zlacker

>>feross+(OP)
As I've said for a long time, I don't mind moderation, I just want to be in charge of what I see. Give me the tools that the moderators have, let me be able to filter out bots at some confidence level; let me see "removed" posts, banned accounts; don't mess with my searches unless I've asked for that explicitly.

Power to the people.

>>brigan+Ms
I don't think that really deals with beheading videos, incitement to terrorism, campaigns to harass individuals and groups, child porn, and many cases where online communities document or facilitate crimes elsewhere.

>>PaulHo+Wa1
Child porn is illegal. Are beheading videos illegal? Incitement to terrorism is probably a crime (though I'd argue that it should be looked at under the imminent lawless action test[1] as it's speech). So all of these would be removed and are not part of a moderation discussion.

As to "many cases where online communities document or facilitate crimes elsewhere", why criminalise the speech if the action is already criminalised?

That leaves only "Campaigns to harass individuals and groups". Why wouldn't moderation tools as powerful as the ones employed by Twitter's own moderators deal with that?

[1] https://mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/970/incitement-to-i...

>>brigan+fo1
It's the "documentation of the crime" aspect of child pornography that makes it illegal. It is still technically illegal in parts of the US to possess, say, drawn illustrations of pornography featuring minors (what 日本人 call "lolicon") but the legal precedents are such that it can't really be prosecuted.

That is, it's not clear in the US you can ban something on the basis of it being immoral, you need to have the justification that it is "documentation of a crime".

>>PaulHo+at1
What makes child porn illegal is the argument that anyone who views or distributes it is re-abusing the victim. Otherwise, it would be justifiably illegal to create but not to view, possess, or distribute. Yet all are illegal in the USA.

This does not stop the FBI from being a major child porn distributor, despite that meaning the FBI is re-abusing thousands of victims under this rubric.

>>bitwiz+q62
> What makes child porn illegal is the argument that anyone who views or distributes it is re-abusing the victim.

That's what makes it illegal? What if it's done on a private forum that the victim never finds out about? What if the victim is, say, dead? I don't think those change the legality.

>>waterh+1o2
That's the rubric courts and legislatures in the USA have used.

It is, in general, really really difficult to pass speech laws in the USA because of that pesky First Amendment -- even if they're documentation of a crime. Famously, Joshua Moon of Kiwi Farms gleefully hosted the footage from the Christchurch shooting even when the actual Kiwis demanded its removal.

But if you can argue that procurement or distribution of the original material perpetuates the original crime, that is, if it constitutes criminal activity beyond speech -- then you can justify criminalizing such procurement or distribution. It's flimsy (and that makes it prone to potentially being overturned by some madlad Supreme Court in the future with zero fucks to give about the social blowbacks), but it does the job.

In other countries it's easy to pass laws banning speech based on its potential for ill social effects. Nazi propaganda and lolicon manga are criminalized in other countries, but still legal in the USA because they're victimless.

If this makes you wonder whether it's time to re-evaluate the First Amendment -- yes. Yes, it is.

>>bitwiz+1g3
I'm in favor of the First Amendment remaining at least this strong. None of the above things strike me as nearly as dangerous as "the ruling party being able to suppress criticism and opposition by claiming that their opponents' words have potential for ill social effects".