Free Speech: Thank You Jacob

[prognastat]

I'm surprised there are so many(relatively) others here that have been banned from there. It's a shame that that's the case, not in that you guys are here, but that it is happening so much.

[Mikeallison]

People love echo chambers, I'm personally guilty of it. I moved from a blue to a red state in order to be surrounded by people who share my values. We sort ourselves out the same way online, I guess. I purposely signed up for this site because it forces me to hear arguments from the otherside, although I'm not sure being surrounded by a bunch of fellow intj/intp personality types is really giving me an accurate worldview either, we are pretty rare out in the wild...

My biggest fear is that this tribalism leads us into another civil conflict, that tends to be what happens when the middle ground disappears.

[prognastat]

The irony for me was that I probably agree with many if not most of the more leftwing things they believe in, simply not agreeing to the right wing by default being monsters and the left wing being saints was enough to end up in me being banned. I think the main problem was that though I'm a liberal, I'm not an ardent progressive and that seems to be more the bent there.

[Mikeallison]

@prognastat

I've noticed a weird tendency on the left lately, especially after the election, where they now vet you according to this progressive ideological purity test. If you don't follow the party line, you're out.

Just look at what happened to Matt Damon when he suggested that grabbing a girl's butt, though despicable if done without consent, is not the equivalent of rape. They about nailed his ass to a cross.

Another example would be Bill Maher being ostracized for using the "N-word", even though the context/intent was obviously self depreciation, and not racism.

The more they radicalize and self induldge in identity politics and cultural marxism, the worse it will go for them.

[ZAFCorrection]

This is a private forum-Jacob's choices in allowing or banning certain types of speech have nothing to do with your first amendment right.

This is an issue that has always interested me. Most free speech issues I have seen are completely unaddressed by the first amendment and yet it keeps getting trotted out. I assume because it has kinda sorta been extended in people's minds that free speech is or should be protected generally. Then people gleefully retort that only government interference is protected against, so they are free to impose any sanctions not otherwise prohibited by law.

It seems the first amendment does not go far enough protecting free speech both in terms of free speech's value and in terms of actual social norms (controversial opinions notwithstanding).

[Mikeallison]

@ZAFcorrection

It would be interesting to explore this concept more. For example, if you owned a private club, let's say a gun club, do you think you should be compelled by law to allow someone who is anti-gun to speak at one of the meetings? Or a church be forced to allow a pro-abortion activist to speak to the congregation?

Conversely, should a LGBTQ meeting/convention/whatever be forced to let a Christian speak about the "evils of homosexuality" to them?

[ZAFCorrection]

I would focus on extending it more in that there would be some prohibition on sanctioning or deplatforming people in cases where there is basically no cost in allowing them a platform (i.e. social media). I would be against compelling people to allow people to speak at their events just because there is a real time and money cost there, but I could see some value in it.

I will point out I am not married to the idea. It just seems likely that free speech could use some more protection than is currently afforded legally.

[Mikeallison]

@ZAFCorrection

So the problem lies not with the idea of a separation between private and public space, but more with cost incurred to whoever is hosting the event?

I tend to think of blogs kind of like private property, and in that regard the owner should have the say on who gets to come and speak, or join.

Where it gets tricky is social media...private business so they should be able to decide how to run the show, and yet it has become such a huge part of how we communicate, should they really? Where I'm currently at in my thinking, is that, as a "vital service" they need regulation like a utility. They should provide the platform, as you say, but that's it. No vetting content, except what is unlawful, and no censorship.

[ZAFCorrection]

Ya, I would say it is primarily about the cost. Though, to be clear I am thinking of cost both in terms of money buying goods and services and the time cost of people engaging with the ideas.

