employees) you alienate people

sithlord 2y ago
I would hazard a guess that no one likes ads except the likes of google and meta SHAREHOLDERS).
- brigadier132 2y ago
  I was incredulous but many normal people actually enjoy ads.
  - dwayne_dibley 2y ago
    I mean they can often be useful.
  - ssklash 2y ago
    Many people have also never experienced a world where ads do not exist. I use so many layers of adblocking that whenever I use a vanilla VM or devices, I'm stunned at how shockingly bad the internet experience is for most people.
randomdata 2y ago
Ads can be likeable under the right conditions. Who doesn't want to learn about something that will actually improve their life? Which is also ideal for advertisers. Who wants to pay to advertise to an audience that doesn't want their product? Google and Facebook, in the early days, thought they could use copious amounts of data to tailor the ads to the user such that they would only be subjected to those which are likeable, but then the audience got skittish about having that much information collected on them. And so we now just get whatever random ad happens to be in the queue – which, indeed, is statistically unlikely to be in line with what you actually need, and therefore unlikable.