Also, love the presentation on this page.
I’d like to know how curious this would make non-HN people, and those living in more censored places.
My assumption is that they take it for granted and just continue to watch the show. It might be hard for them to even find the uncensored clips.
The glitches serve to remind them daily that their government is manipulating them.
The dilemma that China's leaders have is that they need an educated workforce, capable of logical and critical thinking, but they can't stop that workforce thinking critically outside work.
Are you referring to the UK version of the 1987 animated "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" TV series? I never realized it was considered controversial! [0]
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teenage_Mutant_Ninja_Turtles_(...
Huh, you weren't kidding. Banned and censored in the UK, banned in Canada, Germany, and several US states... because of Bruce Lee? Bizarre.
On this, Dragon Ball is heavily edited too
I suspect that the vast majority of Chinese viewers barely notice, or just assume that there was some sort of problem with the source material when it was imported into their country. Most probably don't make the connection that portions have been censored, because this is just what they've grown up with, and seems normal.
I think you both under- and over-estimate Chinese people in this regard. Certainly they are well-educated, but they've been raised culturally very differently than you or I. It's not impossible to be smart and know how to think, but also close off your mind to certain classes of criticism because you've been raised to value unity and harmony above other concerns.
We also forget that, in the mid and late 1900s (or, like many of us, just weren't born yet), many (though not all) of the same kinds of censorship were present in American TV, and to some extent movies as well.
I do find the Chinese version to be more insidious (and more dangerous, given current surveillance and content-blocking technology), and much of it probably is, but I do think some of it is just unconscious nationalism and "othering" on my part, as much as I try to stamp out that kind of thinking in myself.
Anecdotally from my own perspective, I see big waves of voting on HN that go in various political directions. Seems consistent with self-selection by topic combined with randomness.
None of it inspires confidence in your assessment of being "censored" on HN, or diagnosing the audience as less curious.
Just a few days ago Zuckerberg was discussing banning / suppressing discussion of the Hunter Biden laptop - https://nypost.com/2022/08/25/mark-zuckerberg-criticizes-twi...
Idk what to say about that. It’s not editorial decisions when DMs are being censored or social media posts. Particularly when the FBI / government is suggesting it.
2. This is a perfect example of my point. Most people don’t even realize they are surrounded by censorship. Or they outright agree with it. Look up the list of topics bannable on YouTube. On Twitter you can’t even call someone by the name their parents gave them if they disagree. In schools near where I live you can get suspended for using proper pronouns, if someone disagrees.
Censorship in the US is different, but very apparent.
The fact you responded with “hello troll” is a perfect example.
1. The “election fortification” comment is in regards to https://time.com/5936036/secret-2020-election-campaign/ it’s a tongue in cheek title from a group which helped “ensure the outcome of the election” as they put it.
2. Hunter Biden's laptop was confirmed legitimate. It was easily confirmable by multiple people who knew the Biden’s. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/who-is-tony-bobulinski-hunt... The senate report further confirmed it https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/HSGAC_Finance_Rep...
I can keep going, but my general point was that if you didn’t read the reports in detail (not via a pundit). Particularly, if you didn’t / couldn’t review the source material. Then the censorship worked. There’s a great segment on CNN about wikileaks https://streamable.com/6g5v where you can’t read Hillary emails, you have to hear it from CNN. “Remember it’s illegal for anyone besides journalists to read her emails” a lie, but a form of censorship.
It doesn’t matter who is right or wrong, it’s wether the discussion is suppressed. That’s the censorship.
Let's take your first point for example. If I go on Fox News right now and search for articles about the 2020 election being stolen, I get plenty of articles and opinions talking about it. How exactly was it censored, and how is it comparable to censorship in China?
Besides, censorship is not inherently bad, and most stable democracies with a functioning legal system will have some form of censorship, to protect minors, for example.
Disagreement among private parties, or getting less private promotion than you wanted to get, is not “censorship”. It’s free speech in action.
The main problem is that you compare the freedom of social media platforms to regulate the content they host, to outright government-controlled censorship of all media. If it was actually the government censoring the topic, you would not have been able to link to a nypost article talking about it, and Trump wouldn't be able to post on his own social media platform.
> Look up the list of topics bannable on YouTube. On Twitter you can’t even call someone by the name their parents gave them if they disagree. In schools near where I live you can get suspended for using proper pronouns, if someone disagrees.
Why are those topics bannable? Could it be that there is some kind of "code of conduct" that makes sure people are respectful to each other? Those people disagreeing are still free to host their own service, if they desperately want to deadname someone.
