Donald Trump Jr suspended from tweeting after Covid post | Hacker News Reader

Donald Trump Jr suspended from tweeting after Covid post

bbc.co.uk

48 pointsColinWright23 comments

From the article: "While there is indeed much disagreement in the medical community about the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine in treating coronavirus, there have been studies reported by mainstream outlets like CNN, suggesting that it may in fact by an effective treatment."

Is hydroxychloroquine's effectiveness questionable? Yes.

Should Twitter be the one to make that judgement call and block a video from medical professionals? No.

Can Twitter do this? Sadly, until Section 230 is reformed, Yes.

The video didn't just suggest that it might be an effective treatment, it claimed that hydroxychloroquine is a cure.

"This virus has a cure. It's called hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and Zithromax. I know people want to talk about a mask. Hello. You don't need mask. There is a cure."

These "medical professionals" are quacks

What? How can you not trust the person that runs https://archive.fo/G7wtb ?

> Should Twitter be the one to make that judgement call and block a video from medical professionals? No.

Why not? Their house, their rules.

"Should" != "Could"

Could they do it? Yes. Their house, their rules.

Should they do it? Well, that is a business decision.

It can be their rules, but then they should not be able to advertise things like this:

"Free expression is a human right. Everyone has a voice, and the right to use it. On Twitter, you should feel safe expressing your unique point of view with every Tweet – and it’s our job to make that happen."

"Twitter stands for freedom of expression for everyone."

"We do not take sides. We show sides. Every side."

"We treat everyone equally: the same Twitter Rules apply to all."

"we allow strong opinions and controversial views."

I kind of agree with you, but also disagree somewhat. I think these statements are aspirational in that they reflect Twitter's general principles. But when the rubber hits the road, there are practical limits and exceptions that you make to preserve what you perceive as the greater good and to make sure that the potential harms that come with unrestrained freedom don't outweigh the benefits. I don't think Twitter wants their principles to constitute a suicide pact.

The way you're framing this is disingenuous at best. This isn't a disagreement between medical professionals. The person he linked to isn't some respected pathologist, it's a person I can only classify as borderline if not outright insane.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/stella-immanuel-trumps-new-cov...

Twitter should prevent you from reading instructions on how to make chlorine gas that pretend you aren't actually going to make chlorine gas.

Let's run a poll. What kind of stuck on stupid does DJT most resemble because getting kicked off social media is a real achievement:

- Kevin Cline's Otto in "Fish Called Wanda"

- "The Zapper" from Futurama

- The Duke from Doonesbury (bonus: who's his Honey?)

I've been surprised that Trump has been so toothless in the contest against Twitter. I thought for sure things like this, or when they apply the different labels or restrictions to his tweets, would've set him off and made him do something against Twitter.

The problem is he needs Twitter as much as Twitter needs him. Lots of people have talked about getting his base over to some other app that will allow him to say whatever, but it just hasn't worked.

Curious, has the President really tried that hard? I can't imagine that he would fail if he made a clean break from Twitter when switching. Love him or hate him, he in a position to command endless press through whichever platform he chooses.

Interesting business case. I think yes, he single handed Ky could jump start a new social network. Millions of people would follow him just to argue about his posts.

He could definitely pull several million people onto a new service immediately, but it would just be his most hardcore followers I would think.

The WHO has been wrong many times.

You may have commented on the wrong article, because the WHO isn't mentioned in this article.

The big tech companies in question (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc) are using the WHO's guidance as the barometer for what does and does not constitute "misleading information" when it comes to deciding what to block. So, OP's point is not misguided. It's not like Twitter's own medical staff are the ones deciding whether hydroxychloroquine is or is not effective.

Yes sorry this is exactly what I meant. Thank you.

The role of the WHO is to provide timely advice based on the best evidence on hand. Sometimes preliminary research is overturned by subsequent studies. Sometimes best practices are flawed and need to be updated. WHO is not omniscient; they're pragmatic scientists.

Scientists have been wrong frequently throughout history, but do you know who's wrong even more often? The people who ignore science.

Certainly, in the balance of probabilities the WHO's guidance is more likely to be correct than incorrect. It's certainly more likely to be correct than a layperson's.

But it's not SO overwhelmingly likely to be correct that all of the big 3 social networks (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube) need to have a policy of aggressively removing anyone who contradicts them.

Even though I agree the WHO is probably right about most things, it's far below the level of certainty you'd need to justify these overreactions. It doesn't even have the intended effect of preventing irresponsible behavior by gullible people; the COVID19 hoaxers are getting way more ammunition out of the media's censorious behaviour than they would out of Trump Jr's bad medical advice.

Chrissakes, what happened in the past 6 months here? This place is overrun with low-quality comments like yours.

Mostly is it on COVID and Trump posts. Hide or flagging is the best response to the entire thread. These topics do not come out well here.

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