The article contains the questions they asked. The questions are only asking about social media. Specifically whether social media is sufficiently regulated and whether political advertising should be allowed on social media.
It does not mention surveillance, and it's not about tech in general. The title is misleading. (Edit: the OP kindly updated the title and it's no longer misleading)
Note how lots of slicing is provided on a bunch of dimensions except the one that really matters: age groups. Fully willing to bet 60+ is both more likely to answer these surveys and very pro-censorship. If we weighted this survey by remaining life expectancy I bet the results would be inverted.
The youth tend to be much less absolutists for free speech and don't value anonymity as much as the elders of the internet(!), at least that's my observation. They are much more familiar with people who are into all these things for the profits and don't idealise the WWW as the old folks used to. My guess is that they were born in already corrupt world where online professionals were doing everything for money and dirty tricks like rage baiting and astroturfing were already the norm and as a result they don't have a grand mission fantasy about the internet. Also, because they were born in an already online world they don't see the disturbances of trolls as disturbances in their online persona that is a toy for their real persona, they see trolls as trouble makers to their real persona which is fused with their online persona.
Back in the day of forums personal banning wasn't a thing, we had to see everything until someone did something bad enough to be deplatformed from the forum. In the current social media, you can just block people you don't like, you don't have to endure their "content".
The censorship is built-in in modern platforms. I prefer the old ways personally but in the old days the profile of the people was different.
Not people doesn't mean that they must be bots, IMHO it means not people who are having opinions but social media workers or entrepreneurs who are having opinions based on metrics that fulfill their KPI which are often stuff like increase engagement, increase followers, increase revenue, get a talking point into the trends, make people talk about a brand or a politician etc. Many large accounts on Twitter are openly corporate accounts of some social media companies and many others are freelancers.
People are not having concerned citizen ideas 24 hours a day everyday, those are obviously professionals who are having concerns about the society, race, jews etc in order to fulfill some goals. Those are not real people, you won't be able to change their minds with argumentation because they don't speak their mind in first place. That's for Twitter of course, in other places they have other productions like "tradwifes" on Instagram or reviewers on Youtube. They are all businesses or indies trying to become businesses. They all use analytics and do A/B testing to acquire and steer their content ideas to the platforms liking.
The irony is that youth are simulatenously the biggest consumers of (new) social media, and the staunchest haters [EDIT: this is directly contradicted by the research article I found below…]. I can’t find the source so take it with a grain of salt, but I’ve read that something like 80% of TikTok users under some age think they’d be happier if it didn’t exist and/or wish it didn’t exist.
I don’t think this is really an issue of censorship to a lot of people (though that may be how it shakes out in the government) but rather of control over their digital environment and sanity.
EDIT: I don’t think this is what I’m remembering, but it has concrete numbers somewhat lower than I thought (48% of teens think social media harms people their age, but only 14% think it harms them personally) https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2025/04/22/teens-social...
Maybe we should listen to those that have more experience and perspective of living without social media as they can see the difference of having/not having it more clearly?
Interesting, that you equal social media regulation = pro censorship.
Btw every age group over 30 has a majority to imitate Australian model in Germany.
Even lower 30 there is only a small relative majority against it. So no, your hypothesis for Germany
is wrong.
https://www.bild.de/politik/inland/social-media-verbot-deuts...
If you want to say "Enforcing regulation equals censorship", that is fine by me. For many, there could be a difference between them, as they reserve censorship to unjust regulation.
That would be a matter of linguistics, and I can't say which of both definitions is true.
No it is not necessarily. For example forcing to have a chronical timeline on followers would be strong social media regulation but no censorship even in the broadest terms.
From reading the page the study “examines public attitudes social media regulation and banning political advertising from social platforms.”
The question: To what extent, if at all, would you support or oppose banning political adverts from being shown on social media platforms?
They conclude with: Voters for far-right parties are frequently less likely to support banning of political advertising on social media … and less likely to think regulations are too lax … typically less likely to think social media regulations are too relaxed (with Italy being an exception).