That said, if a private company like Twitter thinks Alex Jones is a liability because he spreads conspiracy theories of shape shifting lizard people from alternate dimensions sabotaging the Trump Presidency via the deep state because he’s prepping the military and cia to take out the satanic cultists that worship and appease said lizard shapeshifting creatures via the blood of post-coital children, well…
Secondly, why are you responding to "Those topics are censored" claim with "Here are all the correct answers to those topics that my media tells me to believe"? GP didn't say whether they think there is a correct answer to a topic and what, if any, may that answer be, GP has simply observed that those topics are heavily and nakedly suppressed in legacy media and social media, often with hilarious results (e.g. Instagram banning Cochrane, a medical database of the highest quality, simply for mentioning Ivermectin).
Contradicting GP here would consist of bringing up evidence that those topics were, on the contrary to GP's claim, discussed fairly and found wanting. Talking about correct answers are irrelevant, we're talking about whether all questions and answers are allowed for discussion. Because Americans are often shocked that China hates things they consider elementary and bans them, GP is simply saying their own society frequently and obviously engages in this as well, often with cheering from those self same people.
Third, some of your points about masks are self-contradicting. If the CDC lied about masks once, why wouldn't they lie twice or third or tenth? You would be a fool if you trust a liar after the 1st time, and medical institutions have proven to be thoroughly partisan and rotten and corrupt during the entire crisis, anybody taking a covid-related claim from a medical institution at face value is a prime target for bridge selling.
Another point is that masks come in types, and only very few types protect adequately against the latest covid variants, and the vast majority of people don't buy those types (N95 or KN95) or don't wear them correctly. So masks, as worn in practice, are indeed very close to useless, as evidenced from the fact that they're not predictive of viral spread (i.e the fact that a country's population wears masks has no better than random chance correlation with whether it has lower infections, i.e masks are statistically useless).
This why your correct answers are wrong, at least in part, some of the time. This is why you need to be constantly questioning them, and not rushing to defend the censorship loving institutions and corporations who have no particular interest in you or your well being, and all the interest in Power and Money and Status.
Fourth, why the hell are you bringing up more evidence for censorship as evidence against GP? You're supporting them, not contradicting them. GP never claimed the censorship is done by only 1 party, only that is done. You're arguing for GP's claim while thinking you're arguing against.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BN3PIGLDscQ
https://twitter.com/alexberenson/status/1558060844549902338
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/wp-content/uploads/FACEBO...
https://nypost.com/2021/07/16/government-dictating-what-soci...
I can keep going, but most of those people who are impacted you don’t hear from due to censorship.
Banana699 has the right to block you or otherwise tell you to fuck off from their private property, the 10 million viewers Banana699^TM Inc Ltd does not. Media corporations picking and choosing the type of the story to serve is a very plausible reason for the intense polarization and Rage-As-A-Service ecosystem we are in.
Otherwise, I don’t know what you’re suggesting to be done. Do you want to expand the powers of the government to moderate these companies and their property?
heres an example where the White House admits it: https://nypost.com/2021/07/15/white-house-flagging-posts-for...
That is censorship, because social media then bans (censors) those users and the discussion. Which was my exact point.
What do they do in China: “hey this snippet here looks like misinformation” then the company removes that snippet. They extend it to insults about the Chinese race, but don’t we do the same with gender pronouns?
How is it different materially?
My point was censorship is done universally, just in different ways and for different topics. It’s always the same reason though, to avoid some idea the people in power don’t want propagated. Could be a joke, could be “misinformation”, could be that there’s only one good race (no one dare make fun of), or you can have any gender. It’s all just power / politics.
The censored rarely take the time to learn what is being censored because they don’t think to know. You have to keep the idea from entering the mind of the opposition. That’s why you censor in the first place. You have to defame those who question the authority and call them “fascists” so no one listens to them. Self-censoring who you listen to and not telling others “hey this person has an interesting take!” It’s all the same game, a game to control the population.
> Besides, censorship is not inherently bad, and most stable democracies with a functioning legal system will have some form of censorship, to protect minors, for example.
I would argue we don’t see stable “democracies”, we see oligarchies. Why is it ruling families in the UK still effectively rule? Politicians are always from a certain class. Similar in France, when’s the last commoner who speaks like the rural folk who’s held the prime minister seat? We all see how Trump was treated for speaking plainly… then again, he was a “threat to democracy”
The oligarchs control what you can think, through managing what information you can read / see. “Democracy” in the US is a code word, for the status quo.
There’s an implied threat. The Supreme Court has already ruled on this previously. I expect in the next couple years as court cases about the censorship work through the courts, the same thing will happen again.
