‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the world’s democracies

Re:‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the... by CrazyPyroLinux on Wednesday November 18, 2020 @06:01PM (#25143807)

> Open debate and discussion are really the only cure for propaganda.

I think "cure" is too strong a word; certainly it is necessary, but perhaps not sufficient. (See: the state of most debate and discussion.) I don't know what would be a cure, or even if that's even possible. Censorship definitely seems to be the wrong approach. Since it's hard to improve what you can't measure, perhaps this attempt to measure censorship will be helpful.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the... by Clubber on Wednesday November 18, 2020 @07:34PM (#25144740)

It takes time, but it does cure it. The biggest problem with censorship is it locks a state into conservatism. What is conservative now was liberal 20-50 years ago. When you censor new ideas, you're stuck 20-50 years ago.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the... by Pokepokalypse on Wednesday November 18, 2020 @08:51PM (#25145317)

. . . for example: "open debate" will accomplish nothing, if we are continually spending time debating whether or not racism and genocide are immoral. We fought wars over this.

I am very much for "free speech" - but at some point, you have to shut certain topics out of reasonable debate, because at the end of the day, if we have to keep debating things like this, we've learned nothing.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:‘Extremely aggressive’ internet censorship spreads in the... by chrisco255 on Thursday November 19, 2020 @04:19PM (#25154492)

You're not really for free speech if you're arguing that any topic is off limits. Sometimes even playing the devil's advocate for a "bad" topic can be illuminating and can help strengthen and deepen your own understanding of why racism or genocide are immoral.

[ Parent | on HN ]