The ongoing X and Elon Musk Transgressions Thread

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Wastedyouth

If you want unlimited freespeech, spend a day or two on the chans (or 8kun if it was still running).

Unmoderated freespeech has fostered mass-killers, Qanon and some of the most vile #### ever created.

I think I've made my position pretty clear. If it is criminal ie: Child Porn, Murder Ideation, Organizing Riots that cause Millions in property damage.... of course, I am not talking the extreme elements. And I have made that clear.

However, if you want to use extremes, so can I.

If given two choices.

A) Moderated and censored speech at the whim of a governing body.

B) Unadulterated, no holds barred free speech.

I'm taking B every time.

I am not worried about, and have the capacity to ignore the minority of nut jobs. I am not personally going to stand on roof stops spewing hate and racism. I will continue wondering through life just treating everyone as an equal, on their merits of being a human being. What others do is not my responsibility. Nor should I have my rights limited, because there are people that choose to not install a filter.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Warren Buffett is a very interesting contrast to Elon Musk in terms of how very wealthy people behave.

Sure.

He seems like a pretty humble guy with an interesting outlook.

And when it comes to business decisions, he is ruthless and will take things to the brink to try and extract every dollar while at the same time avoiding better benefits for his workers. He's just not public, and most people don't even know which companies he owns so nobody complains.

Warren Buffett and BNSF have been at the center of railroad workers’ demands since last April, when railroad union members protested outside the first in-person annual meeting of Berkshire Hathaway shareholders in over two years in Buffett’s hometown of Omaha, demanding pay increases and better working conditions.

Earlier this week, Dennis Pierce, a top negotiator representing railroad unions, accused BNSF and Union Pacific of holding up progress, specifically where attendance and sick leave policies were concerned. BNSF responded to the accusations by calling Pierce’s claim “categorically false.”

“During the pandemic, Mr. Buffett became $36 billion richer. He must ensure that rail workers receive decent wages and safe working conditions,” Sanders wrote in a Tuesday tweet.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/reall...195334669.html

With a quick Google search you can find many other examples of anti-worker practices by Berkshire companies.

But for some reason people think he's a 'better' billionare than the rest.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Wastedyouth

I shut down my Twitter account today.

I just dont see the point of it anymore. It was already trash before, but at least if you only followed people you wanted to, you could curate out the garbage.

Elon has taken a troubled, yet useful tool, and turned it into a dumpster fire.

lol, it was the same dumpster fire before Musk bought it. The fact that you suddenly think it got 'worse' is hilarious.

[JohnnyB]

~~The year is 2025. The American house and senate are both Republican, and Donald Trump is in office. Tik Tok has been banned. Meta, Google, and Reddit are facing regulations that will restrict freedom of publishing political speech on their platforms. Still nobody cares about LinkedIn. Twitter is the favored platform of the party of Trump and requires all users to verify using their real identity with government ID and acceptance of liability for speech that violates the platforms standards for harm as judged by their own internal panel. Kanye is the Secretary of Commerce. Joe Rogan is Secretary of Education. Elon is hailed as an industrial hero of the MAGA movement and has been given a new role with responsibility for innovation in the DHS, Energy, and the Space Force. America is reducing defense spending and redirecting hundreds of billions of dollars into equipment for mining the moon and for terraforming Mars. The companies receiving the contracts for this are co-invested by Elon and Kushner.~~

Not saying this will happen, but given all the #### we've seen in recent years I don't know if anyone would actually still be really shocked to find this is where our timeline is headed.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by pylon

Yes and no...LOL.

I don't believe anyone should be told what they can and cannot say. Nobody shouldn't be censored in the first place. Obviously there are limitations. Trump incited a riot, and we all know it. He should be held accountable. He and his minions yelled fire in a crowded theater essentially. If you say something so stupid and offensive you dig your own grave, so be it. As Kanye did. That's good cancel culture.

My issue is with how far cancel culture went. I do disagree with people having their lives ruined because they simply don't agree with something. Have a different or opposing view. Or have a moment of weakness and say one stupid sentence in their life's journey. But once the SJW mob decides your time is up.... you don't have a chance.

I think a good example is Jordan Peterson. Say what you want about the guy, but he's made it clear his issue with C16 never had anything to do with the Trans community, it was with compelled speech component. They didn't exactly 'cancel' him per se, as he has quite the audience and wealth now. But he was driven from his chosen profession as a result of his opinion and holding his ground on an issue.

Yeah, it's already been said by a few people, but if you're going to try to find/use an example of someone who was cancelled just because they had a different opinion, Jordan Peterson isn't the hill to die on.
1) He very much is transphobic, he has made that very clear
2) The entire premise of his beef with C16 was completely wrong, there was no compelled speech component. He knew this, and he completely/deliberately misrepresented the whole thing so he could make is bad faith argument about what the bill represented/actually did
3) He wasn't cancelled/driven away by the university, he continued to teach his crappy classes and spout whatever he wanted for quite some time. He quit, in no small part (and in his own words) because because students (other than white, heterosexual, males) generally decided for themselves that they didn't want to listen to someone preaching a bunch garbage. He essentially got tired of students exercising their right to free speech by telling him they didn't want to listen to him.