If the government was silent and the censorship occurred then MAYBE it’s legal. That of course depends on if it’s a common carrier or public space. Both arguably are true for social media, but again it takes time for the courts to figure it out. I would concede that point, but again government asked for the censorship here.
There’s a faction / ideology (across all party lines) in the west that is doing the same thing as China. For the same reasons “to be respectful to one another”.
That’s kinda the point I’m trying to make.
Unlike the ccp example here, where I would say they do have a great handle on what can and cannot be discussed on any public platform and dissenters are most definitely threatened with if not actually subjected to physical force.
Q: How exactly was it censored, and how is it comparable to censorship in China?
A: https://nypost.com/2021/07/15/white-house-flagging-posts-for... That is censorship, because social media then bans (censors) those users and the discussion. Which was my exact point. What do they do in China: “hey this snippet here looks like misinformation” then the company removes that snippet. They extend it to insults about the Chinese race, but don’t we do the same with gender pronouns? How is it different materially?
We know that geopolitical adversaries weaponize narratives to cause destabilization of the body politic of other nations. We know that the internet and social media have exploded in popularity in the last 20 years, giving 'foreign actors' unprecedented access to citizens.
What should a government of a 'free' nation do to counter that destabilization or those weaponized narratives?
> Let's take your first point for example. If I go on Fox News right now and search for articles about the 2020 election being stolen, I get plenty of articles and opinions talking about it. How exactly was it censored, and how is it comparable to censorship in China?
You have conveniently pivoted to a straw man argument about Covid-19 which was not mentioned.
And there are plenty of people on Facebook talking all sorts of crap about vaccines. If it was so stringently “censored” as you claim, it would be hard for us to argue about - as I would have never heard the anti vaxxers arguments. But good lord, they never shut up- so I’m exceptionally aware of their opinions.
The local Christian cake shop are not a corporation and, by the very definition of 'local', almost certainly doesn't meet the legal prerequisites for fairness regulations, so they should not be forced to bake a cake against their will.
2. My position has never been the government has to be doing the censorship. People censor, some in media, some in social media, some on HN, some in government, etc.
3. Censorship doesn't mean you cannot reach data; it's a suppression of speech (which Zuckerberg, Dorsey, and Youtube admitted to censoring publicly). https://www.britannica.com/topic/censorship
> censorship, the changing or the suppression or prohibition of speech or writing that is deemed subversive of the common good. It occurs in all manifestations of authority to some degree, but in modern times it has been of special importance in its relation to government and the rule of law.
4. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/did-social-media-actua...
> Ahead of the election, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube promised to clamp down on election misinformation, including unsubstantiated charges of fraud and premature declarations of victory by candidates. And they mostly did just that — though not without a few hiccups.
They have been open about censoring since before the election. Now, if we want to get into government, the FBI interfered by (1) strongly suggesting social media to "limit" (censor) information; and ironically (2) accused of not investigating or sharing relevant information about the candidates (https://www.ronjohnson.senate.gov/services/files/7CD44E16-BF...)
5. I know many people banned from social media. They can't post on any accounts. I also followed many people I didn't know personally banned. If you ask questions / discuss certain topics you will be removed; typically for sharing particular pieces of content.
> censorship, the changing or the suppression or prohibition of speech or writing that is deemed subversive of the common good. It occurs in all manifestations of authority to some degree, but in modern times it has been of special importance in its relation to government and the rule of law.
Once we got satellite and I started watching American channels I had my first encounter with censorship. Bleeps and blurs and random spots where audio cuts out. It was very jarring. I couldn't understand it at all and still can't. It really stands out, breaks the flow, makes everything feel cheap and ugly. In real life people swear and sometimes there is nudity. That never bothered me. But the jarring edits "protecting" me from these? Those certainly do.
Start to teach logical fallacies in primary schools. Encourage critical thinking. This comes at the cost that the government's own bs does not work so well anymore, because people now know how to spot a logical fallacy.
I think people a lot of us started to get out of the common path because of the limitations (which censorship is at the basic level) we hit. My hypothesis would be that simply “curious” people get pushed into the “hacker” bucket by getting refused something that seems reachable with some creativity.
The dumb example is people will get creative and jumping through hoops to get foreign porn. Growing non-authorized plants is another example, where people have to learn so much by themselves to make it happen. Even getting pirated non-censored versons comes to require more and more technical proficiency I think, and looking at industry’s reaction it seems there’s a decent number of people sailing the seven seas.
Then why do you get mad when China or the Middle East bans material they find objectionable? They simply have a different definition of what counts as objectionable, that's all, and it's well within their rights to enforce their different cultural values within their borders, just like you argue that a "democracy" has this right.
