4 ms·

Genuinely hate this. Thanks to the so-called "vibe shift" all of the ostracism mechanisms pioneered by the left are now being turned against them. I think the l

Genuinely hate this. Thanks to the so-called "vibe shift" all of the ostracism mechanisms pioneered by the left are now being turned against them. I think the lesson here is that when building tools of social change, consider what happens when they're turned against you. I agree with Keira Knightley[1] - people need to learn to live with those that disagree with them (again). [1] https://www.youtube.com/shorts/v4zSxefgKQM https://www.youtube.com/shorts/v4zSxefgKQM

defrost 1y ago
HN deserves comments with less of a short horizon on history. The ghost of Joseph R. McCarthy is questioning your hot take on ostracism mechanisms.
- dissent 1y ago
  You're arguing in favour of OP there. For most of the past 10 years we've seen the liberal left celebrating this kind of McCarthyism. They normalised it, raised the stakes, and now it's being leveraged by the traditional actors who've always wanted to. Liberal elites should have been a bulwark against this, but they were not.
  - defrost 1y ago
    You're mistaken in your strawmanning of my position. I'm against the dull left V right shallow simplemindedness dominant in US forums. I reject the notion that "ostracism mechanisms", especially in a Hollywood context, were recently "pioneered by the left". I read comments that blather on about "liberal left", "deplorables", et al. and despair for political sanity in the US. It's an interesting emergance of iterative dynamics that the ancient rules of elections in middle north America resulted in a Hotelling's law two party system, neither broadly representative of US citizens, when those rules were founded by people opposed to party politics who sought robust debate of a multitude of views.
estearum 1y ago
Can you identify for us which merger approvals or broadcast licenses were threatened by the incumbent left-wing government for private parties engaging in protected speech?
- rendall 1y ago
  I'll bite, despite your goal-post shift. Both sides do this, by the way, but you asked specifically for Democratic abuse of state institutions to suppress speech: The Biden administration engaged in communications with social media companies urging moderation of content labelled "misinformation," especially around COVID-19 and the 2020 election. A district court found that the government had likely violated the First Amendment by "urging, encouraging, pressuring or inducing" platforms to suppress protected speech. In 2022 the DHS announced creation of the Disinformation Governance Board, whose stated role was to advise on "mis-, dis- and malinformation." The board was paused and then disbanded that same year following backlash, but the initiative itself is an example of Democratic-led state power being proposed for controlling speech. There are many more, but those are 2 recent examples.
  - winkwinkwink 1y ago
    Do continue! And please be more specific which cases you're citing. The case I think you're referring to (Murthy v. Missouri) was decided this last June by the US Supreme Court. Even that resulted in a wash where plaintiffs didn't show standing. Also, you're citing instances that were walked back or otherwise not implemented. That's very different to what happened with Kimmel. Or is that moving goal posts again?
    - rendall 1y ago
      Standing was denied, not the underlying finding. The Court never ruled that coordination between the White House and social-media platforms was constitutionally fine. The district court had found likely coercion, which remains uncontested on the merits. And whether an initiative was walked back (like the Disinformation Board) doesn’t erase the intent to institutionalize speech regulation through DHS. Retraction after exposure doesn’t mean it wasn’t attempted. But sure, as you requested: The FBI’s role in the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story is another example. In the months leading up to the 2020 election, the FBI held regular briefings with major tech platforms warning of possible “hack-and-leak” operations by foreign actors, specifically referencing topics that would later match the Hunter Biden reports. When The New York Post published its story, Twitter and Facebook immediately throttled or blocked it. Later, both companies acknowledged that the FBI’s warnings influenced those decisions. The Bureau didn’t issue a formal takedown order, but the effect was identical: a law-enforcement agency used its authority to shape the information environment around an election. The Obama administration’s record under the Espionage Act also fits the pattern. Obama’s Department of Justice prosecuted more whistleblowers and leakers under that law than all previous administrations combined, often targeting disclosures that embarrassed the government but posed no clear security risk. Journalists who published the material, such as James Risen and others, were subpoenaed and threatened with jail time for refusing to reveal sources. That’s a textbook use of state power to chill investigative reporting. There’s also the IRS targeting scandal, in which conservative nonprofit groups applying for tax-exempt status were singled out for extra scrutiny based on their political keywords (“Tea Party,” “Patriots,” etc.). The eventual Inspector General report confirmed viewpoint discrimination within a federal agency that directly affected the ability of those groups to operate and speak. These episodes differ in scale and directness, but they share a common feature: government institutions, under Democratic leadership, exerting pressure,formal or informal, on the flow of information and the people disseminating it. Whether by pre-emptive warnings, selective enforcement, or bureaucratic choke points, each represents a form of speech control that doesn’t need a censorship law to be effective. None of this is to suggest the problem is uniquely Democratic. Republicans have done the same and sometimes more overtly: pressuring the NFL over protests, threatening tech companies with regulation for perceived bias, using state legislatures to police campus or library speech, or floating defamation crackdowns against critics. Both parties reach for state power when it suits their narrative. The conclusion isn’t that Democrats are worse, but that once any faction normalizes using the machinery of government to manage expression, the precedent will be used by everyone. The real lesson is that censorship, whether bureaucratic or partisan, always expands beyond its architects’ original intent.

