Hacker News Reader

Comment by gigatexal | Hacker News Reader

Facebook needs to be shutdown as it poses an existential threat to democracy because it provides a platform for the worst of us to amplify their messages of hate and division and to spread conspiracies. It facilitates people who would otherwise not be able to find others like them to organize. So instead of the crazy person on the corner with a sign condemning homosexuals or spouting conspiracies that most would look at and laugh these people find others like them and become ever more extreme.

Addendum: This isn’t about Zuckerberg. Any other dominant social network will be co-opted in the same way because of inherent flaws in people: we are prone to groupthink and as demographics change such that there’s an ever growing acceptance of conspiracy theories and greater division in American politics for example Facebook will continue to drive discord and thereby profits from further engagement on its service by exploiting these inner human vices.

View on HN

For some odd synapse firing reason this quote popped into my mind while reading your comment:

"It tells me that goose-stepping morons like yourself should try reading books instead of BURNING them!" - Henry Jones - Last Crusade

- Not wishing to insult you but you want to get rid of a service that you personally dislike. Newsflash: Many people don't share that opinion. (And I'm frankly almost as tired of hearing it as I am tired of hearing about the amazing benefits of crypto currencies.)

Interestingly the same people arguing for removing/regulating/moderating FB also heavily criticize China's censoring politics.

There's a difference between wanting to ban something because it is a threat to your autocracy and wanting to dissolve something because it is too powerful and abusive. Punching down vs punching up.

I think most people of that persuasion just want to break up large tech companies though, not ban them outright.

Social networking has its issues but it’s not the root of all evil. These copypasta-esque rants about FB being a threat to democracy are as bad as anything you’d see on FB itself.

You’ve basically just described an Eternal September which pre-dates Facebook by about a decade.

Taking away the platform doesn’t change the inherent nature of these people, who could easily educate themselves with actual facts if they chose to do so.

Key is “if they chose to” do so. But to overcome one’s own ethnocentrism and cognitive biases is proving to be difficult.

I agree, I just feel like it’s worth calling a spade a spade.

People believe horrible falsehoods because they are simpler, more convenient and (critically) more exciting than taking the time to understand actual facts. That’s laziness, with victims.

Not only that but it’s changed the social dynamic in a shitty way.

Social media has brought out the worst in us.

And US, too.

> Facebook needs to be shutdown as it poses an existential threat to democracy

I really would welcome that but no way it will.

1) even if it were banned in many countries it would still survive in the US for Intel/NatSec reasons.

2) it's so ingrained in society that it's unthinkable that it could disappear. In many countries facebook _is_ the Internet and large parts of the economy and social fabric (as toxic and shitty as it is) depend on it. This has implications to 1) (e.g. NatSec) above, because

3) FB is part of the US propaganda[1] machine. Radio free Europe or VoA, etc dwarf in comparison of what US dominated BigTech does[2]. See also trending here recently [3] note especially the title changed from the original official title (presumably to be less inflammatory even though the original title made exactly that point and the new title does the bidding for the propagandists).

FB is too big too fail in every sense. It is impossible to fight legally (or with illegal means it will survive like the stubborn parasite it is)

[1] Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes by Jacques Ellul https://archive.org/details/Propaganda_201512

[2] https://thenextweb.com/distract/2020/12/21/how-netflix-shape...

[3] How Netflix is creating a common European culture https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26696396

I think the only real possible way for institutions that grow as large and powerful as facebook to decline is by irrelevance.

Which might be hard for some to imagine a future where facebook becomes irrelevant, but not for me… but that's not to say such a future wont hold other kinds of powerful orgs that wont have others calling for their demise ;)

This is very thoughtful. I do not know why people downvoted your comment.

I personally despise Facebook and all of its services.

Same. It's a scourge.

Facebook employs thousands. It's not unthinkable that a lot of them are here and feeling a bit red-faced.

> I do not know why people downvoted your comment.

reason why people call me out for my behavior is this:

> I personally despise Facebook

^^ I do not agree with the mainstream view which is to hold companies liable for their actions. Instead my attitude (and I get why people have a hard time with it) is to direct my anger at the individuals hiding behind these big-corps. I'm making it personal because for me it is. We (humans in most "civilized" countries) made a huge mistake by allowing a company to be a "legal" person which gives people the ability to hide their ghoulish behavior behind the legal facade of a company. You can not win a fight as a person against a company (only in rare cases that don't matter much). As a legal person I can fund terror with shell/shelf companies and get away with paying 0% income tax (e.g. Netflix, Google and all other cancerous US companies registered in Ireland or Luxembourg) while as a natural person I get away scot-free.

My solution to the problem is too radical for most as it calls out the Zuckerberg's, Eric Princes, Peter Thiel, Bezos, Musk, Koch, Trumps and hundreds of others.

People here absolutely hate that and (in some cases rightfully) attack me because what I propose is against the law and probably violates my own code of human rights. If laws don't serve us we have to change them and in many cases this will not be possible without violence. I'm not saying I have a solution[1] for it but I also can't see how companies should continue to get away with destruction of society (and the environment). Until we start eating the rich (metaphorically) and they start fearing the rest of us (again) nothing will change.

[1] my pov is constantly evolving and in many regards half baked, e.g. I also am deeply suspicious of more government power to solve these issues or any form of "seizing the means of production". and I think that technology (science) will even less be able to provide a cure for something that isn't a technological problem (see Jacques Ellul "The Technological Society"). again I absolutely need to stress that I have no solution either.

I agree with you. I will read Jacques Ellul today. Thank you for the recommendation.

You may want to check out Timothy Snyder (both his books and YouTube discussions). He talked about Big Tech in creative ways, like how to deal with it.

I am personally American and Croatian by citizenship, but I am culturally American. I live in Croatia and I am enjoying it. Social media is evil (in my opinion) but it is toned down here in Europe, which we are lucky. But, I am so worried about America.

appreciate the suggestion and I'm also going to look into it. I too live in Zagreb and work mostly for US companies. Perhaps we'll one day bump into each other at Tkalčićeva when they let us out again.

Everything you say about the situation being very critical/worrisome in the US is true IMO. What I see as a problem is how smaller less powerful places here in Europe ideologically appropriate the problems of those they are "ruled by" and look up to. As a kid I spent some years in Austria and every time there were news about something happening in Germany the same things got debated as being a problem in Austria to the point where it was ridiculous. Like a strange me-too complex (it comes in many shapes and sizes often justified but also sometimes not). I see this as a huge problem since much of what is an issue in the US isn't one over here etc.

Hey, it's a small world! I hope to see you sometime at Tkalčićeva :-)

Oh yeah, I agree with you on the "me-too" complex. It's toxic and harmful and it feeds into populism too.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com