Also, when I go to Netflix and search for "LGBT", I see tons of material. So that must obviously mean censoring of LGBT is a pathetic lie, it's right there in one (very big, much bigger than Fox) media outlet so it's obviously not censored.
There is a difference between banning content that is objectively harmful (e.g. child porn) and banning content to control and suppress minorities. Just because they can doesn't mean it's good.
> So that must obviously mean censoring of LGBT is a pathetic lie
I never argued this.
First, I will point out that almost no government, ever and everywhere, isn't full to the core with corruption and lying, like a decaying and rotten fruit left for weeks in a garbage dump.
Some Westerners are deluded with the strange thought that it somehow makes a difference that those who are bamboozling them do it through convoluted interlocking systems of protocols and processes, commonly called Democracy, and not through brute force or other such barbarous means.
From a dispassionate analysis of raw results, however, considering just the outside blackbox behaviour of a country without reference to its internal algorithms and data structures, almost every single thing China or Russia can do to a citizen, USA and Canada and UK And Germany can (and does), just maybe not as frequently and not as publicly (yet).
This rather large caveat\objection aside, I will take the question at face value : what can a (supposedly benevolent) government do in the face of outside propaganda? A lot.
First, propaganda is easy, especially when you're a government. If a foreign country is paying X to propagandize your citizens, you can afford to pay 10X, discounted by all the natural advantages you have when you're propagandizing your own citizens (same language and culture, official capacity to make and enforce laws, privileged position when dealing with media outlets, etc..., you literally rule). Indeed, for the same reason that religions always need a devil and revolutions always need enemies, the foreign propaganda might be a boon to you, a thing to rally against in your own propaganda, food for your propaganda artists.
Second, talk is cheap, and the vast majority of people would rather rage than do anything in real life. So, let propaganda fester, like a harmless fever. This an unfortunate effect of large human populations, known at the smaller scales as the bystander effect. In essence, everybody just says "not my problem" and just keeps shouting (if they do even that), hoping for someone else to actually do something, but everybody is thinking like that so nothing really gets done. This is bad for the people, but it's good for governments, it means most Free Speech is harmless. (which is bad news for any serious Free Speech advocate, because the goal isn't Free Speech in and of itself, but Free Expression, which starts with Free Speech but must end with Free Action. But again, this is all normative land, in actual material fact, most Free Speech is pure thunder without lightning or rain, and nobody loses anything by allowing it unless what they're hiding is truly egregious.)
Finally, returning to the first caveat again, maybe just fuck you, the government? Maybe the foreign government is actually correct and the citizens should revolt and create unrest and become ungovernable till their demands are met?
In summary, don't worry about the poor little governments, they can manage very well, with all the monopoly on violence and money printing and whatnot.
It doesn't have to be governments only as well, the Middle East is majority Muslim after all, and muslims do get incredibly offended at LGBT stuff (a lot of Arabic insults are just variations on "gay"). So, according to you, those private citizens and corporations should be allowed to ban the LGBT, it's not censorship if the government isn't doing it right?
>I never argued this.
No, but you did argue for something indistinguishably similar, which is that because a news story is found on Fox then this news story is not actually censored. So, by that same unassailable logic, LGBT stuff is on Netflix and therefore LGBT stuff is not actually being censored. All objections you have against my satire argument is applicable to your real argument.
However, when I first started seeing this stuff as a kid I had no idea why and it really struck me as odd.
I think the funniest thing I've heard about censorship was Magnus Uggla, a Swedish artist, complaining that because he had a UK firm produce one of his music videos it was a real struggle getting them not to blur a scene where they're drinking shots.
Let me make an analogy to Alex Jones and Trump: if the water company cuts someone off, but they continue to run a huge fountain in front of their mansion, then you can't reasonably claim they're being deprived of drinking water.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/30/hunter-...
Excessive profanity generally makes things sound less eloquent, but limited use can be really good for emphasis.
How long were the FBI in possession of Hunter Biden's laptop, why is Mark Zuckerberg trying to blame them for the censorship of the NY Post's story, and do you consider the FBI to be part of the government?
There's no need for quotes around suppressing as it was suppressed, objectively.
> they were awfully bad at it
It was done to sway an election, which went the way was desired, and without any legal blowback. That is not being "awfully bad at it".
> as anyone who ever wanted to learn about them certainly won’t shut up about it.
But at the time and when it was most important people were shut up regardless of whether they wanted to be.
Again, if you are somehow equating this hunter biden story with the censorship of, say, tiannamen square by the ccp, I encourage you to visit china and research the subject. Compare the efforts you mentioned were used to suppress the hunter biden story with what is outlined here, for example: https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/03/a-look-at-the-many-ways-ch... and you will see how awfully bad the us gov is at censorship.