This is a little weird because I am invoking a new principle out of nothing, and I am posting as I formulate my thoughts. The big problem I see with modern society, at least in the United States, is no sense or requirement of community. There is some expectation of live-and-let-live (typified by the non-aggression principle) and lending assistance so that people can succeed, with the extreme case being social justice. But people can do both of those things well and still be absolute terrors to one another. There is no expectation that anyone is going to listen to you, be empathetic, or demonstrate any concern at all, and I think the result of this is that people are silo-ing up and loneliness is extremely high.

I guess the source of the problem is that the small social structures (e.g. towns, tribes) that were previously in place have generally been eliminated or marginalized by the dominant culture, we are all on Dunbar's number overload, and nothing exists to fill in the gap. Thus, I would propose some measures to push people to act in a more community-minded manner. A prohibition on exiling people for saying annoying things might be a good start.

[Jason]

The formation of groups based on shared interests was essential to the development of the country. This is the best book I have read on it.

http://bowlingalone.com

Belonging to a forum such as ERE is essential to the health of society as people thirst for community. As we have seen in recent years, if groups do not start organically, big ass Koch money will create the groups for us, giving them the appearance that they have started organically.

That being said, JLF has to the best of his abilities created a platform for rational and moral discourse, the basis of free speech i.e. euphemistically calling your opponent an asshole through an informed dissection of his erroneous views and when you are done, grabbing an ale and if you really hit it off, letting him sleep with one of your slave girls.

[7Wannabe5]

Thus, I would propose some measures to push people to act in a more community-minded manner. A prohibition on exiling people for saying annoying things might be a good start.

I would be careful about romanticizing the level of acceptance of free speech, thought, or behavior to be found in the smaller communities of yesterday. You might add "Main Street" by Sinclair Lewis (1920) and "Peyton Place" by Grace Metalious (1956) to your reading list. I spent the last 3 years of high school in a semi-rural conservative community, in the decade prior to wide-spread adoption of the internet. I clung to Lewis Lapham's editorial pieces in Harper's magazine like a life preserver during that era.

I would also like to thank Jacob for allowing this forum, which was conceived for a more specific purpose, to function as a well-moderated salon. And I apologize for my occasional loss of control of boundaries of good taste, as well as my frequent loss of control of punctuation.

[jacob]

So the problem lies not with the idea of a separation between private and public space, but more with cost incurred to whoever is hosting the event?

I tend to think of blogs kind of like private property, and in that regard the owner should have the say on who gets to come and speak, or join.

Yes, this.

There's definitely more to it than just paying the rent/hosting costs. The way I see it is that you're essentially coming into my virtual house and are allowed to write graffiti on the walls. Because I live here, there's a limit (my Overton window) to what kind of scribbles I'll accept on my walls. When we're talking about free speech here, it's only free in that it doesn't cost you guys anything to post something but it's not free in the sense that you guys can post anything you want. For example, Jason is not allowed to say "tits and ass" in my house because I have to balance the value-add of that with the occasional school tour to learn about ERE. (Not because the kids don't say worse things .. but because the teacher/parents wouldn't allow the tour in the first place because they like to pretend otherwise.) Also after 4 long threads of stupid---no one is allowed to post climate change denial URLs either unless they quickly demonstrate a basic level of physics. (Hence, the forum rule about misinformation). Stuff like that, so there are limits. I should also note that it's hard to set up these limits in advance because it's hard to know what kind of problems might appear.

Some years ago, the culture of reddit was going down drain because parts of it had been taken over by shitposting (alt-)right wingers. This was not good for reddit and they had to do a lot of cleaning up. An internet culture (such as ERE) is a complex system and it's created in a very path-dependent way. Thus one can't just cut out the bad parts and expect it to go back to what it was. Once the piss is in the pool ... and all that. Maintaining the system is thus more like keeping a garden with constant weeding. If you let it go, it's very hard to get it back.

