[backpackviolet]

I think it's inversely correlated with power, influence and reach. HN and Reddit don't have guns, can't throw you in prison, and there are lots of social medias to choose from, so a fair bit of censorship can be tolerated. Apple can't deport you, but you also don't have a lot of other choices, very low tolerance for censorship. The Government can really ruin your life if you get on the wrong side and your options for changing it or escaping it are pretty limited, we should demand the highest levels of transparency. Sure, some secrecy around military and intelligence for a little while, but we should eventually know what they decided and why.

[analog8374]

Censorship is fundamentally poisonous. Even without all that other stuff.

[surajrmal]

This is dogmatic reasoning. If censorship wasn't necessary, neither would the government. At sufficient scale, humans stop behaving in the best interest of the group, and you need ways to correct that. It'll never be perfect, but much like democracy, we don't know of a better system.

[analog8374]

Surely, in a conversation, the most damaging thing you can do to the integrity of that conversation is to selectively nullify the voice of a participant.

It ceases to be a conversation then. It is something else, posing as a conversation.

Maybe it would be better if this censorship-power is democratically controlled. But if this power is given to an individual. Well that's different.

[pjc50]

In order to have a conversation at all, you need to deal with the guy with the megaphone first. If you do not have moderation, you drown in spam, and do not have a conversation at all.