Sacha Baron Cohen Gave the Greatest Speech on Why Social Networks Need To Be Put On Check (zdnet.com) 194
For an actor who made a career by playing silly characters, actor Sacha Baron Cohen gave yesterday one of the most eloquent and convincing speeches in a long time in support of cracking down on large social media networks to prevent the spread of lies and hate speech that these platforms allow. From a report: While accepting his award, Cohen touched on the role companies like Facebook, Google, and Twitter have played in spreading lies and hate speech online, calling the sites "the greatest propaganda machine in history." Below is a short summary of his main talking points. Cohen called Facebook, YouTube and Google, Twitter and others -- the biggest propaganda machine in history. He coined the term "Silicon Six" to describe the six US billionaires that control this machine -- naming Zuckerberg at Facebook, Sundar Pichai at Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Alphabet, Susan Wojcicki at YouTube, and Jack Dorsey at Twitter. The actor ripped Zuckerberg for defending holocaust deniers.
He ripped Zuckerberg for his platform facilitating Russia's interference in US elections. He ripped Zuckerberg for facilitating the Myanmar genocide. Said if another genocide takes place, Zuckerberg needs to go to jail. Cohen ripped Facebook for allowing political ads. Said if Facebook existed in the 1930s they would have allowed Hitler to post "post 30-second ads on his 'solution' to the 'Jewish problem'." Cohen likened the Christchurch massacre video to "a snuff film broadcast by social media." He said social media sites are today's largest publishers, and should have to abide to the same standards that newspapers, radio, and TV stations abide. He agreed that social media should function based on government-mandated rules, and not by internal policies set by billionaires more focused on protecting share prices than human life. He called "for regulation and legislation to curb the greed of these high-tech robber barons."
He ripped Zuckerberg for his platform facilitating Russia's interference in US elections. He ripped Zuckerberg for facilitating the Myanmar genocide. Said if another genocide takes place, Zuckerberg needs to go to jail. Cohen ripped Facebook for allowing political ads. Said if Facebook existed in the 1930s they would have allowed Hitler to post "post 30-second ads on his 'solution' to the 'Jewish problem'." Cohen likened the Christchurch massacre video to "a snuff film broadcast by social media." He said social media sites are today's largest publishers, and should have to abide to the same standards that newspapers, radio, and TV stations abide. He agreed that social media should function based on government-mandated rules, and not by internal policies set by billionaires more focused on protecting share prices than human life. He called "for regulation and legislation to curb the greed of these high-tech robber barons."
Facebook is just a megaphone (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Facebook is just a megaphone (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes. Because this megaphone manufacturer is actually yelling the shit. Facebook not just provides a platform, it pushes its content to people, actively.
Re: Facebook is just a megaphone (Score:2, Insightful)
Stop blaming the platforms. If Facebook was run by the government it would be subject to 1st amendment protections for all users. If you dislike a particular post and point it out as false and back up your claim, you'd be right to solicit your fellow man in condemning it.
While Mark has the right to do with his website as he pleases (it's private property), I'd discourage him from any oversight and interference in other people's use of
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The stuff someone paid to target you because of your age, location, recent purchases, interests, etc... needs to be factual. There is no reason Facebook shouldn't be required to fact check this stuff like anyone in publishing.
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Facebook is a publisher, not a platform, they actively engage against viewpoints they don't like such as conservatives while promoting other political viewpoints, hence they are liable for the viewpoints they do publish.
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Leftie governments have killed more then rightie governments, but please keep thinking your ideas are woke, comrade.
Coward
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Kill yourself faggot
Coward
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The question at hand is, should he be immune from liability? Should he be allowed to have great power without great responsibility?
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The question at hand is, should he be immune from liability? Should he be allowed to have great power without great responsibility?
I submit that it should not.
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The question at hand is, should he be immune from liability?
No, that is not the question. Read TFA.
SBC is calling for government censorship of social media. Here is a direct quote:
let our elected representatives, voted for by the people, of every democracy in the world, have at least some say.
