[throwaway20875]

This whole circus is about as contrived as it gets, complete with the "think of the children" gimmick. The timing, the theatrics, the manufactured celebrity of a middle manager at Facebook who is doing the "right" kind of whistleblowing that the establishment likes.

Facebook's predatory business model isn't unique or new. This is about raw power to censor.

[hunterb123]

I mean, it's a stupid plan. A whistleblower to advocate for censorship? Do they think the people are that stupid?

I guess like most things they don't need the majority of public on board, just a bit of plausible deniability.

If anyone was really concerned about the algorithms, they'd make transparency requirements, not censorship requirements.

If anyone was really concerned about the results of teenagers in the study, they'd go after TikTok, where teenagers are and where they rank them by looks.

If anyone was really concerned about bad foreign actors on social media they'd go after the Taliban and the Ayatollah on Twitter.

[rscoots]

Actually this messaging has achieved significant impact in the past 3 years. They might not have the majority of the public on board, but they do have the majority of Dems:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/08/18/more-americ...

Unfortunately for them it seems to be having the opposite affect on Republicans, but not to the same degree.

[hunterb123]

They always have the Dems on board. Every little plot they do.

Christine Blasey Ford, Eric Ciamarella, it never ends. They'll find one person to exploit or pay off (respectively) and create a show around them.

Their base will get riled up, the R base will see through it but be ignored and dehumanized.

Also, FB is more conservative overall in the US as it attracts an older audience. Dems are more likely to be on Twitter and other social media.

[unethical_ban]

The Taliban aren't running disinformation campaigns on Americans via Facebook or Twitter.

Like it or not, people care more about a problem that affects them. That's like saying "if Americans /really/ cared about democracy, they would all be advocating for an invasion of Belarus".

[hunterb123]

First off, yes they are. Second, the CCP use "disinformation" as a reason for censoring too.

Americans aren't orchestrating this, Democrats are.

The Taliban comparison was in relation to the FB Myanmar issue the "whistleblower" brought up.

Just as the TikTok comparison was in relation to the girl's study.

The point is, the Dems are laser focused on Facebook because they want to silence conservatives, not because of some virtue to help people.

[unethical_ban]

I completely disagree with your assessment. No one is trying to silence people for saying "poor people are worth less than me, taxes are inherently evil, non-whites are probably illegals, and abortion is murder". I'm using the most offensive stereotypes to make the point that no one is even trying to ban those ideas.

The concern is the spread of lies known to be generated by bad actors, and how to handle it. Does "more truth" win against "lies"? Or should we try to limit facebook groups and twitter feeds that say Biden lost the election against all facts and evidence, when we see millions of people believe it just because it feels right to them?

It's not an easy problem, and doesn't seem to have any easy solution.

[hunterb123]

They are banning dissenting information that looks bad for them.

Similar to how CCP bans political dissent, Dems ban any stories on Hunter Biden for example.

The Dems also ban things that look bad on China, like the lab leak, I suppose because they share some of the same goals.

Also the election is perfectly reasonable to question. It's fine to question why the bell weathers and many other record indicators were broken during the 2020 election. It's fine to want to audit and make sure something is secure, especially after we spent $20 million and 5 years investigating the 2016 election for "Russian interference".

[shadowgovt]

A simple search for "hunter biden laptop" on Facebook immediately kicks up three news articles, dozens of site posts, and (in the bubble I can see from my own friends list) several dozen posts on the topic from the point of view that the laptop was real.

If this is Democratic censorship in action, it's incredibly bad at its goals.

[unethical_ban]

No one has called for bans of discussions of the lab leak theory (or no one mainstream). It was simply obvious that early harping about it from Tucker Carlson was a useless distraction in the early time of the pandemic, when the rest of the world was focusing on how to respond to the pandemic instead of beating the shit out of Asians and calling Coronavirus "Wuhan flu" to enrage the libs.

No one has "banned" discussion of Hunter Biden. (I just saw your reply to someone else saying it was censored from facebook; I would be interested in seeing any evidence of that). Downvoting isn't censorship. Lack of prioritizing coverage by a newspaper could be a concern, but that isn't censorship (and boy, do I have some news for you if you don't know how Fox does its reporting).

Republicans have barely lifted a finger when in power to secure voting systems, or take any interest in voting security. You keep on acting like Republicans care about election security (or election fairness at all) but they don't. They care about disenfranchisement.

There was no evidence of widespread voter fraud in 2020, as stated by Secretaries of State from multiple states Republican-led and Democrat-led. As shown by reviews in multiple states that were done for partisan reasons (we lost and we don't like Democrats winning).

Voting records might have been broken because political polarization is at a high note and we had a hugely polarizing president in office.

The investigation into Russian interference was related to disinformation campaigns and collusion with members of the Trump campaign, NOT voter or election fraud.

It found evidence of that, but the Republican-led house did nothing with the information. https://wannabewonk.com/summary-of-hypocrisies/

edit2: Ah, yes, you're talking about the discredited hitpieces that were released in the weeks before the election. Yes, it seems those were throttled, openly and transparently, due to them being discredited hitpieces.

[dang-guefever]

Pretty much. This is the next generation version of "This is extremely dangerous to our democracy"^1 level of collusion to push narratives.

1 - https://youtube.com/watch?v=ZggCipbiHwE

[mint2]

Contrived by who?

Are you saying the middle manager was bribed to leak docs or is some plant by “The Shadow Powers”?

Are you saying we shouldn’t care about a company targeting children with products it knows increase suicidal thoughts in substantial numbers of children?

Who is the establishment. Spell it out for me.

How did they orchestrate the Facebook leak? Spell it out.

[enumjorge]

This borders on conspiratorial. What "establishment" are you talking about? You might as well have said boogey man. I'm guessing you mean Democrats, since Republicans have greatly benefited from the distribution of propaganda and misinformation that social media like Facebook enables. These are the same Democrats who barely have a majority in Congress. They're struggling to pass legislation because the moment they lose even a single senator, they don't have the votes. The Republicans, who favor no intervention, are as much "establishment" as those who want to reign in FB and still hold a lot of power.

> Facebook's predatory business model isn't unique or new.

I don't get this. Nothing to see here because other companies are also bad? Someone who worked at the company leaked documents showing that Facebook's own research shows they are causing harm and we should do nothing because this isn't new? I don't understand this logic.

> This is about raw power to censor.

The implication here is that our society's free speech is largely dependent on Facebook. Free speech existed before social media, why is it that now it can't exist without it? Now the health of our democracy is linked to what Facebook, which is controlled by a single person, decides to do on the platform. That seems pretty unhealthy and something worth correcting. Government intervention has its downsides, but what else do you suggest?

[mmmpop]

>> I'm guessing you mean Democrats, since Republicans have greatly benefited from the distribution of propaganda and misinformation that social media like Facebook enables.

Right, propaganda is only a thing the Right peddles.

[h2odragon]

This isn't the first time we've seen this PR package. Some of the architects of the story are the same. I dunno whom one writes a check out to, to order this service, but I bet it needs a few more digits on it than I could muster.

[busymom0]

They Do Not Want to Weaken Facebook, Just Commandeer its Power to Censor: https://greenwald.substack.com/p/democrats-and-media-do-not-...

[tiahura]

You’re right, and that’s why the story is boring - nothing is going to happen.

Even if a majority could agree on a more heavy-handed approach to the tech giants (which it won’t), there’s been 0 discussion of the First Amendment implications of any proposed “solution.” For anyone who’s unsure or confused, the chances of the Roberts’ Court upholding content restrictions are zip. There will NEVER be a law that penalizes FB for promoting LEGAL SPEECH.