The rate of cigarette smoking among young people has dropped dramatically over the past few decades. This isn't because of any change in scientific finding, we've known cigarettes are harmful and cause cancer for decades prior to that. What changed is we stopped advertising them on TV and putting cigarettes in kids cartoons and movies. We stopped letting people smoke them in restaurants/airplanes/schools/hospitals/etc. Cigarettes became uncool, became socially unacceptable.
In one generation, smoking went from the coolest thing you could do to one of the least cool things you could do. Because it was made abundantly clear that it wasn't socially acceptable anymore, and that message was sent by banning smoking from public view.
If you are the one being censored it sends the message that you are not welcome here, so you find another outlet. I hadn't hear of Gab until yesterday and my initial impression that it was a cool idea to have a social media platform that is pro free-speech, but obviously the community is very polarized and not very diverse in non-hate ideas (still don't have a complete picture of that site).
>>smoking went from the coolest thing you could do to one of the least cool things you could do
That's the power of marketing you're referring to. I was thinking about an individuals freedom to say what's on their mind. And if someone has super confused ideas, I would like for them to be able to express them so they can be addressed.
It's not censorship to shut down hate speech any more than it's censorship when `dang tells me I'm not allowed to call someone an idiot on Hacker News. It sets the tone for the conversation we're all having, and you know, after I got warned a few times I stopped calling people idiots because I know that kind of behavior doesn't fly here.
If people have to leave Twitter and go to Gab in order to spread their message of hate, that's fantastic. Because everyone knows Twitter, everyone uses Twitter, but no one's ever heard of Gab. And then when they visit Gab, they find it's full of hate speech and extreme opinions and never visit again. Bad business model for Gab, but a huge win for everyone else.
Not calling someone an idiot, sets the tone of a conversation. You can have a civilized conversation that contains very twisted ideas. The same ideas can be expressed eloquently , i.e. eugenics, but that doesn't change what they are.
If I say "hate speech" and Trump voters think I'm talking about them, that is a very big problem. Is there no nuance between "Trump voter" and "person who spreads hate speech"?
Somewhere in the minds of the people who are afraid of Twitter's hate speech rules, they themselves believe they are engaging in hate speech whether it's true or not. And since the US doesn't have any legal definition of hate speech, it's up to society to create and enforce its own rules. Twitter banning Alex Jones and Roger Stone is just society's way of saying that the message they're spreading is not acceptable in society.
Like you said, two opposing viewpoints can benefit from having a reasoned discussion. But hate speech is not a reasoned discussion, it's a one-way communication, generally against people who cannot defend themselves. Conservative or liberal viewpoints are one thing. Hate speech is something completely different. Again, if I say "hate speech" and you immediately think "Trump supporter", we're having two very different conversations.
At any rate I don't think either of us are getting anything productive from this conversation, so I'm going to back out. Have a nice day.
Being made illegal or banned only makes things cooler. Marijuana is cool now despite being illegal.
Attitudes toward tobacco changed because of the power of advertising. There's a certain justice in that, since advertising made it popular in the first place.
My university banned smoking on campus years back, and no one said "aww man smoking is so cool now that I can't do it on campus". It's just so inconvenient to smoke now that fewer people bother to do so. It's not cool to have to put on your coat and walk three blocks to go have a smoke every hour.
For a long time being homosexual was illegal and socially unacceptable, but that has changed over the years after the expected social harm from homosexuality had not been realized. It's the same process, just in reverse. Society is attempting to minimize harm to itself, whether that's rejecting ideas that are socially harmful or demanding the decriminalization of activities that are not socially harmful.
Free speech is being abused, plain and simple.
Maybe the spread of "free-form-facts" propaganda is not as significant, as that there is a large subset of people who are easily misled. If you can't judge and think critically about the stuff you hear you're basically a house plant with complicated emotions.
Also how do you know what is propaganda and what is not if you've never been exposed to it?
The version of Article 19 in the ICCPR amends the "freedom of expression" by stating that the exercise of these rights carries "special duties and responsibilities" and may "therefore be subject to certain restrictions" when necessary "[f]or respect of the rights or reputation of others" or "[f]or the protection of national security or of public order (order public), or of public health or morals".
https://web.archive.org/web/20080705115024/http://www2.ohchr...
I have always thought of freedoms being limited by the effect they have on others' freedoms. You can't use your freedoms at the expense of someone else's freedom. E.g. you can't kill someone because you are restricting their right to live.
That being said, speech is kinda nuanced. Because, spoken word does not directly affect other freedoms. In extreme cases, like shouting "fire" in the theater or "bomb" in an airport, speech is limited because of the direct link between it and the result. But that's not really the case with propaganda, even if it is the goal to misled.