He thinks that elected officials such as Donald Trump, Mitch McConnel, and Nancy Pelosi should be the arbiters of "truth".
I trust Mark Zuckerberg more than any of those three.
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(it's private property)
It is a publicly traded company. It is not "private property".
Unless of course you were strictly speaking to real estate property law , and the fact that the land that the company "Facebook" owns is private property, in which case i digress.
Facebook isn't like USPS or Amtrak (Score:2)
I think saloomy was indeed using "private" in the same sense as real or personal property. Facebook is a publicly traded company, whose stock is the private property of its shareholders. This is different from being a public sector company, such as US Postal Service or Amtrak. The government has far less control over a publicly traded company than over a public sector company.
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So does a megaphone. It actively amplifies the content. Your point?
That you don't need a megaphone to yell "FIRE" in a cinema whilst everyone is busy watching the movie.
Facebook is a mental illness (Score:2)
Another point is that people crave social media interactions. It's not healthy.
Abusers have enablers and they are usually very naive with a binary view of good and evil.
You're assuming people are always rational and not subject to emotional outbursts and manipulation.
There Is Only ONE Case For Curbing Speech (Score:2, Insightful)
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Isn't that how the world of "Fahrenheit 451" arose? Different groups from across the political spectrum demanding censorship of "this or that" until "this or that" became "this and that" and the government ended up banning (and burning) everything.
Problem is that there is always going to be ambiguity to any ""law". Traditional literature and law has relied on the premise that there was some level of fundamental socially accepted decency. That time is gone. We have seen our high ranking government officials displaying a disregard for social norms like I have never seen in my lifetime.
Mostly by the boy in the bubble, the one who was born into vast fortune , was never properly educated, and never had his judgement questioned. It really isn't entir
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What an utter crock of shite. Beyond corporate main stream media on the idiot box, what is seen in social media is largely invisible. OHHH NOOESSS naghty page on the internet one amongst tens of billions of pages, if you aint actively looking for it, you will not find it, nearly impossible. Until the duck douche cunts start screaming about it on corporate main stream media and the idiot box because people are starting to realise those idiot fuckers are just another blogger, full of the same for profit lies
Re: Facebook is just a megaphone (Score:2)
You just said two different things, are they a megaphone, or are they a megaphone manufacturer?
They indisputably have absolute control over who uses and how their platform is used.
I'd say they are a megaphone, and they do share responsibility with anyone they lend themselves to.
If someone places a sign in your yard, no amount of ideological hand waving or love for free speech will ever make the contents of that speech not your voice if you choose to allow it. If it's within your power to take it down and y
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Megaphone has even less liability in any kind of usage - it is absolutely 0. The whole common-carrier thing is based on the same principle. Let us not forget that GUNS are still legal in USA for the same reason that "guns don't kill, people do".
Facebook has absolutely no liability whatsoever. Sacha Baron Cohen is afraid that he has helped create a world where everyone is afraid of "being on the internet" and bigotry has only one place left to go - up.
No, its not. (Score:5, Informative)
Facebook (and youtube, and to a lesser extent google search, and others) are now actively removing content that they decide to, and 'deplatforming' people that they decide to.
They always claimed 'we are just a neutral carrier, so no rules should apply'.
However they have shown they are not, they have shown a willingness to be aware of the content, and to remove what they wish, therefore they are no longer neutral, and should have to choose...
Either you are a neutral carrier who doesnt touch any of the content.
OR You are a publisher who has editorial oversight (and responsibility) for the content, and you can pick and choose what is published.
You cannot have both!
Filtering all the content is 'inconvenient' for them? Cry me a river. Obeying drink driving laws may be inconvenient for people at times, but we still do (or get punished)
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When people are being booted from a platform, they usually behaved like dicks and broke the TOS. The solution for those people is very simple, don't be a dick and follow the rules for the platform you want to use.
There is nothing that says a platform has to be neutral and AFAIK none of the big ones has said that they are neutral in what they allow on their platforms (you did read their TOS, right?).