defrost 1y ago

HN deserves comments with less of a short horizon on history. The ghost of Joseph R. McCarthy is questioning your hot take on ostracism mechanisms.

dissent 1y ago
You're arguing in favour of OP there. For most of the past 10 years we've seen the liberal left celebrating this kind of McCarthyism. They normalised it, raised the stakes, and now it's being leveraged by the traditional actors who've always wanted to. Liberal elites should have been a bulwark against this, but they were not.
- defrost 1y ago
  You're mistaken in your strawmanning of my position. I'm against the dull left V right shallow simplemindedness dominant in US forums. I reject the notion that "ostracism mechanisms", especially in a Hollywood context, were recently "pioneered by the left". I read comments that blather on about "liberal left", "deplorables", et al. and despair for political sanity in the US. It's an interesting emergance of iterative dynamics that the ancient rules of elections in middle north America resulted in a Hotelling's law two party system, neither broadly representative of US citizens, when those rules were founded by people opposed to party politics who sought robust debate of a multitude of views.

estearum 1y ago

Can you identify for us which merger approvals or broadcast licenses were threatened by the incumbent left-wing government for private parties engaging in protected speech?

rendall 1y ago
I'll bite, despite your goal-post shift. Both sides do this, by the way, but you asked specifically for Democratic abuse of state institutions to suppress speech: The Biden administration engaged in communications with social media companies urging moderation of content labelled "misinformation," especially around COVID-19 and the 2020 election. A district court found that the government had likely violated the First Amendment by "urging, encouraging, pressuring or inducing" platforms to suppress protected speech. In 2022 the DHS announced creation of the Disinformation Governance Board, whose stated role was to advise on "mis-, dis- and malinformation." The board was paused and then disbanded that same year following backlash, but the initiative itself is an example of Democratic-led state power being proposed for controlling speech. There are many more, but those are 2 recent examples.
- winkwinkwink 1y ago
  Do continue! And please be more specific which cases you're citing. The case I think you're referring to (Murthy v. Missouri) was decided this last June by the US Supreme Court. Even that resulted in a wash where plaintiffs didn't show standing. Also, you're citing instances that were walked back or otherwise not implemented. That's very different to what happened with Kimmel. Or is that moving goal posts again?
  - rendall 1y ago
    Standing was denied, not the underlying finding. The Court never ruled that coordination between the White House and social-media platforms was constitutionally fine. The district court had found likely coercion, which remains uncontested on the merits. And whether an initiative was walked back (like the Disinformation Board) doesn’t erase the intent to institutionalize speech regulation through DHS. Retraction after exposure doesn’t mean it wasn’t attempted. But sure, as you requested: The FBI’s role in the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story is another example. In the months leading up to the 2020 election, the FBI held regular briefings with major tech platforms warning of possible “hack-and-leak” operations by foreign actors, specifically referencing topics that would later match the Hunter Biden reports. When The New York Post published its story, Twitter and Facebook immediately throttled or blocked it. Later, both companies acknowledged that the FBI’s warnings influenced those decisions. The Bureau didn’t issue a formal takedown order, but the effect was identical: a law-enforcement agency used its authority to shape the information environment around an election. The Obama administration’s record under the Espionage Act also fits the pattern. Obama’s Department of Justice prosecuted more whistleblowers and leakers under that law than all previous administrations combined, often targeting disclosures that embarrassed the government but posed no clear security risk. Journalists who published the material, such as James Risen and others, were subpoenaed and threatened with jail time for refusing to reveal sources. That’s a textbook use of state power to chill investigative reporting. There’s also the IRS targeting scandal, in which conservative nonprofit groups applying for tax-exempt status were singled out for extra scrutiny based on their political keywords (“Tea Party,” “Patriots,” etc.). The eventual Inspector General report confirmed viewpoint discrimination within a federal agency that directly affected the ability of those groups to operate and speak. These episodes differ in scale and directness, but they share a common feature: government institutions, under Democratic leadership, exerting pressure,formal or informal, on the flow of information and the people disseminating it. Whether by pre-emptive warnings, selective enforcement, or bureaucratic choke points, each represents a form of speech control that doesn’t need a censorship law to be effective. None of this is to suggest the problem is uniquely Democratic. Republicans have done the same and sometimes more overtly: pressuring the NFL over protests, threatening tech companies with regulation for perceived bias, using state legislatures to police campus or library speech, or floating defamation crackdowns against critics. Both parties reach for state power when it suits their narrative. The conclusion isn’t that Democrats are worse, but that once any faction normalizes using the machinery of government to manage expression, the precedent will be used by everyone. The real lesson is that censorship, whether bureaucratic or partisan, always expands beyond its architects’ original intent.