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Journal by c0lo
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/04/the-internet-doesnt-have-to-be-awful/618079/
I... simply can't summarize it. I can tease with some selections, but I won't.
It's a 20mins or more reading (if you don't just want to tick a box) and longer to digest it and let the things settle in their place.
The Atlantic - How to Put Out Democracy’s Dumpster Fire
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Life is not for everyone.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @12:41PM (48 children)
We need to deplatform crimethink and destroy anonymity. Turn internet into a TV.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday March 16 2021, @01:02PM (46 children)
Wrong. Fuck off and read it again, or just fuck off.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @01:57PM (3 children)
So would you agree that "A strong democracy requires a fair and honest press"? [thepostmillennial.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:40PM (2 children)
Surely you mean a fair and balanced press.
Why is it that when I hold a stick, everyone begins to look like a pinata?
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @06:08PM
Yes, we need the 'balanced' part, not our current Pravada in disguise [substack.com] press that we presently have now.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:01AM
Honesty is sufficient. Sometimes brutally honest. It’s easy to throw rocks at honest reporting by claiming it’s not fair (translation: someone who had it coming is upset), or claim it doesn’t tell the other side (translation: our narrative of lies and misdirections).
It is possible to be both honest and kind, rather than honest and brutal. But when the other side lies, both fairness and balance have already gone out the door.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:00PM (9 children)
The story starts off strong and then goes into this crazy detour into censorship and meme-control.
[...]
It's too bad the author can't get out of their jackboots long enough to think about internet oligopolies, an actual problem. These speech control schemes are crazy and far worse than the mostly imaginary problems concerning public discourse.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:25PM (3 children)
Yes, Věra Jourová a member of the EU Commission, an institution with the sole purpose of evading democratic accountability. [jacobinmag.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @03:15PM (2 children)
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @06:36PM (1 child)
If it isn't a decade or less away from collapsing.
The person on the street in Germany has wildly different expectations of European government than a random Greek. Poles and Hungarians are seeing a different Soviet Union trying to set itself up as their overlords.
When there still was the European Community, it was about easing trade and fostering cooperation. Now its exiled politicians from 26(?) member countries trying to impose their control.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @09:33PM
I see the wisdom in having a dumping ground for terrible politicians, but someone screwed up and gave them power and spending money.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by c0lo on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:03PM (3 children)
Actually, the authors** do such a thing:
Fuck off and actually RTFA or just fuck off.
---
** Anne Applebaum and Peter Pomerantsev
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:19PM (2 children)
The obvious rebuttal here is dilution of power. Actual thinking here would not conclude that one powerful disinformation operator is better than 20 weak competing operators. Every gullible person out there would have 20 choices rather than one.
So we have this weird apologism for monopolistic practices. What explains that?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:27AM (1 child)
Disagree. If you really took the time to read it all, you'll get to see their suggestion goes on the line of while breaking up the concentrated SM (as is it is now) is necessary, it is not sufficient
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @04:46AM
I see you couldn't quote it. I certainly didn't see anything like that. Meanwhile we have the above weird apologism for oligopolies. Here's the full paragraph:
It's just as weird as the section you quoted. They observe that there are parties out there trying to break up these big companies, but they refuse to have an opinion on that.
But if we think about the idea of breaking up businesses and encouraging competition, it can defeat the very problems that the authors were worried about. The large platforms are no longer so large and their ability to sway and suppress is considerably reduced.
(Score: 2) by leon_the_cat on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:04PM
So has Glenn
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/greenwald-leading-activists-online-censorship-are-corporate-journalists [zerohedge.com]
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Tuesday March 16 2021, @05:52PM (31 children)
Sorry, the AC is right. It's just another call to regulate content by "authorized" producers, i.e. censorship. The characterization of the problem is a false flag. They have the wrong guy, and the idea of "illegal content" is a bullshit pretext.
The only problem we have with our internet is service provision. That's why nobody can compete with Facebook et al. Service providers must be classified and regulated as common carriers, so that more people can speak up and be heard without having to find a "platform". They have their own, but presently their ISP regulates what they can do with it, and this is the angle we must attack, not the gossip girls [youtube.com]
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:12PM (1 child)
Please quote the parts in the article that call for censorship. The only thing I found was in regulating algorithms and forcing companies to give users control over algorithmic content sorting.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 22 2021, @03:49PM
Regulating algorithms is de facto censorship, when the algorithms do things such as bury or delete content.
Scenario:
Bob Goverment: Your algorithm lets through some posts that says nasty things about the teachers' unions.
Ted Ecommerce: Yeah, so, that's political speech, what's the problem?
Bob: It's discriminatory against public servants and anti-worker.
Ted: Actually, it's anti-union, and has no bearing on the public servants.
Bob: Union membership is a protected class according to section V, subsection 3, paragraph a, item xiv. Your algorithm is approving hate speech.
Ted: Sheesh, OK, we'll have it call that stuff fact-checked and bury it, how's that?
Bob: It'll do for now. We'll review later.
