To 80% of the population? Wouldn't that be the Book of Mormon?
To 60%? The Quran?
I think this part of their answer is a great response: "Of course, the simplest reason is that it's not up to us to decide what the rest of the world should or shouldn't see. Bad news, it's not up to you either. Worse news, it's still true even when we agree. Which is probably most of the time."
This is exactly the comment I clicked through to add. Without someone to be offended, nothing is offensive. When a service provider crosses the line and polices a piece of media, they are now responsible for defining that line moving forward. That's an insanely hard task.
Most people who want "offensive" content taken down do not understand the complexity of what they are asking for.
Offensive to those, who can make enough noise about it.
> "Why do you host harmful content?"
To which your returned question would be similarly open-ended: Harmful to whom? Define harmless content. Etc.
... but probably a little more "down to earth" in terms of discussing the bounds of such definitions.
The root of being "offended" may often be grounded in an agenda to silence and control, but it's typically defended by referencing potential harm. So that's usually a good place to start overturning such arguments.
It's just funny to see the same old argument brought up the thousandth time with maybe a slight context change to the last.
If it is not posted then folks will not know how to refute it when it crops up again -- and it will.
Free Speech for bad ideas is as important as free speech for good ideas.
Don't be offended. That's your choice.
P.S. This doesn't mean that everything offensive must be posted -- there is stuff that should be illegal to post because of the harm it can cause.
Edit: downvote within 15 seconds of posting ... you are speedy in your thoughtlessness.
that's the public market of ideas at work for you
What stuff? Using this logic, why should anything be off-limits to the "public market of ideas"? e.g. libel should be perfectly acceptable speech — that way it can be exposed and refuted!
This is a particularly insidious point of view because it frames its own line between acceptable and unacceptable speech as some sort of natural law, when really it's just as arbitrary as any other line.
I would argue that it's more important.
> Phillip DeFranco
Edit regarding your edit: Complaining about downvotes is cringe inducing.
It's a good idea to be wary of the sneaking-in of bad ideas by packaging them with good ideas. In 2019, this applies to even some of the most reprehensible ones. (For example: Politics through intimidation and violent assault.) Ideologies and movements aren't monoliths. The bad parts of them can be teased apart and criticized, without making you an opponent of all of the overarching ideas and principles. Anyone who tries to sell you on the "all or nothing" idea is (perhaps unwittingly) engaging in this packaging of bad ideas.
downvote within 15 seconds of posting ... you are speedy in your thoughtlessness.
Here is the pattern that I often see around that: 2 or 3 rapid, thoughtless downvotes, followed by more upvotes. Be courageous, and take the long view. (Also, we're not supposed to talk about this meta stuff around here, according to the guidelines, but I'm giving you a heads up.)
Of course no one mentioned perhaps the most important reason for non censorship of ideas.
The censors and public at large can be wrong. Imagine living in a society where racism was the norm and the censors did not allow speech that argued for the equality of races. Instead of "hate speech" they called it "unnatural speech" or some such twisted label.
In fact, our society could be very wrong about some popular ideas. In fact, I don't think we are new or different than many societies that proceeded us -- we have been here before. We can't be so myopic that we are the generation that has discovered all the ideal points of view. Let views stand up to the test.
Also censorship is fear based. Buck up. Take on the challenge. Make sure the positive voices are heard. Don't protect adults with "safe spaces" where they will never be challenged. You are just setting them up for a fall later.
The reasons racism is wrong needs to be constantly reposted -- we forget and repeat our mistakes too often. That is why we have holocaust museums. In fact the dangers of racism become more obvious when you let the racists speak! Let them. Teach your children from them. Show them the effect.
Defamation against private individual (including libel and slander)
Child pornography
Blackmail
Incitement to imminent violence
Solicitations to commit crimes
You can't simply turn your emotions on and off unless you are a sociopath.
You mean "promotes." People are free to judge. However, by granting discovery/virality selectively, rather than going by pure interest and numbers, YouTube is exercising editorial judgement. This makes them into a publisher, not a platform. People are free to urge YouTube to become a publisher. YouTube is free to follow suit or not and take the rewards and consequences of their actions.
Says who? "Publisher" and "Platform" are not mutually exclusive identities.
I've used them before and they offer a great service for a good price and I support their general philosophy in regards to privacy and free speech.
This isn't true. A few examples.
If I post your naked photos online and they are censored, that isn't bad.
If I post your address online next to a photo of your house and it is censored, that isn't bad.