The owner of the platform can choose to allow or disallow content as they see fit, aka moderating content beca
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When people are being booted from a platform, they usually behaved like dicks
People get put into Fb jail for posting nipples, even to private groups, because someone who doesn't like them reports their posts. Who's the dick there?
and broke the TOS.
The ToSes tend to be extremely unevenly enforced.
Also, CDA 230 explicitly spells out that platforms can moderate content as they see fit without being liable for any shit their users do because the blame is put on the person actually doing the deed.
Nobody is questioning the fact of that, only whether it makes sense. And many people believe that if you're going to moderate outside the bounds of the law, you should be responsible for all the content since you're clearly exercising editorial influence.
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People get put into Fb jail for posting nipples, even to private groups, because someone who doesn't like them reports their posts. Who's the dick there?
That's why I said "usually behaved", but being oblivious to how FB and some people reacts to some types of "nudity" should be a learning experience in how to be mindful of what you post and who can see it.
The ToSes tend to be extremely unevenly enforced.
How so? I understand it's not perfect because the people at FB doing the judgments isn't automatons with perfect knowledge of the context. Which is why you should be mindful of what you post on a platform you have no control over.
And many people believe that if you're going to moderate outside the bounds of the law, you should be responsible for all the content since you're clearly exercising editorial influence.
Moderate outside the bounds of the law??? There is no such thing except for s
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Moderate outside the bounds of the law??? There is no such thing except for some very few special cases where a platform is required to remove content..
Yeah, I didn't say that clearly, or even correctly, sorry. I meant, aside from content they are legally obligated to remove.
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Yeah, I didn't say that clearly, or even correctly, sorry. I meant, aside from content they are legally obligated to remove.
No worries. We all get errors in the brain to hands-interface sometimes.
"interactive computer service" == platform (Score:2)
Also, CDA 230 doesn't make a distinction between a platform or a publisher, it's not even mentioned.
CDA does mention platforms and publishers. Though 47 USC 230 [cornell.edu] uses terms that readers nowadays consider quaint, "interactive computer service" clearly means what has since come to be called a platform, and "information content provider" is very close to what title 17 calls an "author."
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Does the Megaphone manufacturer do A/B testing to see which one gathers the most people?
Did the Megaphone manufacturer see if modulating the pitch intentionally made people depressed?
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A megaphone doesn't let me target people between a certain age that live in a certain zip code and made certain purchases recently. I'm not really seeing how these are the same thing.
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Not the same.
As Cohen describes, social media advertising isn't under the same rules print and TV ads. Why not?
As an individual, yell all you want. But when paying to advertise, there are rules and regulations, and I don't see why Facebook should have different rules than, say, the NYT.
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I'll see your false equivalency and raise you one.
Megaphones can't control the content that they amplify. There's no way to prevent anything from coming in one end and coming out the other louder. There's an on/off switch, but the megaphone can't change its state at will.
Facebook, on the other hand, can completely control it. And they can opt to amplify the message more or less as they see fit. Not only are they the megaphone, they're also the operator of the megaphone taking instructions on what to say fro
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Lol, visit Prescott... (Score:4, Insightful)
Side bar add is trying to convince me to Visit Prescott, with an image of a attractive woman poling a long board through a lake... problem is that doesn't look like Prescott... Maybe Lake Powell, Maybe Saguaro Lake, but definitely nowhere around Prescott (which is populated by either old Geezers, or addicts that have slipped out of their halfway houses
And that gets us to the crux of the matter, it is ALL ADVERTISING
Either you learn to spot bullshit, or you get sucked dry
Figure it out assholes
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Side bar add is trying to convince me to Visit Prescott, with an image of a attractive woman poling a long board through a lake... problem is that doesn't look like Prescott... Maybe Lake Powell, Maybe Saguaro Lake, but definitely nowhere around Prescott (which is populated by either old Geezers, or addicts that have slipped out of their halfway houses
And that gets us to the crux of the matter, it is ALL ADVERTISING
Either you learn to spot bullshit, or you get sucked dry
Figure it out assholes
I didn't see the advert.......uBlock Origin FTW....
