Substack says it will not remove or demonetize Nazi content
Substack says it will not remove or demonetize Nazi content
“We don’t think that censorship (including through demonetizing publications) makes the problem go away.”
More than 200 Substack authors asked the platform to explain why it’s “platforming and monetizing Nazis,” and now they have an answer straight from co-founder Hamish McKenzie:
I just want to make it clear that we don’t like Nazis either—we wish no-one held those views. But some people do hold those and other extreme views. Given that, we don’t think that censorship (including through demonetizing publications) makes the problem go away—in fact, it makes it worse.
While McKenzie offers no evidence to back these ideas, this tracks with the company’s previous stance on taking a hands-off approach to moderation. In April, Substack CEO Chris Best appeared on the Decoder podcast and refused to answer moderation questions. “We’re not going to get into specific ‘would you or won’t you’ content moderation questions” over the issue of overt racism being published on the platform, Best said. McKenzie followed up later with a similar statement to the one today, saying “we don’t like or condone bigotry in any form.”
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I actually prefer this type of hands-off approach. I find it offensive that people would refuse to let me see things because they deem it too "bad" for me to deal with. I find it insulting anyone would stop me reading how to make meth or read Mein Kampf. I'm 40yo and it's pretty fucking difficult to offend me and to think I'm going to be driven to commit crime just by reading is offensive.
I don't need protecting from speech/information. I'm perfectly capable and confident in my own views to deal with bullshit of all types.
If you're incapable of dealing with it - then don't fucking read it.
Fact is the more you clamp down on stuff like this the more you drive people into the shadows. 4chan and the darkweb become havens of 'victimhood' where they can spout their bullshit and create terrorists. When you prohibit information/speech you give it power.
In high school it was common for everyone to hunt for the Anarchists/Jolly Roger Cookbook. I imagine there's kids now who see it as a challenge to get hold of it and terrorist manuals - not because they want to blow shit up, but because it's taboo!
Same with drugs - don't pick and eat that mushroom. Don't burn that plant. Anyone with 0.1% of curiosity will ask "why?" and do it because they want to know why it's prohibited.
Porn is another example. The more you lock it down the more people will thirst for it.
Open it all up to the bright light of day. Show it up for all it's naked stupidity.
That's not really how this works. Do you also think advertising and marketing don't work?
In what way is advertising and marketing the same as Mein Kampf?
Pinching the bridge of my nose here. Nazi blog posts are marketing for nazi beliefs. They're posting because they have ideas that they want you to have, too. What do you think marketing is? Ok, let's assume you're asking in good faith.
When you see an ad you don't typically run right out and buy it. But now you're more aware of whatever they're advertising. Maybe that's a new car. Maybe it's pepsi. Maybe it's "You should recycle." And maybe, when it's a literal nazi post, it's "the jews are the problem". Some people will bounce right off the ad.. Some people will immediately click through, read the related links, blah blah. And many people who read it will sort of remember it, and now have context for the next post they see. The more ads they see for nazi beliefs (or anything, really), the more likely they are to be persuaded.
If you saw posts every day that promoted nazism as a solution for the world's problems, it would have an effect on you. Look how effective fox news has been at propagating right wing beliefs.
Ok, let’s assume you’re asking in good faith.
I really wish people would do this more often. Hanlons razor. "Don't attribute to malice what can so easily be attributed to ignorance".
Stop assuming you know anything about my motives or beliefs. Stop assuming I'm saying things in "bad faith". I'm aware right-wing cretins on QAnon have scripts and tricks around making bad faith arguments but that shouldn't stifle us discussing things. It's lazy from you, annoying for me and ruins the chance for others to learn something.
Having said that - thank you for your response. When I read the first sentence I started typing a long-winded reply but then I read the rest and had to stop. It's now been ruminating in my head for most of the day and I'll be honest - I hadn't thought of it like that!
Not that it should matter but my political leanings are in the bottom left quadrant of the political compass. "Socialist Libertarian". I'm not a Nazi and I despise them but I don't believe in taking away people's rights to protect me. I'm capable of protecting myself. Those that aren't capable of protecting themselves (e.g. kids) have parents/guardians to protect them.
My motivation for the comment is probably spurred by recent developments in UK and EU law that are pushing draconian porn ID rules. Creating databases of adults and their porn preferences because parents are too fucking stupid to implement the adult filter on their router or ISP provider. So ALL of us have to suffer for the ignorance of parents.