> They conclude with: Voters for far-right parties are frequently less likely to support banning of political advertising on social media
Maybe the issue here is that many political options have social media and underground marketing as their only option due to heavy bias and censorship on European traditional media.
Even the term used here "far right" is an euphemism for opinions not approved by governing European regimes.
In European politics, "far right" is a dogwhistle for "anti-imperialist" or "pro-nationalist". It is otherwise a semantic void into which you can pour whatever prejudices you have against the proletariat and be assured that the state and its apparatchiks will happily reward you for airing them as long as you perpetuate the label of "far right" against their designated class enemies.
So what? That changes nothing about their policies and views.
Ernst Röhm was one of the most powerful people in early Nazi Germany and famously gay. And still, the NSDAP brutally and systemically persecuted queer people.
You act as if hypocrisy, bigotry, moral flexibility and opportunism weren't core "virtues" of far right populists.
Yes, that is an opinion you are supposed to have. You are supposed to associate the regime's class enemies with nazis and communists so that their claims can be dismissed without a single rational thought. "They beat up jews and gays!" is a great way to avoid having a difficult conversation about the regime's blatantly hostile policies against their own people.
> It [regime] is used colloquially by some, such as government officials, media journalists, and policy makers, when referring to governments that they believe are repressive, undemocratic, or illegitimate or simply do not square with the person’s own view of the world.
> Even the term used here "far right" is an euphemism for opinions not approved by governing European regimes.
Seriously. We know what far right is. It’s close to mainstream or mainstream in all EU countries. It is not suppressed anywhere, except for the nazi party in Germany. I mean, even AfD, which is as close as it gets, can still present candidates and campaign for them.
And we have plenty of experience of what happens when they come to power. You can stop clutching your pearls.
Yes? The Primae Noctis party would largely be “censored” in current social circles.
The fact that we can use money to saturate the information economy, and create the perception of validity, is a form of market manipulation that is used extensively today. See “Intelligent Design” for a great example of how that was applied in America.
These ideological beach heads are strategized and implemented by media consultants, and media owners. Yet this is protected speech. All the while actual fact checkers, researchers and content moderation efforts are censorial.
This super simplistic interpretation of how speech operates in the modern world is now more abused by attackers, than of explanatory value to defenders.
I would really love if people were somehow more interested in the way modern persuasion techniques are applied. At least that way we would have more interesting conversations on how to have checks and balances that work.
The current government constantly violates the consitution, they are still trying to implement Vorratsdatenspeicherung which was ruled illegal by the constitutional court. The former government tried to change how elections work with the goal of kicking out opposition parties. And for the current elections there still wasn't a needed re-count because the organisation that needs to approve a re-count is the current government themselves. How is any of that in line with the consitution? It's ever only an argument when it's the "side I don't like".
It’s funny when people blame opposition for things regime says they would do if they come to power, but tolerate all autocratic tendencies of the current regime. The self-elected one, as you point out.
Edit: self-approved is better term, since without recount of votes we still don’t know if current regime has a majority.
> Which of actual AfD policies are actually far right?
What about most of them? Just look at who they are teaming with in the European Parliament. Or what they say about themselves. That should give you a hint.
> I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime.
Right. It’s just what (((they))) want you to believe.
> EDIT: I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime.
Well, if you ignore all the evidence you consider inconvenient, you could, you know, read their own self-description as "right wing" and combine that with the observation of them being too right wing for the other right wing parties.
To you edit: Again, you are ignoring the issue I raised: Whitewashing nazi issues(not the casual nazi labels we have seen these days, but the actual Nazi Germany) would be considered far right.
This is about the actual fact about whitewashing the actual historical Nazi Germany. So I would take it as you are dodging the question and you are agreeing with my previous criteria:
The people or organization whitewashing the actual historical Nazi Germany issues would be considered as far right.
