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News Aggregator Fark Adds Misogyny Ban
An anonymous reader writes The news aggregator Fark is ancient in dot com terms. Users submit news links to the privately run site and tear it — and each other — to pieces in the discussion threads. (Sound familiar?) While the site isn't as popular as during the early 2000s, the privately run discussion forum has continued and has its champions. site operator Drew Curtis announced today that Gifs, references, jokes and comments involving sexism will be deleted. "Adam Savage once described to me the problem this way: if the Internet was a dude, we'd all agree that dude has a serious problem with women. We've actually been tightening up moderation style along these lines for awhile now, but as of today, the FArQ will be updated with new rules reminding you all that we don't want to be the He Man Woman Hater's Club. This represents enough of a departure from pretty much how every other large internet community operates that I figure an announcement is necessary."
Given how bare-knuckled Fark can be, is it time? Overdue?
Given how bare-knuckled Fark can be, is it time? Overdue?
A lot of things run counter to typical internet culture on Fark. You can't even curse on that site. It has moved away from porn. People actually pay for membership. They do IRL meetups almost every week somewhere in the world. They've been pretty successful at banning memes in the past.
I find it more witty than harsh.
Textbooks and Open Educational Resources
It's a very US American thing to pretend that the only valid position against homophobia is the dogma that sexual orientation is 100% genetically determined. Instead of "Fuck your hateful god and his moral law" they say "I'm sorry if my life is an abomination, I can't help it, I was born this way". I think this is a reactionary biologistic position. It devalues my conscious choice, in my case in my early teens, to become gay. I'd rather tell young people that what you are isn't set in stone and that what makes life worth living is to experiment and invent yourself, sexually and otherwise.
While surely this could have been worded differently for clarity and to lighten the offense, I don't believe its flamebait (just a bit misguided).
I disagree with the post in that it's not just liberals that want to control people's mind, it's an establishment problem that relates to people in office/power and not just liberals. Half of waking up is to notice the corruption, the other half is to start broadening your view to ensure you are getting the full picture.
When the News is manipulated to give you a specific opinion, that is mind control. For example, everyone in the US is under the belief that Iran is evil, hell bent on destroying Israel, and bent on world domination. They have a larger military than most countries in the region, yet have not invaded anyone in over 200 years. Assad from Syria is painted as a horrible dictator today, yet prior to the revolt in Libya, US media repeatedly claimed that Syria was the most progressive country in the Middle East. You won't hear about the Saudi Arabian police killing people for speaking out against the government, or putting a women in jail for driving in US media. Ignore the slave labor problems in Dubai and UAE. Those guys are our friends, so we have TV specials showing you how great they are and fire journalists that cover a story that is not favorable.
You will also hear intentionally manipulated "news" to ensure that you have a biased opinion and reaction. Zimmerman/Martin is an easy example, and on the surface the Ferguson MO is another. OWS was just a bunch of bums, they were not demanding accountability for criminal acts by executives. And when protesters are too big of a nuisance, send in agent provocateurs. I'm sure you remember that during the Oakland OWS protests which turned violent the majority of protestors arrested for violent confrontation were not from California. (Interesting that similar reports are coming from Ferguson IMHO.)
People may want to (falsely) believe that the only kind of mind control is like the Manchurian candidate, because someone shaped their reality to have that belief. Just like most people associate the word "conspiracy" with insanity and impossible. Not rational when you look at it, we all know conspiracies happen. I'm sure you remember the TV show "Survivor" which was full of people conspiring to win. Yet if I told you that a winner was in a conspiracy you may have difficulty agreeing. People will argue that they plotted or planned and manipulated, very rarely will they agree with the term conspiracy.
Shaping thought is not new, not novel, and not unique. We like to think it only happens to those other guys, but it has been happening here for generations. Further, US Media has been working at demoralizing the USA for a long time (has nothing to do with homophobia or sexism, ask for clarity if you are lost). You don't have to like it, and you can surely ignore that portion of reality, but you can't deny the facts. There is plenty of material to study if you so desire.
Last point so that I'm not writing a novel, is that there is more than one reason for the people in power to do this. If the people in power can keep us arguing with each other about our differences they get to stay in power and gain more power. The Hegelian dialectic is exactly this. Own both sides of the argument so that people line up in the center. Provide a problem so that you can implement a solution you want towards a resolution that you want. Hegel was not the first person to understand this social control method, he was just the first person we know of that wrote down the process.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.