Talk about hyperbole. In no way did even 1% of the population on Parler want mass executions for people like you.
> the world is a little more complex than "privacy at all costs."
The line doesn't have to do with the infringement of privacy, it's about whether that infringement is being done by publicly sanctioned power, or the whim of the arbitrary, domineering power of private (tech) actors. Elizabeth Anderson has written quite well on this topic in "Private Government."
Facebook and Twitter have millions of people who want mass executions for all kinds of groups, a quick trip into Muslim areas of both services and you'll find moderate and right-wing versions that want execution for LGBTQ+ people. You can find the same desire for marginalization and extermination of other groups. Not every language and dialect has a huge team of moderators that review content and take the appropriate punitive action against malicious users.
I have a Parler account. I have a GAB account. I make accounts on all new social media platforms and communications services. Everyone should. Because you have no idea what platform might be the next Facebook, or which one is going to be the next MySpace.
Someone then decide to associate with these people by joining the site. They may not personally post messages calling for violence, but are now associated with them. And the response is: well sure I'm in the group but I don't actually agree with any of this.
Then my question is: why did you join in the first place? If you don't agree with the most vocal 1% (I SERIOUSLY doubt that number after spending time perusing the site), and you don't denounce what they're saying, what do you expect others to think? We're supposed to read your mind that you're part of a "silent dissent" and just joined the site because...?
People were banned from facebook and twitter for calling for violence, if you switched sites specifically to follow that person I have a REAL tough time believing you don't support them.
Edit to add: Also what happens behind doors on invite only subreddits?
Edit to add further: https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitPoliticsSays/comments/bmtdqb/ch...
CHapoTrapHouse got banned but....CTH is invite only.
>Recently, we’ve seen a steady increase in this violent content on your website, all of which violates our terms. It’s clear that Parler does not have an effective process to comply with the AWS terms of service. It also seems that Parler is still trying to determine its position on content moderation. You remove some violent content when contacted by us or others, but not always with urgency. Your CEO recently stated publicly that he doesn’t “feel responsible for any of this, and neither should the platform.” This morning, you shared that you have a plan to more proactively moderate violent content, but plan to do so manually with volunteers. It’s our view that this nascent plan to use volunteers to promptly identify and remove dangerous content will not work in light of the rapidly growing number of violent posts. This is further demonstrated by the fact that you still have not taken down much of the content that we’ve sent you. Given the unfortunate events that transpired this past week in Washington, D.C., there is serious risk that this type of content will further incite violence.
You think you can assert with confidence that there are not 40,000 people with Parler accounts who want mass executions?
I'd like to think you're right, but I'm not as confident as you are.
Not after watching someone beat a Capitol Police officer to death with a flag pole flying the American Flag. People think they are defending their country against evil. Like me, apparently.
How many QAnon followers are there? How many believe the most outrageous claims? I would not be surprised if 40,000 do. Would you?
> single post
> on Parler
> calling for mass executions
I still think these are not legit death threats by the content of it. Saying things like “a good commie is a dead a commie” might be tasteless but it’s far from being a serious thing. No one is killing communists in the US.
https://imgur.com/gallery/nHb2lO8
Those are legit death threats. Including from a lawyer associated with the President.
> “Death to all Marxist Democrats. Take no prisoners leave no survivors!!” Chief Holland added.
How would this have to be modified to become a "legitimate death threat"?
I will admit that it's draining, talking to one user who keeps moving the goal-posts.
And I will then say that I think it's their intention to drain people like me.
So I try to shrug it off and keep refuting arguments with the evidence they pretend they will be convinced by.
It's clear that you are arguing in good faith and the other person who keeps moving the goalposts and demanding more proof is not, and moreover it's very enlightening to see this scenarios played out nearly identically whenever I lurk and follow a discussion between the left and right in US politics.
You can't usually "win" the argument, just your own time.
Easily done:
https://imgur.com/gallery/nHb2lO8
Some of these are Verified users - Parler has their Drivers License and Social Security number, and yet they still felt secure in brazenly violating the law like this.
I do not think "literally millions" do. That is an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence.
I am saddened by extremists like this, on all sides.
I want to win a tough but fair political fight, and I think that's what almost everyone in America wants, too. I'm sorry some people think 60 court cases were simultaneously wrongly decided, but I don't feel sympathy for anyone who thinks the next step is to storm the Capitol.
Unfortunately the service is down, but I would imagine that other post was removed as well.
The question we were discussing was whether or not many of the USERS are calling for mass executions.