See? That's how this works. So yes, the article did call for censorship, but just wrapped it in pretty words.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Tuesday March 16 2021, @09:45PM (28 children)
Sorry, you and the AC are wrong.
First of all, TFA does not call for anything, it's an organized collection of what others (who study the phenomenon) see in it and what they think are the possible solution.
After approaching the idea of "regulation" (and it approaches it from the interesting angle of "regulating the algorithms" rather than the "content"), the article continues on the line of "Sounds good in theory but it's impossible"
So, fusti, fuck off and actually read TFA or just fuck off.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:07PM (2 children)
This is what we have to deal with from the rightwing propagandists. They never read and don't think further than what their propganda outlets like Fox, Hannity, and Carlson tell them. Tucker Carlson was apparently the most watched show on cable recently since young people are ditching cable. Another show did a good analysis on him, and *shockingly* Tucker spouts the same white supremacist talking points that try to make their bigotry more palatable through words like "culture" and "society.." Don't mind the violent rhetoric they use, surely no one would be radicalized by such obviously not-serious words /sarcasm
These fuckers talk about freedoms so long as it enables their agenda, but they are plenty happy to crush their opponents via oppressive laws and with actual physical violence. I'm done tip toeing around the obvious, and even TMB the supposed libertarian is pushing their narratives occasionally! Rules for thee not for me. Fuck em' no point in discussing anything with them beyond "fuck off shill" until they can deal with reality instead of the partisan fantasies they have constructed.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:49PM (1 child)
So sounds like you wouldn't want to give "these fuckers" the power to crush their opponents, right? This article proposes to do exactly that. There's little way to control how rules are interpreted and enforced once the wrong people are in power. If they don't have the enforcement power to suppress your speech as disinformation, then that's one less power that they can crush you with.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:31AM
"You should not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harm it would cause if improperly administered."
-- Lyndon Johnson, 36th President of the U.S.
IOW, consider what those powers may allow when your enemies are in charge.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:13PM (20 children)
:-) I did... and you convinced me... that it can all wrapped up nice and pretty with a little pink bow, and even you are ready to behead the non believers [wp.com]. I think I'll go along with the small crowd that sees it correctly as I do, but thanks for the invitation.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:59PM (19 children)
Then you understood nothing. The article is actually a very pessimistic one.
The "little pink box" that is presented? It's what you will be missing in the future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:56PM (5 children)
Fusty got this one right. Exaggerated pessimism is a classic little pink bow. We have to do this terrible thing because the nonproblem is far more terrible.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:31AM (4 children)
Totally unwilling to ask questions, are you? You know it all, you can infer whatever because it will be automatically true (in your mind)... yeah, I know, typical khallow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:53AM (3 children)
What would be the point of the exercise? (A question!)
And because of those passages I quote at length. Evidence. I don't know about you, but I take people who bother to back their words with evidence much more seriously than I take whiners who complain (as here) without evidence about such approaches.
Sounds like you're having trouble with that "knowing".
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:58AM (2 children)
To actually ask what I had in mind, for example.
But since you think you already have the answer, I can understand you point of not seeing the point.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:46AM (1 child)
Since you have yet to mention what you allegedly had in mind (or why that should be relevant to our discussion - remember we weren't talking about your mind in the first place!) while simultaneously playing these games, it sure sounds to me like what you had in mind wasn't and still isn't important to you. So why should I care?
Maybe you should tell us what you have in mind so we can move on from your ridiculous stance? I just ctrl-f'd through the discussion and I have yet to see any explanation.
I was cool with your original journal entry. You didn't state what you had in mind, but the journal wasn't about that. I know elsewhere I posted something about how I thought this discussion wasn't going a way you liked. That seems to be where you suddenly cared about what's on your mind. So I guess I got something wrong about what you had in mind? Enlighten us then.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @02:52AM
Indeed. Now, go play in the sandbox outside, we're done here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:59AM (9 children)
It's just a variation of "Social Credit", censorship by the crowd, just as tyrannical as any other.
I know the article is pessimistic, and and they are using it as a pretext for their "solution", which is worse.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:29AM (8 children)
Yeeess, the traditional social rules about showing and granting respect (mostly observed by our parents) were indeed tyrrrraaannnny.
Be glad you have today the freedom to curse anyone and everyone, and they don't have the right to be upset or else they are snowflakes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @06:38AM (7 children)
This is and never was about respect, it's about authoritarianism which is rapidly trending towards fascism. You must believe what you are told to believe, or we will destroy your life. People are not being attacked for being rude, they're being attacked for stating things that go against the desired narrative.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @07:25AM (6 children)
Yes, respecting common-sensical social rules, which is a type of "censorship by the crowd", will rapidly trend to fascism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 22 2021, @03:59PM (5 children)
You're confusing two different ideas.
Authoritarianism is not the same as social norms without the force of government. It's the difference between having someone shouting on the street corner about UFO chemtrails, and everyone else shrugging their shoulders and saying: "That's Crazy Alf, he always does that." and having the same individual hauled off by the police.