I really think he is wrong on almost all counts (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I really think he is wrong on almost all counts (Score:5, Interesting)
It's easy to see why even if politically incorrect to say it.
All the things he claims never happened in the past, in fact did happen.
You could go to a nazi rally, they held them. You could go to a klan meeting, they held them. You could pick up a propaganda flyer or choose to read a paper that already caters to your view, both existed.
The thing is, you can choose not to as well, if you don't wish to hear such things.
Sacha appears not capable of this, as are many people to be fair.
He chooses to read and believe everything he sees without bothering to think about those things on his own.
This is the root of the problem.
Back in the day if you went to the authorities and said people at the klan meeting said things you didn't want to hear, they would tell you to stop going then.
Really the same applies today. No one is forcing you to go, or in the case of social media to read, let alone blindly believe everything without the slightest thought about it.
The ability to think for ones self, take personal responsibility for your own choices, and take charge of your own life by not blindly following everyone that asks you to, is no less important now than in the past.
It's the fact we all *can* communicate so easily and trivially today that we see more and more people not capable of this, and for some reason that seems to justify it as acceptable and OK.
If you aren't able to take care of yourself and avoid doing the things you don't want to be doing, like a child, then they really are not in any position to be affecting other peoples lives.
Sacha can't even not read the things he doesn't want to read! Why should anything he say about what should and shouldn't be allowed to be read be taken seriously by anyone?
The answer is that it shouldn't. He should learn how to do something himself before demanding how others do it.
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That's not what he said or what happened 80 years ago.
Take his point that if Facebook had existed in the 1930s they would have allowed Hitler to post 30 second ads for his "final solution". Actually back in the 30s and 40s Hitler didn't advertise that he was committing genocide. After the war the Allies took German people on tours of the concentration camps to see the conditions and the piles of bodies, and most of them were shocked and often physically ill. The average German had little idea that it was ha
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Of course he's wrong. The guys an idiot. His claim to fame is pissing people off while wearing a neon green speedo. Always amazing how many people give credence to "celebrities" for no reason other than their ugly face was on TV. Fucking ridiculous.
Re: I really think he is wrong on almost all count (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, both CNN and Breitbart have published false statements, but CNN does it by mistake, while it's Breitbart's raison d'etre
And speaking of false statements...
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Sure, both CNN and Breitbart have published false statements, but CNN does it by mistake, while it's Breitbart's raison d'etre
And speaking of false statements...
It's trivial to find data to back that claim up. So trivial, I'm tired of doing it. Lying is what Breitbart does best. Tell you what, if you can find a credible citation that claims otherwise, I'll poke holes in it for you, with citations.
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Sure, both CNN and Breitbart have published false statements, but CNN does it by mistake, while it's Breitbart's raison d'etre
And speaking of false statements...
It's trivial to find data to back that claim up. So trivial, I'm tired of doing it. Lying is what Breitbart does best. Tell you what, if you can find a credible citation that claims otherwise, I'll poke holes in it for you, with citations.
I don't care about that rag. What's laughably absurd is the "CNN does it by mistake" part.
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CNN is a propaganda machine for the Democrats. It is pretty much "news free".
What's so great about it (Score:2, Interesting)
Facebook didn't kill any of the Rohingya, it was other people who did and they're they ones who need to be held accountable. Is anyone so naive to think that were it not for Facebook that the genocide never wou
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I'm not quite sure what makes him any more or less qualified than the next schmuck to speak on this topic or why we should consider his advice more sage.
Exactly. He seems to be saying that free speech is great and all, until you reach a certain audience and actually have a measurable impact, at which point we need to bring some censorship in. I would agree that there are some serious dangers to having unbridled free speech, but I'm not sure what the solution is, and I certainly don't think that there is a fundamental issue with free speech as Cohen implies with the statement: "should have to abide to the same standards".
I'm sure. (Score:2)
I would agree that there are some serious dangers to having unbridled free speech, but I'm not sure what the solution is ...
