Facebook decides what information you see every day. They decide to promote certain messages and suppress others, not editorially but with algorhythms.

Facebook does not only moderate through algorithms. There was a documentary on UK Channel 4 where subcontracted moderators were instructed to allow controversial topics [1].

1: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/17/17582152/facebook-channel...

True. It doesn't bother me that companies show me what they think I want to see based on a recommendation algorithm. It does bother me that they would decline to show me something that would otherwise be recommended because they, in their infinite wisdom, have deemed it bad.

> It doesn't bother me that companies show me what they think I want to see based on a recommendation algorithm.

It isn't a great choice for users to have to decide between debunking someone's Facebook thing in their post's comments and thereby boosting engagement and promoting it to all their friends, or just leaving it be unchallenged.

Or for Youtube, do you watch a youtube video of a demagogue to prepare arguments against them, knowing that Youtube will promote it more because you watched it?

We need some kind of way to interact with this stuff while getting the choice to not promote it as a result.

I guess I don't see that much of a difference between someone picking what are the best articles, news and videos to show by hand and someone designing an algorithm to do the same function. Their organization still has responsibility every time they choose to show some content over others.

I don't believe that when an algorithm is used, the output is suddenly not a function of human nature or human design. That suddenly no human has any responsibility for it.

if facebook gave this post a score of -infinity, such that it is literally never recommended to anyone, doesn't show up on feeds, and you can only find it by typing in the URL, that would be fine with you?

If it was because they predicted that no one would be interested, then yes. If it was because they disagreed with it, then no.

I think that's too simplistic a take. But it's a fair point that we should be concerned about corporate censorship if people start to depend on private platforms for public speech.

But oft-repeated falsehoods are harmful even if we know they're not true.

No it's really not too simplistic. The only case where Facebook's censorship is a positive is if the following 2 statements are both true:

- FB's moderators posses better judgment than me as to what is and isn't true

- FB's moderators will always act in the best interest of the users and not the company when they come into conflict

I would say that the first point is very unlikely to be true, and the second is certain not to be true. I'm not sure how a lie can be harmful if it is know to be a lie.

I mostly agree with your point here. But a lie can be very harmful, even if it is known to be a lie, if enough people either don't know it's a lie, or don't care. See "Blood libel" for perhaps the most extreme example.

Maybe you should choose to use curated information services rather than ones that show you anything and everything people could think to post then.

Might I suggest moving to Facebook rather than complaining that Voat doesnt fit your needs when it doesn’t claim it does?

As an alternative, we could allow all threats of physical violence to be shared freely across all platforms.

Threats of violence are illegal. We could leave it to the police to handle this, as they always have until now.

Right, so we have a platform where tens of millions of posts are made every day, and we leave all of the threats of violence up for however long it takes the appropriate law enforcement agency to respond.

And I, a hapless plebe, am clearly unqualified to judge whether calling for beheading someone is reasonable. Only Facebook should be able to determine what is reasonable for the hoi polloi to hear. The general public, as we all know, are helpless infants who need Facebook and other tech companies to censor their media for them.

You are missing the point. It is not about the content.

Go look at Parlor if you want see people inciting the death of all democrats, gays, and non-christians.

And here you touch on the real problem. By banning extreme people from the commons you send them all to cluster together somewhere else, where their views are met with support instead of derision, thus amplifying and intensifying the extremity of their views.

Steve Bannon on Facebook gets called out and shouted down. Steve Bannon on Parlor gets praised and encouraged. People on Parlor get positive feedback and begin to think their views are mainstream and reasonable. People on Facebook get negative feedback and at least have a chance to think "Hmm, maybe if everyone says I'm wrong about this, I should rethink it".

Yes, I know many people won't rethink it, but facing some opposition at least provides the possibility of that happening. Forcing everyone into a filter bubble of only their own views provides no possibility of that happening.

Facebook is already a filter bubble though. It is Facebook itself that can impose opposition.

There are plenty of officials on Twitter openly wished that Trump died when he got coronavirus. Both situations are disgusting but neither are real threats.

Passive versus active would make a huge difference here, right? Even if it’s amoral to wish someone does not recover from an ailment, there’s no act involved or even promulgated in such a statement.

No, there is a huge difference because Trump's death would be from the same disease he criminally downplayed.