If you want to see mutual respect in action, spend some time around bikers. Not the dentist-with-a-harley type, but the did-hard-time-for-smuggling-heroin type. Their respect for the law is minimal. Their respect for the fact that, when shit starts it can turn lethal in moments, is quite strong.
See the difference?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Monday March 22 2021, @10:19PM (4 children)
Now imagine Crazy Alf with you in an elevator, would you still shrug?
Then imagine Crazy Alf with you in an elevator, booming other crazies from around through a boom box he carries with him. Still freedom of speech?
Then imagine Crazy Alf with you in an elevator refusing to follow the "normies rules" for personal hygiene, 'cause soap is making the people weak and germs are a hoax anyway. And he brought with him others like-minded.
This world started to resemble "in an elevator" more than the "prairies of the old Wild West", especially when the Internet negates the distance for speech and cheap cars makes "Trump trains" possible.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 23 2021, @02:27AM (3 children)
Crazy Alf on an elevator is not a good analogy for the internet. You can ignore whomever you want, they're not in your face, and the boombox thing would fall under nuisance laws - and still a terrible analogy for the internet.
None of your bad analogies constitute a clinching argument in favour authoritarianism (not that authoritarians ever needed one), and if you really want to take the matter to its logical conclusion, you'd want to see what would happen when Crazy Alf meets bikers. Out in the open, they'd probably leave him alone. They have plenty of crazies of their own, who are tolerated as long as they keep their hands to themselves. (I've met a few.) In the elevator, Crazy Alf would get a short, bloody lesson in good neighbourliness.
But to go back to the internet, the analogy would be the bikers simply ignoring Crazy Alf, and letting him spout his nonsense as much as he wants while they continue their eternal debate about blockheads, panheads, knuckleheads and the agricultural years. Even Facebook lets you ignore people, and nobody is forcing you to be on Facebook, Twitter or even Gab if you don't want to be.
If you choose the wallow in the sewer, your demands to clean it up are going to look pretty silly, you see? If you choose to do so without any kind of breathing equipment, and then demand that it be pre-filtered for your convenience, those of us who stand by to watch might even point at you and laugh.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 23 2021, @06:52AM (2 children)
Analogy? Perhaps no. But it's the other extreme of the "Wild West space to expand into if you don't like something".
The Earth population is somewhere in between, with some areas being quite close to the elevator cabin analogy (cities) and some areas still having enough room to cross to the other site of the street to avoid Crazy Alf, let him be.
Maybe that's because I didn't make an argument for authoritarianism?
I only said "mob rule is not necessarily authoritarianism", since there are conditions that will push you to respect the rules that were selected over time by the society or face the consequences from it.
Freedom of speech in balance with the responsibility for your speech will be different under different constraints. You won't have the same freedom in an elevator and this does absolutely not mean that the elevator "mob" oppresses you, even when they will repress your attempts to retain a freedom that the elevator cabin can't allow.
Between "Wild West prairies" and "elevator cabin" extremes, you will find different points of balance between your "God-fuckin-given rights" and what the society will find acceptable.
If you don't believe me, go live in an apartment block in a big city. Try a capsule hotel in Tokyo, maybe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 23 2021, @03:46PM
The original article made a case for authoritarian handling of the internet, intervening in activities, algorithms and economic activity.
Foregoing posts referred to fascism in specific, authoritarianism in general, and the relationship of the individual to others and to a power structure.
A defence of the idea of restraining others in an open medium where personal control is a viable strategy at both client and server ends of the model, is a de facto argument for the authoritarian approach (poorly) advocated by the original article. Doing so by an inept analogy is just to make the same argument by artifice.
But very well; you say that you were not making an argument for authoritarianism - presumably you disagree with the burden of the article that you orginally linked. Would you care to illustrate what your points of variance with respect to it might be?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by fustakrakich on Wednesday March 24 2021, @03:51AM
:-) Didn't know you're still on this crusade, but like the AC said, the internet is not an elevator, not even close. The internet is something you have to tune to be offended. You have no right to regulate content on the internet when, in your house, you can just turn it off. You filter your connection and leave everyone else alone.
One solution for this issue is to make the WAN an ad hoc network that can't be shut down so easily. All filtering is then done on the personal LAN, where it belongs
The internet is not the Wild West, it is Outer Space
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:23AM (2 children)
Sorry if I wasn't clear:
They're trying to wrap up their deceitful little scheme in a pretty little bow. It's entirely bogus.
The only way to effectively combat disinformation is to tell the government and mass media to stop lying and to demand more transparency.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:23AM (1 child)
I don't see it this way.
I see it as a presentation on the set of solutions one or another suggested, with the risks for each of them and the reason it may actually fail.
Ending with
but passing through "Most people still have their political discussions on Facebook."
And that's were I read it as a pessimist.
Yeap. It will do a lot of good, especially if you tell them this using Facebook and Twitter, especially the mass media will be highly receptive.