Hell you even say yourself he wasn't canceled. He essentially took his ball and went home. Freaking snowflake that he is.

[Erick Estrada]

I liked this thread a lot better when we were having a good time laughing at Musk.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by pylon

I think I've made my position pretty clear. If it is criminal ie: Child Porn, Murder Ideation, Organizing Riots that cause Millions in property damage.... of course, I am not talking the extreme elements. And I have made that clear.

However, if you want to use extremes, so can I.

If given two choices.

A) Moderated and censored speech at the whim of a governing body.

B) Unadulterated, no holds barred free speech.

I'm taking B every time.

I am not worried about, and have the capacity to ignore the minority of nut jobs. I am not personally going to stand on roof stops spewing hate and racism. I will continue wondering through life just treating everyone as an equal, on their merits of being a human being. What others do is not my responsibility. Nor should I have my rights limited, because there are people that choose to not install a filter.

That’s great for adult, life-experience-under-his-belt pylon. How would adolescent-brained pylon have dealt with a world of Andrew Tate and Joe Rogan worshippers?

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Wastedyouth

For someone who hates Cancel Culture so much, you have no clear idea what it is or isn't.

Please define it so we can understand what you actually think it is.

Jordan Peterson's stupid Facebook ads and face still pop up in all social media no matter my consistent reporting of his stupidity.

What, exactly, has been cancelled about him?

Did I in any capacity defend Jordan Peterson as a person? "Say what you want about the guy...." is a pretty clear indication of I really don't hold him in reverence. That doesn't change the fact he was ostracized, at the time, for challenging the narrative. And having a mob of teenagers shreiking in his face. That's not a civil way to challenge someone.

I have zero doubt that there is a community of people suffering gender dysphoria. I can't imagine the pain and confusion. And my heart bleeds for people suffering in the trans community.

[Wastedyouth]

Originally Posted by pylon

I think I've made my position pretty clear. If it is criminal ie: Child Porn, Murder Ideation, Organizing Riots that cause Millions in property damage.... of course, I am not talking the extreme elements. And I have made that clear.

However, if you want to use extremes, so can I.

If given two choices.

A) Moderated and censored speech at the whim of a governing body.

B) Unadulterated, no holds barred free speech.

I'm taking B every time.

I am not worried about, and have the capacity to ignore the minority of nut jobs. I am not personally going to stand on roof stops spewing hate and racism. I will continue wondering through life just treating everyone as an equal, on their merits of being a human being. What others do is not my responsibility. Nor should I have my rights limited, because there are people that choose to not install a filter.

You still have not let me know exactly what you think Cancel Culture is. I am trying to understand.

Because as of right now my understanding of your point is:

1) Cancel Culture shouldn't exist, unmoderated free speech is better
2) Free market is when someone is held accountable for what they do or say, but not when its something you agree with, then its "Cancel Culture. Free Market is Kanye's situation (probably because he was talking bad about Jewish people??)
3) Cancel Culture Example Jordan Peterson, who wasn't cancelled, so why is he an example?
4) You believe there are only two options, unmoderated free speech and totalitarian regime, as if there is no gray area between the two that can exist.
5) You don't understand what "Free Speech" is, or what is and isn't a right.

[Roughneck]

Originally Posted by pylon

That doesn't change the fact he was ostracized, at the time, for challenging the narrative. And having a mob of teenagers shreiking in his face. That's not a civil way to challenge someone.

Not everybody is cut out for "unadulterated, no holds barred free speech".

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

The market is rife for a new kind of social network, one that is secure, free of misinformation and bots, and community-driven. Not sure if Mastadon is the answer but I do have faith that the tech community can rally to put something next-generation together.

I am interested in Jack Dorsey's "Bluesky" technology which pivots from platform-adherence to content creation independence, and decentralizes social networking hosting.

Additionally, I think platforms need socially-responsible objectives. Particularly, industry self-regulation and standards implementation across platforms is long overdue. Here is an academic paper by Nina Brown at Syracuse University about the need for such industry regulation and what that might look like: https://scholarship.law.tamu.edu/cgi...text=lawreview

I personally don't think there there is a silver bullet technology to solve all of the social media woes we endure today. It has to be a combination of things, and the will to 'do better' from users, corporations, governments, and institutions alike.

I'm not sure how this can easily be solved. In the olden days we always had freedom of speech but what we didn't have was freedom of reach.

There was always the crazy arsehole in the town square yelling from his soap box but he would have limited reach and paranoid delusions and hate speech would not proliferate and be shared as easily.

At the same time, public discourse about important information was driving by journalists who had to earn their respect, had to abide by fairness doctrines in objective reporting, had editors and teams to ensure objectivity, etc. This is the golden age of investigative reporters and trusted news anchors . Your wacky aunt would tune into and trust Cronkite, Murrow, Brinkley, and Jennings versus some basement dwelling conspiracy theorist on her social media feed. Those malicious voices couldn't reach her to deceive her into believing all the objective journalists were peddling fake news.