Since the election of the [invidious and divisive] Trump administration, maintaining order on the forum has been like steering a ship through a storm. I can't wait until this is over #FML. I didn't know that we had MMM-refugees here, but now some things make sense. It would not surprise me that MMM has some ERE-refugees as well. Right after Trump won (Nov/Dec 2016), the extreme right suddenly felt legitimized in terms of saying certain things that was previously socially sanctioned. We got our first white supremacist (definitely outside my Overton window) on the forum. A few longterm (minority) forum members either outright left or stopped logging in. So that's an example of another cost: A neonazi shows up in your "house", but he's well-behaved, so you can't really kick him out because all your rules are based on behavior rather than being. Still his hanging around causes other people to leave. It is on the other hand also hard to have a "just society" if you make rules about "being" because where does that end. Well, what happened in practice was that the guy got doxxed and left. I was not happy about the doxxing, but I was glad he left.

Well, the chaos continued. I don't recall exactly what started it but in the beginning of 2017 there was one outrageous political disaster after an other. Most forum activity was political and the whole FIRE/ERE thing took a backseat. The pendulum swung to the left and several active members on the right went on hiatus and stopped posting for a several months. After a while they came back. Then Charlottesville happened and things exploded again. I eventually had to lock the thread down after the usual sniping of personal attacks didn't work. As a result, we lost some active members on the left. The pendulum swung to the right.

So apparently what might have happened is that FIRE forums may have sorted themselves into vague bubbles according to red/blue colors and how tight people prefer the moderation/the size of the bubbles. I've been specifically told by [some] X that they won't come back as long as [some] Y are still around ... and vice versa. As long as those attitudes persist, the bubbles will persist. The situation in 2017 was kinda fluid, but now I think it's crystallized.

What was interesting to me and the sole reason there's a political forum here (politics is banned on both early-retirement and bogleheads --- both forums are older and therefore maybe wiser than mine in terms of moderation) was to see a civil exchange between different opinions. This is why I deliberately stretched my Overton window outside of my comfort zone. I do not like the result (opinions/thoughts are less diverse than they used to be), though, but I don't see how I can steer it back.

[Jason]

For example, Jason is not allowed to say "tits and ass" in my house

Oh, man, having to sit there as a child while they explained to my parents why they were sending me home before the birthday cake was served.

[prognastat]

@jacob

I wouldn't take it too hard, I think you've done a relatively good job at it within the frame of still allowing political discussion. I don't really feel the need to be in an echo chamber politically and I don't think we truly are as apparently both BRUTE and I were banned from MMM, but have respectfully been able to disagree on various topics here. I would still probably be posting at MMM if it weren't for the ban despite most of their community being pretty extreme left right now as I do value differing opinions and people being able to discuss and argue them as long as it remains respectful. Though the members of this forum definitely skew more towards the libertarian side of the scale we do still have a variety of people both with left and right wing positions and people in the middle.

I feel that as far as politics is considered it needs to kind of be an all or nothing approach, either no politics at all or you have to make sure moderation isn't coming from a politically biased perspective and just making sure everyone is staying respectful of everyone else. There are downsides to the no politics position of course as FIRE/ERE does intersect with politics at times with things such as healthcare, insurance, taxes etc.

The one thing I don't like is how you can tell moderators actively ignoring people denigrating and insulting right winger/trump voters on MMM now while at the same time a right winger responds to this treatment they get warnings and bans and even just calling them out on this behaviour from the mods gets you banned.

[Riggerjack]

@ Jacob

As one who has disagreed with your moderation policy in the past, (unsurprisingly, I'm a free speech absolutist) I think you have done everything about right, here. We have gone through a cultural change, that caused people to cling more tightly to clan identity.

The current climate can't last, and I don't think anything has crystallized. The alarms only work so long. (What's the terror watch color today? Indigo with a pink stripe?) When Trump is in his 3rd year, after midterms, and everyone is rallying around proposed replacements, this will seem like the overreacting hysteria it is.

We are where we are. And people will do what they do. But even if we all had only the one spectrum, and we sorted ourselves out perfectly, people change and grow, and move from group to group. If we leave room, the diversity of opinions will widen again on it's own.