I have a visceral hatred of any censorship and prohibition. Prohibition of certain texts pushed me and other high school kids to find ways to make bombs. 70% of university students experiment with drugs after a lifetime of prohibition from parents, teachers and government. Having said that you're right about Fox News! I don't think it's healthy for major platforms to pump out dangerous misinformation. Similar channels have cropped up in the UK (GBNews) and it's been a nightmare seeing idiots taken in by the misinformation.
Which leads me to think there is a solution here: Education.
One of my best lessons in high school 25yrs ago was an English class where we read various newspaper articles and broke down the biases and language used. Another is my A-level politics class where we spent many lessons dissecting the history and realities of political ideologies.
I feel those lessons inoculated me to a great degree from the effects of bullshit throughout life.
I think we're both right. I see your point that if we normalise these dangerous ideologies we risk acting on them. But at the same time I feel complete prohibition results in making it worse.
Ultimately, I think a balance needs to be struck and I think language, history and political education are key to making sure we don't fall for these things.
Yeah, I try to be patient with people. Sometimes they're trolls, but sometimes they're just people. And sometimes even when they are trolls, being patient gets better results, anyway. Thanks for you reply. It's rare for someone on the internet to admit the other person's argument had any traction at all. Good on you.
We probably agree on things more than our initial interaction would make it look. I'm also not a fan of government mandated "enter your ID to see porn online" rules. There are many reasons that's a bad idea that we don't need to go into right now. But I think a key difference between that topic and the substack-with-nazis thing we started on is the involvement of government. The porn-id thing is the government forcing an action. The substack thing is all private people.
If the government, backed with all the power that comes from the state, was going to enforce what you can and cannot write on your website I would be extremely skeptical of that policy. I'd consider it for hate-speech or literal nazism, but even then the devils are surely in the details.
The topic here though is a private organization. Substack, as a private organization, is choosing to allow nazis hang out on their platform. They could choose otherwise. They are not legally bound one way or the other, but people are 100% entitled to call them a bunch of assholes for letting the nazis in. People can cut business ties with substack, tell people who are using it that they're not going to engage with them, either, until the situation changes, and so on. All of that is firmly in the free speech and free association camp.
The question isn't really "Is substack breaking the law?" so much as "Is substack doing a good thing?" Moderation and choosing who can use your platform is a kind of speech. It's not enforced by an inscrutable god-machine or malicious genie, either. Substack would choose to just not let nazis use their platform. But maybe we already agree on this point.
The nazis could go set up their own website with their own blog. They have that freedom (in most places - Germany might be an exception). But we're not obligated to make it easy for them.
One of my best lessons in high school 25yrs ago was an English class where we read various newspaper articles and broke down the biases and language used. Another is my A-level politics class where we spent many lessons dissecting the history and realities of political ideologies.
Those sound like good classes. I mentioned somewhere else (possibly in this thread) about a class I took in college for journalism 101. We were assigned several websites to review, and had to determine which ones were legitimate and which ones weren't. That kind of skill is probably something that should be taught more widely.
I feel those lessons inoculated me to a great degree from the effects of bullshit throughout life.
I'm glad you remember the lessons. Just don't fall prey to hubris. My mother always was pretty reasonable, but in her old age she's been slipping into some bad politics. She thinks she's too smart to be fooled like those other idiots.
I think we’re both right. I see your point that if we normalise these dangerous ideologies we risk acting on them. But at the same time I feel complete prohibition results in making it worse.
I think we're converging on agreement. I would be hesitant to back complete prohibition at the government level, but I will object if I see someone supporting nazis. Substack doesn't have to host them. They can buy their own server.
In a lot of languages advertising and propaganda are literally the same word. The only difference is whether the goal is commercial or political.
I'm still not sure how that relates to the point I was making.
I don't want anyone to censor what I'm allowed to see.
If you're asking if that's how I feel about advertising then yes - of course. Like I said I want to be wholly responsible for what I see or don't see. I don't want people a government or corporation parenting my viewing.
The corporation already makes choices about your viewing. Unless it's a completely unmoderated wiki, they make choices about what is allowed. There are presumably lines that substack (or anyone) are unwilling to cross. We can probably assume that they would not be okay with "livestream of grinding up babies and puppies and snorting them".
If such a line exists, then I am saying nazi shit should be on the far side of the line.
If such a line does NOT exist, then I guess we'd have to have that discussion about why some things are unacceptable.
If the line is "only what is literally illegal" then that just punts editorial responsibility into a slower, less responsive system. It's a cowardly shirking of responsibility.
