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Not to minimize the impact of social media censorship, but one should really live in a country like Iran to grasp what pervasive censorship is. Most people born

Not to minimize the impact of social media censorship, but one should really live in a country like Iran to grasp what pervasive censorship is. Most people born and raised in the relative freedoms provided in modern democratic systems have no clue what it feels like when you have such dictatorships. I say this because, looking at the current trends, we _could be_ heading in that direction, and the comparison is apt.

like_any_other 7d ago
[flagged]
- geraneum 7d ago
  > You don't know what it feels like not because you're so free, but because you agree with the ruling regime on what it considers the most important questions. We don’t know what it feels like because we collectively participate and decide what should be considered and what not _periodically_ and it’s possible to change it, evidently, with various degrees and velocity by voting. > I would much prefer the dictatorship-style censorship, because our censorship is far, far more effective. Case in point! I’ve lived under both and can guarantee you don’t know what that dictatorship you so much yearn for has in their bag for you until it’s too late.
  - aaa_aaa 7d ago
    I guess he is not yearning for dictatorship, the style of censorship is the question. Preventing access to information is bad, but likely less harmful than deception.
    - aaa_aaa 7d ago
      It is a shame OP's comment is flagged. Talk about censorship
    - geraneum 7d ago
      > Preventing access to information is bad, but likely less harmful than deception. It’s a mistake to separate these. They go hand in hand and mich further as you climb up the authoritarian ladder. What do you think is the style of censorship in authoritarian regimes like Iran? Do you think it’s just preventing access?
  - like_any_other 7d ago
    > by voting Not a single one of my examples was committed by the government (except if you count funding Carnegie Mellon and MIT). But even in cases when they are, voting rarely helps: https://www.woes.blog/p/tgr-democracy https://www.woes.blog/p/tgr-democracy > you don’t know what that dictatorship you so much yearn for Re-read my sentence. I don't yearn for a dictatorship, I yearn to blunt and make obvious the current secret, subtle censorship regime. > has in their bag for you Is it jail? “White Lives Matter” Slogan Earns Two Dutch Men Imprisonment for Racism - https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news-corner/netherlands-jail-for-white-lives-matter-slogan/ https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news-corner/nether... Activist ran race-hate sticker library, court told - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51zn2l33r9o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51zn2l33r9o -Stickers with text like "It's OK to be White" and "We will be a minority in our homeland by 2066". For which he was later convicted and jailed - https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867 I repeat - you agree with the regime. You're floating in the river, letting it carry you where it pleases, while telling those swimming upstream that there is no current, nothing to struggle against. Edit as reply because "posting too fast": > How did all of these social media companies made a 180 suddenly after power shifts in Washington? None of the racist or right-wing or white nationalist subreddits got unbanned, American Renaissance is still banned off Facebook and Youtube, Facebook still explicitly bans white nationalism, and other social media ban it implicitly as "hate speech", TikTok bans "white lives matter" [1], and promised to ban even more [2] (under Trump's 1st term), while wikipedia doesn't even bother to mention that as censorship [3]. All of this is still the case under the current Washington. The only exception is Twitter, after Musk bought it - there, American Renaissance got unbanned. And a 180 would imply that these things are not only unbanned, but their opponents are banned. So if you're going to just make stuff up, i.e. lie, then I won't waste my time with you. [1] https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/tiktok-sparks-massive-backlash-after-it-bans-the-phrase-white-lives-matter-while-keeping-black-lives-matter-chinese-propaganda/ar-AA24RbWj https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/tiktok-sparks-massive-b... [2] https://www.timesofisrael.com/tiktok-says-it-will-crack-down-on-anti-semitism-white-nationalism/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/tiktok-says-it-will-crack-down... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_TikTok https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_TikTok
    - 7d ago
  - theendisney 7d ago
    Its true, all usually highly conplex world events are dumbed down to an insanely infantile level that carefully omits anything that may poorly reflect on corporate interests. Also obvious is that all news is made in a short list of countries. Everywhere else the best you can hope for are terrible events. You will only get opinions from a small list of talking heads. One might imagine populating the media with nothing but professors. Each field has new stuff every week. In stead you get Adam Savage. The name isn't by acident.
howunfortunate 7d ago
I'm curious what trends you see towards censorship? Elon presumably being an exemplar for current trends: Twitter is unarguably far less censored than it was before (though censorship is still present). And Meta took note and also turned down its censorship significantly in response. The Epstein files, while far less than hoped for by many, are another example of a trend towards sharing far more sensitive info than has been typical by past administrations. There are many good examples you could point to of increased authoritarianism, but censorship in particular seems to be on the backswing, if anything. Edit: oof, it's extremely concerning that the comment below was flagged
- geraneum 7d ago
  It’s too soon for such a conclusion IMO. The pervasive Iran-like censorship I was talking about will rear its ugly head when those authoritarian regimes are established. It’s a tool and I can assure you it will be used extensively. This is nothing new really. P.S. the Epstein files were just a cruel joke! I wouldn’t list it there.
  - howunfortunate 7d ago
    It doesn't add up for me. If the goal is simply authoritarian control, why would they employ less censorship than their predecessors? Surely they could get away with at the very least the same amount?
    - geraneum 7d ago
      > simply authoritarian control There’s nothing simple about authoritarian control. Who says we have less censorship? Sure people can tweet all kind of stuff without getting banned. Fine, but at the same time US president is removing news networks he doesn’t like from press briefings. That’s just one example. To say the censorship is in decline is baffling.
    - trombuance 6d ago
      [dead]
cindyllm 7d ago
[dead]