If I post the source code of your personal project online and it is censored, that isn't bad.
If I post the contents of your diary online and it is censored, that isn't bad.
If I post the contents of a heated argument between you and your spouse online and it is censored, that isn't bad.
If I post a photoshopped picture of your kid online and it is censored, that isn't bad.
Not everything deserves to see the light of day and actually, we do get to make that decision. This idea that "free speech" means everyone has to agree to let everything appear on the internet is false. "Free speech" also means "I have the freedom not to support someone else's speech".
If you have to resort to extreme examples, then it shows the weakness of your position. Those examples are mostly illegal. It's not "censorship" in the context of Free Speech if one is counteracting illegal activity. The serious societal problems come in when there is censorship on an ideological basis.
This idea that "free speech" means everyone has to agree to let everything appear on the internet is false.
If Free Speech applies to the Internet, then it means precisely that everyone has to agree to let everything appear on the Internet. In 2019, saying that people can have Free Speech, just not on the Internet, is like saying people can have Free Speech, just not with mechanized printing. In 2019, publishing has to include the Internet, and suppressing publishing on an ideological basis is suppressing the principle of Free Speech.
What is extreme about them? An example of an extreme would be "child porn" or "your credit card number" or "the password to your email". The examples I listed are pretty mundane and actually quite common. Either way, you haven't actually explained why any of the examples I listed would be "bad".
> Those examples are mostly illegal
None of those examples are illegal except the naked photos and not even that in all states (but most, and not even just "naked photos" in and of themselves necessarily, i.e. naked photos in the context of "revenge porn"). But even if they were, so what? If it's illegal does that mean it's not censorship to remove it?
> If Free Speech applies to the Internet, then it means precisely that everyone has to agree to let everything appear on the Internet
This is obviously wrong. Based on that logic you should never be able to delete a comment from your personal blog because you're censoring the critics.
I believe I do, and so I think there should be a platform for free speech. I believe this even though I largely do not wish to consume much of what people might term offensive.
I appreciate platforms which curate and moderate content as a form of customer service. What I don't appreciate is entities (governments or corporations) taking a moralistic stance as if it is their duty to stamp out bad ideas from existence.
https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/about/faq#BecauseFuckNazisT...
I couldn't find any, but I'm also not familiar with the site.
There's "offensive" as in thinks I don't like, or even hateful statements ... but to me threats of violence and etc fall into another area.
This sort of thing came up a long time ago:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Socialist_Party_of_Am...
It's censorship if a government suppresses information, if a company decides not to business with you, it's contract law.
This isn't that difficult to grasp.
> Finally, censorship is always bad, for a variety of well understood reasons that we don't need to repeat here. But in the case of some types of content, it has special dangers. When you censor a web site based on the extreme or dangerous views of its creator(s), you haven't stopped those people from thinking that way.
Why? The problem is that I've seen someone who was very close to me repost propaganda on Facebook that looks like it's following the Nazi propaganda playbook. Stuff against immigrants, against religious minorities, ect. Just take some classic Nazi propaganda, swap out "jew", and that's this person reposts.
(Or used to, as this person recently complained that Facebook is blocking their posts.)
Anyway, I don't think that this person really thinks this way; instead I think this person's thinking is manipulated to push a political agenda.
Since when the fuck is that how the internet works?
If Stormfront hosts a site on NFS.net, who do you think visits that site? Bright young progressives valiantly carrying a banner of social justice?
No. Fucking neo-Nazis visit the Stormfront website, because, and this is important, _it's a platform for fucking neo-Nazis_.
Christchurch. Charlottesville. Numerous terrorists have indicated very clearly that they were radicalized online. Why the fuck is it somehow your responsibility to provide these people a platform to spread their poison?
To end my rant, here's that ridiculous quote that always gets tossed around in these discussions:
> "Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman."
Actually, as it happens, the best disinfectant is a harsh chemical, and the most efficient policeman is a fucking policeman. The internet is not a place of light and exposure. It is a place where disgusting ideologies can hide, quietly attract followers, and conspire to murder people.
Consider how powerful that sunlight was the next time a right-wing terrorist screams about blood and soil while brandishing an AR.
I'm sorry the tone of this is so angry. NFS is a great service -- I just can't stand this pitiful justification for aiding radicalization and eventual violence. There is a line you can draw. It is up to you to draw it.
People can also be radicalized in person. Rallies, meetings, one-on-one conversations.
Does that mean we have to police everyone's personal lives and invade their privacy?