I am saying the act of whitewashing nazi issues(not the casual nazi labels we have seen these days, but the actual Nazi Germany) would be considered far right. Do you agree that this happened?
No one is calling everyone nazi in this thread. Who are you referring to?
you are here https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/innenpolitik/afd-verfassung...
"EDIT: I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime" Maybe they just publish what you don't like. They are a left outlet but certainly not pro government.
"Far right" isn't a euphemism for anything, it's exactly what it is. Countries that collapsed into actual fascism (e.g. Germany, Italy, Spain) within living memory, which then spent the subsequent century abutting the monstrosity of a totalitarian Communist regime ("far left") are indeed reluctant to air "far right" and "far left" views because they understand how they play out in practice: global war killing tens of millions, millions of civilians dead at the hands of their own state-sponsored militaries, a legacy of atrocity that will never wash clean, utter economic and cultural devastation echoing for decades... just an absolutely sickening inversion of the human spirit and what people want to believe in as citizens.
"Far right" views are far right views. They are morally repulsive in the extreme. We've witnessed the consequences before.
Somehow the modern right are the most opposed to government intervention these days, so I would expect them to be the majority in opposition to almost any proposed regulation or legislation, regardless of the contents.
EU commision has a centre right head. Germany has a centre right head. Italy has Meloni. Yet most people in these countries want more social media regulation.
media structures can be used as arms. most of the current media content is not "speech" (opinion, human talk, etc.) but targeted consumer or political product. both of them are regulated on their traditional platforms but not on new tech, and the big tech tries to avoid it, escaping behind the "free speech" lie.
I think we should shut down the current crop of social media
but that isn't going to happen anytime soon.
I think an easier way to achieves instead of imposing this on everyone.
Social media companies should be required to add paid tier where
the individual user can block the types of the user does not want
to see, (or just block all of them).
In some places perhaps the government would ban "free social media"
and only allow the paid tier to operate.
This in the best case would make the price reasonably low, if the
social media company does not want to lose a lot of users.
Perhaps even subsidised. At which point the goal set above is
achieved.
It should be regulated similar to online gambling in the UK (so barely, but it is a start).
The key being age verification. Under 18, or maybe 16 accounts have: Mandatory blackout periods (after 9pm most account functions stop working, parents could set this more aggressively if they cared about the child's studies). Interaction limits like time spent on feeds, type of content that will appear in feeds, number of friends, visibility of comments ect. Only one account allowed and enforcement taken seriously.
Over 16/18s should have the option to "time themselves out" for a chosen period with their account going into a limited mode where feeds no longer work . Similar to the option problem gamblers have where gambling sites are supposed to stop them playing if they block themselves. Maybe when someone needs to focus for exams or a work commitment.
Sure kids will try and get round limits, but I think when you have investment in a main account it would be something you would want to keep, so the threat of loosing it would be real.
My pet idea (which I'm also reluctant to fully get behind):
Participation in social media (including comments sections in newspapers, etc) only with verified identities but behind some sort of escrow (so that you're anonymous to the public and also the platform... until you break the law by threatening SA or similar).
Why?
Bots, trolls, etc are a huge problem and if only actual people could post, this would a bit harder for bad actors.
There are plenty of "easy money working from home" scams where the victim/patsy is a regular person duped into criminal activities like mail forwarding packages bought with stolen credit cards. I wonder if the same ecosystem would crop up around such an identity scheme.
I've changed the title to be more precise (from tech regulation to social media regulation).
It's important though, that attempts from foreign governmental entities (you might guess which country) might backfire if it's against popular policy decisions.
I'm not sure if this foreign government is aware of it.
The questions seem more focused around social media but I wish there were more safeguards to stop us (I’m talking as an EU citizen) from crashing and burning when the AI bubble pops.
I don't condone more regulation if it means decreasing the public's voice. Some things a society should endure in order to LEARN or GROW as a society or a person. There are things worth keeping out of that sphere but it's minimally relevant to this legal push. After all "far right" is not the issue, it's far left.
