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Comment by noetic_techy | Hacker News Reader

Oh please. The headline might as well have been:

We need to protect people from information and ideas we don't agree with.

Freedom of speech is not just about speech, its about ideas. Nobody should ever be deemed the arbiter of truth. Not Facebook, not the government, not anyone. Decentralize the social networks. Let everyone speak, even the bad people.

Realize that you actually make the problem worse by suppressing information, even bad information. Making information "forbidden" makes it that much more appealing to people, enhancing the us-vs-them tribal mentality. Especially when its a reasonable opinion or idea with some merit. Suddenly it sounds like suppression of the truth.

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Saying "everyone should speak" actually means "everyone should speak according to their purchasing power in the market" right now - so I think your premise, while well meaning, is not realistic.

Having liars with big pockets broadcast lies (propaganda) works very effectively, no "black market suppression of the truth" is needed to weaponize bad ideas.

Propaganda from deep-pocketed individuals and organizations is a problem, but the current cure is worse than the disease, particularly when the censorship itself is biased. It takes more to be labelled fringe and justify censorship for left-leaning speech, than it takes for right-leaning speech.

The root problem with modern discourse and social media is subtle, unforced siloing of communication within subgroups, so that there's not enough subgroup-bridging discussion. Overton windows shrink until subgroup-bridging discussion is mostly impossible. That all happens without any active censorship.

> the current cure is worse than the disease

This comment is the text version of that cartoon where the dog sits in the room where everything is on fire thinking "this is fine."

Assuming that the "cure" refers to some form of blasphemy law, then it is actually apropos, although devoid of explanation, sure.

I'm assuming you are liberal. Go read Popehat's views on blasphemy laws. He's liberal.

> It takes more to be labelled fringe and justify censorship for left-leaning speech, than it takes for right-leaning speech.

That's because there's more harm-promoting speech, and more incoherent lies, from the right? Saying there should be equal treatment of left and right speech regardless of the content is nonsense.

I come from a very right-leaning area. I was quite surprised to find that everyone I knew supported the daily killing and torture of Jews... because that is what Nazis do, right?

I was also quite surprised to hear that my community wants to take away rights from black people, which I heard in a radio ad not so long ago.

The left has its equal share of hobgoblins.

> I was also quite surprised to hear that my community wants to take away rights from black people, which I heard in a radio ad not so long ago

Have you checked this? What's their opinion on, for example, Black Lives matter?

Most of them don't have the education to know the definition of a false equivalence.

That you can seriously entertain Republicans would remove black freedoms if not for Black Lives Matter just turned this thread into one where you can rant away without my participation.

I'm learning to walk away from hate.

Control and monitoring turns easily into oppression and stagnation, and there is many blooded pages in history to describe that outcome. We might say that this time it will be different, that we are just removing the bad actors and obvious bad behavior, and to put our trust in those that sit at the control. To that I quote: "Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."

On the other end we have the open town square where the loudest speakers and richest will overpower all other voices until none can hear anything and chaos pours forth.

From both we see people flee into isolated subgroups with perfect echo chamber where the oppressed be free from the loud and censors, with the eventual result of polarization where those outside turns in their eyes into less and less human. From there hate and violence ensures and we go back and ask our self, did we want the censors or loudest to rule.

Our attention is a limited resource. How do you propose to arbitrate access to this limited resource except through the price mechanism? Some kind of attention lottery?

In Canada there is a law where you can't lie on the news. It's worked pretty well and I can at least stand the news programs we have.

I also think you're a bit too naive. Without proper governance look at what is happening in america. America from the outside believes climate change is a hoax because republicans are bought. No one is willing to go against the establishment and make laws to stop this when they're clearly INCORRECT ideas that are being pushed to the masses misinforming people.

Who gets to determine if you lie? What constitutes a lie? Can I say that the holocaust never happened, if that is what I actually believe? How about global warming.

Besides it only takes a marginally more more skilled speaker to get the same result and say nothing at all that can be stated as a direct lie.

No, if you're a news organization you can't say things because you believe it. That's the point.