If "progressives" aren't visiting the website or doing anything to speak out against the website and it's content, it must not be important enough for them to warrant doing it.
Also, it's not a pitiful justification. It's a really good business move on their part. I assume NFS has seen in the past that larger webhosts don't/won't allow this type of content on their platform and are removing it because it's easier for their legal team/marketing/PR/etc.
NFS has filled the hole saying "hey, we'll support your right to free speech, even if you're offensive as all hell. We're just letting everyone know (including you) that we're donating all of the profits plus some to charities that actively fight against this type of culture since we don't agree with it."
They get good PR, they get the "woe is me, we're beaten and downtrodden from censorship" customers that keep getting removed from other platforms, and they can still be on their moral/ethical high horse by donating the proceeds to charity. NFS shouldn't be responsible for who goes to their website or the content on it. NFS's job is to host websites, not police them.
You can't ensure that! At all! Which sucks! But that doesn't mean we should wring our hands and worry about "what if?" -- in fact, it only makes it MORE important that we resoundingly reject ideologies that would seek to abuse a line for nefarious, censorship-y purposes.
Maybe we make that part of our line...
I no longer believe this, when cesspits of alt-right, racist assholes use such grandiose ideals to spread their hatred, which then bubbles out into the real world.
The idea that good ideas will win, and that common sense and rationality will take the day, are not really supported by what we see around the net. Instead the greater internet fuckwad theorem holds more true, and the spread of vile, violent ideologies is enabled.
Freedom of speech is a protection from government, but I think those providing speech platforms, such as hosting companies, should probably take more responsibility for what they propagate.
Translate the Bible into a barbaric language like German or English? That caused great offense. People were excommunicated and even killed for that (like Wycliffe).
The book "The Coddling of the American Mind" goes into this concept that ideas and speech are not violent. We do a huge disservice to young people today by teaching them to fear ideas and block speakers at Universities they don't agree with. Listening to other viewpoints and challenging them makes us better thinkers. By banning speech is to say, "I agree people are too stupid to make their own decisions. Let's make the world 'safe' for them and ban ideas I don't agree with."
I highly recommend Brendan O'Neill's video on offensiveness:
1. People are stupid. Really, really stupid. Especially when given the means to surround and reinforce themselves with other idiots. See for example - antivax and alt-med in general, chemtrails any number of ridiculous conspiracy theories that propagate through the web.
2. These people are not thinkers, they are not open to having their viewpoints challenged and reason will not move them from their course.
I agree, this whole area is massively subjective, I'm not saying I have a solution. But this black and white idea that censorship is always bad, and the notion that we have a functional marketplace of ideas which people re-evaluate based on reason is ... well it's a fantasy.
When you catch a cold, it is because viruses have used a bunch of subtle hacks to convince some of your cells to stop being part of you and start making more viruses instead. Your immune system comes in and stops them from doing this. Sometimes it makes mistakes, sometimes it can be co-opted and used as a viral host itself (see HIV for instance), but on the whole it keeps your cells busy being a part of you rather than striking out on their own agenda, whether it's one they arrived at by random mutations like most cancers, or one that crawled in under their normal defenses like a virus.
Running a platform that gives a voice to anyone and everyone, up to the limits of "whatever gets the platform-runner hauled into court and fined for more money than they make off of spreading the view that got them in trouble", is like actively providing places for diseases to grow.
Just because someone thinks the world is flat, doesn't mean I have to disagree with them on most issues, except MAYBE on space exploration, and certain academic fields connected to it. Believing the earth was flat takes nothing at all away from their ability to judge humans, celebrate traditions and reciprocate favors. I do not buy into "getting spooked" by ideas I don't identify with, because if I draw a line in the sand that keeps moving towards me, maybe it indeed moves because of my own bad reasoning.
It began with Alex Jones and that kinda made sense but now the same people and institutions are asking for the head of individuals like Phillip DeFranco.
The thing about censorship is that it never stops where you think it should.
Friendly reminder that "slippery slope" is a fallacy.
100% censorship is obviously bad. It remains to be shown that 0.1% censorship inevitably leads to it.
I'm fairly lefty, and haven't heard of this Phillip DeFranco before. Surely if I consult my biased google bubble, it will show me the dirt on him? Well, not really:
> “Hey, writer here,” Roose responded. “This collage is just a sample from his viewing history. Some far-right, some not.” [1]
And reading the original NYT article... they aren't asking for anybody's head. And this is where it gets really interesting from a free speech perspective. Phillip got offended because he was in a collage of somebody's viewing history. He might have been a step along somebody's slippery slope, whose politics are/were too extreme for his comfort -- or it might just be correlation without causation. The article didn't dig into Phillip and denounce him.