In the meantime, I will try to make your job less difficult, from my end.


And towards that end, maybe I should pop over to MMM and see how this banning thing works. I feel like a boy scout missing a merit badge.

[prognastat]

@ffj

I know in the time there before I got banned I saw a few people that didn't agree with the political bent get banned and some just seemed to disappear where I'm not sure if they ended up getting banned or leaving as some others DMed me to let me know they were giving up and leaving. I had definitely noticed the difference in moderation when it came to left wing insults towards the right wing and vice versa.

I went over and took a look at their forum(from another device as they seem to have banned my MAC address too) the other day and it took me looking at 2 topics before I found one containing a reply that outright disparaged those with right wing beliefs and it took 7 days before any moderator addressed it with a mild warning, while I could see other moderators had replied to the same topic without moderating it for those 7 days.

[Kriegsspiel]

I wonder how many posts ffj would have to make at MMM before he's banned.

ETA: HAHAHAHAH, I had a feels that I knew which poster you were quoting, and I was RIGHT, fuck yea! I have The Sight; time to go buy a lottery ticket.

[Riggerjack]

Rigger jack wouldn't last ten minutes.

Honestly? I didn't. I posted there a bit, years ago. But MMM forum posters are only slightly different from YouTube commenters. No room for ideas there. Lots of social signalling, "me too", and dog piling. It was like the online version of Starbucks. I have no idea what it's like now.

As for the Banned, I think it's not just right, to ban you, it's justice.

Internet forums are communities of sorts, and there needs to be a way to define that community. Banning people is as effective as any other way of community definition, and takes less effort. What has really opened my eyes to this is years of watching Jacob work. He brings a maturity and neutrality to the job that are hard to select for, and rare. I can't fault other sites for not living up to the same standard. Hell, I can't live up to that standard.

But if there's a theme here, it's that ideas can be explored. I am just in the last year or so catching on to how hard that theme is to moderate, when so many people are driven by consensus, and the need for factionalism.

Finding people willing to do the work of moderator, and CAN do the work of a moderator, without abusing the position, has to be one of the consistently difficult headaches after setting up a forum. That someone is abusing that power shouldn't be a surprise. Since it is, I think that is an indication that the system is working.

That said, I have enjoyed your posts. But the low cost of entry to forums means there is a low cost to exit, and exile. That's the world, if you don't like the rules, be sure to post a link to your forum, where the rules are different. In the meantime, I will post here.

[prognastat]

@Riggerjack

I understand that, though I would say based on MMMs blogposts it would seem that although he is definitely left wing and very pro-environmentalist that he tries to keep his blog as one open to people with diverse politics both left and right wing for the most part. Unfortunately, it seems he no longer plays any real role in the moderation of the forums and as such the mods have taken over the direction the forums are taking rather than the admin MMM himself which leads to a disconnect between the portrayal of the MMM mindset/community on the blog and that on the forums.

There is also of course understanding the rules and then having the rules applied in an inconsistent and politically biased way which is a corruption of those very rules.

[jacob]

@Riggerjack - In MMM's defense, his forum is so huge he has to delegate. I used to delegate and so we had many moderators---basically anyone who had a few hundred posts would be promoted. However, after an early incident, it blew up. Something got moderated when it might not/should not have happened(*). So since then every "kill" decision has been mine and mine alone. However, I don't think I would be able to handle a post-flow of MMM's magnitude. I suspect that's also why the large boglehead and early-retirement forums have converged on not allowing politics at all. Like not even a hint of it.

(*) And I realize that I get some leeway in terms of mistakes because it's my house. Insofar it's a special talent, I would not be able to apply it with the same effectiveness on other forums. IOW, it's embedded in the system.

Another case in point ... you've been around long enough to see what happens if I go on a laptop free vacation for more than a few days. The odds of some thread exploding in my absence is about 50/50.