There are so many things wrong about this single sentence.

What makes you so sure you're the one getting so many things right at once?

Perhaps in a decade or so's time someone in Facebook will be called before an international criminal tribunal for what's happened there. Perhaps not. There's a bit of a case backlog.

The people who built the radio didn't get called before an international criminal tribunal; it was the broadcasters who did.

FB is both though. They built the system & tech (the ‘radio’), and via their algos/policies also control what gets spread and to what extent (the ‘broadcasting’).

It’s not at all clear cut.

Now, consider that it's common across South-East Asia to have very basic data plans that allow you to navigate Facebook for free (or at heavily discounted rates). https://www.mmtimes.com/business/technology/20685-facebook-f...

For a huge lot of these subscribers Facebook is the Internet.

People in the developed world who after gone through innumerable Internet phases and fads, and who presumably have more experience and a better sense of its subcultures, still have a hard time to distinguish fake from legit news.

How do you think a small towner in Myanmar who went from zero to Facebook overnight would fare?

>Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLMC), which broadcast racist propaganda, obscene jokes and music, becoming very popular throughout the country. One study finds that approximately 10% of the overall violence during the Rwandan genocide can be attributed to this new radio station.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_genocide#Preparation_f...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_T%C3%A9l%C3%A9vision_Lib...

The two founders and one announcer were sentenced to life, subsequently ~30 years in prison, the people who built this particular radio and the broadcasters together

People should not be allowed to communicate certain things which lead to harm to other people, no. I don't understand why this gets turned into "people not be allowed to communicate" (implying "at all"?).

If we think that Facebook should decide what's permissible, then that's US culture being the global nanny. If we let the local government decide what's permissible, then you better watch out because every single genocide in history has involved demonizing the victims as the real danger (so, their speech would be pointed at as "harmful" and banned, the perpetrators would be painted as organizing a just revolution). The worst genocides were conducted with state support, and wouldn't be stopped if local national governments were moderating Facebook. Forming a special panel to decide which groups deserve to get their message out seems like a very dangerous and poorly motivated concentration of power. I can't think of any other ways to decide which speech is dangerous and ban it, therefore I conclude we're stuck with not doing it.

Facebook shows you from the feeds of your "friends" whatever the company decided. Probably based on some algorithms, but it could be millions of cats rolling over the keyboards for it's not public what Facebook really does.

Third parties analyze and weaponize this behavior for many things from comercial interests, to justifying murder, to incitement to violence.

Facebook needs to be held responsible for its algorithms. Somehow. Stupid autonomous car makers will eventually be held accountable for their algorithms too. It's not like they can put some crap in their EULA and be done with it.

PS: Add to it that Facebook is the internet in some places. It's not just one of the websites.

Many people today wish we had a more open world, myself among them. Do you know we didn't used to even have passports? There was no 'schengen zone.' You could freely travel between nations as a human. But as a "temporary war measure" passports began to be required in WW1. And once governments had that new level of power and control, they of course not only did not relinquish it but expanded it magnitudes over. In the US income tax was another "temporary war measure." Government is not your enemy, but it is also not your friend. Beware of the implications of granting power to an authority who does not, or at some time will not, necessarily have your best interests in mind.

People should be allowed to communicate period.

People should not be allowed to harm other people.

A recent example of this are the ability for conspiracy theorists to communicate news stories after these mass shootings that these attacks were staged or the victims are "Fake". This further pushes harmful propaganda that there is not a real threat to students in schools, and the "third party" children are the ones who suffer from this communication.

For example, see every war ever. In any war, both sides believe they're right, but they can't both be right, so one or more is always wrong. They just can't see it because they can't process information safely.

And this is where you are lacking critical thinking. Single issue wars and issues with only two sides are rare enough that I'm not sure any have ever existed. Its definitely possible for both sides to be right (and wrong) and its definitely normal that educated people won't agree no matter how long they discuss an issue.

"I would be better off with that bloke's resources".

I'm not sold on the idea that wars are fought for ideals. There is a lot of coincidental wealth transfer when countries fight. Why else travel long distances to kill people you don't know?

It's not like there's a big man in the sky telling everyone that wars must only be fought between two opposing sides with identical motives on a logically comparable continuum.

It's not even like wars must even be based on positions that can be meaningfully called right or wrong. Or that most wars can be meaningfully interpreted as "two sides". Even within the allies of world war 2, you would have a variety of factions and motivations, as well as minority players with diametrically opposed views and beliefs.

And who is going to do that? Governments have no incentive to do that because lack of critical thinking in citizens is a major factor to ensure they they can get away with exploitation and prevent them from revolting..