I'm sure.
Free speech sometimes gets some people hurt or killed. But censoring it gets a LOT MORE people hurt or killed a LOT MORE OFTEN. Meanwhile, free speech is often used to STOP or REDUCE the hurting or killing, while censorship is mainly used to block that sort of free speech.
It's like the law's "innocent until proven guilty", "Fruit of the Poisoned Tree", "Miranda warning", and
You need to be eloquent, to act silly. (Score:2)
Because it requires a lot of thought and philosophy, to even cristallize out what makes something silly.
John Cleese should be an even better prime example.of this.
What The Fuck Is This Crap (Score:5, Insightful)
And why is it on Slashdot?
Is the first paragraph the views of the 'editor' who put this on the front page? I certainly hope not. 'Eloquent'? You're going to call a screed that invokes Hitler from the guy who made 'Borat' eloquent? A scare mongering, hateful, misleading attack on free speech is 'eloquent'? Really? Really?
I don't like Mark Zuckerberg, I don't like Facebook, but that doesn't mean anyone who criticizes them is automatically a hero to be held up as a great example.
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I don't like Mark Zuckerberg, I don't like Facebook, but that doesn't mean anyone who criticizes them is automatically a hero to be held up as a great example.
First, listen to what he has to say [epicpic.me].
If you prefer text [adl.org]:
Thank you, Jonathan, for your very kind words. Thank you, ADL, for this recognition and your work in fighting racism, hate and bigotry. And to be clear, when I say “racism, hate and bigotry” I’m not referring to the names of Stephen Miller’s Labradoodles.
Now, I realize that some of you may be thinking, what the hell is a comedian doing speaking at a conference like this! I certainly am. I’ve spent most of the past two
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First, listen to what he has to say [epicpic.me].
Dear god, I am really a drunken, gassy idiot.
Correct video link is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymaWq5yZIYM [youtube.com]
.
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So, my takeaway from this is that its ok for SBC to gain fame and money through a bunch of what could easily be considered 'hate acts', however it is not ok for anyone else, because he is claiming to be GOOD, and stating they are BAD?
There are many issues with social media, however he almost completely misses what they are, by focusing on what he politically doesnt like, instead of the day to day damage they are doing to individuals, which he doesnt seem to care less about.
Re:What The Fuck Is This Crap (Score:5, Informative)
He isn't saying anything new.
Just that lies are bad, they should be banned, and people like him should define what is "true".
This is the same crap we have been hearing ever since America voted the "wrong way" in 2016.
The solution to right-wing authoritarianism is not left-wing authoritarianism.
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But that's not what he said. Watch the video.
His point is that because Facebook takes such a hands-off approach but also offers an incredibly powerful platform it's actually worse than anything that has gone before. Until recently the most the average person could do was print some leaflets or write to a newspaper to get their message out. Their reach was limited, to get onto the major broadcast mediums like newspapers or radio/TV they had to get through people checking their content before it was published
Re: What The Fuck Is This Crap (Score:2)
You know how rare objective truth is in a non-deterministic frame?
It takes a hell of a lot of effort to dig out, and by then, the next sensational thing has hit and nobody wants to think about yesterdayâ(TM)s news.
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You deny the existence of objective truth
No, I just deny that humans can be trusted with power.
The power to decide what is true is the ultimate power.
and think that instead of facing the challenge of setting guardrails
Who gets to erect the guardrails?
it's better to throw the gates wide open to whatever propaganda the worst of us can dream up.
In the world today there are many countries with many different policies on freedom of expression. More freedom leads to better societies. Power to censor is ALWAYS abused.
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No, I just deny that humans can be trusted with power.
The power to decide what is true is the ultimate power.
Lots of people have that power. It's collectively enacted by a society. It's just that if you coddle and enable liars, you grow a class of people who don't care what's true, endangering the rest of society.
Who gets to erect the guardrails?
Let's start with private platforms, that's easy and as SBC points out, doesn't infringe on free speech.