We ban accounts that post like this, regardless of how right they are or feel they are, so it would be good if you'd review the rules and stick to them.
> as the European Union (and former EU states like the UK) are transparently run like banana republics whose barely-elected bureaucrats run them like their own little ramshackle empire for their personal enrichment
Bold Statement. I wonder though, could you offer examples of places in the world today where it is being done otherwise?
Also someone whose name is Earl (norsk-germanic for King) and King.. you seem to be hell bent on an anti-european slant.. whilst having a pretty European name.
Sorry! Actually I am glad to be reassured that the comment I replied to is still considered egregious. The sentiments being expressed in that comment seemed genuinely similar to those of US secretary of state Marco Rubio when he revoked the US visas of two European CEOs from the "Centre for Countering Digital Hate" and the "Global Disinformation Index" today. The reason he gave was "Extraterritorial overreach by foreign censors targeting American speech". Perhaps that act was egregious too. But in this context a comment which accused Europeans of meddling in US affairs and threatening to kick them out did seem plausible.
Of course the comment I replied to went much further than kicking people out of America and into crazy land with a suggestion that we kick Europeans off the internet! This should have been a give away... Again I'm sorry and will refrain in future.
Seriously, though, it's not that we don't have our own problems... just that I'm tired of europeans telling the rest of us how we should run our own affairs. Inviting Europe into the Internet was a mistake.
Never underestimate the level of grievance these people wallow in every day. Legitimately a big part of it is making up stories so they can feel like they have been victimised and can therefore say and do what they want in response because they were wronged first. The account you’re replying to is a masterclass in this exact behaviour
DSA only applies to Social Media doing in Europe. X can leave if they want. But since you believe gay men or jews aren't threated by nazis in Germany i'm not sure how to convince you anyway.
For what it's worth, I'm European, and I disagree with the US on many things, but I'm not gonna dismiss all Americans' point of view because of that, regardless of how bad I think the country does things. Even the most horrible practices, can have small helpful ideas, that you can cherry-pick. But, no one is forcing you to do so, just like no one can really force us off the internet either.
Well, technically, yes, you can be forced off the internet ... insofar as no one on this side of the pond wants to connect to you. Bam. You're gone. I long for that day so that I don't have to listen to eurocrats whinging about our politics.
> the freedom of speech, the right to privacy, obscenity, or indeed anything of import online
That's funny - the EU has better digital laws protecting the average Joe than the US could ever muster in the current climate... GDPR, DMA, etc. You decry 'censorship' and 'barely-elected bureaucrats' while the US is controlled by the billionaire class.
If you don't care, why do you comment?
Recent actions show the US government cares. And it might be good to know how people would act on the actions.
(Also check your assumption about other countries.)
Let me guess, you only see freedom of speech from the perspective of those who speak and not of those who don’t dare to speak because of online harassment. Strangely enough their freedom of speech doesn’t seem to matter for people who justify things like hate speech under the label of free speech.
In a society freedoms are compromises. Absolute freedoms means all for some and nothing for the rest.
The EU at least tries a balance.
Countries like the US don’t seem to care and seem to favor the strongest or even sociopaths.
A good start would be government officials and institutions to stop relying on and promoting (on) them. Ministers in office shouldn't be using them to communicate with their constituents. Public service broadcasters shouldn't be publishing on them.
Then it would be great of the population follows.
But it is certainly not the role of government to decide what foreign communications services their citizens can access.
Autoritarian censorship is not a democratic tool even if other apparently democratic countries are doing it.
I think you're either misinformed or a far-left troll. The issue I see is demonization of a vision of a single company but the way I see it X has truth-first approach objectively. Meta is a cesspool of lies. I see my post can be seen in the same way. Can we find a middle ground? That could perhaps solve the issue on larger scale.
> favors more tech regulation
You mean "social media regulation". Not "tech regulation".