like_any_other 7d ago

[flagged]

geraneum 7d ago
> You don't know what it feels like not because you're so free, but because you agree with the ruling regime on what it considers the most important questions. We don’t know what it feels like because we collectively participate and decide what should be considered and what not _periodically_ and it’s possible to change it, evidently, with various degrees and velocity by voting. > I would much prefer the dictatorship-style censorship, because our censorship is far, far more effective. Case in point! I’ve lived under both and can guarantee you don’t know what that dictatorship you so much yearn for has in their bag for you until it’s too late.
- aaa_aaa 7d ago
  I guess he is not yearning for dictatorship, the style of censorship is the question. Preventing access to information is bad, but likely less harmful than deception.
  - aaa_aaa 7d ago
    It is a shame OP's comment is flagged. Talk about censorship
  - geraneum 7d ago
    > Preventing access to information is bad, but likely less harmful than deception. It’s a mistake to separate these. They go hand in hand and mich further as you climb up the authoritarian ladder. What do you think is the style of censorship in authoritarian regimes like Iran? Do you think it’s just preventing access?
- like_any_other 7d ago
  > by voting Not a single one of my examples was committed by the government (except if you count funding Carnegie Mellon and MIT). But even in cases when they are, voting rarely helps: https://www.woes.blog/p/tgr-democracy https://www.woes.blog/p/tgr-democracy > you don’t know what that dictatorship you so much yearn for Re-read my sentence. I don't yearn for a dictatorship, I yearn to blunt and make obvious the current secret, subtle censorship regime. > has in their bag for you Is it jail? “White Lives Matter” Slogan Earns Two Dutch Men Imprisonment for Racism - https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news-corner/netherlands-jail-for-white-lives-matter-slogan/ https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news-corner/nether... Activist ran race-hate sticker library, court told - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51zn2l33r9o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51zn2l33r9o -Stickers with text like "It's OK to be White" and "We will be a minority in our homeland by 2066". For which he was later convicted and jailed - https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867 I repeat - you agree with the regime. You're floating in the river, letting it carry you where it pleases, while telling those swimming upstream that there is no current, nothing to struggle against. Edit as reply because "posting too fast": > How did all of these social media companies made a 180 suddenly after power shifts in Washington? None of the racist or right-wing or white nationalist subreddits got unbanned, American Renaissance is still banned off Facebook and Youtube, Facebook still explicitly bans white nationalism, and other social media ban it implicitly as "hate speech", TikTok bans "white lives matter" [1], and promised to ban even more [2] (under Trump's 1st term), while wikipedia doesn't even bother to mention that as censorship [3]. All of this is still the case under the current Washington. The only exception is Twitter, after Musk bought it - there, American Renaissance got unbanned. And a 180 would imply that these things are not only unbanned, but their opponents are banned. So if you're going to just make stuff up, i.e. lie, then I won't waste my time with you. [1] https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/tiktok-sparks-massive-backlash-after-it-bans-the-phrase-white-lives-matter-while-keeping-black-lives-matter-chinese-propaganda/ar-AA24RbWj https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/tiktok-sparks-massive-b... [2] https://www.timesofisrael.com/tiktok-says-it-will-crack-down-on-anti-semitism-white-nationalism/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/tiktok-says-it-will-crack-down... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_TikTok https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_TikTok
  - 7d ago
- theendisney 7d ago
  Its true, all usually highly conplex world events are dumbed down to an insanely infantile level that carefully omits anything that may poorly reflect on corporate interests. Also obvious is that all news is made in a short list of countries. Everywhere else the best you can hope for are terrible events. You will only get opinions from a small list of talking heads. One might imagine populating the media with nothing but professors. Each field has new stuff every week. In stead you get Adam Savage. The name isn't by acident.

howunfortunate 7d ago

I'm curious what trends you see towards censorship? Elon presumably being an exemplar for current trends: Twitter is unarguably far less censored than it was before (though censorship is still present). And Meta took note and also turned down its censorship significantly in response. The Epstein files, while far less than hoped for by many, are another example of a trend towards sharing far more sensitive info than has been typical by past administrations. There are many good examples you could point to of increased authoritarianism, but censorship in particular seems to be on the backswing, if anything. Edit: oof, it's extremely concerning that the comment below was flagged

geraneum 7d ago
It’s too soon for such a conclusion IMO. The pervasive Iran-like censorship I was talking about will rear its ugly head when those authoritarian regimes are established. It’s a tool and I can assure you it will be used extensively. This is nothing new really. P.S. the Epstein files were just a cruel joke! I wouldn’t list it there.
- howunfortunate 7d ago
  It doesn't add up for me. If the goal is simply authoritarian control, why would they employ less censorship than their predecessors? Surely they could get away with at the very least the same amount?
  - geraneum 7d ago
    > simply authoritarian control There’s nothing simple about authoritarian control. Who says we have less censorship? Sure people can tweet all kind of stuff without getting banned. Fine, but at the same time US president is removing news networks he doesn’t like from press briefings. That’s just one example. To say the censorship is in decline is baffling.
  - trombuance 6d ago
    [dead]

cindyllm 7d ago

[dead]