In the world today there are many countries with many different policies on freedom of expression. More freedom leads to better societies.
To a point. See: USA vs. Europe.
Power to censor is ALWAYS abused.
Power to enforce laws is always abused, yet we've decided that the good outweighs the bad and we carry on with oversight. Same for any power in government. The same can go
Re:What The Fuck Is This Crap (Score:5, Insightful)
as SBC points out, doesn't infringe on free speech.
Bullcrap. Perhaps you should re-read his speech.
Here is a quote:
Instead of letting the Silicon Six decide the fate of the world, let our elected representatives, voted for by the people, of every democracy in the world, have at least some say.
He is advocating direct government censorship. And to be clear, he is advocating UNDEMOCRATIC government censorship. Another quote:
President Trump, using Twitter, has spread more than 1,700 times to his 67 million followers. The President even tweeted that he was considering designating Antifa—anti-fascists who march against the far right—as a terror organization
So we should have government-imposed censorship, but only by officials who have the "correct" viewpoints. If we elect a president who thinks "wrongly", then not only should he not have the power to censor, he should be censored himself.
He says that Antifa engages in nothing more than "marches", when in fact, they often initiate violence. Should SBC be allowed to say that? Who gets to decide?
More quotes:
we prioritize truth over lies
Again, who gets to decide what is true? SBC's answer is "elected officials" ... unless voters don't pick the correct officials.
tolerance over prejudice
Ironic to hear a censor speak of tolerance.
experts over ignoramuses
Who gets to pick the experts?
and, most importantly, my jokes will still work.
Maybe not. SBC's jokes tend to be racist, anti-semitic, and full of flat-out lies.
He may be one of the first victims of the censor.
Perhaps he should read about Lenny Bruce [wikipedia.org] to learn how clumsily censorship deals with satire.
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No-one is denying objective truth.
What we are pointing out that it is an astonishingly bad idea to grant anyone the power to prevent people saying things they deem to be false.
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Well, he doesn't seem to understand the difference between free expression and the First Amendement:
Zuckerberg claimed that new limits on what’s posted on social media would be to “pull back on free expression.” This is utter nonsense. The First Amendment says that “Congress shall make no law” abridging freedom of speech, however, this does not apply to private businesses like Facebook.
Kind of shocking, actually. Zuckerberg isn't talking about the First Amendment, but about the concept of free expression.
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And why is it on Slashdot?
It's about technology and how it has allowed individuals and groups to sidestep the unofficial censorship governments have over large news organizations with the threat of ostracizing them. In the old days, the New York Times, Washington Post and a few others were invited to press conferences on the condition that they publish only from the prepared handouts. Step too far out of line and no more access to the leadership. Occasionally, you'd read an editorial running counter to the standard narrative. But th
Re: What The Fuck Is This Crap (Score:2)
Actually, itâ(TM)s a huge opinion piece with little content and a lot of shouting and rudeness.
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Actually, itâ(TM)s a huge opinion piece with little content and a lot of shouting and rudeness.
Social media is most textual, so no, it is not "shouting" and ALL CAPS doesn't count.
If someone is shouting in a video, try reducing the volume.
If rudeness bothers you, instead of demanding censorship, perhaps you should grow thicker skin.
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I translate this as: "I think social media helped elect a terrible politician, so I'm calling on the government to clamp down on this sort of wrongthink."
Brilliant! Let's create a new government department to figure out what's true and what's not. Ministry of Truth, anyone?
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You're going to call a screed that invokes Hitler from the guy who made 'Borat' eloquent?
Invoking Hitler is a perfectly legitimate thing to do in a broad variety of situations. He wasn't even comparing anyone involved to Hitler, so it's hard to figure out what you have to complain about. The Nazis did in fact engage in media manipulation in the USA, they just didn't have social media to play with at the time. Which, by the way, was Cohen's point.
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The Nazis did in fact engage in media manipulation in the USA, they just didn't have social media to play with at the time. Which, by the way, was Cohen's point.