As to how it relates:
I don’t need protecting from speech/information. I’m perfectly capable and confident in my own views to deal with bullshit of all types.
That's false. That's not how you or anyone works. You are just as vulnerable to advertising as anyone else. And even if you were the platonic ideal of Strong Rational Man, many other people aren't.
If we were talking about government censorship, which we were not, then that's a slightly different conversation. The government has more power and is fundamentally different than a private blog platform or whatever.
Censorship isn't the right word here, I would say. Censorship would make sense if this were a government that was being spoken about but it's not.
I'll take it from the perspective of myself, I run a Lemmy instance that is open for people to register for (after a brief application question and confirming your email address). If someone registered, and wanted to post Nazi-adjacent content I would remove it and ban them right away.
I would not be "censoring" your ability to see it. I would be saying "I do not want to host this content on the hardware that I am paying for and maintain". Sure, you could argue that the side effect is that you're not able to see it, but my intent isn't "censorship". If you want to see red and pink diamonds (just a completely abstract example), but I did not want to host it, then as the person who's paying for the hardware then my want will always come first. That isn't to say that others aren't free (including yourself) to host said red and pink diamonds.
Censorship as a term makes sense for the government, because they have the power to enforce that everyone under their ruling must not host red and pink diamonds. I alone do not. Now, maybe almost every single Lemmy instance also doesn't want to host red and pink diamonds - that would still not be censorship, that would just be most instance admins happen to align the same and are executing the same rules for their own sites.
Of course, replace myself with a private business owner, and Lemmy instances with something like a News subscription website, the meaning should still be the same. Hopefully my stance makes sense, I'm not writing this with the intent of "You're wrong and I'm right" in the direct sense, but as a "I disagree, and here's why".
I did see your conversation with the other person here, and I agree that government censorship is bad (such as the weird concept of having to upload your ID to view porn), but I just don't view this in the same way I suppose.
Obviously, Substack is within their rights to allow red and pink diamonds if they want, but if they didn't then that would not be censorship (in my eyes, at least).
this ain't about you
Exposure
fascinated that you think it would somehow be harder for you to go out and find nazis if substack weren't hosting and paying them. it will always be easy to find and read Nazi content. the reason substack matters is that the platform helps THEM find YOU, or a suggestible journalist, or a suggestible politician, etc. you are not the protagonist here
Substack bans pornography but allows Nazis.
Agreed. I actually had come back to this topic specifically to make this exact point, which for all the time I'd spent on this at this point I feel like I hadn't said.
People are adults, generally speaking. It's weird to say that you can't have a newsletter that has a literal swastika on it, because people will be able to read it but unable to realize that what it's saying is dangerous violence. Apparently we have to have someone "in charge" of making sure only the good stuff is allowed to be published, and keeping away the bad stuff, so people won't be influenced by bad stuff. This is a weird viewpoint. It's one the founding fathers were not at all in agreement with.
Personally, I do think that there's a place for organized opposition to slick internet propaganda which pulls people down the right-wing rabbit hole, because that's a huge problem right now. I don't actually know what that opposition looks like, and I can definitely see a place for banning certain behaviors (bot accounts, funded troll operations, disguising the source of a message) that people might class as "free speech," or adding counterbalancing "free speech" in kind to misleading messages (Twitter's "community notes" are actually a pretty good way of combating it for example). But simply knee-jerking that we have to find the people who are wrong, and ban them, because if we let people say wrong stuff then other people will read it and become wrong, is a very childish way to look at people who consume media on the internet.
This article is not about government censorship. This is about a private entity actively deciding to allow nazi content on their platform. Hand wringing about founding fathers belongs in some other thread where the topic is the government prohibiting content from being published.
I'm aware of how the first amendment applies, yes. I agree with the spirit of it in addition to the letter, though. You're free to delete the one sentence where I talked about founding fathers, and respond to the whole rest of my message which doesn't reference them or government censorship in any way.
(Edit: Actually, I wasn't super explicit about it, but in the whole final paragraph I was thinking partly of government regulation to combat misinformation. That is, in part, what I meant by "organized opposition." So, I spent time in my message referring to what the government should do to limit harmful internet content, and no time at all talking about what it shouldn't do. I did throw in a passing reference to founding fathers, in reference to the spirit that I think should inform private companies who are non-governmental gatekeepers of content.)
Fine.
