Re:Agent fired from literary agency for using Parler and Gab
by smaryjerry on Wednesday January 27, 2021 @11:19AM
(#25930078)
I think trying to stop what causes mobs can be noble but will be done in vain, validate people’s ideas since they are now being blocked and it also has the ability to be abused. Media sites spent months blocking, banning, demonetizing, and posting disputes about election fraud but none the less there were still riots at the capital building. I like to think of all these websites as a search engine and so will use Google as an example. If Google blocks searches for illegal activity does it stop that illegal activity? No. Does it even lessen that activity? No. In my opinion is hides it which is actually what those committing illegal acts want. They may not know they want it, but it literally protects them from being found by the ones who can stand up to them, sometimes the police. Let’s say you have a person who makes a threat towards another person and that is blocked before it’s posted. Now, the person who was threatened has no idea they were ever threatened. That person is unable to report to the police the treat and has no evidence of the threat. Not only can they not prepare to protect themselves or defend themselves but their evidence is gone and the person making the threats has no consequences. Google and others do turn over threats to the FBI but let’s be honest they don’t have the time or man power to investigate every threat on the internet. So who does? Websites don’t, but the people who are being threatened do. They need to know. This example obviously doesn’t apply as well to mob attacks, but I think the solution is the same. You need transparency and more visibility to these things not less. You literally need police for the internet, not just moderators. Stop the activity where it becomes illegal but not with hiding it, find a way to enforce that through the government with real world consequences, not through moderation of a narrative.
Re:Agent fired from literary agency for using Parler and Gab
by iso1631 on Wednesday January 27, 2021 @03:23PM
(#25933431)
I'm thinking more tackling the causes that feeds people into mobs, the need of people to effectively wear gang shirts because of the lack of compartmentalisation of communication caused by non-anonymous online conversations
This is it. In the last 10 years or so mob instinct has shown up in many ways - in looting stores, in doxing people and cancelling people who say the wrong things, in trying to overthrow governments, or just simple pile-ons. In part this has been fanned by big tech, but not entirely
The trick is tackling the causes of the creation of the mobs. "You're either with us or against us" is not new - Clinton and Bush were using it 20 years ago, but Cicero used it in Rome and it's in the bible. Big Tech is certainly a key part of the creation and expanse as it connects people, and people are encouraged to "pick a side". In traditional discourse what you'd say to your sportsmates up the pub could be a very different conversation to what you say to your collegues at an awayday. With social media, what you say to one, you say to all -- walking between worlds is difficult.
You might agree with group A on one thing (say housing), and group B on another thing (say BLM), and group C on another thing (say economy), but if those don't all align with your side, you won't fit in.