I think they might also mean surveillance tech, like plate readers and facial recognition.
The article contains the questions they asked. The questions are only asking about social media. Specifically whether social media is sufficiently regulated and whether political advertising should be allowed on social media.
It does not mention surveillance, and it's not about tech in general. The title is misleading. (Edit: the OP kindly updated the title and it's no longer misleading)
I'm almost positive a lot of HN Users don't read the studies they comment on. They probably don't even read the articles.
Which, ironically, given the topic of this post, speaks to the kinds of pathologies we find out on social media these days.
The comments are often more interesting than the original articles.
Social media tech, and surveillance tech, but I repeat myself
And "don't build Skynet[1] or LLM overlords that can overpower us through the sheer power of their intellect"
[1]the UK calls its military satcomms network that, but we've always been different...
Not just social media. Amazon misusing is monopoly powers is also smack in the middle of the target.
changed it. Thanks.
Note how lots of slicing is provided on a bunch of dimensions except the one that really matters: age groups. Fully willing to bet 60+ is both more likely to answer these surveys and very pro-censorship. If we weighted this survey by remaining life expectancy I bet the results would be inverted.
The youth tend to be much less absolutists for free speech and don't value anonymity as much as the elders of the internet(!), at least that's my observation. They are much more familiar with people who are into all these things for the profits and don't idealise the WWW as the old folks used to. My guess is that they were born in already corrupt world where online professionals were doing everything for money and dirty tricks like rage baiting and astroturfing were already the norm and as a result they don't have a grand mission fantasy about the internet. Also, because they were born in an already online world they don't see the disturbances of trolls as disturbances in their online persona that is a toy for their real persona, they see trolls as trouble makers to their real persona which is fused with their online persona.
Back in the day of forums personal banning wasn't a thing, we had to see everything until someone did something bad enough to be deplatformed from the forum. In the current social media, you can just block people you don't like, you don't have to endure their "content".
The censorship is built-in in modern platforms. I prefer the old ways personally but in the old days the profile of the people was different.
> but in the old days the profile of the people was different.
in the old days there were actual people, today most “social” media is not people
> today most “social” media is not people
Do you have any evidence to support that?
People frequently claim the majority of social media is "bots", but I highly doubt that.
Not people doesn't mean that they must be bots, IMHO it means not people who are having opinions but social media workers or entrepreneurs who are having opinions based on metrics that fulfill their KPI which are often stuff like increase engagement, increase followers, increase revenue, get a talking point into the trends, make people talk about a brand or a politician etc. Many large accounts on Twitter are openly corporate accounts of some social media companies and many others are freelancers.
People are not having concerned citizen ideas 24 hours a day everyday, those are obviously professionals who are having concerns about the society, race, jews etc in order to fulfill some goals. Those are not real people, you won't be able to change their minds with argumentation because they don't speak their mind in first place. That's for Twitter of course, in other places they have other productions like "tradwifes" on Instagram or reviewers on Youtube. They are all businesses or indies trying to become businesses. They all use analytics and do A/B testing to acquire and steer their content ideas to the platforms liking.
The irony is that youth are simulatenously the biggest consumers of (new) social media, and the staunchest haters [EDIT: this is directly contradicted by the research article I found below…]. I can’t find the source so take it with a grain of salt, but I’ve read that something like 80% of TikTok users under some age think they’d be happier if it didn’t exist and/or wish it didn’t exist.
I don’t think this is really an issue of censorship to a lot of people (though that may be how it shakes out in the government) but rather of control over their digital environment and sanity.
EDIT: I don’t think this is what I’m remembering, but it has concrete numbers somewhat lower than I thought (48% of teens think social media harms people their age, but only 14% think it harms them personally) https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2025/04/22/teens-social...
It's not even irony? They want to quit, but it's too hard.
I assume people in government, at some level, are weighting constituent inputs by taxes paid. Which keeps it upright. :)
There's absolutely weighing on money, but it's not from taxes.