It’s weird to say that you can’t have a newsletter that has a literal swastika on it, because people will be able to read it but unable to realize that what it’s saying is dangerous violence. Apparently we have to have someone “in charge” of making sure only the good stuff is allowed to be published, and keeping away the bad stuff, so people won’t be influenced by bad stuff. This is a weird viewpoint.
How is "can't" happening, here? It's not the government. Are you arguing against private entities having editorial freedom? Should private entities not be in charge of their own publications and platforms? And if they do choose to publish nazi stuff, shouldn't the rest of us be free to say "Fuck off, nazi scum" ?
As I said to someone else, there is presumably a line that's too much to cross. Is it "live stream of grinding up live babies and puppies and snorting them"? If there is no line, I don't even know where to begin. That's a whole other conversation. If there is a line, I think nazi content should be on the far side of it. Don't you? And if the line is something like "whatever's technically legal", well that's just punting responsibility to a slower, less responsive, ruleset run by the government.
Personally, I do think that there’s a place for organized opposition to slick internet propaganda which pulls people down the right-wing rabbit hole, because that’s a huge problem right now.
Platforms taking some responsibility for what they allow would go a long way without requiring a heavy handed government solution. Substack could just say "nah, we're not letting nazis post stuff."
But if a platform is making a lot of money with nazi content, they're probably going to be reluctant to deal with it. So if you still don't want heavy government involvement (which can be a reasonable position, probably), you fall back to individuals saying "Fuck you. I'm not going to use your service while you serve nazis."
But then you have several related problems. Something that's a hugely dominant player in a market is hard to avoid. YouTube doesn't have a lot of major competitors, for example, and is pretty ubiquitous. AWS is basically impossible to avoid. And on top of that, many people are apathetic or too busy trying to survive to spend a lot of time curating things.
I agree with the spirit of it in addition to the letter, though
What even is the spirit of it?
Are you arguing against private entities having editorial freedom? Should private entities not be in charge of their own publications and platforms?
Yes, absolutely. Lemmy.world should be able to ban Nazis if they want to, as should Substack. Personally, I think it would be better in some cases if people didn't. Although, there's so much overlap between Nazis and general-toxic-behavior users that I wouldn't really fault them for banning Nazis outright even if they theoretically supported the Nazis' right to free speech.
Notably though, I think Substack should also be free to not ban Nazis, and no one should give them shit for it. In particular, they definitely shouldn't be talking about trying to get their Stripe account cancelled, or pressuring their advertisers, as I've seen other posters here advocate for (although I think the thing about advertisers is just a result of pure confusion on the poster's part about how Substack even makes income).
In this particular case, I think allowing the Nazis to speak is the "right answer," so I definitely don't advocate for interfering in anything Substack wants to do with their private servers. But no, I also don't think anyone who doesn't want to host Nazis should have to, and it's a pretty good and reasonable question.
As I said to someone else, there is presumably a line that’s too much to cross. Is it “live stream of grinding up live babies and puppies and snorting them”? If there is no line, I don’t even know where to begin.
Let me say it this way: If what you're doing or saying would be illegal, even if you weren't a Nazi, it should be illegal. It shouldn't suddenly become illegal to say if you're wearing a Nazi uniform. Threatening violence? Illegal. Threatening violence as part of your Nazi political platform? Illegal. Wearing a Nazi uniform, saying that white people are superior and the holocaust didn't happen? Legal as long as you're not doing some other illegal thing, even though historically that's adjacent to clearly-illegal behavior.
I realize there can be a good faith difference of opinion on that, but you asked me what I thought; that's what I think. If it's illegal to wear a Nazi uniform, or platforms kick you off for wearing one, then it can be illegal to wear a BLM shirt, and platforms can kick you off for saying #blacklivesmatter. Neither is acceptable. To me.
Probably the closest I can come to agreeing with you is on something like Patriot Front. Technically, is it legal to gather up and march around cities in threatening fashion, with the implication that you'll attack anyone who tries to stop you? Sure. Is it dangerous? Fuck yes. Should it be legal? Um... maybe. I don't know. Am I happy that people attacked them and chased them out of Philadelphia, even though attacking them was interfering with their free speech? Yes. I put that in a much more dangerous category than someone hosting a web site that says the holocaust didn't happen.
Platforms taking some responsibility for what they allow would go a long way without requiring a heavy handed government solution. Substack could just say “nah, we’re not letting nazis post stuff.”
Would it go a long way, though?
Youtube, Facebook, and Twitter have been trying to take responsibility for antivax stuff and election denialism for years now, and banned it in some cases and tried to limit its reach with simple blacklisting. Has that approach worked?
