>Harrasment and alternative viewpoint are not the same.

The problem isn't that this isn't true. The problem is that some people don't see the difference.

I would make a strong argument that twitter is a lightening rod for people who can't see a difference.

The idea is that if you allow someone blocking someone else to make all their replies to your tweet go away, people will just over-use the block feature for anyone they even mildly disagree with.

But it is not your thread. It is Theirs. If someone doesn't want to talk to you, that is their choice, and you should leave and talk to a different person.

I don't continue talking to people who don't want to talk to me.

Actually it's Twitter's thread. You pay nothing to them and you're basically using their computational and bandwidth resources to show your content to the world for free. That's exactly what you signed up for.

And Twitter is giving this blocking right to it's users, lol.

Twitter is choosing to give this feature of blocking to people, so I don't know what people are complaining about.

Why is this a problem? I'm already using it freely to block people I see posting garbage in other people's replies.

Is that ability so bad? In real life, people can refuse to socialize with you too. That is current state through. It is possible now and was for ages.

What is not possible (except for those with blue tick) is to block accounts with few followers or new accounts etc. So it is easy to create swarm of accounts even after being blocked.

> Is that ability so bad? In real life, people can refuse to socialize with you too

It depends on what you think Twitter is for. I think it’s the equivalent of the public town square.

In that context I don’t think it’s appropriate.

If you start a public conversation it’s ok to walk away from it (equivalent of ignore) but it is not ok to stop certain groups you don’t like from continuing the conversation (equivalent of a real block).

In a sense you don’t own the conversation and once you have made a contribution everyone else is free to talk about your contribution.

I don't know why you're being downvoted without comment. You'reentitled to your opinion, and it's a perfectly valid opinion to have.

Personally though, I think there is one thing you're missing. If you say something controversial in a public town square: a) it is transitory and people won't tend to remember it and harangue you about it years later; and b) people who don't like what you're saying only have a limited ability to harass you.

Online people can easily call flash mobs together to harass you en-masse if they don't like what you're saying. When people have more powerful tools online to harass other people, surely we deserve better tools to prevent ourselves being harassed.

Yes, those tools will be abused in some cases; but all tools can be abused. A knife is really useful for cutting meat, vegetables, and other things... It can also be really useful for slicing throats and plunging into chests for those with such a monstrous disposition. We don't stop people having knives and we shouldn't prevent people from having tools to stop other people from harassing and threatening them online.

> a) it is transitory and people won't tend to remember it and harangue you about it years later

I think this is a feature and not a bug. I don’t want to see a carefully curated representation of the past.

There are plenty of other social networks for you if that is what you want.

Or you could contribute anonymously if you want to say something transitory.

> people who don't like what you're saying only have a limited ability to harass you.

I think that’s true on Twitter as well for the most part.

What Twitter does that is different is it still allows the people you don’t like to participate in the general conversation.

Certain groups hate this and want to deny other groups the right to speak.

> surely we deserve better tools to prevent ourselves being harassed.

I think the problem is people want to benefit from the upside of having a public conversation but still want to carefully control it and I don’t think that’s healthy for society.

Again, if you are happy to forego the upside you can always contribute anonymously.

> Yes, those tools will be abused in some cases; but all tools can be abused

Exactly - Twitter is a great example.

If you start to follow people around in public space while yelling at them loudly or threatening them, the police will eventually stop by, id you and possibly order you to leave the place or arrest you (depending on whether you are drunk and what exactly is being said). Also, if you happen to be not in town, but in mall or other privately owned space, security will kick you out pretty soon.

Generally speaking, a lot of what goes on twitter does not actually goes on in person.

> If you start to follow people around in public space while yelling at them loudly or threatening them

Sure they do - I don’t like it but it happens all the time.

Think of all the protestors who show up on campus whenever a conservative is invited to speak.