The problem with "Cohen's point" is that he is assuming the censorship sword will always be wielded by people who agree with him. That didn't happen with the Nazis.
America passed the Smith Act [wikipedia.org] in 1940, and created an Office of Censorship [wikipedia.org] to suppress right-wing extremism.
When the political tide shifted, these same laws were weaponized by McCarthy and used against the left.
This time, the tides don't even need to shift. The right already controls 5 of 6 centers of political power in America (presidency, sena
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First off : if this is not news for nerds, news that matters, I frankly would like to know what is. /
Let's count the ways. 1) it is an analysis and critique of the functioning of social media in our world, social media being the premier application of computing technologies in existence today. Social media exists only because of computing technologies, computing technologies being the sum of the physical existence of social media. Not merely computing devices, but also programming, is what renders the condi
Borat (Score:2)
Re:Borat (Score:4, Informative)
I didn't read the article, but I must say that Borat is some of the funniest shit I've ever seen.
Yes. His humor is hilarious. It is also racist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, and full of lies (Kazakstan is not actually a major producer of potassium).
Exactly the kind of thing he believes should be censored.
Or are satire and lies okay if they come from woke people on the left?
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I didn't read the article, but I must say that Borat is some of the funniest shit I've ever seen.
Yes. His humor is hilarious. It is also racist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, and full of lies (Kazakstan is not actually a major producer of potassium).
Exactly the kind of thing he believes should be censored.
Or are satire and lies okay if they come from woke people on the left?
You miss the point. Nobody watches Borat and thinks that its the honest-to-god truth.
How do you tell the difference between types of content on Facebook? How do you tell the difference when its an ad on Facebook?
Removing Freedom of Speech (Score:5, Insightful)
Who decides what is 'real' and 'true' news and what is fake?
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Minitrue
The easy button (Score:2)
Make a rule just like we do for family gatherings:
No Politics
No Religion
This should be social media policy 101
Mark Zuckerberg gave the greatest speech (Score:3)
"Mark Zuckerberg gave the greatest speech on why actors need to be put on check" might be the headline in an alternative universe. Clamps on free speech to stop your enemies? It sounds like a great weapon, until you realize it's a nuclear hand grenade.
Sad really (Score:2)
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The current trend among organizations such as these is the embrace and pushing of censorship. ADL, ACLU, SPLC. Same shit, different name, full of people who've engaged in the behavior they claim others are engaging in.
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Maybe it was just Cohen, but i donÃ(TM)t see the ADL supporting his line.
But people were clapping!1!!11!1
Seriously though, you're correct. He spoke to the ADL, not for the ADL.
Just kill all 'social media' and be done with it (Score:2)
So um (Score:2)
I agree, but also have to dissent (Score:2)
I agree with most of Cohen's principles assertions.
1. Amplifying known facts should take priority over known falsehoods.
2. Not all sides of every argument are equal nor do they deserve equal consideration (see #1).
3. Company executives and administrators have an ethical responsibility to the people they affect.
However,
1. We are not yet in a place, as a species, to permanently attribute 100% trust in a single source of information as fact. People are still too corruptible and we have to assume that someone c
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2. Like Cohen: SLOW DOWN.
Who controls the brake?
Who controls the accelerator?
Cohen's answer is "Elected officials who, of course, agree with me about what is true."
The problem is that most elected officials in America don't agree with him.
FB loosens the control on propaganda (Score:4, Interesting)
FB loosens the control on propaganda. What was previously controlled by a handful of rich folks is no longer controlled by anybody, really (for as long as Zuck has aspirations of FB staying a "platform" rather than a bona fide propaganda bullhorn like the rest of the mass media).
For as long as mass media existed, its sole purpose and sole way of remaining operational was to manufacture consent for the ruling regime to advance its agenda. That agenda, quite often, reallocates trillions of dollars in wealth to causes and people one would normally consider unworthy. So those people have MSM shit in your head and convince you that it's worthwhile to spend $1.5T bombing Iraq for example. How else do you explain that money-losing newspapers are held afloat for decades by people who, if it was about money alone, could much better invest their money elsewhere. Cui bono? The establishment, that's who.
