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Comment by alpaca128 | Hacker News Reader

> without the longevity of Twitter/FB posts, people just wouldn't think twice about what they're saying

You clearly have not yet witnessed the bad parts of Facebook and Twitter. I've seen people calling for genocide on Facebook under their real name and that's not even remotely the worst.

Facebook's content moderation teams are basically getting PTSD[0] by default as they enforce rules that specify under what circumstances photos of things like animal abuse or decapitation are acceptable(!).

The assumption that people behave normally on the internet when they're not anonymous is provably false. You might think that intuitively, but that's because you're a decent person.

[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/facebook-content-moderators-...

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I mean, I didn’t sleep through 2016 onwards but people threatening violence still get banned, people with bigoted views still get called out or damage their real-world offline relationships, and it’s possible that there’d be even less people who’d be mindful of what they say without those feedback mechanisms.

Many of those people facing real-life consequences don't identify themselves, though. I agree that it helps to some extent, but that kind of individual often doesn't care about a possible backlash or just avoids platforms without anonymity in the first place.

The only real solution I see is to keep such online platforms small or segmented enough that they can be effectively moderated. Troublemakers will not go away no matter what rules are in place; but if those rules are properly enforced they can be kicked out before causing too much damage.

Why does Facebook need to moderate the populations talking points?

The us government literally drops bombs on people's homes.

Humanity is full of all kinds of bullshit. I wish people would stop trying to make everything online a fucking safe space.

>Why does Facebook need to moderate the populations talking points?

Why do you think?

>The us government literally drops bombs on people's homes.

Ok.

>Humanity is full of all kinds of bullshit. I wish people would stop trying to make everything online a fucking safe space.

Waheoo, I know you deliberately caught the coronavirus to spread it as part of your Jihad. I shared your address on my Facebook wall. I'm sure you don't mind; you don't need a fucking safe space.

You're welcome to do whatever you like, don't complain to me when you end up in jail.

I'm not claiming laws are bad, I'm claiming Facebook isn't the fucking police.

Why would I end up in jail? Freedom of speech.

My mentally ill brother-in-law and his militia may go to jail, but by then it will be way too late for you.

It's not about making everything a safe space, it's making sure kids on social media don't get sent gory pictures, radical extremists aren't able to incite violence on a massive scale, shooters don't get to livestream their mass murders and school kids don't commit suicide due to cyber bullying.

This issue isn't black or white and your edgy worldview doesn't improve the situation. Just so you know, even 4chan is heavily moderated and so are many other places the average person would usually avoid.

Freedom of speech isn't an edgy world view.

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