Or... do you think something on the line of "Kraken/The storm"?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday March 17 2021, @07:22PM
I'm only telling you that you are attacking the problem from the wrong angle. Your fixed, singular point of view only reveals a distorted image. The real source of the problem, which I spelled out twice now, is quite obvious, the proverbial *elephant in the room*. Your article essentially wants to control user input to compensate. That is a bad thing. The fix is in the demand for real official transparency.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:46PM
And another thing, don't go after people who spread lies. Target the main thing that fuels popular belief, official lies and government secrecy [caitlinjohnstone.com]
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:05AM (2 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:30AM (1 child)
You aren't even original. You could actually cite TFA if you would care, but it's so much more interested to parade your "originality".
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @05:04AM
So you say. Where have you heard this argument concerning media "middleware" before?
Cite what article? Seriously, where are you trying to go with this?
And frankly, if an argument works, it doesn't matter how unoriginal it is. Flat Earthers, for example, hold their beliefs despite the Earth being shown to be round centuries ago (with some solid arguments for a round Earth going back thousands of years). Shiny, new original arguments in defense of a round Earth won't change their minds because they've already demonstrated that they'll ignore the existing evidence.
So much of the argument for censorship relies on ignoring history, human nature, and even the mechanics of the censorship schemes (a common approach as seen in this article is to make token adjustments to the censorship scheme and then claim that makes it not censorship). It's one thing to adjust an idea for an old, unoriginal counterargument and another to just pretend the counterargument doesn't exist in the first place. The latter is some combination of delusion and deception.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 21 2021, @01:57AM
Same with hall web sites.
They can still carry ads - just not targeted ads.
And of course if people have to pay for social media because ad revenue isn’t enough, they will be more choosy about the number of subscriptions they maintain. Same as, with so many streaming TV services, people have to pick and choose. Quality over quantity.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 16 2021, @01:20PM (9 children)
It was a waste of five minutes of my life for a pile of outright lies and the same old polished turd arguments attempting to look justified by directly contradicting the ideals of the things he referred to in the beginning.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday March 16 2021, @03:38PM (8 children)
Outright lies and polished turds. Yeah, there's lots of that.
The problem is, they are tossed in with a lot of those nuggets of truth that NoStyle mentions in a later post. And, Shortscreen mentions "mythology building".
Like most of us who are not progressive/lib/dem, the author recognizes that the entire communication systems (news, internet, telephony, television, and maybe even radio) is fundamentally broken. The author also recognizes that Big Tech is largely responsible, and affixes a lot of the blame pretty accurately.
The problem is, the author is indeed a progressive/lib/dem, and wants to "fix" the system to promote his own ideology.
"Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master."
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:19PM (7 children)
Funny you would use that quote when you get your info from breitbart, fox, and other shameless propaganda outlets. You ever watch Tucker Carlson? Because Fox paid a team of lawyers a lot of money to convince a court that the show is so obviously misinformed bullshit that no one would take it seriously.
That doesn't even begin to cover the fact that the article does not advocate censorship, but don't let that stop your 2 minutes of hate, Brought to you by Carl's Jr.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:55PM
He's also the guy who posted a link from americanpartisan.org which calls itself "A vanguard movement of Western Civilisation" (No, stop laughing) as if he thinks it is a reliable source.
Or maybe he's trying to convince other people its more than clumsy propaganda, it's hard to tell.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:09AM (3 children)
If this is proof that Fox is bullshit: Fox paid a team of lawyers...
Then this is proof that the DNC is not democratic: DNC paid a team of lawyers...
Specifically, the DNC was sued over the unfair actions taken against Bernie. The DNC argued in court that the primary election didn't have to determine anything; it was fine to help one candidate win by unfair means. The DNC could do whatever they pleased to make sure their desired winner won.
You OK with that? Agree that democrats aren't into democracy? If not, what Fox argued in court doesn't matter either.
FYI, in both cases, the lawyer probably picked the strategy. He picked whatever legal argument might succeed. Often, a lawyer will provide multiple arguments, sometimes even ones that can't be simultaneously true.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @09:29AM (1 child)
Nope, don't like the DNC but until we get voting reforms to split the two party stranglehold I will vote for the not-fascist not-white-supremacists. At best the GOP are sociopaths that give tax cuts to the rich. At best.
Did you have a point? Tucker Fuckerson is still a blatant liar and propagandist that pushes culture war white supremacist rhetoric.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 18 2021, @05:38PM
Aww, triggered the tucker fans. Anyone that listens to that guy is a braindead clueless moron. He makes Bill Maher look good for christ's sake!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 21 2021, @02:01AM
(Score: 1) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 19 2021, @12:20AM (1 child)
Liar.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 20 2021, @11:02PM
Moron, but I repeat myself . . . .
(Score: 1) by nostyle on Tuesday March 16 2021, @01:47PM
TL/DR - except for a cursory scanning to catch the topic and major points. I will try to get back to it when I have more time. It reminded me of another reference work that I read 25 years ago - (so my memory of it has faded) - that i highly recommend:
Robert Pirsig, author of the renowned "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" had a follow-up book titled, "Lila" which also discusses the roots of what makes USA body politic rather different from others. Notably, it highlights the impact that "native american" ideas have played in shaping an "american perspective". Insofar as it agrees with the ideas presented in the article you have linked, there may be nuggets of truth.