> Realize that you actually make the problem worse by suppressing information

I'm not taking a position on your larger post but this is a bit of a cliche I'd politely suggest you stop using. There are numerous historical examples of the successful suppression of information and the impact of said suppression frequently helps the suppressor in exactly the way they intend.

Unless those are less than about 20 years old, I will argue that they no longer apply. With the internet you simply cannot censor information they way you used to be able to do.

With the internet you can't have an Albigensian genocide.

No, you have a Rohingya genocide instead.

I never said you couldn't have a genocide, just that you couldn't have a genocide whoes goal was to remove from the face of the planet some knowledge.

The combined cultural knowledge of every tribe in the world would fit on one hard drive.

The problem is the signal to noise ratio is getting so bad that you don’t know what information to trust.

> signal to noise ratio

This is another euphemism for hearing ideas you disagree with. You choose who to friend/follow/read. Occasionally those people will say things you don't agree with.

> you don’t know what information to trust

Just because someone landed a job at [fill in traditional media outlet] does not make them more trustworthy. You're simply being exposed to the reality that their bullshit is just as much bullshit as everything else.

So you're telling me that russian bots spreading lies are merely "ideas you disagree with"? I can't... I can't... jesus...

Words "Russian", and "bots" are absolutely irrelevant for the discussion. "Lies" is relevant, but who is the authority to decide what belongs to the category? The whole Free Speech thing is invented exactly because history of humanity many times proved that mandatory filtering of information inevitably leads to abuse, and to lies which you want to counter.

Why is everything a Russian bot? That conspiracy needs to end. The American media lies to you constantly (Manufacturing Consent, Chomsky), politicians lie to you constantly, advertising lies to you constantly. This isn't one big Russian scheme, it's simply capital.

Was this Russia?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2003/02/06/i...

Na BrO. You are probably not on the social often enough to see the ephemeral ads that (that have been paid for) to target specific opinion clusters. It's a sophisticated attack on common sense, by appealing to gut instincts. How do you think a bunch of old people were able to harness the power of the internet in 2016,17,18? They paid private firms to figure this stuff out. People love trading money for control, and you should not be so naive as to think the opposite.

You've just described most advertising, ever.

It's a meme, not something literal. Of course it's not all russian bots, and that's besides the point.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/11/15/faceboo...

Verified by multiple sources. "Facebook said it had found and removed roughly 1.5 billion fake accounts" surely doesn't suggest they're all literally Russian, or bots, but they sure were fake and spreading propaganda.

Yes, because that's exactly what it is. They are ideas. And you disagree with them.

It's very simple - anyone can assert anything, thus each individual must take it upon themselves to be skeptical of the assertion, or blindly agree with it.

The real problem you're getting at here is that many people are dumb, and may be made to believe anything.

If these people became skeptical or were simply deleted from reality, such bots would have no value.

Please, please, let me decide for myself what is information, and what is noise.

Why am I able to find information I can trust easily, verifiable among many different non-mainstream sources that are nearly always accurate?

The most important thing is to get off Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Snapchat, etc, find some independent news sites you like, and be very skeptical.

Disagree, make better platforms. People will exercise their ability to choose once choices exist.

> Nobody should ever be deemed the arbiter of truth.

Except for you and your comment, right?

GP didn't say that.

Don't give up your right to unbiased information! Don't channel your understanding through one source! You've gotta fight, for your right, to party!

Nah. This conflagratory term "fake news" deliberately muddles "things that aren't very important" with "lies told by officials".

I think the second needs to be a condition of public office. You deliberately lie, or show a pattern of not giving a shit about the truth, pack your bags and get a private sector job.

Conversely and perversely, the varied institutions of public office seem to protect politicians' speech. This seems deeply wrong.

And obviously this seems partisan at the moment because there's currrently a 200lb orangutan as POTUS who can't keep his story straight about anything... But this is a standard we should all want, for all out politicians, worldwide.

Just to be clear, I think you have to be allowed to say this stuff, I just think that ends at the point where you're a public official. You can still say it, but you'll lose your job.

But who would be the arbitraitor who decides when you have lied so much you have to leave?

I'm not saying there are quick and easy answers here, just that even agreeing a very high burden of evidence is better than... this.

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