Private companies try to offer primary education in some developing countries. Since the problem is not only lack of resources, but lack of infrastructure to use those resources (no trained teachers etc.) this is a plausible path forward. I have no statistics of the results. Is it just one more scheme to funnel aid money into investors pockets? I have no idea.

https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21660063-where-gover...

Teaching students critical thinking, means they are encouraged and taught to ask questions first, before obeying. Governments like a population that just would work obediently and pay taxes without questioning, than a populace that ask questions at every turn. So they would prevent the kind of education that can lead to such a population...

Well, all public education is based on the Prussian template so what would you expect :)

But seriously...

I think the tendency of the masses to follow the perceived leader is a facet of the human psychology rather than the result of a nefarious scheme.

From what I can tell of the education of my kids in Finland, the teachers really try to walk a tight rope between having small kids behave in an orderly manner as a group and not to stifle individual creativity and will to learn.

You need some authority and and respect of it in schools. Otherwise it would turn into a lord of the flies remake. I presume your critique is directed towards overbearing, paternalistic unnecessary harsh discipline.

I think the amount of this depends on the country you are discussing and and you need to be more specific. All primary education systems are not alike.

May be to an extent. But you cannot deny that this is exaggerated by social pressure and training from child hood. For example, in most school, the obedience is seen as a foremost quality of a good student.

Imagine the animals in the wild and how they can be tamed by training them in a specific way. You can see how a small man or woman is able to control a large animal such as an elephant or tiger in this fashion.

When you look at that, and when you see how, if the people put their minds, they can so easily revolt/react against the increasingly oppressive actions from governments, and how they don't, just like a tiger or lion can so easily refuse to obey their trainer, but they don't, only because of their training they have received from their birth, and the thought of not obeying just does not cross their minds..

You see, you have to stop looking at the people individually, and have to look the populace as a single entity. Like a reagent in a test tube. You pour in the obedience and compliance and you get more work and taxes out of it (and less unwanted reactions). You pour things like nationalism and patriotism into it, and you get lives to expend in the name of service of nation. You pour dreams of a better tomorrow, and you get votes...

I think all revolutions are started by tiny groups of inspired people, and the hoi polloi will follow them, or don't, based on the current general mood and the network effects they instigate.

That's also an inspiring thought. To make a change, you don't need to convince everyone. Just a tiny group will suffice, and if the dice fall correctly, everyone else will just follow along.

This, of course applies to both beneficial and pathological changes as well. The coarse grained group mind of the population is not familiar with ethics. That's why free speech and oppressing complete dick heads such as neonazis live in a delicate balance. A small group can cause harm to a society.

The funny thing here is that, since such a society won't lend itself to control easily, the governments does not want this. They want a population that can be controlled easily, but then as you said, they can also be controlled by a small group causing major harm, and the government's solution to that is regulating free speech.

So governments wins on both fronts and people lose on the same.

For example, immigration in Europe... some people want to make it easier others want to curb it completely. Who is right? There are arguments for both sides and your individual preferences and experiences determine which one you will find more convincing. There is no binary right or wrong over all cases.

I see plenty of similar sentiments in my facebook feed.

If you assume that there is an objective, external moral “right” defined in a very particular kind of way, this may be true, but that hidden premise is far from universally aceepted.

Who are you do "allow" or "disallow" free speech?

"Disallowing" free spech is actually a human rights violation. Isn't it? So what you're doing here is you're providing weasel moral grounds for human rights abuse.

The strangest thing is that there's a sizable number of women who support the law in its current form. Religion is difficult to comprehend.

Different localities have different cultures, and for some, it's good. Say for example, in my locality (Kerala), Muslim men have more than a wife only on certain conditions like:

1. The first wife can't bear a child and the person marries another one without avoiding the earlier wife

2. Marrying widows so as to protect them (there might be occasional cases of exploiting this too, though I'm not aware of any).

I do also have seen a finger countable cases where a man marries some women to threaten other wives. But so far, I remember only two such cases in my neighborhood, and none in my family. Usually such men get really less support from the community.

So women having such an experience shall be supporting the current law.

Men deciding what women want is a repugnant thing to do. To use your own examples:

1. If infertility is with the man, can the woman simulataneously keep two husbands?

2. Can a woman marry a widower to take care of him while being in a marriage?

Pretty sure this is blasphemous in Islam.

It's pretty much hard to get a woman married once divorced (pretty much every village in India at least, to say). But for males that isn't usually the case.

And considering Islam, it is men's duty to protect and feed his women, not the other way. I think this is true for all Abrahamic religions.

