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Comment by the_drunkard | Hacker News Reader

The victim actually took steps to have content removed and Twitter failed to do so (initially). I wonder if payment vendors will give Twitter the "Pornhub treatment" and de-platform their access to financial services.

> Finally on Jan. 28, Twitter replied to Doe and said they wouldn’t be taking down the material, which had already racked up over 167,000 views and 2,223 retweets, the suit states.

> “Thanks for reaching out. We’ve reviewed the content, and didn’t find a violation of our policies, so no action will be taken at this time,” the response reads, according to the lawsuit.

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The whole deplatforming thing is mostly virtue-signalling.

PornHub is an easy target and the people & companies involved in its deplatforming do not need it in any way (at least not in a way they would publicly admit - I'm sure some of them do consume its content) so it's an easy call to make and can gather significant support from certain conservative and religious circles.

Twitter on the other hand is near-essential to most brands and media outlets, so the virtue-signalling benefit from deplatforming it is minuscule compared to the loss (the people most vocal in support of PornHub's deplatforming would be the first ones out of a job), not to mention that virtue-signalling only works if you have a place to brag about your action - if you deplatform Twitter, where are you going to brag about it?

Is virtue signaling being a good person through your actions?

It can appear that way, sure. But it usually means broadcasting your ‘goodness’ visibly, to ingratiate yourself with certain people. It can also mean seeking to establish one’s moral superiority, creating a power imbalance for offensive or defensive purposes.

Not in my experience. That's why the distinction is made between "virtue signalling" and "actually being virtuous".

It's more akin to showing up to a date wearing fancy clothes and driving an expensive, but borrowed car. Giving the symbols of wealth while possessing none, to fool an audience.

Many of those I've seen signalling their virtue the loudest possess the least.

The reason for the growth and awareness of the phenomena? In prior times, one must perform virtuous actions to appear virtuous. Now, it costs nothing, takes no effort, and carries no risk; it's as simple as typing 140 characters into a phone screen.

Think of what Jeffrey Epstein was obtaining from MIT president Rafael Reif in the form of a personally signed thank-you note in exchange for donations to the MIT Media Lab that started back in 2002 with co-founder and accused co-pedophile Marvin Minsky and which continued after his conviction on Florida state child rape charges in 2008 at a time when he was being investigated by the FBI for violations of the Mann Act during "Operation Leap Year."

Epstein's donations to science were a form of "virtue signaling" designed to help him evade prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors.

The guy had never earned as much as an undergraduate degree in pursuit of his two loves in life, namely "science and pussy," as he once put it to a professor whose work he was funding at the time.

I always remember that biblical passage about praying in private vs public. Such concerns about virtue signalling have been around for a long, long time.

I hope this doesn't result in Twitter banning all adult content which seems to be how all platforms handle pedophilia lawsuits/legal pressure these days.

Unfortunately, mainstream media won't pick on it, nor will the story gain traction because it is published in the NY Post. (if it is true)

Edit:- to the folks down voting me, please show me some major outlets (NYT, BBC, etc) reporting on this. As far as we are concerned, this kind of stuff should be news.

There's more than one explanation as to why "mainstream media" might not run a story. The NY Post isn't exactly known as a bastion of credible journalism. That's why they ran the Hunter Biden laptop story when everyone else passed because they couldn't verify it.

I agree with the overall sentiment of your post, but using the Hunter Biden laptop story as an example is an unfortunate choice. There's a popular view that politics had a lot to do with who picked up the story and who didn't, as opposed to just the strength of the case itself. I would recommend picking a less controversial example that highlights the shortcomings of NY Post's journalism, such as their reporting on the Boston Bombers [1].

[1] https://archives.cjr.org/the_audit/the_new_york_posts_disgra...

Ahem. You mean alleged (by Rudy Giuliani, the least credible source in the continental United States) "Hunter Biden" laptop.

Or, it could be a garbage story manufactured by liars, implying that of all the outlets not running it, there's a chance they had looked into it and decided it was a garbage story manufactured by liars.

Sometimes a thing that fails, fails because it's bad or disingenuous or both. It's possible this is a garbage suit that won't go anywhere because it's a garbage suit.

Yeah, there are a lot of "popular views" that are complete and utter nonsense

Couldn’t verify? Or refused to try?

Tried, hard, and found that it was not substantive.

I know that it's the Post. My point is that if the Post was able to cover it, why couldn't a bigger outlet such as NYT or the BBC spare the resources to cover it too.

Not to mention, the Hunter Biden story was mostly speculative without proof. This one is a federal case with all details out in the open.

> Edit:- to the folks down voting me, please show me some major outlets (NYT, BBC, etc) reporting on this. As far as we are concerned, this kind of stuff should be news.

The story is only a few hours old. "Mainstream" media often requires a level of verification that may take a few more days before you see their stories happen.

I get it, that's its the Post. But there are a lot of things going against the major outlets in this debate: a.) It's a federal case so except for identities, most of the damning information against Twitter is out there b.) Major outlets such as NYT like to brag about the size of their newsrooms, but don't seem to have the resources to cover stories of CP on Twitter and the lackadaisical attitude of its censors c.) Major outlets should not take days to investigate something like this and write it up, especially if all the content matter is out there. Else obviously openly biased outlets with an axe to grind, such as the Post will pick it up, obviously reducing the credibility of stories they output.

How is "all content matter out there"? From what I can tell, all we have is allegations from the accusing party.

It's a federal suit filed in DC, all the filings are public data, save for identities.

The mainstream media won't pick this up because they like Twitter. If Facebook had done this, WaPo and CNN would be all over it.

Real media don't make decisions on whether to publish based on whether something also appears in the NY Post. That's a ludicrous assertion.

What's actually happening: Murdoch rags like the Post have zero editorial standards, whereas others are attempting to actually vet this story before running it.

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