They'll be weighing constituents by their ability and willingness to give campaign donations and other favors.
The article is about Europe. In Europe, parties are publicly funded and donations are strictly limited https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funding_of_European_political_...
Maybe we should listen to those that have more experience and perspective of living without social media as they can see the difference of having/not having it more clearly?
Or they fail to properly grasp its value accordingly.
Interesting, that you equal social media regulation = pro censorship. Btw every age group over 30 has a majority to imitate Australian model in Germany. Even lower 30 there is only a small relative majority against it. So no, your hypothesis for Germany is wrong. https://www.bild.de/politik/inland/social-media-verbot-deuts...
It's in the name. Any media regulation is some kind of censorship.
If your body clears out cancer cells, that is also censorship.
Paradox of Tolerance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
Participating in a society means social contract, not: I have the absolute right to sink the boat so that everyone dies.
Oh so if there is a contract, can you show it to me? Did I sign it? Did everyone else?
No? Sounds like it's just something you made up.
You did. By being born in a nation and getting automatic citizenship. If you don't like it, you can leave
Being born doesn't constitute consent, and neither does one's physical location. This is an awfully creepy conception of consent.
It has nothing to do with consent. As soon as you are born Jus soli comes into play. You are given citizenship and you are now subject to the laws.
The question isn't if some censorship is good or bad. The question is if media regulation is censorship, and the answer is yes.
If you want to say "Enforcing regulation equals censorship", that is fine by me. For many, there could be a difference between them, as they reserve censorship to unjust regulation.
That would be a matter of linguistics, and I can't say which of both definitions is true.
No it is not necessarily. For example forcing to have a chronical timeline on followers would be strong social media regulation but no censorship even in the broadest terms.
If I'm unable to publish something that I otherwise would, that is de facto censorship.
Your example is not a dismiss of my argumentation.
It's not a dismissal, it's a refutation.
From reading the page the study “examines public attitudes social media regulation and banning political advertising from social platforms.”
The question: To what extent, if at all, would you support or oppose banning political adverts from being shown on social media platforms?
They conclude with: Voters for far-right parties are frequently less likely to support banning of political advertising on social media … and less likely to think regulations are too lax … typically less likely to think social media regulations are too relaxed (with Italy being an exception).
> They conclude with: Voters for far-right parties are frequently less likely to support banning of political advertising on social media
Maybe the issue here is that many political options have social media and underground marketing as their only option due to heavy bias and censorship on European traditional media.
Even the term used here "far right" is an euphemism for opinions not approved by governing European regimes.
We can see specifically which parties You Gov classify as far right.
AfD in Germany. Le Pen in France. Fratelli d’Italia in Italy. VOX in Spain. PVV in the Netherlands.
I do not know that any of those parties would seriously disagree with their classification as far right.
In European politics, "far right" is a dogwhistle for "anti-imperialist" or "pro-nationalist". It is otherwise a semantic void into which you can pour whatever prejudices you have against the proletariat and be assured that the state and its apparatchiks will happily reward you for airing them as long as you perpetuate the label of "far right" against their designated class enemies.
For the purposes of the survey the term refers to a specific list of specific parties. There's no semantic void here!
Stop hurting their feelings when they are telling you they’re oppressed!
I dont think the proletariat will beat up jews or gay men on the street which is one assoziation I have for far right.
You would be surprised that "far right" AfD is the most pro Jew party in Germany, polling at first place among Jews.
AfD party later is gay and merited with a coloured migrant lay.
But hey, they beat gays and Jews. Probably kick kittens and puppies too.
> You would be surprised that "far right" AfD is the most pro Jew party in Germany, polling at first place among Jews.
Pro-Israel. Xenophobic nationalists known their kind. The interesting bit is that they are both pro-Israel and antisemitic.
Most important jewish organisations are fighting against the afd.
https://www.zentralratderjuden.de/presse/juden-gegen-die-afd...
