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Twitter Announces (More) Hate-Speech Fighting Tools (Again) (cnn.com)

Building on anti-harassment tools announced in November, Twitter is now "trying to shake its reputation as a haven for online harassment" with still more new internal algorithms and features, reports CNN. An anonymous reader quotes their report: The changes include preventing serial abusers from creating new accounts, a new "safe search" function and blocking potentially abusive and "low-quality" tweets from appearing in conversations, Twitter's engineering chief Ed Ho said in a blog post. Twitter is working on identifying users that have been permanently suspended and prevent them from creating new accounts, Ho said. This new measure specifically targets "accounts that are created only to abuse and harass others," he said, a problem that has long plagued the platform.

The new safe search function prevents tweets that are abusive, or from blocked and muted accounts, from appearing in users' search results. Those tweets can still be found if people want to see them, but they "won't clutter search results any longer," Ho said. And Twitter will now collapse tweet replies that are potentially abusive or low quality -- like duplicate tweets or content that appears to be automated. But those tweets "will still be accessible to those who seek them out," Ho said.

The blog post announces Twitter's ultimate goal is "a significant impact that people can feel," arguing that freedom of speech for all viewpoints is "put in jeopardy when abuse and harassment stifle and silence those voices."

18 of 341 comments (clear)

  1. lets look to the past by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    âoePolitical correctness is America's newest form of intolerance, and it is especially pernicious because it comes disguised as tolerance. It presents itself as fairness, yet attempts to restrict and control people's language with strict codes and rigid rules. I'm not sure that's the way to fight discrimination. I'm not sure silencing people or forcing them to alter their speech is the best method for solving problems that go much deeper than speech.â

    and

    "Political Correctness is fascism pretending to be manners"

    - George Carlin

    1. Re:lets look to the past by quantaman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      âoePolitical correctness is America's newest form of intolerance, and it is especially pernicious because it comes disguised as tolerance. It presents itself as fairness, yet attempts to restrict and control people's language with strict codes and rigid rules. I'm not sure that's the way to fight discrimination.

      This isn't about restricting or controlling people's language or fighting discrimination, it's about stopping harassment.

      Consider criminal law, assuming you don't care about safety or property or anything besides freedom, then what do you want for a set of laws?

      The easy answer is anarchy, but that's wrong because under anarchy a strongman will come in and take your freedom. The laws that give you the most freedom are also going to protect your safety and property, because if others are free to threaten you then you don't have freedom.

      The same applies to speech, giving people the freedom to harass gives them the power to silence.

      --
      I stole this Sig
  2. Doomed by Wuhao · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Twitter wants to have it both ways: it wants to have a big room where they can put in all the liberals and conservatives, all the Islamists and Zionists, and have them talk about whatever is happening in their world... and then it wants them all to get along. It doesn't work that way.

    To put it more technically, Twitter's problem is that, as a social network, it reflects a connected graph of hundreds of millions of people. A lot of those people aren't going to like each other very much. Now they're making themselves responsible for the safety of their users, and that does two really bad things:

    1) It announces that Twitter is presently an unsafe platform, and
    2) It puts them in the middle of whatever fight any two people might have, equipped with no tools to resolve the underlying conflicts that drive those fights, and only their own subjective morals (with all the attendant biases those bring) to resolve them.

    Twitter is at war with itself here.

    1. Re:Doomed by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Twitter wants to have it both ways: it wants to have a big room where they can put in all the liberals and conservatives, all the Islamists and Zionists, and have them talk about whatever is happening in their world... and then it wants them all to get along. It doesn't work that way.

      If Twitter's actions of late are any indication, it would be more accurate to say that it wants to put everyone in a big room where only the SJW/liberal voices are allowed to talk and everyone else sits quietly out of fear of being banned like Milo.

      There is no such thing as one-way freedom of speech. If you're telling someone else that their speech is hate speech and therefore not allowed, you're ultimately hurting your own freedom just as much as theirs. As Robespierre could warn you, the rules and laws you make to oppress others today will be turned against you tomorrow.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  3. Hate Speech by _KiTA_ · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Let me give you an example of "Hate Speech" that I have been harassed and attacked over saying, including on this very website.

    "There are only two genders. Male and Female."

    Which pretty much sums up the problem with fighting "hate speech." The regressive left has co-opted and twisted the meaning of the already meaningless term "hate speech" -- along with other terms like "racism" or "nazi" -- to the point that they've lost all semblance of meaning.

    But "Twitter announces more [UnAmerican Political Censorship] tools (Again.)" doesn't have the same kick to it, I guess.

    1. Re: Hate Speech by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      Ars Technica recently banned over 30 users because they referred to Bradley Manning as "him". No trolling, insults, or even hostility. Just using the wrong word.