--
I'm off to get shot ( J&J vaccine ). I will post later if I survive. Otherwise, bye and thanks for all the karma.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Mojibake Tengu on Tuesday March 16 2021, @01:55PM (2 children)
The Atlantic itself is the very part of problem.
Full of ideologisms and hypocrisy. Actually, it is the loss of truth concept and ideological detachment from reality what broke America apart.
Just like what happened to the Soviet Union before that and to many other Empires before that.
The core of failure is in delusion Americans conjured upon themselves, so they can control all the World to their interest and profit.
That's not possible. For a short time, maybe. But certainly not forever. And that time of exceptionality is already over.
You cannot spread the democracy by bombing, genocide and wars, and at the same time accuse your strategic opponents of doing the same.
That does not work well.
No one would believe you your intentions are good, if your politicians are profiteering from wars directly, like in Yugoslavia or Ukraine.
That's not even a real democracy. That's conquest of resources.
Remember, today it is anniversary of My Lai Massacre, a distinguished event of bringing a democracy to children by U.S. troops...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%E1%BB%B9_Lai_massacre [wikipedia.org]
The edge of 太玄 cannot be defined, for it is beyond every aspect of design
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday March 16 2021, @03:44PM
Some similarities, but not "just like".
That is the single biggest similarity, and you're right, it can't work. A guy could launch into a thesis right there, but I'll stop.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by leon_the_cat on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:18PM
The Atlantic has close links to the council on foreign relations.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:18PM (2 children)
- Lots of stuff everybody would agree with, to prepare you for what the paper really wants to say.
- People think the election was dubious so we need to do more to censor not only social media but the entire internet. And then everybody will believe what they're supposed to believe.
- Social media companies aren't censoring enough.
- Everything except what the political establishment and corporate media says is a conspiracy theory and should be censored.
- Lots of stuff everybody would agree with, to prepare you for what the paper really wants to say.
- If social media doesn't censor what we want them to censor, they should be able to be sued.
- Showing black people and white people different ads is racist
- Algorithms are racist.
- Everything is racist.
- Lets censor everything with algorithms.
- American tech platforms at like Communist China.
- Citizen's in other countries see their country's propaganda. They should only see ours.
- Lots of stuff everybody would agree with, to prepare you for what the paper really wants to say.
- Let's have social media without the ability to reply. Unidirectional communcation is where it's at.
- Let's also get rid of anonoymity so we can destroy the lives of anybody who doesn't say or believe the right things.
- Let's get rid of all private communication and make it all government controlled. That way you can sue when they censor you. So they won't censor you. Because governments always follow their own rules.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by shortscreen on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:51PM
Good synopsis. I would add that there is a strong element of mythology building going on in there, appeals to an imaginary good-old-days of democracy (a word used 26 times) where I suppose Schenck v. United States and COINTELPRO never happened.
It reads like a Hollywood sequel of Manufacturing Consent where the legacy media villains from the last movie are now being savagely eaten by the equally unprincipled but more profitable big tech giants.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:10PM
Paranoid hallucinatory synopsis. You can tell by how words are twisted to fit what the poster b e l i e v e s is being said.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @02:51PM (1 child)
Twitter may be where all the awful is concentrated, and the twits there get an inordinate amount of media coverage, but the whole Internet is still a wonder of the modern world, at the disposal of royalty and the humblest beggar.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @03:01PM
They want to destroy that wonder and replace it with something they can control. No surprise that Anne Applebaum has a blue checkmark on Twitter.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @03:05PM (11 children)
The entire corporate media and political establishment have turned into something very dangerous. Do you remember how the entire media and political establishment kept claiming that Trump told Georgia's chief investigator to "find the fraud" and that if she did, she'd become a "national hero"? And remember how the corporate media not only universally repeated this, but also claimed they had "verified" it with anonymous sources? If you don't here [rumble.com] is a little montage to jog your memory. Yes it's rumble, but things like a factual recording of the past are now increasingly subject to deletion on e.g. YouTube.
Guess what? Like an increasing amount of "information" coming from the corporate media, it was fake. The Washing Post, the first to start spreading the story, has now issued a 'correction.' [washingtonpost.com] Kind of funny how all the anonymous sources of the corporate media all somehow said the exact same fake thing, isn't it? It turns out that the effort to destroy the recording of the call was met with incompetence. The audio recording was found in the trash-bin on a state computer. Whoever tried to delete the record of the call forgot, or did not understand that delete does not actually delete. What the call actually said is that Trump believed there was dishonesty during the election, and that the investigator currently had the most important job in the country. This is an entirely different tone and message.
These people, the ones that are actively lying, maliciously destroying evidence, and constantly spreading overt propaganda are the ones asking you to give them greater control and the ability to censor anything and everything they want. And also claiming that any criticism of them, or doubt of their integrity, is tantamount a baseless conspiracy theory. One day you're going to have your Are We the Baddies? [youtube.com] moment. I obviously believe you are a good person and so you, in turn, believe that the establishment must be the good guys and are basing your views and values accordingly. But can you even consider the thought, for a moment, that perhaps they are not? That perhaps the sort of personality to seek out political power and influence, and succeed at obtaining such, tend to be some of the worst humans on this planet - if not only for this selection bias?