Nazi stuff is unpopular because it's abhorrent and people can see that when they read it. I genuinely don't think that allowing Nazi speech on Substack is a step towards wider acceptance of Naziism. I don't think there are all these people who might have been Nazis but they're prevented by not being able to read it on Substack. I do think allowing Nazi stuff on Substack would be a step towards exposing the wider community to the actual reality of Naziism, and exposing the Nazis to a community which can openly disagree with them instead of quarantining them in a place where they can only talk to each other.
I do think responsibility by the platforms is an important thing. I talked about that in terms of combatting organized disinformation, which is usually a lot more sophisticated and a lot more subtle than Nazi newsletters. I just don't think banning the content is a good answer. Also, I suspect that the same people who want the Nazis off Substack also want lots of other non-Nazi content to be "forbidden" in the same way that, e.g. Dave Chappelle or Joe Rogan should be "forbidden" from their chosen platforms. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but that's part of why I make a big deal about the Nazi content.
Thank you for the detailed response.
Notably though, I think Substack should also be free to not ban Nazis, and no one should give them shit for it.
Substack can host nazis given the legal framework in the US. But why shouldn't I speak up about their platforming of evil? Substack can do what they want, and I can tell them to fuck off. I can tell people who do business with them that I don't approve, and I'm not going to do business with them while they're engaged with this nazi loving platform. That's just regular old freedom of speech and association.
Their speech is not more important than mine. There is no obligation for me to sit in silence when someone else is saying horrible things.
It feels like you're arguing for free speech for the platform, but restricted speech for the audience. The platform is free to pick who can post there, but you don't want the audience to speak back.
Let me say it this way: If what you’re doing or saying would be illegal, even if you weren’t a Nazi, it should be illegal. [...] I realize there can be a good faith difference of opinion on that, but you asked me what I thought; that’s what I think. If it’s illegal to wear a Nazi uniform, or platforms kick you off for wearing one, then it can be illegal to wear a BLM shirt, and platforms can kick you off for saying #blacklivesmatter. Neither is acceptable. To me.
You're conflating laws and government with private stuff. The bulk of this conversation is about what can private organizations do to moderate their platforms. Legality is only tangentially related. (Also it doesn't necessarily follow that banning nazi uniforms would ban BLM t-shirts. Germany has some heavy bans on nazi imagery and to my knowledge have not slid enthusiastically down that slope)
A web forum I used to frequent banned pro-trump and pro-ice posts. The world didn't end. They didn't ban BLM. It helps that it was a forum run by people, and not an inscrutable god-machine or malicious genie running the place.
I'm also not sure I understood your answer to my question. Is there a line other than "technically legal" that you don't want crossed? Is the law actually a good arbiter?
Youtube, Facebook, and Twitter have been trying to take responsibility for antivax stuff and election denialism for years now, and banned it in some cases and tried to limit its reach with simple blacklisting. Has that approach worked?
I don't think they've actually been trying very hard. They make a lot of money by not doing much. Google's also internally incompetent (see: their many, many, canceled projects), Facebook is evil (see: that time they tried to make people sad to see if they could), and twitter has always had a child's understanding of free speech.
I do think responsibility by the platforms is an important thing. I talked about that in terms of combatting organized disinformation, which is usually a lot more sophisticated and a lot more subtle than Nazi newsletters. I just don’t think banning the content is a good answer. Also, I suspect that the same people who want the Nazis off Substack also want lots of other non-Nazi content to be “forbidden” in the same way that, e.g. Dave Chappelle or Joe Rogan should be “forbidden” from their chosen platforms. Maybe I’m wrong about that, but that’s part of why I make a big deal about the Nazi content.
A related problem here is probably the consolidation of platforms. Twitter and Facebook as so big that banning someone from it is a bigger deal than it probably should be. But they are free to move to a more permissive platform if their content is getting them kicked out of popular places. We're not talking about a nationwide, government backed-by-force content ban.
I'm not sure what to do about coordinated disinformation. Platforms banning or refusing to host some of it is probably one part of the remedy, though.
Substack can host nazis given the legal framework in the US. But why shouldn’t I speak up about their platforming of evil?
Oh, yeah, you can say whatever you like.
I think you're right that I was a little fuzzy when I talked about things that were illegal versus things I personally don't like, yeah. You should obviously be able (legally and what-I-think-is-right wise) to say anything you like about Substack. And, they are legally able to do whatever they want with their servers, whether that involves allowing or banning or demonetizing Nazis or whatever. Most of my conversation was about what I think they should do with their servers, but it's just my opinion. And yes I think you should be able to state your opinion and I should be able to disagree with it and all that.