I provided ample evidence, despite your "find me a single post" challenge.
Now we might want to engage in a different discussion, about whether Parler was correctly moderating that content. But that is not a "clarification," that's a new topic.
I do not have access to information about how long content was allowed to remain before it was removed. Do you?
I am equally concerned about what happened about the Capitol, but the actions taken by tech in response are unacceptable to me.
The problem with fascist terrorists is not their rhetoric, it's their violence. Allow them to speak their mind and you lower their need for violent action and everyone else gets to show that their ideas are horribly flawed.
It's amusing to think that people seriously believe there are huge swathes of people just ripe to become neo-nazis because someone gave a rousing speech or wrote some tweets - how do you manage not to succumb to these rhetorical titans?
Given that exactly this happened 90 years ago and caused the deaths of tens of millions, people are needless to say cautious.
If it hadn't been Hitler, it would have eventually been someone else.
On top of that, it's only a matter of time before they're linked to one of the many .win site that sprang up after Twitter purged the_donald and the Qanon people.
And again, people have been moved to violence and facism in human history, that's not difficult to find.
I'm really not, and I'd prefer if you started off responding to me by not (mis)characterising my intentions. I'm 100% sincere in my support of free speech and stand 100% behind my comment.
> People having their brains hit with racist or violent rhetoric over a long period of time will be changed by that
Yes, they will, which is why it's good to allow every voice and every kind of viewpoint a chance to be expressed and hence challenged. Unless you think that echo chambers are a good thing?
> people have been moved to violence and facism in human history, that's not difficult to find
Did they occur in places with high amounts of censorship or free speech? The Holocaust wasn't caused simply by one of Hitler's speeches, for example, it was also (among other things) primed by the rampant anti-semitic prejudice that came from the pulpit every Sunday for hundreds of years - which was unchallengable due to blasphemy laws.
Another "win" for the repression of speech someone in power doesn't like, eh?
> which was unchallengable due to blasphemy laws
There's basically no support for this claim in any literature I can find. Care to cite a historian?
> There's basically no support for this claim in any literature I can find. Care to cite a historian?
Tell me the literature you looked in first, because I want to know which books can miss such basic facts, and hence what I should avoid. The history of Europe is soaked in blood provoked by differences over what can be said by religious people, to religious people, and of them and their views. Entire wars have been fought over it - are you going to tell me there are historians that are credible who'll claim Europe was a land of toleration? Locke wrote his letter of toleration specifically because of the widespread intolerance and bloodshed.
If you use the word heresy instead of blasphemy and your search may prove more fruitful. It was effect in Europe from the Edict of Thessalonica, which brought the first execution, and in some countries hasn't been repealed from law. If you look up the last people executed under these laws you may even find what they said to deserve execution.
Yes, widespread antisemitism was a contributor to the holocaust, but that wasn't primarily or even really particularly due to blasphemy laws. Taking anti-Semitism in pre WWII Europe and blaming it, in any significant part, on a lack of free speech, is not something that has any mainstream historic support. It's weird historical revisionism that's honestly a bit uncomfortable. (for example, Germany blasphemy laws pre-WWII, as written, actually protected Judaism)
I'm claiming that they were a necessary condition. Am I changing my position? No. I've no idea how you came to that.
> Yes, widespread antisemitism was a contributor to the holocaust
We agree.
> but that wasn't primarily or even really particularly due to blasphemy laws
In which free speech zone did a similar situation occur? Your statement is pure speculation. At least try attribute things to conditions that are present or have something to compare with to show the contrast.
> blaming it, in any significant part, on a lack of free speech, is not something that has any mainstream historic support.
I'd like to know what these mysterious "mainstream" historians think was behind the anti-semitism that was so rife in Christian Europe for so long. Where did Nazis get the idea of blood libel from? What ever could be the reason…?
On a less sarcastic note, I hope they don't blame the Jews for their predicament, as the only other explanation would be that the hatred arose from nothing but some rousing speeches by Hitler. That to me would seem incredibly childish a notion and not in the slightest supported by the accounts of prominent Nazi party members of the time but at least it's better than victim blaming.
Of course, we could rely again on looking at the conditions present and what effects correlate - what happens when blasphemy laws are present, and what happens when freedom of conscience (free speech + freedom of religion) is present - does support for Christianity go down? Does anti-semitism rise or fall? Is this consistent across the world? Is the same true for Europe?