In fact, the thrust of the NYT article is that YouTube's recommendations take folks from moderate content, and send them on a spiral to more extreme content.
You're free to describe all of that as 'asking for heads,' but that really doesn't seem to be the case here.
[1] https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/youtuber-philip-defran...
I agree that uncensored speech is good, but when I read this I knew it would come up as problematic. I think we've all seen a lot of bad arguments sneak their axioms into the conversation with a line like this (but again, I agree with what's written here). Does uncensored speech fall into the category of "it goes without saying"? Perhaps I should learn more about censorship so I can effectively advocate against it, just like the article says.
Maybe you’re wrong?
I find NearlyFreeSpeech.Net's position on hosting "really offensive content" to be well-reasoned and thoughtful. I'm just not convinced it's ultimately true. The web has brought unparalleled good to the world in the mere quarter century it's been with us. It's also arguably been the prime mover in bringing back flat earthers, Nazis, and measles. When you ask "don't the anti-vaxxers, climate change denialists, and white supremacists deserve great web hosting, too?", maybe the answer is "no, not really."
I'm not saying censorship is good, let's go full-on NewSpeak here, or even that I have any sort of solution to propose.
I just don't think this ideal, that censorship is necessarily always bad and that the best, only way to fight evil ideas is with discussion and better ideas ... I don't think holds up to scrutiny in the face of reality.
The anti-vax movement and climate change deniers are better examples of this than Nazis and similar shitheads, IMO. There's easily accessible, scientifically sound evidence that both these groups are completely wrong. It's not at all open to debate. If the "free marketplace of ideas" worked then these groups would have disappeared long ago, yet the former group has led to almost ten thousand preventable deaths and the latter may result in far more. Maybe the truth will eventually reign supreme and both groups will become a footnote in history, but there are real consequences in letting groups like these spread their views online.
There's a good Contrapoints video on the limits of free speech, which you will probably enjoy (NSFW): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBUuBd5VRbY
The Anti-Vax movement is a prime example of the Free Marketplace of Ideas working!
https://slate.com/technology/2019/06/measles-outbreak-anti-v...
Nazis and similar shitheads are in the same boat. I would agree that Climate Change Deniers are an example of the Free Marketplace of Ideas not having worked yet. However, suppressing them just gives them ammunition. Best to just keep debunking: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugwqXKHLrGk
(Re: The potholer54 video: If you dislike Steven Crowder, you should be glad he's a Climate Change Denier. That's just about the biggest hole in his hull!)
There is a pretty direct line drawn between speech and violence against out-groups; anyone who says otherwise would do well to read about the Rwandan genocide and their 200 days of public radio broadcasting demonizing the Tutsis prior to the genocide itself.
After all, if there wasn't power in speech, none of this would matter; there would be no restrictions on speech anywhere if it didn't threaten someone.
Even in free-speech absolutists, there's often agreement that direct incitements to violence should be off-limits, and why? Because speech moves people to act.
I haven't often seen the position that incitements to violence should also be protected speech, though I'm sure those people are there -- the question to them for me would be, what are you trying to advance or protect against with that position?
The question I'd also ask is: if you want to say that speech such as calls to genocide should also be protected, how is that advancing society, especially for the targets of that? The marketplace of ideas doesn't seem to do a good job protecting them, so...what's the solution there?
Free speech is a tool for reducing need for violence. That's why direct incitement to violence is usually not protected -- it goes against the whole point.
If you want a tech solution to misleading speech and outright lies though, then mandate all publications of debunked speech to publish links to rebuttals, without having to remove original content.
"Those Three Shocking Ways Vaccines Cause Mice Tails To Fall Off Will Shock You!!! [Five Factual Claims This Article Gets Wrong <link>]"
If you're concerned about the "pretty direct line drawn between speech and violence against out-groups" then you should be paying keen attention to the normalization of political intimidation and violence in the past several years.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC4u1zo6OpQ
The fact that the media have been giving groups tacit support, by not or minimally covering their assaults and vandalism, while even giving them positive spin, should raise some concern.
I haven't often seen the position that incitements to violence should also be protected speech
They should not be. "Punch a Nazi" -- despite the vileness of the purported targets -- shouldn't be allowed. "Milkshaking" is incitement to assault. The fact that Twitter allows those to continue shows a groupthink bias at operation there.