With Twitter, you have to constantly police bots and then you get these idiots complaining that being fact-checked or banned is limiting their first amendment rights. I think to get to a socially responsible platform, you need to get back to the part where certain people have earned respect and trustworthiness and the community overall can overpower the voices of the nutjobs and scheming politicians rather than silence them.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Azure

Sure.

He seems like a pretty humble guy with an interesting outlook.

And when it comes to business decisions, he is ruthless and will take things to the brink to try and extract every dollar while at the same time avoiding better benefits for his workers. He's just not public, and most people don't even know which companies he owns so nobody complains.


https://finance.yahoo.com/news/reall...195334669.html

With a quick Google search you can find many other examples of anti-worker practices by Berkshire companies.

But for some reason people think he's a 'better' billionare than the rest.

You’re probably right. I just picked the first billionaire that wasn’t being an outrageous jerk. He ranked less of a dink above Bezos and Gates in my mind so I just went with Buffett.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

I'm not sure how this can easily be solved. In the olden days we always had freedom of speech but what we didn't have was freedom of reach.

There was always the crazy arsehole in the town square yelling from his soap box but he would have limited reach and paranoid delusions and hate speech would not proliferate and be shared as easily.

When I read this, the first thing that went through my mind was "Larry Heather has entered chat".

[photon]

Anyone who has been banned from Twitter still has all the free speech afforded them by the laws of where they live.

Any private property has the ability to limit speech as Musk is demonstrating now.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by pylon

I think I've made my position pretty clear. If it is criminal ie: Child Porn, Murder Ideation, Organizing Riots that cause Millions in property damage.... of course, I am not talking the extreme elements. And I have made that clear.

However, if you want to use extremes, so can I.

If given two choices.

A) Moderated and censored speech at the whim of a governing body.

B) Unadulterated, no holds barred free speech.

I'm taking B every time.

I am not worried about, and have the capacity to ignore the minority of nut jobs. I am not personally going to stand on roof stops spewing hate and racism. I will continue wondering through life just treating everyone as an equal, on their merits of being a human being. What others do is not my responsibility. Nor should I have my rights limited, because there are people that choose to not install a filter.

I think it's important to remember the history of laws around the internet, as that puts the current climate into a bit of context.

Social media companies are generally exempted from the responsibilities that traditional publishers have in terms of what they disseminate. The idea being, the chilling effect on free speech that would result from making social media companies liable for what users post would cause more harm than the benefit it might provide (less illegal content, less hate speech, etc.).

Like, if a newspaper published the things that get posted every day on social media, they'd be sued into bankruptcy. Look at Alex Jones. He was civilly liable for spreading lies, and that's not cancel culture or political correctness gone too far; that's straight up slander/libel. But there are innumerable posts on social media saying the exact same things, but the companies aren't held responsible because they're exempted from liability.

But the corollary of that exemption is the sort of tacit expectation that these companies will make a good faith attempt to moderate their content in a relatively neutral way to avoid straying into that territory. So when a social media company wants to get away from that, to a large degree they're trying to have it both ways. They want to provide unadulterated free speech, but then they also want the legal protection from the liability of what that results in.

[Yeah_Baby]

*waits patiently for pylon to back themself into a transmedicalist position*

[JohnnyB]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1589727781428101127

[Yeah_Baby]

Ah yes, the Facebook 'pivot to video' method

[Azure]

His drum banging and everyone's outrage is obviously going to generate interest.

User growth means nothing though if you can't monetize it properly.

Also, wouldn't trust it for one second that the signups weren't bots. He was complaining for months that the bot count was higher than stated, and now suddenly this user growth is ACTUAL users? Right.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Wormius

That’s great for adult, life-experience-under-his-belt pylon. How would adolescent-brained pylon have dealt with a world of Andrew Tate and Joe Rogan worshippers?

I grew up very fast and was 100% on my own at 17. I was an adult before I was an adult and putting food in my mouth and paying my rent was my only priority. Full on survival mode. I was working 15-18 hours a day from 17-20. So I did not have your typical young mans life. And we didn't have the same outside influences. So I honestly couldn't compare as that was the early 90's. It is however a good question. That being said, I've never been easily influenced by anyone. I'm a pretty free thinker and it takes A LOT to persuade me.

However, I do listen to Joe Rogan a lot. Not as much for Joe Rogan, but moreso for some of his guests. I love the conversations where he's the dumb guy in the room, just looking for answers. I think the guy can be a total buffoon, but I also like some of the questions the guy is willing to ask, that some people would be too scared to.

Same goes for Fox News. I love wandering over there to see the polar opposite take to... pretty much everyone else. LOL.

I think anyone is selling themselves short if they are completely willing to tune out 100% of the people they disagree with, and follow the people they do, relegating themselves to Tik Tok sound bites of the bad guys. Both sides do it. And both sides should listen a little more to other takes. I personally don't like to form opinions with just one side of the argument presented.

Again, I think Jordan Peterson is another good example. Some of his takes really suck and lack empathy. However I do also agree with his assertion we are raising a lost generation of young men, and that masculinity shouldn't be automatically labelled as toxic.

Sometimes you have to sift through a lot of coal, to find a diamond. And it goes both ways.