Rule on what power to give to government: (Score:5, Insightful)
Never give any power to an Obama administration that would make you uncomfortable if it were in the hands of a Trump administration.
Never give any power to a Trump administration that would make you uncomfortable if it were in the hands of an Obama administration.
Irony (Score:2)
Anyone else see the high irony of SBC complaining about other people lying to him, when his ENTIRE GIG was lying to people about who he was and interviewing them?
John Stewart Mill (Score:2)
I do suggest reading what John Stewart Mill had to say about free speech and how it should be protected, even for speech that we know to be false or offensive.
the real problem ... (Score:2)
... is education. if we hadn't spent the last century just growing ignorant workers (which were convenient but for which there will soon be no work left at all) instead of educating society in critical thinking, tolerance and personal improvement, all this wouldn't have happened.
of course that was never intended, a conscious, critical and tolerant society is not a good thing for the elites. that's the whole point and why they won't do squat about this. it's not gonna be them dying or being harassed, just ra
This guy is a comedian, not simply an actor (Score:3)
Being a comedian requires significant insight into people and reality, and it requires being pretty smart. These things are not required for an actor.
Extremes (Score:2)
Social media companies aren't dependable (Score:2)
So why the hell would one rely on them to be a fair and neutral arbiter in censorship?
Never mind that the very idea is un-American.
Yeah yeah. Private company.
Just bend over and beg for the Corporate Oligarchy not to wreck your ass too bad...
It's a societal failing that people don't insist the people they do business with not violate their rights.
"GIVES US THE FREE SHITS MY PRECIOUS!!!"
Sondland testimony buried, why Cohen is wrong (Score:2)
I really like his movies and characters for the (Score:2)
most part. But I watched the entire speech and disagree with most of it.
At one point he made an analogy between facebook and a restaurant and said that a nazi going in to your local diner would be thrown out by the owner and that it was the owner's right and MORAL OBLIGATION to do so.
This is poor for several reasons, on facebook you're not paying, you are the product. The owner of the restaurant would certainly be within his rights to kick the guy out and most likely his business would suffer he didn't -
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No one has to use /any/ of these platforms. /I/ search for, not that is pushed at me)...
I have a fb account. I use it to message family and friends. I don't use it as a news source.
I don't use twitter, google+, youtube (other than occasional stuff that
I really don't see the problem, other than the majority of the masses are stupid, and /will/ believe stuff you push at them.
Critical thinking skills are in the shitter for most people it seems.
And yes, we as a society do get punished for the ignorance of the masses... which is why we have an electoral college, but hey, that's another hot topic.
^^^ This exactly. Damn, where are my mod points when I need them?
Re:no one has to use them! (Score:5, Interesting)
No one has to use /any/ of these platforms.
People who want to suppress free expression on social media are not trying to avoid seeing fake news. They are trying to prevent OTHER PEOPLE from seeing it.
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I really don't see the problem, other than the majority of the masses are stupid, and /will/ believe stuff you push at them.
You almost see the problem. While too many people are stupid and will believe things, there are also many people that aren't that stupid but that are susceptible to propaganda and carefully constructed messaging.
That's not stupidity, that's called being human. Even intelligent people fall prey to marketing, and if you want proof look at Apple's success.
So no, nobody has to use Facebook or Twitter or other social media, but many people do, and those people are - purely because they're human - vulnerable to m
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Fortunately, you're not an actor. Or, being correct in everything would have prevented you from spelling "they're" "their".
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Don't forget CNN, NBC and literally every other major news organization while you're at it.
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Lies spread faster than truth:
https://science.sciencemag.org... [sciencemag.org]
"We investigated the differential diffusion of all of the verified true and false news stories distributed on Twitter from 2006 to 2017. The data comprise ~126,000 stories tweeted by ~3 million people more than 4.5 million times. We classified news as true or false using information from six independent fact-checking organizations that exhibited 95 to 98% agreement on the classifications.
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