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Comment by halfjoking | Hacker News Reader

Musk has repeatedly said that inciting violence will be banned while other forms of speech will be allowed. So I think he has a coherent ideology, but it still depends on a judgment call. When Kanye says he "loves Nazis" one could make the judgment he's endorsing violence against Jews because the context involves the history of what Nazis did.

When Trump said on Jan 6th he wants his supporters to "fight" to "stop the steal" a lot of people took that as endorsing violence to storm the capitol. I think that's less clear-cut than Nazi endorsement, but other people disagree.

Main thing I care about is "covid misinformation" is no longer banned. So Twitter won't ban an epidemiologist who posts a clinical study saying mRNA vaccines lower sperm counts anymore. https://legalinsurrection.com/2022/06/im-an-md-suspended-by-... Bans like that were just absurd.

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How was (paraphrasing) "going defcon on the jews" not inciting violence?

Edit: I want to add that I don't believe this is due to his manic depressive disorder but because he's a naraasstic asshole. Posting a picture of a swastika then saying how the Nazis and Hitler are great is the most obvious way to get attention.

Fuck Kayne West

Is that officially what got Kanye banned?

My understanding is that Twitter did not specify what exactly (i.e. which set of tweets) Kanye is banned for.

I'm referring to pre musk ban. The exact tweet was “I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE,”

Someone was proposing incitement to violence has a threahold etc. This to me is clearly incitement to violence.

Some have claimed he didn't know what "death con" (defcon) means to which I say what could he have possibly meant. It's <something negative> on Jewish People.

Defcon is a defense term indicating a level of preparedness. I don't see how it could possibly be argued that preparation and an incitement to violence are the same thing. Words matter even if he doesn't know what they mean. Would be very interesting to see that attempted.

Personally, I think he probably meant something else that very likely could have been closer to an incitement of violence, but he doesn't have the vocabulary and we can't convict someone for what you think might be in their head.

> I don't see how it could possibly be argued that preparation and an incitement to violence are the same thing.

Possibly due to very limited imagination?

Or familiarity with case law going back to Brandenburg. Do you know how many times this very high legal bar has been met in the US?

Your argument is similar to that of Tesla and the term autopilot.

The technical definition of a word is not as important as the real world usage of the word.

And pretty sure most people would consider using Defcon in that way to be hostile.

It just plain reads as hostile to me, and hostile entities often claim they are just defending themselves (justified or not), whether people or countries. But I don't think anyone has mentioned convicting him of anything unless you're talking about a court of public opinion or something.

We can't convict them, but we can absolutely ban them from a social media network. The threshold for that is far lower than legal deprivation of liberties.

Preparation for what?

Defcon levels are about preparing for defense not attack. I think your bias is showing.

When the government speaks of defcon levels, they don't speak of going "defcon X on somebody". This template is borrowed from expression like "going medieval on your ass", which is clearly not about preparing for defense. What would it mean to prepare for defense on somebody?

When you combine that with him using "death con" instead of "defcon" and the tenor of his comments both before and since (posting a swastika?) it is a little hard to imagine he meant he was preparing to defend himself from an attack rather than going on attack. "I'm a little sleepy, but after I wake up I'm going to prepare for an attach By JEWISH PEOPLE." Is this seriously what you think he was saying?

It's probably reasonable to assume Kanye doesn't have a good understanding of Defcon levels though, right? He called it "death con", after all. I think to most people, it's a phrase uttered in movies before war begins.

"death" con 3

Can't understand how you can be racing to explain and apologize that.

So because he said death con (instead of DEFCON), it had some secret meaning that meant something entirely different and you have proof of this where? I am no fan of Kanye, but people see what they want to see. Maybe he was making some trope about the holocaust, but even holocaust denial isn't illegal in the US.

This is fucking ridiculous. There's no subjectivity here, and people don't commonly confuse those terms. You're just making shit up.

"My new secret word for praising a group of people and respecting their culture is death"

Nailed it

heh well i seriously doubt Kanye has the slightest clue about the actual meaning of defcon levels.

but i was thinking, does this tweet "I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE," incite violence? I don't think it does.

Now if he said "when i wake up i want to read on the news how all of you went death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE" that would be inciting violence to me. btw, i'm thankful Taylor Swift is mostly benign, her fans are fanatical to the point of acting like a brain washed cult. Anything she tells them to do is done.

I think they kind of have. Musk replied "that's fine" to Ye posting the Musk yacht photo and "that is not" to the Star of David Nazi symbol which suggests that was the final line for the ban. The "going deathcon one on the Jews", which led to the pre-Musk ban, is arguably a more explictly a violent threat than the symbol.

The swastika itself represents historical violence on the Jews. I would argue it alone is an explicit threat of violence because I can't see what other meaning today it could have?

Oh don't get me wrong, they are both unacceptable and I haven't and don't want to see the symbol tweet. I personally find words more impactful, revealing of intent and suggesting action than symbols. I say arguable because I don't which was worse, or if it's a worthy discussion, but the deathcon tweet is enough for me to see an unwell/dangerous person that needs a ban just to save them from themselves let alone anyone else.