To conclude, we are victims to our own freedom of speech if it can be used against us. If someone can say outrageous things and there are people that hear it and don't immediately think "huh, that's crazy" and walk away that is a different problem. But I don't think the solution is telling him to go sit in the corner, I feel like this wrong and also polarizing.
It allows so many "certain restrictions" that the freedom effectively ceases to exist.
If the article was worded differently, would it make any difference when there is no way of holding bad-faith regimes accountable?
There are strict limits on free speech in Germany, showing it can work as intended.
If anything, it shows that free speech can be abused by bigots on both sides.
And as I pointed out in my response to your other comment, Germany has been governed by the SPD/CDU coalition since 1974. Banning opposition works.
You're either misinterpreting facts or wilfully ignorant. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/17/germany-s-top-...
I'm not familiar with the second case, but feel confident in someone writing "Kill Pope Francis" on his car being not acceptable anymore.
> Germany has been governed by the SPD/CDU coalition since 1974
This is just ridiculous. Like saying the US is governed by a coalition of Democrats and Republicans.
Actually, there is a difference: Our system allows more than two parties to exist practically. This pushes extremists into their own parties... NPD (+ now AfD) for Nazis, Linke for Communists. This makes our two big parties actually represent common people. But yeah, they are closer to each other than I'd like. Hope SPD will find a more socialist platform. If not... well, they are already on the way to be replaced by Grünen. Something that could never under the US two party voting system.
Yes, the SPD and CDU are just two of Germany's many parties - two who have long cooperated in order to gain a majority. In the US, political groups that cooperate that closely join into a single party (like evangelicals and business leaders in the Republican party). So I think that if Germany had a two-party system, the SPD and CDU would form a single party and it would be more obvious that one party has ruled for 40 years.
Regarding the limits on free speech, I could list many more examples. There's a law banning public dancing on certain holidays, for example. Infamous censorship of movies and video games (many need a separate German edition). And so on...
Or any system were politicians have to pander to a large block of voters in the middle instead of to extremists.
Yes, the swastika is a touchy subject as a result of what happened under it. I have little problem with it being banned. I understand it can be annoying, especially when the cut version of the game only includes german audio. Thankfully the USK seems to ease up a bit on swastika usage recently.
I'm sure there are lots of cases of stupid law leading to stupid situations. Then press will report about it and the law gets improved... hopefully.
But you were claiming "In Germany, they ban ideas.". With they exception of rewriting ww2 history (as mentioned a touchy subject), what is an idea I'm not allowed to communicate a civil manner?
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=39&v=s7tWHJfhiyo
Can you call Mohammed a pedophile? The fact that that's not allowed in Austria was big news recently.
I've also heard that you can get fined for insulting a civil servant.
This discussion could go on a long time, but it seems clear that you don't have free speech in Germany. You're only allowed to say what the government permits.
Not really a thing according to wikipedia [0]. But doing so is dumb in the same way you shouldn't sue a lawyer... he is fighting on home turf.
> Can you call Mohammed a pedophile?
The recent Elon Musk case has shown you shouldn't just call someone that under US law as well [1]
I never claimed there is "free speech" in Germany, where "free speech" is defined being allowed to say the same or more than the united states government permits. Germany choose a more restrictive approach that will probably lead to better outcomes for society. That doesn't make your claim "In Germany, they ban ideas." less wrong.
It is kind of telling to me that my understand of "free speech" is the freedom to criticize (especially the government), while you apparently value the freedom to insult.
[0] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beamtenbeleidigung
[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/michellefabio/2018/09/18/why-el...
De-platforming by very central actors (In order of my currently perceived descending danger: tld operators, credit card companies, payment processors, end-user dns registries, hosting platforms) is dangerous, but so is just letting entities like gab, the daily stormer etc continue largely unchallenged.
Eliminating hate is impossible, so that's not the goal.
It is possible to reduce the percentage of people who are consumed by attacking others with words, memes, threats and violence.
Isolating them reduces their reach and reduces their reproduction rate so that their numbers decrease.
Ostracizing works.
I guess I could see ostracism working if you removed them from society and kept them separate. Which doesn't work with the internet well.
Obviously, these are companies that offer products and they can tailor them anyway they want. But I'm making this as a broader statement about our culture.
What seems to have happened with Gab is that its founder got kicked out of YC for harassing batch-mates, got some publicity for that, and decided to use it to capitalize on the "alt-right". Is there any indication anywhere that Torba is doing anything more interesting than trying to sell neo-Nazis a monorail?