The paradox of democracy is that we invariably pick the worst of us to lead us. And it's not just "the other side".
(Score: 4, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 16 2021, @05:55PM (8 children)
Here is a recording of Trump asking to find the votes. [youtube.com]
We don't know what's on this tape yet, it's been provided to the Grand Jury though. We do know the investigator said it didn't exist and then we found it in her Trash folder. [cnn.com] So we'll probably see some Obstruction of Justice and Destruction of Evidences charges on that as well.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:04PM (2 children)
Careful now, don't tear down their Golden Idol or they may go apeshit. Goddamn dirty apes!
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday March 17 2021, @03:05PM (1 child)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday March 17 2021, @05:23PM
Huffing paint [herald-dispatch.com] is the ultimate pleasure.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:20PM (4 children)
The recording has nothing to do with what this is about. If you prefer CNN, here [archive.org] was there story on the whole 'find the fraud' fabrication:
That call with the chief investigator is what is being talked about. They are intentionally trying to confuse you by now framing this release as some amazing new recording. It's not. It's the actual recording of a conversation that they previously reported on and completely fabricated the details of. It's the just latest example of outright lies and fabrications from the same media that is constantly pushing for the power to censor and silence others.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:09PM (2 children)
Mmmmm, stable genius roadkill. Hope your ego can withstand the inevitable reconcilation with reality.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @02:26AM
"this is not good for democracy." [spectator.us]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 18 2021, @12:22AM
the inevitable reconcilation with reality. [redstate.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 18 2021, @01:05PM
Find the fraud? The voters already did that. That anyone still believes Trump is symptomatic of the large portion of the population who believes reality TV is real, pro wrestling is real, and the actors promoting various products while wearing lab coats are real. They’re also responsible for those wastes of skin called “influencers.” A pox on them all.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:48PM (1 child)
Yep, and a very nice description of where this happened before is here [substack.com].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @07:02AM
Ugh. That is an absolutely fantastic article, and there is no doubt that the parallels are extremely... eerie. The reason for the ugh is because this is ultimately all just so frustrating. When you see the people supporting this "transformation", I don't really think they're inherently bad people in the least - not even the progressives. But the problem is that they've become so vehemently convinced that they're the saviors of righteousness and that everybody *else* are bad people that they're turning into that which they think they're saving the world from.
It's no doubt similar to things like lynch mobs of the past that would, more than occasionally, end up killing completely innocent individuals. I expect those individuals final thoughts were pretty much the same - 'why can't you people see what you're doing'? Of course nothing those individuals could have said would have ever swayed the mob, because the mobs are fueled by their own self-determined righteousness. Otherwise normal and good people turned to thoughtless beasts simply by nature of being convinced that everybody else is a beast.
I was one of the people who thought the internet would bring in the great democratization, great equalization of society. How stupid were we all to ignore what has happened every single time you bring large groups of people together with no immediate focus to occupy their attention. And the internet has simply brought together the largest mob in our species history, with absolutely nothing to occupy themselves. So they look outward.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @04:12PM (15 children)
My take on this is that we should just completely deep six the ideas in this article. There is no serious problem in the first place to justify the exercise and nobody trusts the parties that would be censoring. Better to just not do it in the first place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @04:44PM
Damage contr0lo is working on some epic clapbacks, just you wait.
(Score: 1, Troll) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 16 2021, @06:34PM (7 children)
Again, my poor irreducible khallow, your lackadasical reading comprehension and ideologically skewed reality have caused you to totally misunderstand the situation. It is not organized censorship, it is a matter of discourse shaping. In a normal conversational situation, say like SoylentNews, fringe and crazy ideas such as yours would be recognized as such, and either shamed or ignored. It is the attempted "normalization" of extremism that the new methods of conversation have enabled, and the commercial interests that have corrupted the public sphere. This is what is being exposed here. Nazism and white supremacy are just "different ideas", they are insane and evil ideologies, ones that were physically refuted in WWII. And this is why khallow gets modded down so often.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @06:53PM
Have you clowns brought back racially segregated drinking fountains yet? [thecollegefix.com] If it's "voluntary" [newsweek.com] are you volunteering?
(Score: 2, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:18PM (3 children)
WTF is the difference between "censorship" and "discourse shaping"? Tell us more, oh Extreme Aristarchus.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @07:50PM (2 children)
"Censorship" is when it is done to the speech of Aristarchus.