      SJW is a mental illness and a plague. They are fascists in the literal meaning of the word.

  4. The real brownshirts propagate on Twitter by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    After banning (and shadowbanning) quite a lot of Trump supporters, it seems like the Brownshirt alliance of Anti-Trump fascists is now only allowed to persist, but to prosper.

    Ask the people in Berkely who just wanted to hear Milo Yannopolis speak but were assaulted with flagpoles instead just who are the violent brownshirts of today...

    But I guess you consider it OK to beat women with flagpoles because they are just Trump supporters, right?

    Watch that video, I dare you to come back and say that Trump supporters are the brownshirts.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  5. What will SJW allow? by AHuxley · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Blasphemy reporting about a faith or cults reaction to cartoons? No cartoons posted, links to cartoons? SJW approved news sites about cartoons that might show cartoons then also get banned?
    Communist party officials don't like been reminded of any terms surrounding Tiananmen Square and the use of numbers like 1989?
    Whats left on the site that teams of SJW approve of?
    Celebrities posting about events or their new projects? Only happy movie reviews are allowed by teams of SJW?
    Governments posting "fictional" accounts of tourism in their repressive nations?
    No mention of human rights issues or import/export deals to support wars?
    SJW approved officials promoting their city or town projects can be helped to trend?
    People posting real news or comments about such policies are removed and reported to their own governments?
    Everyone fun or interesting expecting freedom of speech and freedom after speech will just follow the fun people to real US sites offering real freedoms.
    Been banned and reported on by gov workers from other nations, by SJW and other groups does not make interesting people want to stay with any brand offering social media.
    Censorship by a SJW in the name of a faith, gov, political party is not a selling point that attracts users.

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  6. Re:limitations of the platform by hackwrench · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I was writing a lengthy response that contained observations and conjectures about social media, when I hit upon one important factor. For some reason YouTube and Twitter seem to have sort of "media darlings", and that factor more than any other seems to indicate whether harassment happens.

  7. Re: The funny thing about protection... by hackwrench · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't really care for the content of that post to be protected, but I know that if I start drawing lines, it will only encourage people to draw lines that endanger speech that I think should be protected.

  8. Death threats against Trump are fine by walterbyrd · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think there is still an #assassinatetrump tag.

    Thousands of such threats are posted all the time.

    On the hand, Twitter has recently disabled the account of a cartoonist, with 1.3 million followers, because he offended a feminist.

    Any kind of anti-white hate is fine. Okay for Muslims to post hateful tweets against Jews, or anybody else, but it is not okay to offend Muslims.

  9. Re: The funny thing about protection... by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't really care for the content of that post to be protected, but I know that if I start drawing lines, it will only encourage people to draw lines that endanger speech that I think should be protected.

    Oh, it's protected. It's just not protected in my fucking house. Or in Twitter's fucking house.

    And the person posting that does not have a right to demand there are no consequences. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  10. Escalation of Terms to Justify Censorship by Kunedog · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Disagreement is now harrassment.
    Mockery is now hate speech.
    Offense is now trauma.
    Criticism is now abuse.
    Compelling criticism is now violence.
    Anyone who talks about subjects the MSM wants to suppress is now a troll.
    Anyone at random is a racist/sexist/white supremacist/nazi/etc if they say so.

    The use of this alarmist (and usually, simply wrong) language is ubiquitous and deliberate. It's all a pretense to justify a disproportionate censorial "response," especially when they know no response is warranted at all. It's also a brazenly transparent tactic, especially since Twitter/Reddit/etc rarely seem to use it against users that properly align with their politics.

    This video is an excellent illustration of how the media lies about "online abuse" (and how even the crumbs that are true are exaggerated for false impact):
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    P.S. It's also entertaining as Hell cuz Milo's a riot.

    1. Re:Escalation of Terms to Justify Censorship by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

      He's so full of self hate now that he's even become homophobic?

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  11. Re: Left and further left by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Right means conservative. Left means liberal. Conservative means "let's do the things we have always done." Liberal means "let's change how we do everything"

    That has never really been true, and it certainly isn't true today, when many liberals want go back to the social policies of the 1960s and the economic policies of the 1950s.

    I think the main difference between right and left is not the policies, but the justification for the policies. The right justifies their policies by saying they are good for the country, while the left says their policies are good for the citizens. The actual policies are not that different. Donald and Bernie have much more in common with each other than either has with moderates.

  12. Re: Point proven by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Funny

    Umm... your point being?