In Islam, this is even true when the women is rich. That is, the ownership of women's property won't change before or after marriage. The man have to provide food and shelter to his wife and children regardless of the women's wealth. Women is free from such duties. There are also other issues like inheritance (finding the true father of child), or considering the spouse equally (to the extend that a person with two wives should spent every alternate day which one wife and the other day with the other. This isn't possible when a woman marry two man, where there is pregnancy period, etc.)

And to answer your question: No. Islam doesn't allow that.

Women's rights are an absolute, irrespective of whichever religion people belong. If that means striking off what's regressive from the holy books, that's what liberal believers need to do. The sooner we get to Uniform Civil Code, the better.

(Same as most Abrahamic religions, since you mentioned those.)

And no, "it's our culture" is not an excuse for that.

Polygamy is common is all major religions in India. Also it can be argued in most Indian cases having a mistress is polygamy too.

You will also be a tad little surprised to know Muslims are the least polygamous community in India.

https://scroll.in/article/669083/muslim-women-and-the-surpri...

>>The strangest thing is that there's a sizable number of women who support the law in its current form.

Polygamy has/had its uses across history. Also if you don't mass murder girls like they do in India, you inevitably come up with use cases for things like these.

>>Religion is difficult to comprehend.

Its isn't. Religion is social evolution. That a few things don't apply to one person, doesn't mean they don't apply to billions of people.

For that matter other religions register under special marriage act in which Polygamy is forbidden too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Personal_Law_in_India https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1325952/

Sure, but how common is it really? Are you talking 3% of Muslim men? (in which case it's peculiar to regard as a particulalry Muslim thing) Or 93%?

And what, specifically do we object to about it? I'm against polygamy only in that (at least in situations I know more about such as the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints movement, or FLDS) it seems very heavily entwined with abuse of power and/or underage marriage, and cults. If polygamy was not coupled with those things then I would struggle to identify on what basis (if any) it is objectionable.

I completely agree that polygamy by itself isn't objectionable. What's objectionable is allowing it only for men.

We just read about false information being spread about religions, and about Islam in particular. Let's be careful to back up what we say.

That and the prophet was actually monogamous for 25 years (until his first wife who was 15 years older than him passed away).

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

It's amazing how biased you are in this.

You unfortunately have a history of violating the HN guidelines in comments. We've asked you several times to stop doing this. If you can't or won't stop, we're going to ban you. Please (re-)read https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and use this site as intended.

My point is - HN is largely about tech. Not about bias against or for a community. So STOP making it about communities and religion!

What people use these tools for should be discussed on the context of the people. Discrimination didn't start because of Facebook and won't stop if/after it leaves.

This is a problem of moral education, and I personally don't want Facebook to be the moral compass of the world. This is something the government and society of Myanmar need to work against and figure out in sovereignty.

Are we suddenly implying someone in a first-world rich western country should interfere with the politics of an independent southeast asian nation again? Please.

They already have. By deploying Facebook. And especially Facebook's decision to subsidise internet data use for customer acquisition.

What do you need, a flashing neon sign reading “tech” to be interested? He’s directly pointing to one of the 5 big Tech firms, it could not be more relevent. Given that, what’s your problem?

You can argue a lot of things about this, but “not related to tech” isn’t one of them.

Facebook seems to be the most viral/effective platform for spreading any (fake or true) news, and in this instance, the news was possibly harmful to a community. If not facebook, the perps would have relied on the next most viral platform.

That still doesn't explain his cherry picking of comments that speak to bias more than tech. So, no - his comment is NOT relevant to tech!!

Including one of my more important figures in those questions surrounding chemical technology and nuclear physics, paraphrasing an old Buddhist proverb:

---

“To every man is given the key to the gates of heaven. The same key opens the gates of hell.

And so it is with science.”

Richard Feynman

---

I'm continually baffled, though less surprised lately, how many people still think that they can shirk all responsibility. It's important to take time to consider what effects your work can have on the world, and not think anything and everything justified in the name of making money. At some point, we're all in it together.

It’s all over this place, regrettably.

It's convenient to blame facebook, and ignore the goverment's actions. And it's convenient to ignore the fact that facebook is infrastructure, like roads and electricity. When bad people use roads and electricity, you do not cut it off for the rest of society, or blame the roads for bad things

No – instead, the government passes regulation to minimize the number of people that die on the roads. Your car needs to meet safety standards to drive on the road, it needs to be registered with the government, and you need to be licensed to drive it.

Things that become interwoven in the fabric of society don't automatically just get a free pass. I would say the opposite happens, actually.