"discourse shaping" is when Aristarchus does it to the speech of others.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by aristarchus on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:53AM
Actually, there is a vast difference between them. Suppression is what censorship attempts, and that hardly ever succeeds. "Discourse shaping" is what hemo is attempting, to construct the narrative, to frame the discussion. This is also what Google and Facebook engage in, inadvertently, when they suggest content based on an algorithm. The Military, bless their heart, refer to this as "information warfare" I3C, or I5C by now? (Intelligence, Command, Communication, Computers) Began as PsyOps, operations aimed at sapping the morale of the enemy soldiers, think Tokyo Rose or Leaflets showered on Iraq, but then expanded to target the civilian populace in an attempt to influence and control politics in the target state, or in the military's own state if their budget was threatened. The term most often used by the Military is "Perception management", or, "strategic communication". So much more professional sounding than "propaganda". In politics, outside the military, it is called "spin". And in advertising, it is called, "advertising".
Be aware: the greatest threat is not outright censorship or blatant lying, but the undermining of truth and rationality through disinformation and Freeze Peaches.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday March 18 2021, @11:51AM
My take on this is that outright censorship is reactive, whereas "discourse shaping" is proactive, and also a hell of a lot more insidious. "Shape the discourse" enough, and you may end up with people who don't even have the vocabulary to say things a given entity might want censored.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:55PM (1 child)
aristarchus, I think I love you. Because you defy any and all efforts at my classifying you. I think we all, myself included, can generally be fit into a nice tidy little pigeon hole. But you? You're clearly not a nutter - at least I think not, yet you say things that a nutter would say - but in a sane voice. And you're clearly educated, yet say things the would suggest a lack of education - in an educated voice. You behave as if you are aloof, yet at the same over-reactive to the slightest of slights.
I'm half assuming you're just a Godfrey Elfwick, but to stay in character for years is seemingly unthinkable. Andy Kaufman reincarnate? Too interesting.
xoxoxo
AC
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday March 17 2021, @11:10AM
Sounds more like Diogenes than Aristarchus sometimes, doesn't he? Though i notice he leaves the "jacking off in public" bits to the alt-right nutbars.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:14PM (5 children)
Really? Pray tell, where do you imagine I wanted it to go?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:35PM (4 children)
Looks to me like you thought there was some merit to the article. But it's toxic. Sure, there's some lip service to nebulous democracy, then they propose the opposite. Similarly, they express concern about the internet oligopolies and then apologize for them, "Why would 20 data-sucking disinformation machines be better than one?"
We can do better than this.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:28AM (1 child)
Hard pill for you to swallow, yes, I get that from your comments.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2, Touché) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:22AM
Nigerian prince emails are a hard pill to swallow too unless you're gullible to the point of mental illness. Why should I have a different opinion concerning this?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 17 2021, @05:47PM (1 child)
Cite the particular instances of toxic suggestions. Not your interpretation, quote the parts of the articles that suggest toxic anti-democratic changes. Explain your case so we can discuss the details.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 23 2021, @02:31AM
Seems there are a few posts around that cite the article and make points concerning calls for censorship, expanded government control and so on. Take your pick and start there?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @05:55PM (15 children)
Good read, nowhere near the levels of hysteria promoted by the Qultists round here. Very surprising amount of vitriol from the not-long-ago online persecution crowd, you'd think they would be all over holding big tech accountable and passing digital "human rights" laws to protect privacy. I did a little skimming, did I miss the big centralized concept in the article that would turn the internet into China's tyrrancially controller version?
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=42540&page=1&cid=1124854#commentwrap [soylentnews.org]
That comment, modded +3 insightful and claiming "accurate" in the title is anything but. There are no suggestions to have the government control everything and the author specifically mentions that having any institution govern what is good or bad is a terrible idea waiting to fail. Instead they suggest "a means of introducing competition into the system through “middleware,” software that allows people to choose an algorithm that, say, prioritizes content from news sites with high editorial standards. Conspiracy theories and hate campaigns would still exist on the internet, but they would not end up dominating the digital public square the way they do now."
Oh the horror! We very much do need laws to regulate digital privacy, but of course the resident conspiracy theorists who bought into the 2020 stolen election meme are up in arms about it. Methinks these righteous ragers may be choosing the OUTRAGE algorithm every chance they get, shutting down their critical thinking skills in preference of ideology. Of course these are the same people that were all for repealing 230 protections not too many months ago because they felt oppressed by Big Tech.
You can't make this shit up, it would sound too corny in a book.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:02PM (12 children)
The whole modus operandi of this article was to introduce things that you would agree with and like, followed by introducing things that you would normally have absolute disgust for - but wrapped in the verbiage of the previous things that you liked to try to soften your position on it. It's a propaganda technique, somewhat like the opposite of poisoning the well. In poisoning the well we might say "Can you believe they honestly believe that politicians are secretly zombies, the earth is flat, and 2+2=4?" Of course in practice you would not put 2+2=4 but something not well understood by most. The idea is that you try to convince people that believing that 2+2=4 is the same as believing that the Earth is flat or that politicians are going to eat your brains.
This does the equal but opposite scenario by throwing out lots of really positive and good ideas that would be almost universally praised and accepted, and then following it up - in the same style of language - with ideas you would naturally find revolting. So rolling with our example: "Any just person surely understands that all people should be free, independent thought is critical, and that we should all go engage in random acts of violence." Of course, again, you don't put such an absurd notion for the 'catch', but rather something that at a cursory inspection doesn't really seem that bad.
