Comment by tehwebguy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tehwebguy | Hacker News Reader

As someone with an Armenian dad and last name, I’ve felt some interest in this story and my country’s (US) refusal so far to acknowledge it since learning about it.

It’s pretty far removed from me, and I’d probably not live here if my ancestors hadn’t fled the Turks back in the day, but it’s also very sad to see that it’s used as a political token over and over again. Obama promised that he’d be the first sitting president to acknowledge it, but then didn’t. I don’t know if Trump promised to acknowledge it but he didn’t and his admin even rejected a specific opportunity to do so.

Now Biden is dangling it, either as a way to buy points with Armenian Americans (heh not likely, he’s got CA and doesn’t need to further lock in the Glendale vote) or more likely to push Erdogan to do what he wants. My guess is he doesn’t acknowledge it.

It’s really a bummer overall — it’s not like anyone in Turkey today had any part in it unless they are like 120 years old but Erdogan is in many ways basically a dictator that just hasn’t worn out his welcome with the rest of the world, I think largely because of geography and his not so thinly veiled threats re: immigration.

Erdoğan thinks himself as the last Ottoman Emperor standing (c.f. The Third Reich), that’s why no way in hell he’ll accept any atrocities that Ottomans committed.

Facebook has shown themselves completely willing to remove content at the request of the Erdoğan government.

If they deplatform critics of Erdoğan, why would they also not be willing to deplatform anything else that Erdoğan does not like, like discussion of the Armenian Genocide?

And maybe this is why we should consider the consequences of encouraging deplatforming of people we don't like.

My other comment pointing out collusion of Facebook and the Turkish government is heavily downvoted, and I am not sure why. If I am mistaken, please someone let me know.

[1]: https://www.propublica.org/article/sheryl-sandberg-and-top-f...

> My other comment pointing out collusion of Facebook and the Turkish government is heavily downvoted, and I am not sure why. If I am mistaken, please someone let me know.

Fellow Turkish trolls are doing extra duty on this thread :-)

> Fellow Turkish trolls are doing extra duty on this thread :-)

If I got something wrong, anyone please feel free to correct me instead of just downvoting.

If I only get downvoted but nobody can tell me what I'm wrong about, it is just brigading.

And that can backfire, because if this is happening to seemingly reasonable comments, it strongly implies that those downvoting me are not capable of countering what I said.

Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

> And maybe this is why we should consider the consequences of encouraging deplatforming of people we don't like.

But it's as easy to point to the dire consequences of persisting in amplifying the voices of people spewing hateful rhetoric as it is to point to the people silenced to protect the interests of the powerful. I think treating this as a one-sided problem with an obvious answer does it an injustice.

> But it's as easy to point to the dire consequences of persisting in amplifying the voices of people spewing hateful rhetoric as it is to point to the people silenced to protect the interests of the powerful. I think treating this as a one-sided problem with an obvious answer does it an injustice.

I don't think it is as easy to prove that something has been censored, that's the problem. There is not transparency. Maybe if we could examine exactly what was removed and why, that would be different. But we have normalized and legitimized the opaque and arbitrary removal of political content and historical records.

I also don't think it is so easy to prove direct harm from something not being censored, and certainly not enough to outweigh the harm that accepting censorship brings.

The truth is, when you outsource critical thinking to Facebook, it is not just potentially harmful content they remove. You can't say that you only support deplatforming for people you disagree with, because it will never be implemented that way.

In practice, you either you support freedom of speech, or you support billionaires and dictators arbitrarily removing and editing what we say.

> In practice, you either you support freedom of speech, or you support billionaires and dictators arbitrarily removing and editing what we say.

I think that this is a false dichotomy, even if preceded by "in practice", because it follows the practice of conflating the freedom to speak with the freedom to be heard.

I support people's right to say what they please. I don't think that people have any inherent right to be heard saying what they please, even if I personally think that the things that they are saying are important and should be heard.

I support anyone's right not to amplify others' disgusting sentiments. When a private business is used to provide the platform for that speech, I support its right not to host speech that it (not I) finds disgusting, or objectionable, for any reason, even if I disagree with that reason. This is nothing new—it's always been the case, for example, that publishers didn't publish books that they determined to be disgusting or objectionable, and that their reasons for so determining could be lofty, or base, or completely counter to my own reasons.

Given the prominence of Facebook and Twitter as global communications platforms, this gives their owners disproportionate influence over whose voices are heard. That's the problem. Requiring Facebook and Twitter to amplify everyone's voices equally won't fix that problem.

(I have no idea what will fix the problem, to be clear, short of "how about everyone stops using Facebook and Twitter and we switch to a forum that somehow combines global reach with democratic moderation", which only requires (1) someone design the perfect such platform free from any possibility of abuse, and then turns its reins over to the masses, and (2) everyone agrees to use it, and so should be easy.)

In these cases it's a choice to either be pragmatic or completely remove yourself from the country. Which would you choose as the best option for Turkish citizens in a similar position?

The Ottoman empire and later the state of Turkey, have consistently denied this for almost a hundred years. Erdoğan is but a link in a chain.

As someone from the SFV, I appreciate and understood completely the Glendale reference.

The same thought crossed my mind, which is why is this acknowledgment such an important issue and why now? I agree with you and doubt it is to earn points with a super small (albeit wealthy) constituency. I have never even heard people care about this outside of politicians and the news.

Just seems like a very strange hill to die on.

On the other hand it might be worth doing just for a single campaign donation from Alexis Ohanian post-Coinbase IPO ;D

It appears that Biden has acknowledged it since my original post, too.

It only matters in the sense of it being an official statement from the US calling Erdogan a liar and partially deligitmizing his tyrannnical regime, vs US maintaining its up-til-now hypocrisy that the Armenian genocide is irrelevant but the Jewish Holocaust matters.

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