You asked before what I meant about the "spirit" of the first amendment. What I meant was, there's a specific purpose why it was enshrined into law, and the same principles that led to that legal framework also produce some implications for how the operator of a communication network "should" treat that network, in my opinion, especially as it grows to the size of something like Facebook and starts to wield power similar to a government in terms of deciding how people should be able to communicate with each other. But yes, this is all just what I feel about it, and you're free to disagree or say fuck Substack or organize a boycott or whatever you like.
Once it gets into, we need to pressure their advertisers and try to force them to run their servers in a more Nazi-hostile way, I really don't like that. It is legal, yes. But it's coercive. It's like a high-pressure salesman or a slimy romantic partner. All perfectly legal things. But I think that's crossing a whole new line into something bad, much worse than Substack just doing something with their moderation I personally think they shouldn't be doing.
A web forum I used to frequent banned pro-trump and pro-ice posts. The world didn’t end. They didn’t ban BLM. It helps that it was a forum run by people, and not an inscrutable god-machine or malicious genie running the place.
Sure. So, I actually don't like that type of thing (although it is, of course, legal, and I'd defend the rights of those forum operators to do it if they chose). I got banned from a few different subreddits, both left and right wing which was funny to me, because people didn't like what I said. That's, honestly, pretty infuriating. I've also talked with conservative people who got suspended temporarily from Facebook, or had their posts taken down because they were antivax or whatever. Did I agree with those posts? Absolutely not, and I argued with them about it. Do I agree they should have had their posts removed? No. I started out thinking that yes, removing the posts is fine, and told them that more or less Facebook could do whatever they wanted because it was their network, but after having the argument a certain number of times I started to sympathize a lot more with the point of view of "dude fuck you, I'm a human being, just let me say what I want to say." I don't think that simple removal of the post, or chasing people off the "main" shared network completely, and onto a Nazis-only network like Truth Social, is the answer. I'll say this, it definitely didn't make them less antivax when that happened, or make it at all difficult for them to find antivax propaganda.
That's different from actual Nazi posts, of course. Just saying some of my experience with this. I actually don't like a lot of lemmy.world culture that's developing now because it is starting to become this sort of monoculture, where only a particular variety of views are allowed. Like it really irks me that pro-police or conservative viewpoints get shit on so relentlessly that it basically chases those people away. I liked that reddit had both /r/protectandserve and /r/badcopnodonut. It's fine. Let people talk, and don't start yelling at them that they have the "wrong" view (although of course you can always tell them why you think they're wrong). I have plenty of "wrong" views from the POV of the Lemmy hivemind, so maybe I'm more invested in it as an issue because of that.
I’m also not sure I understood your answer to my question. Is there a line other than “technically legal” that you don’t want crossed? Is the law actually a good arbiter?
Fair question. I mean, at the end of the day each server operator can do what they like. Some people will say that Nazis or MAGA people are so frequently trolls that they just don't want to deal with them. Some people don't want porn. Some people want to run a forum that's explicitly pro-conservative and just get tired of left-wing people coming in and jeering at them. All those things sound fine to me (what-I-like wise as well as legally). I don't think it's my business to tell people where to draw that type of line.
To me, though, that principle "I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it" is super important. If you start saying only certain viewpoints are welcome, and dismiss the others not with open debate but with loud jeering or technical restrictions, it hurts the discourse on your server. Of course you're legally allowed to restrict people's access however you like. But to me, I would draw the line by disallowing illegal things or things that hurt the discourse (because of trolling or brigading or deceptive bot posts or whatever). But if someone's just coming in and saying something you think is absolutely dead wrong (e.g. that the holocaust didn't happen), I don't think it's your place to remove or ban them. I think you should allow that.
Does that better answer the question? That's just my take on it. I've never been a modern Lemmy-instance operator, so maybe seeing it first hand and dealing with child porn from angry MAGA people or bomb threats from Nazis and things like that would make me less sympathetic.
I don’t think they’ve actually been trying very hard. They make a lot of money by not doing much. Google’s also internally incompetent (see: their many, many, canceled projects), Facebook is evil (see: that time they tried to make people sad to see if they could), and twitter has always had a child’s understanding of free speech.
