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Comment by s73v3r_ | Hacker News Reader

"Toxic statements = statements from a different political orientation"

Wrong. Saying so is dangerously minimizing the problem.

Have you been following what’s going on in the UK with their anti-“hate” speech laws?

Tweet something that someone decides is offensive to them, get a visit from the police? I’d say it’s a very rational concern that these regulations would be weaponized against “wrongthink”.

I'm not saying the UK's way is the way to go. But trying to handwave away the problem of toxicity with, "It's just people who can't handle' differing opinions" not right either.

The number of actual prosecutions or even visits from the police is tiny, and when you look at the actual cases they tend to be racist death or rape threats.

"Arrests for offensive Facebook and Twitter posts soar in London" [1]

"Arrests for 'offensive' Twitter and Facebook messages up by a third" [2]

"British Police Arrest At Least 3,395 People for ‘Offensive’ Online Comments in One Year" [3]

"Police arresting nine people a day in fight against web trolls" [4]

"More than 3,300 people were detained and questioned last year over so-called trolling on social media and other online forums, a rise of nearly 50 per cent in two years, according to figures obtained by The Times.

About half of the investigations were dropped before prosecutions were brought, however, leading to criticism from civil liberties campaigners that the authorities are over-policing the internet and threatening free speech...."

[1] - http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/arrests-for-offensive-f...

[2] - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/06/02/social_media_arrests...

[3] - http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/10/14/british-police-ar...

[4] - https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-arresting-nine-peo...

None of those articles mention the content of the posts.

There are a few examples in there. Here’s a few more [1]. Mostly it’s ill advised mouthing off, or blowing off steam as was the case of the guy delayed hours at an airport. These are not “true threats” or incitement, which are charged differently.

[1] - https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/killallwhitemen-twitter-trolli...

Dangerously minimizing? What's dangerous is a culture addicted to simulating political action by managing online comments. Instead if putting resources to making your local garden great, to mangle Nietzsche of Ecco Homo, people get worked up by actions they have no control over instead of working locally to change conditions where they could have an impact.

And you lack imagination and historical hindsight if you think the concept of "toxicity" can only be wielded by whatever you consider to be the forces of light. So to speak.

"Dangerously minimizing?"

Yes. Pretending that the problem of toxicity is just people who can't handle differing opinions is to be willfully ignorant of the problem. As such, a reasonable conversation can not be had.

"And you lack imagination and historical hindsight if you think the concept of "toxicity" can only be wielded by whatever you consider to be the forces of light. So to speak."

Nowhere did I say that in the least.

You're spoiled beyond belief if you view "toxic" comments online as a serious problem. If it is truly "a problem", then the larger problem is tying your emotions to what anonymous people say. You live vicariously through an image of how offended someone else might be. Instead of tending to the garden you can actually protect and uphold.

Do you think the poor bastards in Skid Row feel better because some (literal) white typed in defense against toxicity?

Do you think someone...Let's say Tim Wise! Do you think Mr.Wise has actually interacted with black communities while he lives in a 98% white neighborhood? Do you think Mr.Wise would help some homeless junkie who's trying to figure out how to work his phone so he can message an estranged daughter on Facebook? That's part of what I did in Skid Row. There are issues of knowledge, skills, and plain diet that would offer much better benefits than speaking out against some notion of "toxicity", created by people who have no skin in bleating their stupid moralism.

Sorry, but this idea of "Sticks and Stones" hasn't been true for a long, long time. You may be able to shug off terrible, racist, bigoted slurs hurled at you, but people who have that slung at them day after day after day might not be, and I'm not going to blame them for not wanting to take it anymore.

Then why are they on the racist slur subreddit? Same with Twitter, you don't have to follow people who insult you, or the people who retweet the insults to you.

Why are you assuming that stuff stays in it's little corner? It doesn't. Especially with Twitter, it's very easy for anyone to message that kind of thing to you.

You could argue that toxic comments on the internet are the only reason the current president got elected in the US. Should said president lead us to a nuclear holocaust, or any number of other real possibilities due to his proven negligence, toxic internet comments would have a very real impact on the material conditions of citizens in this country.

Huh? What if Clinton had won and started a nuclear holocaust? Who's to blame then? You must be opposed to all political advertising for the party you don't like because somehow you're able to see that it's bad and the other half of the population isn't. That's being hopelessly blinded by partisanship.

I'm opposed to all political advertising period, and would have also considered a Clinton presidency non-optimal, though likely more stable than what we have now.

I'm fine with the down votes, but it should be pretty obvious that it would have been Marco Rubio, or some other sanitary GOP member who got elected if it wasn't for the Russian troll brigade on the internet whipping up a frenzy for Trump.

That's my only point

it should be pretty obvious that it would have been Marco Rubio, or some other sanitary GOP member who got elected if it wasn't for the Russian troll brigade on the internet whipping up a frenzy for Trump

You raise a wonderful point. Personally, I don't think a "Russian troll brigade" was singularly more effective than all the other attempts to affect the election, but if there was an influence, it certainly may have been greater in the GOP primary than in the general election.

But despite having read an awful lot of election analysis, I don't think I've ever heard anyone else make this point. I've only ever seen the issue framed as Trump vs Clinton, with almost all the proponents of the "Russian hacking" narrative being on the pro-Clinton side.

Besides yourself, does there exist a group of pro-Rubio (or perhaps more interestingly pro-Cruz) supporters who believe that Russia successfully influenced the election in support of Trump? Is there somewhere online I could read more about this worldview?

You know, that's a good question. I read a lot, and I pay attention a lot, so for me dots get connected rather naturally. There isn't much out there talking about russian spamming taking place during the primary. I found this though: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/congress...

That being said, my family is loaded with died-in-the-wool republicans, and I remember them all blown away by the fact that trump was winning the primary. None of them could believe it, and they all hated him during the primary!

After trump won, and it was him vs clinton, then the narrative switched. They loved trump at that point.

It was very chilling. It became clear to me that these folks were heavily influenced by some sort of propaganda because their minds changed like the wind!

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