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If you're mad about censorship setting a precedent right now, ask yourself why you're not mad about the MPAA rating system.
If you're making comparisons to the Weimar republic's censorship before the rise of Hitler, maybe look into the Hayes code.
Don't be sloppy. Do the work.
If you're making comparisons to the Weimar republic's censorship before the rise of Hitler, maybe look into the Hayes code.
Don't be sloppy. Do the work.
Seriously there are some good deep arguments here but they're not gonna fit in a single tweet, and you're gonna have to contextualize these actions (voluntary, by a nongovernmental organization) against other things like that, and talk about our civic infrastructure.
There's some obvious parallels to Germany and nazism in the US — we've had fascist ideas and ideals for a long time. But you're gonna run into having to contend with communism in any of these arguments. It's both why they're alike and why they're different.
And this matters, because part of the argument is "how much power over our civic infrastructure should private companies have?"
And lemme tell you, to look at approaches to that question, you're gonna have to look at communism and socialism.
And lemme tell you, to look at approaches to that question, you're gonna have to look at communism and socialism.
There's been some real awful totalitarian left governments, communist. There's been a lot of real awful totalitarian right governments, capitalist, cronyist, oligarchic, and monarchic.
Strict controls on speech are an authoritarian go-to.
But free speech absolutism is a fascist tool too. It's part of the way that fascism wields the freedoms present in a system against that system.
But free speech absolutism is a fascist tool too. It's part of the way that fascism wields the freedoms present in a system against that system.
The paradox of tolerance is fascinating, and that's what we're up against. There _should_ be friction against things like sedition. There should be friction against fascism. A lot of it. There should be friction against exploitation.
But the absolute takes are both authoritarian tools. They are a power grab.
This is spot on. SESTA/FOSTA are nightmarish laws, rights-wise. They've done a lot of harm. https://twitter.com/melissamcewen/status/1347699112809013248
There's a hot take of "it's not censorship unless it's the government doing it" and that's not really true. But to examine it, we have to talk about civic and public infrastructure. We have to talk about "what is amplification?" and "what is giving a platform?"
Like, Twitter is not neutral here. There is an algorithm, much more complex than "show the latest tweets from the people I follow, in order"
They are optimizing for something. The algorithm reflects the choices of its designers, intentional and otherwise.
They are optimizing for something. The algorithm reflects the choices of its designers, intentional and otherwise.
Twitter is also _designed_. What the site amplifies as part of its human design is inducement to act in particular ways. It penalizes others. User interface friction matters a ton, and it's subtle, but it has huge effects.
User experience also has a lot of momentum. Once people use a thing a particular way, you don't have total control to get them to change. Your early decisions set the tone.
Twitter also is structured in a way unprecedented in most of human history. Any person with an account can choose another user and do the internet version of yell at them. At any distance. At any time.
Our discussion of 'censorship' has to take the actual human reality of existing in a social environment into account. We have strong psychological responses to communication with other people.
And on top of all of that, we have to acknowledge power and power differentials. Twitter's error has always been in ignoring power. "With great power comes great responsibility" is a reasonable standard, if very hard to wield.
Trump is a perfect storm: a powerful demagogue with a massive platform. Twitter, both in design and algorithm, amplified him, and his followers.
If people were held to account based on the power given to them, we would be in a better place. That's really hard to define, and any metric you select will be gamed. But there are some terribly obvious cases of abuse that are obvious by their power differential, not content.
While an angry citizen speaks harshly to their rep, and the rep responds harshly to the citizen have the same tone and content at an interpersonal level, the rep has the power. They literally make laws in the body politic that affect that citizen. Higher standard needed.
The hardest one to moderate is a mob of individually low power citizens coming at someone in a position of power. There's power in a mob, but differentiating the legitimate grievances of affected citizens and a mob bent on revenge is hard.
But wow, a president whipping up his base to attack others sure isn't a hard case here. Even the most trivial analysis of power says this is bad.
Another great thread about the power of tech companies and social networks https://twitter.com/ireneista/status/1347691079542386692