I can only say what I've observed in terms of restrictions on Facebook posts from people I know, or Youtube creators I know who got demonetized or otherwise chased off Youtube. All of that, I think sucks. I agree, it's kind of heavy-handed and brainless the way they're doing it. I think that's an additional issue in addition to the fact of censoring the ability of people to post being the wrong approach in the first place.
I think one of the core issues is that a huge for-profit company running a huge content network, where they don't have bandwidth to put much attention into moderation and where most of the architecture of the network is designed to extract revenue from it, is just wrong from start to finish. That's why I'm here right now as opposed to Facebook or wherever. When I talk about free speech issues I'm mostly talking about it in terms of things like Lemmy or Substack. But yeah, maybe you're right that issues of profit motive and moderation bandwidth mean that we can't draw much of any conclusion by looking at how things played out on the big networks.
Thank you for your detailed reply, again.
But yes, this is all just what I feel about it, and you’re free to disagree or say fuck Substack or organize a boycott or whatever you like. Ok but...
Once it gets into, we need to pressure their advertisers and try to force them to run their servers in a more Nazi-hostile way, I really don’t like that. It is legal, yes. But it’s coercive. It’s like a high-pressure salesman or a slimy romantic partner. All perfectly legal things. But I think that’s crossing a whole new line into something bad, much worse than Substack just doing something with their moderation I personally think they shouldn’t be doing.
Why do you find people using their limited economic power coercive? You say you like boycotts. Telling Tide that you saw their advertisement on a nazi blog so you're not going to buy Tide until that's remedied is a boycott.
I don’t think that simple removal of the post, or chasing people off the “main” shared network completely, and onto a Nazis-only network like Truth Social, is the answer. I’ll say this, it definitely didn’t make them less antivax when that happened, or make it at all difficult for them to find antivax propaganda.
You also have to account for the audience. While that person may have gotten mad and gone off to a right extremist website, removing their "Holocaust is a lie check out these posts [nazi propaganda link 1, 2, 3]" post up is a hazard. Many more people read forums than contribute, typically.
If you start saying only certain viewpoints are welcome, and dismiss the others not with open debate but with loud jeering or technical restrictions, it hurts the discourse on your server
There are some points of view that are so hashed out, it is unlikely to be worth our time to debate them again. Nazi ideology, for example, was pretty firmly settled as bad. The forum I mentioned before had a clear "We are not going to debate if gay people have rights" rule. Someone might want to make an argument that they don't, but the belief that they do is so axiomatic for the locale it's not worth entertaining the "debate". I do not think it hurts the discourse on your server to disallow some topics like that. I say this with the assumption that the people running the forum are human, and it's not a shitty algorithm trying to parse it, or some underpaid intern who barely speaks the language. There is a hypothetical bad case where an imaginary server prescribes the exact beliefs that are OK and enforces that with moderation powers, but that's spherical friction-less cow levels removed from my lived experience. Maybe I've just been lucky where I've spent time on the internet. But also, if a forum sucks you can usually just leave. (Another argument for why the megalith sites like facebook and twitter aren't great.)
But if someone’s just coming in and saying something you think is absolutely dead wrong (e.g. that the holocaust didn’t happen), I don’t think it’s your place to remove or ban them. I think you should allow that.
So we disagree on this point. I don't see any good coming from platforming holocaust deniers or homophobes or whatever. If I'm running a bar, I don't need to let the nazis have their meetup in the back booth. That's just going to draw more nazis, and probably scare off the regular people. Likewise, if I'm running a forum, I don't need to let them have their little soapbox in my figurative bar.
maybe seeing it first hand and dealing with child porn from angry MAGA people or bomb threats from Nazis and things like that would make me less sympathetic.
I've also never run a forum. I expect there's a big "for me it was tuesday" experience. For the guy who wants to debate if queer couples really need to get married, it's the first time he's ever waded into this topic. For the moderation team, it's tuesday, and the fourth time this has come up this week. I expect dealing with the worst sorts of people would take the shine off anyone's idealism.
This sub-thread is very long and I'm starting to lose focus. I don't think we agree on everything, but I appreciate that you've been civil.
This sub-thread is very long and I’m starting to lose focus. I don’t think we agree on everything, but I appreciate that you’ve been civil.
Haha yeah, all good. I enjoyed it, thank you as well. I'll wrap up my thoughts if you don't want to go back and forth indefinitely.
Why do you find people using their limited economic power coercive? You say you like boycotts. Telling Tide that you saw their advertisement on a nazi blog so you’re not going to buy Tide until that’s remedied is a boycott.