    Yes, there are animals that can change their gender. In the end, you still have two distinct genders among them. They don't create a new gender that does ... what exactly during procreation? Watch and rate the act?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  13. Re: Left and further left by buck-yar · · Score: 3, Informative

    1791 - The Democratic-Republican Party is formed by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson against Alexander Hamilton’s Federalist Party. The Democratic-Republicans strongly opposed government overreach and expansion, the creation of a national bank, and corruption.
    1804 - Andrew Jackson purchases the plantation that will become his primary source of wealth.
    1824 - The Democratic-Republican Party split. The new Democrats were supported by Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren, and the National Republicans were supported by John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay.
    1828 - Andrew Jackson is elected President of the United States.
    1830 - Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act, whereby the Cherokee and other native tribes were to be forcibly removed from their lands.
    1831 - Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, whereby the Supreme Court ruled that Cherokee Nation was sovereign and the U.S. had no jurisdiction over Cherokee lands. Andrew Jackson had already started to enforce the removal of the Choctaw.
    1832-33 - The Whig Party is formed in opposition to Jackson’s government expansion and overreach in the Nullification Crisis and the establishment of a Second National Bank. The Whig Party successfully absorbs the National Republican Party.
    1838 - Many Indian tribes had been forcibly removed. Under Jackson, General Winfield Scott and 7,000 soldiers forced the Cherokee from their land at bayonet point while their homes were pillaged. They marched the Cherokee more than 1,200 miles to the allocated Indian territory. About 5,000 Cherokee died on the journey due to starvation and disease.
    1854 - The Whig Party dissolves over the question of the expansion of slavery. Anti-slavery Whigs and anti-slavery democrats form the Republican Party with their sole goal being to end slavery.
    1861 -The election of President Lincoln spurs the beginning of the Civil War.
    1862 - Lincoln writes a letter where he declares he wishes to preserve the union regardless of the morals on slavery. He issues the Emancipation Proclamation, whereby all slaves in Union territories had to be freed. As states came under Union control, those slaves too had to be freed.
    1863 - Frederick Douglass, former slave and famous Republican abolitionist, meets with Lincoln on the suffrage of emancipated slaves.
    1864 - Lincoln revised his position on slavery in a letter to Albert G. Hodges stating “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.”
    1865 - Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders at the Appomattox Courthouse to Union victory. After Lincoln’s Assassination, Democrat President Johnson issues amnesty to rebels and pardons the slave owners of their crimes.
    1865 - The 13th Amendment which ended slavery passed with 100% Republican support and 63% Democrat support in congress.
    1866 - The Klu Klux Klan is formed by Confederate veterans to intimidate black and Republicans through violence, lynching, and public floggings. They gave open support to the Democrat Party.
    1866 - The Civil Rights Act of 1866 is vetoed by Democratic President Andrew Johnson. Every single Republican voted and overturned the veto.
    1868 - The 14th Amendment which gave citizenship to freed slaves passed with 94% Republican support and 0% Democrat support in congress. The first grand wizard of the KKK, Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest is honored at the
    1968 Democratic National Convention.
    1868 - Representative James Hinds who taught newly freedmen of their rights is murdered by the KKK.
    1870 - The 15th Amendment which gave freed slaves the right to vote passed with 100% Republican support and 0% Democrat support in congress.
    1871 - The violence of the KKK grew so savage that congress passed the Enforcement Acts to repress their influence.
    1875 - Democrat Senator William Saulsbury speaks out against the Civil RIghts Act of 1875, claiming it will allow “colored men shall sit at the same table beside the white guest; that he shall enter the same parlor and take his seat beside the wife and daughter of the white man, whether

  14. Re: Left and further left by racerx509 · · Score: 4, Informative

    You seemed to have left out the Southern Strategy and the War on Drugs, which went a long way towards splitting the parties.

    Conveniently towards the end of your timeline, Nixon during his 1968 campaign appealed to many dixiecrats who were upset about the passage of the civil rights act, stating it was a form of government encroachment on their lives. This in turn led to a party shift where former dixiecrats turned republicans and in time, the former republicans turned progressive. Once the parties flipped, you've got the War on Drugs for the 1970s and 1980s that heavily criminalized communities of color and anti-war liberals. Or as John Erlichman said it "We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news,"

    Blacks, who were outright demonized by the right, turned to the left, which accepted them because who would not turn down the free vote. The left still treats black voters in a passive-agressive manner, knowing they can reliably count on the black vote, but the relationship is not as antagonistic as what is seen on the right.

    So many right wing people love to crow about how Republicans freed the slaves and were responsible for most progressive legislation early on in this country. All that is true, but the conveniently leave out the part where Nixon and Lee Atwater flipped the parties, and when both Reagan and Bush used race based fear mongering to further drive the republican base whiter and more conservative.

    http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/23/...

    --
    13 year old white supremacists are shitty web designers.