"If you believe in freedom of speech, you believe in freedom of speech for views you don’t like. Goebbels was in favor of freedom of speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you’re in favor of freedom of speech, that means you’re in favor of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise. Otherwise, you’re not in favor of freedom of speech."
@strypey If you believe in freedom of speech you also believe in the freedom of people to not use a particular private company for publishing that speech, to speak the reasons they have for that decision, and to attempt to convince others to join them.
@scattermutant
> you also believe in the freedom of people to not use a particular private company for publishing that speech, to speak the reasons they have for that decision, and to attempt to convince others to join them
Sure. Given the context, your implied claim seems to be that to oppose the censorship, is to advocate censorship of those who advocate for censorship. Not so.
I despise such speech, yet I support freedom of speech for people advocating censorship too. See how that works?
@scattermutant
To clarify, my argument is that there's a difference between choosing to move platforms (freedom of association) and trying to influence the editorial practice of the platform (censorship), by using threats of moving platforms en masse (blackmail), misrepresenting the motivations of platform decision-makers (character assassination) etc.
@strypey People collectively organising to critique editorial decisions and implement boycotts are censorship and blackmail now? I see no reason to take that seriously. Those have always been core approaches for grassroots political movements, and should continue to be.
@scattermutant
> People collectively organising to critique editorial decisions and implement boycotts are censorship and blackmail now?
Hmm. I have no problem with critique or boycotts. I disagree that this is a fair description of the discourse around SubStack since the Atlantic article. Laying out the differences I see will require some careful thought and a long string of posts.
I'm happy to come back to it after some thought. Or we could agree to disagree, and let it drop for now?
This is the quote I've been looking for since I saw the Platformer article about the current cancel campaign against SubStack. Chomsky said this more than 30 years ago in the context of the Faurisson Affair;
The more things change, the more they stay the same. Given the historical amnesia on the contemporary left about our own dark side, it's worth noting Chomsky's point that anti-Nazi pundits are as likely be neo-Stalinists as they are to be pro-democracy leftists.
@dragestil
> Chomsky would almost certainly have been cancelled if this happened today
There was a determined cancel campaign against him at the time. Although we hadn't coined the term yet, the social dynamics involved had already existed for decades. The only thing that's changed since then is the erosion of critical thinking, and a willingness to pick up digital pitchforks without much concern for facts or fairness, just which "side" the target appears to be on.
Which, among other things, broke down our ability to see fragments of speech in context, and fed us the fragments that kept us on their recommender media platforms the longest. Including the most enraging ones. Both sides of the Culture War were assimilated - if not created - by these platforms.
This distinction between "recommendation media" (ie the #DataFarms) and "social media" (eg the fediverse) is a useful one. But I find it weird that in mid-2022 this guy is praising DataFarming algorithms as a good thing. I suspect this might be an industry puff piece, rather than genuine opinion.
"Therefore, only the biggest and most powerful platforms can afford investments in the best machine learning algorithms because they are such expensive and resource intensive assets. In recommendation media, the platform with the best machine learning wins."
"Recommendation media is here. As a result, we’ll make fewer explicit choices ('these are my friends') and more implicit choices ('this is where the algorithm recommends I should spend my attention') about how, when, and why we consume content."
"The ugliest feature about Zuckerberg’s Scissor is that by the time it’s identified the perfect Scissor Statement, the statement is already deployed, because the target destabilization group for the Scissor Statement is the Facebook users themselves.
And this isn’t just speculation. A 2011 study in the Journal of Marketing Research farmed a month of New York Times articles and did an analysis on this very topic — 'what goes viral'."
"This is a recipe for disaster. What happened in Myanmar can happen anywhere. It’s not 'bad actors', it’s the system itself. Everybody needs to quit using these things."
@strypey I think you are giving too much credits to social media. Granted the recommendation algo on social media has the ability to amplify polarisation which YouTube/Facebook rely on to profit.