So with a brief introduction to the technique being used, let's now assess a section from the paper:
Break it down into what is actually being proposed:
1) Township institution - described earlier in the article. Unidirectional (e.g. - no replies) "social" media proposed by a Taiwanese politician.
2) Secure identities - hand over various deeply personal information (suggested in the article was drivers license + diploma) to the site. Further emphasizing the notion that it's a government run operation.
3) Free of [bad stuff] due to algorithms - extensive algorithmic driven censorship as described earlier in the article.
4) Citizen scientists driving censorship - members of the ministry of truth, once again emphasizing the notion that it's a government run operation.
5) Government would cede power to citizens - once again emphasizing the notion that these "institutions" are driven by government. And no power is being ceded. They're suggesting something similar to California ballot initiatives on their undirectional socialmedia.gov site.
6) Citizens could seek recourse in courts if mistreated by the site - Again emphasizing this is a government driven project. You have no right to access any private service, whether or not you're in violation of their terms.
This is something that basically nobody would support, especially as it is being framed as something in *lieu* of private services. But by wrapping a turd in the middle of a tasty sandwich, you'll certainly get some people to bite without taking a more careful peek at what they're sticking in their mouth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:26PM (11 children)
Lot of interpretation and speculation you've got there. Why don't you take your 6 points and pull out the quotes in the article that suggest such things.
I'll adderss the firsts point, I see no problem with having government websites such as you described. Nowhere did I see a suggestion that everyone on the internet must register for an ID number just to get online. For a township discussion I think it would be quite preferable to make sure there are no trolls from other countries trying to muddy the local discussion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:32PM (10 children)
You should be able ctrl+f verify most points pretty easily. So for instance, with the ID I mention the article stating that drivers license and diplomas would be part of the credentialing. ctrl+f for these and you get:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @10:13PM (9 children)
Got it, you probably refused to read the Mueller Report as well. Can't let reality mess up your political agenda!
(Score: 1, Touché) by khallow on Tuesday March 16 2021, @11:38PM (8 children)
(Score: 2, Touché) by aristarchus on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:02AM (7 children)
khallow, khallow, my dear and fluffy khallow! How does your inability to comprehend what you read amount to your opponent losing the argument? Perhaps, my precious and squishy khallow, you have lost the argument, because you never found it in the first place? Try to read the Fine Article again, this time with enthusiasm and for comprehension. Come back when you are done, if you are ready to argue in good faith.
(Score: 1, Touché) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:07AM (6 children)
Sounds like good advice. You ought to listen to it.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by aristarchus on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:13AM (5 children)
Retreating to Pee-Wee Herman level of discourse does not help your case, khallow. Time to put on the big boy pants, and try to understand what the Big Scary EU Article says!
(Score: 1, Touché) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:08AM (4 children)
(Score: 0, Troll) by aristarchus on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:35AM (3 children)
Yes, I've noticed. But given how libertarianism is a lazy person's substitution for actual thinking and learning, I am not surprized. Now, shut up, khallow!
(Score: 1, Touché) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @01:42AM (2 children)
How about you hit us with some actual thinking and learning then? Else you're just wasting everyone's time, including yours (though I gather that's not very valuable).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 18 2021, @03:59AM (1 child)
I've seen him try, pearls before swine.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday March 18 2021, @04:46AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 16 2021, @08:28PM (1 child)
Also, keep something in mind. The idea being proposed here is something, that if generously interpreted, is basically a glorified version of the We the People [archives.gov] petition system. Of course that links to a governmental archive. The reason is that the removing the petitions site was one of the very first acts carried out by the current administration: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/ [whitehouse.gov] It's gone, and the reason is obvious. Tens of millions of Americans would use the system to make their voices heard, and that is unwanted.
And that is also fundamentally what the increasing push for censorship (of which this article is a part of) is about. There is a reason the founding fathers of this nation pushed for the freedom of speech. It's not because they wanted it. It invariably leads to people saying things that result in bad outcomes. The reason is because they lived in a time where they had experienced the eras of mass censorship that these politicians are trying to convince you to return to. And they understood that the many negatives of free speech are surpass only by the negatives of a society driven by censorship. Only now, in the digital era, things would be a million times worse.
And I want to emphasize that this isn't partisan. This entire trend is little more than a continuation of the Patriot Act, started by Bush, which ultimately achieved very little other than massively stripping away the rights of American citizens and granting the government exponentially more power, which they will now never relinquish. Did you know for instance that thanks to a bill [aclu.org] signed in 2011, you can be lawfully indefinitely detained without trial or lawyer?
Our entire country is becoming quite dystopic. The only reason you are failing to perceive yourself being graudally boiled is because the process is slow and paired alongside extensive propaganda.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 17 2021, @12:05AM
Nope. It's also advocacy for continued censorship [soylentnews.org] of "disinformation" (and whatever else Facebook, Twitter, etc choose to suppress) and internet oligopolies [soylentnews.org].
A token petition system (which you could implement personally) is not a significant idea.