We've banned this account for using HN primarily for political battle. That's not allowed here, regardless of what you're battling for or against, because it destroys the intended use of the site.

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

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

Disgusting or not, there would have been delicious irony in Trump dying from a Democratic hoax.

Uncool, but also political exaggeration. Burning an effigy of Donald Trump is an analogue. Nobody expects someone to catch Donald Trump on fire, and no one expects anyone to behead Anthony Fauci.

Then why did Steve Bannon's verified Facebook Page reiterate that he called for their execution without any of those caveats or counterfactuals or even the defense that it was hyperbole or parody?

I am beyond tired of people making excuses for public threats of violence from authoritarian right-wing actors. It isn't helpful to any discourse to pretend words don't mean what they mean anymore.

Facebook post here: https://www.facebook.com/SteveKBannon/posts/376710023761776

archive.org snapshot here: https://web.archive.org/web/20201106185230/https://www.faceb...

Here's the text of that post in case it is removed:

    [BREAKING] On www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com -
    *Steve Bannon Under Massive Attack*
    - Steve Bannon Under Attack
    - Steve Bannon’s Twitter Account Suspended After Calling for Execution of Dr Fauci and FBI Director Wray
    Get your news NOW - Bookmark www [dot] PopulistPress [dot] com

I am also beyond tired about the nebulous interplay between word and deed when it comes to right-wing violence.

Bannon is "just joking" about beheading his opponents, Pompeo is "just joking" about Trump not stepping down, constant talk about jailing political opponents -- sorry, constant jokes -- and constant talk about lynching journalists (e.g. "rope, tree, journalist" t-shirts that you see at MAGA rallies, not at any others).

And the FBI eventually breaks up a ring of people who are planning to kidnap and ??? the sitting governor of Michigan, but all of the violent-yet-it's-a-joke speech continues unabated. Was the kidnapping plot a joke, too? Where does all this end?

Serious question, what's the end-game for increasingly violent, increasingly authoritarian jokes?

You keep posting this like it's a smoking gun but clearly whoever runs his Facebook page just copy posted some blurb from another website.

I think populist dot press might be Bannon's own site. It heavily promotes his content, his weekly live stream, and it ties in to his social media on other platforms.

Even if it's not his own, this is his official Facebook page from which Bannon hosts his weekly live stream.

Here, you can see his "War Room" video series in its entirety: https://populist.press/americas-voice-war-room/

A guillotine was set up outside of Bezos abode, in the spirit of actions speaking louder than words?

https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2020/08/jeff-bezos-guilloti...

Ban them from facebook then.

From the article:

> Bannon suggested in a video posted on Nov. 5 that FBI Director Christopher Wray and government infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci should be beheaded, saying they had been disloyal to U.S. President Donald Trump, who last week lost his re-election bid to Biden.

So I'm not sure where you get your claim that whymauri is lying.

Stronger: Even if whymauri is incorrect, lying is a whole different level. Can you prove whymauri had intent to tell something other than the truth? I'm pretty sure you can't. And if not, site guidelines call for a charitable interpretation of what others say. Your accusation of lying is completely out of bounds.

I don't need to read any article. The video is up in multiple places and I've seen it multiple times. The word 'behead' in any of its tenses is never used.

You may have watched the video an infinite number of times. That doesn't give you any grounds whatsoever for your claim that whymauri is lying. It also doesn't make your claim any less against the site guidelines.

And I am not capable of judging for myself whether or not that is a bad idea, so I am grateful for the Facebook moderators and their superior judgment in making sure I don't see this!

hy·per·bo·le - noun - exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally.

But, to tone down my own snarkiness-- in just a few months we have seen a dramatic increase in moderation in what people are allowed and not allowed to say. This is not going to end well, imo. We are just going to end up with the liberal equivalent of the oppressive religious right from the 80's.

Yeah germany is doing fine I don't think American exceptionalism extends to death threats. Hiding behind hyperbole doesn't make you snarky just idiotic.

Why stop at companies? The government itself should decide everything for us. Can we really be trusted to think correct thoughts or do correct actions? Just look at covid - it's shown us that people don't voluntarily make the right choice at scale and that the government needs more power to force us to make correct choices so that lives can be saved.