[TuringTest]

> I am strongly against this appeal to censorship.

Why do you interpret "experiencing a web without harassment and bullying" as implying "censoring speech"? People may publish all the hatred and bullshit they want on the open web, but I don't need to be forced to watch it. Both things are not exclusive.

IM applications with limited groups (Telegram, Whatsapp) show us a way this can be done. If these tools were open, you could create groups to communicate anything you want; but only people subscribed to those groups will see them, and you won't reach people that isn't interested in that content, or which have blocked you after an awkward interaction.

[superkuh]

Because what a small, loud minority of people call "bullying" simply isn't. Because sometimes mocking ideas is the right thing to do. The idea that "bullying" or "harassment" should be eliminated comes from a place where people believe they can define an absolute right or wrong. And even more unbelievable, they think that there is a person (or worse, a group of people) that know these absolutes.

If they want to block that communications on their forum it's fine. But I'll post to my personal, self-hosted website whatever opinions I want.

The way to cut the gordian knot of what to allow is simple: everyone should self host, federate, and set up web rings. Everyone should be a full participant on the 'net instead of going through centralized proxies that create perverse commercial incentives for censorship.

[Spivak]

I don't think your proposed solution will really change anything and would probably backfire if it became reality. Congrats, you now have a public website espousing opinions that would have gotten you banned from the former central platforms. But it doesn't really matter since the practical reach of your message is basically nonexistant. You're blacklisted from all the popular webrings who are empowered to moderate even stronger since they're not platforms for general speech anymore and their users love it because it's not fun to be bullied and harassed.

Everyone gets what they want I guess?

[superkuh]

Except none of that happens because the people pushing for stupid things like anti-bullying were in the minority all along.

Also, my self hosted website has been doing fine for ~20 years now. And because I don't care about reach or other marketing and business terms even in your scarecrow scenario I'm just fine too.

[GW150914]

It seems that you use HN a lot, and this is a heavily (well) moderated forum. That seems like an implicit endorsement of just the kind of “censorship” you and others are railing against. If HN became oppressively censored, another option would tske its place.