> for example, Germany blasphemy laws pre-WWII, as written, actually protected Judaism
On the one hand there are the hate speech laws that were in place for a few years, and on the other is the rampant anti-semitism for at least hundreds of years prior (supported by blasphemy laws), and to top it all off the hate speech laws didn't even work! On the contrary, they contributed to the rise of the National Socialists.
In both cases a lack of free speech resulted in a negative outcome. Yet, you seem to be against free speech. Maybe it's your comfort levels, and I agree, that really is a problem with free speech.
I'll take it over the alternatives though.
> Your statement is pure speculation.
So is yours.
> and to top it all off the hate speech laws didn't even work!
I'm not talking about hate speech laws. I'm talking about blasphemy laws. Like I said you seem to not have a particularly strong knowledge of the actual history here, hence my request for a historian who supports your position.
> blood libel from
Funny you bring that up. Guess who propogates blood libel conspiracies today? Q-anon, a conspiracy theory group that overlaps with the people who stormed the capitol building. So you see, even with free speech you can have large groups of people believing absolute nonsense.
You also wrote this:
> for example, Germany blasphemy laws pre-WWII, as written, actually protected Judaism
You'll have to forgive my assumption that you were referring to hate speech laws, though I'm not sure what else you would be referring to in the context of this debate. I'm sure you're also clear that the Weimar's hate speech laws protected Judaism and were used against prominent National Socialists.[1]
> > Your statement is pure speculation.
> So is yours.
No, pure speculation occurs when you invoke an alternate timeline. I've speculated based on the existent timeline and factors therein. Yours is akin to fantasy, mine is a deduction. Mine is an answer to "how did that happen?" whereas yours is a "what would happen if…?"
There's no would in my speculation.
> We got damn close here in the US with the Japanese internment. So speech suppression it clearly isn't necessary to imprison an entire ethnic group for political reasons.
Speech was suppressed during wartime. From[2]:
> The day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover emergency authority to censor all news and control all communications in and out of the country.
The Supreme Court also upheld the government's right to the internment (among other things) because SCOTUS has previously and consistently ruled that things are different at wartime, which I largely disagree with, along with the internment.
Not that free speech ultimately protects anyone like a magic amulet, it simply increases the likelihood of protection. You and I will no doubt both wear a seatbelt when driving but neither of us will claim it will definitely stop us flying out of our seats, there are more conditions to consider to make that claim.
Which makes this all the more amusing to me:
> Like I said you seem to not have a particularly strong knowledge of the actual history here, hence my request for a historian who supports your position.
Well, I guess I'll have to wait for you to bring forth the materials you say you checked, and perhaps for you to find out what was actually happening during WWII in the US.
> > blood libel from
> Funny you bring that up.
The only source of possible irony relies on misconception and tribalism so we'll have to disagree on its amusing quality. I brought up the blood libel because these are the consequence of competing Abrahamic religions that took hold over large areas and disallow speech that contradicts doctrine, doctrine that includes anti-semitism. Where's the Jew hatred in groups with no religious affiliation - do you find much anti-semitism among Buddhists and Hindus?
> So you see, even with free speech you can have large groups of people believing absolute nonsense.
When did I claim otherwise? Free speech only makes discernment of truth more likely, it does not guarantee it. Rather like having the best lab with the best scientists and best practice methods for your procedures, it will not guarantee you discoveries but it increases the likelihood versus a garage with a self taught scientist who is making it up as they go along, but some discoveries may still happen there too. To think that freedom of speech is the medicine for all ill would be to engage in fallacious thinking.[3]
[1] https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/copenhagen-speech-v...
[2] https://mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1597/free-speech-du...
I've been browsing /pol/ for years, hell almost decades. Its a great place to go to get an idea of just how fringe certain elements of society are becoming. I was actually actively browsing when QAnon was making his posts there.
I thought they were just as ridiculous and far-fetched then as I do now. People become radicalized largely because some condition in their life is lacking. For every single successful mechanical engineer that joins ISIS, there's 99 out-of-work coal miners and factory workers who storm the American capital.
Most people who have everything in their life going great don't end up extremists.
I watched lawyers, doctors and owners of IT companies attack the Capitol.
There are very few struggling coal miners who can afford to fly into DC during the week along with hundreds of dollars in riot gear in order to spend a few days rioting.
That may be true, or that may not be true. Has there been any research on this?
Popper draws a clear distinction between those who will have intolerant views but do not engage in violence, and those who do engage in violence. It is only the latter, in Popper's view, that must be restricted.