Traditional media like news sites and tv still play an important role in informing people. But when they also started to participate in tribalism then that became a problem because everywhere people turn to it's dishonest coverage.
@dragestil
> Traditional media like news sites and tv still play an important role in informing people
You're ignoring the way recommendation media has starved them of a) their traditional revenue source (ad money), and b) their direct access to audiences, pushing them towards styles of coverage that appeal to recommendation algorithms.
@dragestil
> Social media enabled witch hunts further made it hard for anyone to voice opinions that the most radical 10% woke crowd disapprove of
The "woke" don't have a monopoly on advocating for either censorship or purges. But for some reason the "anti-woke" only notice these things, or see them as a problem, when the "woke" are doing them.
@dragestil
> most of the witch hunt cancellations were perpetrated by the woke
Please link to the data you're basing this on. Otherwise, it seems likely you're jumping to conclusions based on your own biases. Which is exactly how witch hunts work.
There is plenty to criticise about the strategy and tactics of identity politics, as practiced by both sides of the Culture War. There is also an anti-"Woke" crusade that's part of the Culture War.
The two are superficially similar and often fudged together. But the latter is an example of the toxic social dynamics being criticised by the former.
Here's a take on this from the side of the aisle I suspect you are aligned with;
@strypey Well, classification of anti-woke positions is an interesting topic. I was tempted to agree with your two groups or make it a left-right divide, but I could not exactly articulate the difference, or where the "anti-"woke" crusade" stands, so I will need to think more about it.
Thanks for the link, but that article is so smug and nihilistic that I can't even tell where the author stands. My position is that universalism > identity, justice > power and I reject the ...
@dragestil
> My position is that universalism > identity, justice > power and I reject the basis of identity politics that the biggest victims (real or perceived) should tell everyone else what to do
If you accept that this also applies a MAGA identity (for example), as much as it does to any of the identity categories championed by the "Woke", then chances are we agree.
@dragestil
But I don't think most of the partisans on either side of the Culture War are motivated by a desire for control, so much as a fear of loss of autonomy. A fear cultivated and exploited by a minority of authoritarians on both sides, to increase their own power. Classic divide and rule strategy.
@dragestil
> what do you mean by the two sides of the culture war?
"Woke" vs. "anti-woke".
> what is each side's position?
Whatever they perceive to be the position of "their" side, or the inversion of the position of the "wrong" side. Positions are less important to them than allegiances. See;
Both sides are stuck in eternalist ideologies, which include a belief that the "wrong" side is not only wrong but malicious, means them harm, and can't be negotiated with.
@strypey I don't have data at hand. I was making a statement about woke from my experience and observation, which is pretty different from inciting hatred towards an individual.
@dragestil
> which is pretty different from inciting hatred towards an individual
Agreed, but the underlying dynamic of the witch hunt - demonisation without reference to a basis in reality - remains the same.
This was being practiced by the religious right in the US long before the social media era. Famous example include the satanic panic and the demonisation of D&D in the 1980s. Or the 1990s crusade against rap music.
@strypey I still think stating that most of the (social media) witch hunt cancellations were perpetrated by the woke without citing data is quite different from santanic panic
@dragestil
> stating that most of the (social media) witch hunt cancellations were perpetrated by the woke without citing data is quite different from santanic panic
Sure, but the many ways they are different are less important to our discussion than what they have in common;
demonisation without reference to a basis in reality (data that supports the accusation)
That last post made two points. One was about that underlying dynamic of the witch hunt.
@dragestil
Two, examples of this dynamic at work, to show that it's hardly unique to the "Woke".
I mean, the very phrase "witch hunt" points to the fact that this dynamic has been with us for centuries. I think we can agree the original witch hunters were not liberals ; )
"The distinction between content #moderation and #censorship is nebulous. Social networks’ moderation systems combat perceived disinformation, often pitting their AI censors (as well as human ones) against human and AI propagandists... In America, Congressional committees, social scientists, and AI ethicists have all demanded more effective suppression of messages they don’t want heard."
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