If the government was so concerned about trump as you say, then why did the same fbi re open an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server just weeks before the 2016 election?
Actually, tell you what, if you believe that the efforts to censor the hunter biden laptop story and tiannamen square are equivalent, I will make a bet. I will pay to print up two shirts: one with “hunter biden is a criminal” and a QR code to the New York post article. The other will say “remember June 5, 1989” with a QR code to the Wikipedia article titled “tank man”.
Wear both shirts in public outside the US capitol and take selfies. Then wear both shirts out in Beijing. Hell just try to get through customs wearing the June 5 shirt and let me know how that goes. I’ll pay for the shirts.
The government tells publishers all the time not to print things. The decision is up to the publishers. That’s free speech.
What do you think the government said when the Washington Post called them up and said “we have a bunch of top-secret stuff that one of your contractors stole from the NSA”? The Post published the Snowden stories anyway. This sort of thing happens a lot.
Many people posted and talked about the Hunter laptop story. None of those people went to jail for it.
https://web.archive.org/web/20201014171957/http://breitbart....
Look, I’m just on my phone so I’m not going to dig up archive links showing the post article all over the web at the time, but really - what do you want? The emergency broadcast system activated to push the story to everyone’s phone like an amber alert?
I was there - and honestly the news about “suppressing” the ny post story just encouraged me to go read it more, ala the Streisand effect. Which is exactly what I did out of morbid curiosity. I encountered no issues finding the story, had no issues with authorities as a result of searching for it and reading it and took no precautions to protect my identity while doing so.
https://twitter.com/MPSRegentsPark/status/974645778558980096
To be clear, I'm not saying that the enemy agitprop is all true. However, the most effective kind of agitprop is the one that uses facts as the foundation for the rest of the structure. So how about we start there?
Your ability to know about a story does not tell us whether the wider population knew.
> At no point was it difficult to learn more.
And yet it was actively suppressed. I also wonder what topic you couldn't claim that for?
> Again, if you are somehow equating this hunter biden story with the censorship of, say, tiannamen square by the ccp
I didn't use that example, perhaps it was used further up. Regardless, equating is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Comparing would be a better fit. Yes, all instances of censorship can be compared simply because they are censorship.
> you will see how awfully bad the us gov is at censorship
Are you suggesting that we shouldn't be worried about this censorship because the government is bad at it compared to the Chinese government? That's not going to fly. I also think the obvious slippery slope here would be hard to characterise as fallacious, given we're provided with both ends of the slope, and in actual fact, the US is not at the top of the slope.
> If the government was so concerned about trump as you say, then why did the same fbi re open an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server just weeks before the 2016 election?
The government is not of one mind, it is made up of many departments, groups and individuals, each with their own attitudes, desires and intentions. Regardless, how am I supposed to answer that? Or more to the point, what kind of answer would satisfy you?
> if you believe that the efforts to censor the hunter biden laptop story and tiannamen square are equivalent
Did you mean to reply to me?
> I will make a bet
I skipped this as it was childish and unhelpful, and only builds on the straw man (intentional or not) that you are building.
That may well be true.
> The government tells publishers all the time not to print things. The decision is up to the publishers. That’s free speech.
If the mafia offer your business protection you could also make your own decision. Would that be freedom of conscience?
> What do you think the government said when the Washington Post called them up and said “we have a bunch of top-secret stuff that one of your contractors stole from the NSA”? The Post published the Snowden stories anyway. This sort of thing happens a lot.
Why does that incident mean that this incident is different? Were the same people involved?
> Many people posted and talked about the Hunter laptop story. None of those people went to jail for it.
Would people need to go to jail for the aims of the censor to be realised?
So many questions, so few answers.
> The email, which was recently disclosed during discovery in a federal lawsuit that Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt filed in May, vividly illustrates how the Biden administration engages in censorship by proxy, pressuring social media platforms to implement speech restrictions that would be flagrantly unconstitutional if the government tried to impose them directly. Landry and Schmitt, both Republicans, argue that such pressure violates the First Amendment.
> Judging from the examples that Schmitt cites, the tenor of these communications has been cordial and collaborative. The social media companies are at pains to show that they share the government's goals, which is precisely the problem. Given the broad powers that the federal government has to make life difficult for these businesses through public criticism, litigation, regulation, and legislation, the Biden administration's "asks" for stricter moderation are tantamount to commands. The administration expects obsequious compliance, and that is what it gets.
[1] https://reason.com/2022/09/01/these-emails-show-how-the-bide...