Defcon levels have to do with defense not attack.

Well, it's still mobilizing the army. Plus, "death con".

That isn't true in common parlance.

It literally stands for defense readiness condition

And yet humans aren't computers, and the meaning of phrases in popular culture isn't always determined by strict literal definition.

Most people would interpret the phrase "I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going (def) con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE" to mean preparing to go to war or enter into conflict against, not preparing to defend against an attack from, jewish people.

Defense against the jews which implies they act as a group to attack.

No it doesn't. Defense implies that you are planning to be attacked. Regardless though, it is free speech because the word can mean a lot of things. There are countless videos of Democrats like Pelosi saying we are going to "beat" Republicans. I guess those Democrats should be banned from national television for inciting violence.

"I'm going to beat them in a race"? The word is commonly used to mean win a competition and in fact I'd argue it's use meaning physical violence is rarer.

Also being a republican (politican) is a choice and therefore valid to be a target of hatred. People aren't born Republican , however bring Jewish is considered both an ethnic group and religion. This is the key to why it's acceptable to attack a political group verus an ethnic group.

Jews have different views, they don't act as one group, they don't have a hierarchy like republicans, nor don't put out group statements.

Beat is just the tip. There are countless videos of Democrat leaders saying people has to fight, that they're at war, etc. Kanye wasn't telling everyone to go Death (DEF) CON 3 on the Jews, he was saying he was. He could have literally said he hoped that people would die and it still isn't isn't inciting violence according to the law. Conservatives are good at that, where they are constantly advocating for the murder of trans people which according to Musk is okay cause I still see it frequently from many of the right-wing people he is now associating with and their followers. While I don't agree with his statement, it is far from inciting violence and doesn't break any laws in the US.

yes but we're talking about deathcon levels, which are an entirely different thing!

My parents have a vintage carpet with some eastern (counterclockwise) swastikas on it. That said, the context around your comment is completely apparent and the downvote are troubling to say the least. I hope it's just unhelpful pedantry rather than pedantry as a cover for bigotry.

The swastiska has had a very long history, before the Nazis misused it for their purpose.

wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika

So when kayne used it, of course he referred to the Nazi symbol and just wanted attention and strongly hint at his antisemitism.

But other people can mean something very different:

"In several major Indo-European religions, the swastika symbolises lightning bolts, representing the thunder god and the king of the gods, such as Indra in Vedic Hinduism, Zeus in the ancient Greek religion, Jupiter in the ancient Roman religion, and Thor in the ancient Germanic religion."

I'm aware, I'm sure most people are because this tidbit is always brought up when the swastika is discussed. The context is clear all around though

"The context is clear all around though"

Then why make this generalised statement?

" I can't see what other meaning today it could have?"

Because I know people who are into germanic livestyle and they are NOT nazis, but they would like to use that old symbol freely. So that is one counterexample. There are people today who use the swastika who explicitley do not refer to the nazis.

But like I said, when people like kayne use the swastika, their meaning is very clear and different.

Stanning for the swastika is one of the weirdest modern internet fetishes.

Should we be burning school books and cancelling movies about the Holocaust because they have swastikas? Like it or not it is free speech and shouldn't be banned.

I'd stand against a government doing that.

If an individual book owner decides to have a backyard barbecue of all their pro-Nazi propaganda or an individual theater owner doesn't feel comfortable running Jojo Rabbit, that's up to them.

Yes, but when they claim to support free speech and then turn around and do the opposite it is best to call them out on it. The reason for my hyperbole response was because here we are talking about Twitter and free speech, and some people are avidly in support of banning things and people they don't like.

Within the law, Twitter is well within their rights to ban things and people Musk doesn't like.

It's was death con 3 not 1. Which makes it even weirder since 3 is the middle. But that's also assuming he meant defcon which is something we probably shouldn't do. Should stick to the words he's actually saying and w.r.t. the "going death ... on jewish people" is pretty black/white on inciting violence. But it was only a temporarily ban that he got following that tweet (which twitter1.0 did claim to do )[1].

Afaik, nobody at twitter2.0 has made a clear statement as to what tweet caused the permanent suspension. Just commenting "that is not" is not at all the same as saying "and this will get you banned".

[1]: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/10/10/kanye-wests-twitter...

There is a legal definition to fall back on in the case of inciting violence, and what Kanye said doesn't come close. Not that Twitter is obligated to hold to that definition, but I think it's pretty misleading to say you are for "free speech" and then define "inciting violence" so broadly as to have virtually no meaning.

Incitement AFAIK requires eminence, it would not include publicly declaring a fondness of certain people, even if those people were violent. If that were so everyone wearing a Che Guevara t-shirt or declaring a fondness for The Communist Manifesto would also be incitement.

The real reason is that Kayne was booted is that he toxic waste and having him on Twitter would have damaged the Twitter brand and cost Elon money.

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