It comes down to the goal of the boycott. A boycott to stop someone polluting or abusing human rights, I'm down for. A boycott because some comedian said something someone doesn't like and they want to "deplatform" him, I'm against. A boycott because Substack allows Nazis, and you're trying to get third parties to punish Substack to make them stop, I also don't like.
Somewhat related, I think it's great to attack Nazis directly. Something like this where you're crippling them because they broke the law and hurt people, I'm very in favor of. I don't like Nazis any more than anyone else does. I just think it has to be based on behavior rather than speech. Letting them speak, but not letting them hurt people, I think is going to hinder their cause a lot more than it helps it.
their “Holocaust is a lie check out these posts [nazi propaganda link 1, 2, 3]” post up is a hazard
Okay, here's the crux:
I don't think that post is a hazard.
I think having an exchange of ideas which includes dangerous ones, even very dangerous ones, alongside the truth, is a good thing. I think trying to get rid of "dangerous" ideas by banning people from talking about them does more harm than good. I think declaring that no one is allowed to say the holocaust is a lie is a hazard. I think it helps the Nazis to make that rule. I think the people who want to ban Nazis are, unintentionally, helping the Nazis quite a lot. People are talking to me in this subthread like I'm being soft on the Nazis and Nazis are terrible, but I think letting them say what they think, having everyone see it, and having other people free to illustrate why they're wrong, is way harder on the Nazis than forcing them off somewhere where they can congregate in peace and no one can see them.
You might not agree, but that's how I see it.
There are some points of view that are so hashed out, it is unlikely to be worth our time to debate them again. Nazi ideology, for example, was pretty firmly settled as bad. The forum I mentioned before had a clear “We are not going to debate if gay people have rights” rule. Someone might want to make an argument that they don’t, but the belief that they do is so axiomatic for the locale it’s not worth entertaining the “debate”.
So we disagree on this point. I don’t see any good coming from platforming holocaust deniers or homophobes or whatever. If I’m running a bar, I don’t need to let the nazis have their meetup in the back booth.
I’ve also never run a forum. I expect there’s a big “for me it was tuesday” experience. For the guy who wants to debate if queer couples really need to get married, it’s the first time he’s ever waded into this topic. For the moderation team, it’s tuesday, and the fourth time this has come up this week. I expect dealing with the worst sorts of people would take the shine off anyone’s idealism.
Yeah, I get this. I wouldn't try to tell anyone running a forum that they have to entertain this type of debate, because it's incredibly draining and may not fit the goal of the forum and may obscure the actual goal of the forum. I get all that and I wouldn't try to tell you to run your forum any other way.
The thing is though, that "for me it was Tuesday" thing cuts both ways. You may have had this discussion a thousand times already, but for the guy that came in, it may be his very first time being exposed to certain things. I think a lot of religious people have this type of experience when they start talking with athiest people on the internet, and they may be coming from a pretty ignorant place when they start out. I had this type of experience as far as geopolitics and who the "good guys" are. And, I've heard a former white supremacist talking about having his awakening moment and leaving the KKK because of it.
The "talk.origins" newgroup on Usenet was this. It was a place to debate evolution versus creationism. Is that a pretty firmly settled question? Yes. Absolutely it is. Honestly, more so than gay rights (although gay rights is also settled, to me.) And yet, somehow, there are people in the world who don't agree. A lot of them argue in bad faith, a lot of them are tedious or ignorant, there's a ton of ground that gets covered over and over and over again. But is that a useful thing to have exist? Ab so fuckin lutely.
Does that mean that every 4chan troll arguing about the holocaust in bad faith, who's never going to change his mind, deserves your time and attention? On a forum that's not for that? Fuck no. I actually think that deliberate engineered misinformation, and the toxic and mind-change-resistant culture of debate on the modern internet, argues for a radical rethinking of what's a sensible way to approach "an open exchange of communication" so that it doesn't wind up as just the Nazis being able to spew hatred in places it doesn't belong, and public forums being soft fertile ground for disinformation pipelines. I've also debated with enough closed minded people on the internet that I'm not naive about what the result of engaging with Nazis in an earnest debate is likely to be. But, a lot of the creationists on talk.origins were just as bad-faith about their conduct as modern 4chan trolls.
Hopefully that makes sense. I just don't think that the answer is that as soon as someone says one ignorant thing about, for example, gay rights, they're stripped of their ability to continue the conversation. Because if no one is ever willing to talk with them about it except other gay-bashers, how would you expect they would ever change their mind about it?