[notchFilter54]

>But you want Reddit to literally adopt 8chan's moderation policy,

I want reddit to adopt the public square's policy of allowing any content that isn't illegal, which also happens to be pretty much synonymous with 8chan's policy.

Do you consider the town square (which has the policy of allowing content that is not illegal) a center of inspiration for mass shootings? Could it be that the public square is not viewed as a place for inspiration of mass shooting, have anything to do with integration of many ideas and the fact that someone bringing bad ideas might actually be challenged in an environment where they are exposed to the general ideas of the community rather than an echo chamber of fellow nazis or whatever?

The nazi hall may have the same moderation policy as the town square, that doesn't mean I expect the same inspirations to come out of the nazi hall. The issue with the nazi hall is the powder-keg full of people reinforcing bad ideas, whereas a nazi in a more "normal" place like the public square might have some chance of being shamed or convinced their anti-social ideas are undesirable (despite the nazi hall and public square having same moderation policy). I don't want to shove more people into the nazi hall by banning them from the public square (especially when they're only being banned from the square because they have unconventional views on vaccines.)

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In the censor's world, the people with undesirable ideas in the public square are kicked into 8chan where instead of their ideas being challenged they all end up in a self reinforcing chamber. The proportional amount of people wanting a mass shooting may be tenfold that in the public square, leading to more compressed exposure including by other people who were originally just anti-vax or whatever. And the people running the public square turn around and say "see, 8chan allows any ideas, and that's what happens when you do that!"

[fighterpilot]

  "Do you consider the town square a centre of inspiration for mass shootings"

Before the internet, yes, definitely. Maybe not mass shootings specifically because that seems to be a recent fashion trend after Columbine, but violent extremism in general. How do you think Hitler managed to secure over 40 percent of the democratic vote in the early 1930s? How did Osama Bin Laden recruit extremists who were willing to put a bomb into the WTC basement? Propaganda, speech.

This idea that unfettered speech in the public town square, even if it isn't directly inciting violence, can't lead to pathological outcomes just doesn't hold up.

This isn't even an argument for government censorship. It's merely me recognizing that these type of outcomes can come about.

Nowadays almost all extremist speech is online, because that's where there is distribution and anonymity, so the analogy breaks down.

  "where they are exposed to the general ideas of the community rather than an echo chamber"

This isn't a bad argument, but you have to balance it off with the knowledge that ideas are highly, highly contagious. On balance, I think giving such ideas distribution to a billion eyes is far more harmful than pushing a fringe into echo chambers which already existed before social media censorship began anyway (such as the Stormfront forum).

Moreover you have to recognize that these isolated echo chambers would naturally self-segregate on Reddit if given free reign, and so in practice you haven't changed anything aside from giving these ideas more distribution. It's not like /r/88 or whatever would be interacting with the rest of Reddit thus helping their members deradicalize.

[notchFilter54]

I appreciate your honesty in believing the public square is a center of inspiration for mass shootings.

I believe quite the opposite. It has been a place for the public to plan self defense, both to organize themselves in defense from natural disaster, hostile forces, wildfires, and anyone who seeks to do them harm. It is a place for the public to engage in the marketplace of ideas and inspirations, which ultimately leads to the saving of lives, prosperity, security, and bonding of the populace. Harmful ideas can be shamed and those espousing bad ideas have a chance of learning the holes in their ideas. The mass shooter espousing violent ideas in the public square is as likely to have alerted his neighbor to be alert for any evidence of crime, as he is to convince the general populace of his nutjob ideas.

I don't buy your hypothesis that Hitler came to power because of free speech, and quite frankly it is laughable to think banning Hitler from Reddit (were it to exist in his day) would have any effect whatsoever. You seem quite ignorant of the factors precipitating Naziism, including the economic situation of Germany at that time. It's also worth noting that Hitler was quick to stifle certain speech that went against his ideas, meaning he found free speech at odds or even dangerous to Naziism.

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>How did Osama Bin Laden recruit extremists who were willing to put a bomb into the WTC basement? Propaganda, speech.

Bin Laden attempted to blow up the WTC basement with bombs, not free speech. Bin Laden lived in Muslim nations with more limited speech regulations than Reddit.

>Moreover you have to recognize that these isolated echo chambers would naturally self-segregate on Reddit if given free reign, and so in practice you haven't changed anything aside from giving these ideas more distribution. It's not like /r/88 or whatever would be interacting with the rest of Reddit thus helping their members deradicalize.

Some may, some may not. I've stopped using reddit because I was banned because I simply said things like I didn't believe forcefully shutting down a restaurant is an appropriate way to deal with coronavirus. Now maybe that is a very wrong and bad idea, but I'm willing to debate with others on it and learn their perspectives. Instead these communities said fuck you, you're banned, and now you have to go to some echo-chamber where everyone agrees with it. I'm not interested in an echo chamber, I'm interested in engaging with others so my bad ideas can be brought to light and shown to be bad, or my good ideas can be integrated. Your argument sounds more like one against having subreddits.

[fighterpilot]

Hitler convinced almost half the country to vote for him because of speech that drummed up resentments stemming from the Versailles Treaty and the depression, channeling and anthropomorphizing those resentments towards Jews, the lugenpresse, the military establishment, and so on. So you've missed my point, which is that town square offline speech can directly cause pathological outcomes when it is weaponized by bad faith actors.

The belief that sunlight is the best disinfectant is nothing more than empty sloganeering and it flies in the face of everything we know about social contagion and the willingness of humans to be led astray by tribal hatred.

Town square offline speech didn't lead specifically to mass shootings historically only because this particular medium of terrorism is a modern fashion trend, so it follows that it's a phenomenon that's going to be motivated online more than offline in the modern context.

[notchFilter54]

And your argument is that if the venues hosting Hitler's speeches had Reddit's moderation policies then Hitler would not have been elected?

[fighterpilot]

You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square. You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand.

I provided examples of speech in the old town square leading to pathological outcomes, but we are in a very different regime now and analogizing too much isn't helpful.

[notchFilter54]

So who should decide what moderation policies we have for the public? The general populace, who as you say would elect literally Hitler, or the government itself of which Hitler was once a part and used these very moderation mechanisms to suppress the Jews? The tyranny of a minority of special moderators like perhaps a nominally communist censor committee may have? We allow Naziist speech to exist precisely because we don't want the government or the tyranny of the majority or minority choosing what political speech is allowed, such as outlawing speech that doesn't promote Naziism.

>You're trying to draw analogies between modern technology and the old town square.

No I'm trying to find out how you want to apply moderation strategies to "reduce the likelihood" (my apologies if I misquoted your deleted comment) of democratic election of those who some censors decide have the wrong political views or speech.

>You should stop doing that because instant distribution to a billion people isn't the same thing as a speech to a thousand.

Are you also one of those that thinks the first amendment doesn't apply to the internet because the founders never imagined something that distributes so much faster than the printing press could exist? I know this is a straw man but I can't help but think this is where this is leading.

>And your argument is that if the venues hosting Hitler's speeches had Reddit's moderation policies then Hitler would not have been elected?

The fact that you didn't answer this question (well you did, but you deleted it) really is an damning answer of itself.