And AFD members are using "LGBTQ" as a deragatory term. They are most definitely hostile towards queer people.
As some members of other parties too. And yet, of all German parties, only AfD has an openly gay leader. A lesbian married to an immigrant woman.
So what? That changes nothing about their policies and views.
Ernst Röhm was one of the most powerful people in early Nazi Germany and famously gay. And still, the NSDAP brutally and systemically persecuted queer people.
You act as if hypocrisy, bigotry, moral flexibility and opportunism weren't core "virtues" of far right populists.
Yes, that is an opinion you are supposed to have. You are supposed to associate the regime's class enemies with nazis and communists so that their claims can be dismissed without a single rational thought. "They beat up jews and gays!" is a great way to avoid having a difficult conversation about the regime's blatantly hostile policies against their own people.
Why would I dismiss communists, the only people ever fighting for our interests?
I just listen to AfD politicians speeches and read the wikipedia articles about Nazi time in Germany. And I draw my conclusions.
What collective term would you use to describe the parties referenced in the poll?
"Regime" is a popular among populists euphemism for elected governments they wish to topple.
I like Encyclopedia Britannica‘s definition [0]:
> It [regime] is used colloquially by some, such as government officials, media journalists, and policy makers, when referring to governments that they believe are repressive, undemocratic, or illegitimate or simply do not square with the person’s own view of the world.
0 - https://www.britannica.com/topic/regime
I use regime for my government exactly because that's how they call governments they don't like.
Seems like they don't like when their citizens apply the same terminology.
> Even the term used here "far right" is an euphemism for opinions not approved by governing European regimes.
Seriously. We know what far right is. It’s close to mainstream or mainstream in all EU countries. It is not suppressed anywhere, except for the nazi party in Germany. I mean, even AfD, which is as close as it gets, can still present candidates and campaign for them.
And we have plenty of experience of what happens when they come to power. You can stop clutching your pearls.
Yes? The Primae Noctis party would largely be “censored” in current social circles.
The fact that we can use money to saturate the information economy, and create the perception of validity, is a form of market manipulation that is used extensively today. See “Intelligent Design” for a great example of how that was applied in America.
These ideological beach heads are strategized and implemented by media consultants, and media owners. Yet this is protected speech. All the while actual fact checkers, researchers and content moderation efforts are censorial.
This super simplistic interpretation of how speech operates in the modern world is now more abused by attackers, than of explanatory value to defenders.
I would really love if people were somehow more interested in the way modern persuasion techniques are applied. At least that way we would have more interesting conversations on how to have checks and balances that work.
Maybe the "far right" is a good description. E.g. AfD. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_f%C3%BCr_Deutschla...
Which of actual AfD policies are actually far right?
EDIT: I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime.
Not sure about their policies, but there have been many expressions from AfD politicians which are not in line with the German constitution.
https://afd-verbot.de/beweise
The current government constantly violates the consitution, they are still trying to implement Vorratsdatenspeicherung which was ruled illegal by the constitutional court. The former government tried to change how elections work with the goal of kicking out opposition parties. And for the current elections there still wasn't a needed re-count because the organisation that needs to approve a re-count is the current government themselves. How is any of that in line with the consitution? It's ever only an argument when it's the "side I don't like".
It’s funny when people blame opposition for things regime says they would do if they come to power, but tolerate all autocratic tendencies of the current regime. The self-elected one, as you point out.
Edit: self-approved is better term, since without recount of votes we still don’t know if current regime has a majority.
> Which of actual AfD policies are actually far right?
What about most of them? Just look at who they are teaming with in the European Parliament. Or what they say about themselves. That should give you a hint.
> I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime.
Right. It’s just what (((they))) want you to believe.
So, you don’t like their coalition parters in the eu parliament?
And you didn’t list a single far right policy of AfD.
How about just naming one actual far right AfD policy so we can bring discussion from feeling back to facts.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/19/turmoil-in-ger...
> EDIT: I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime.
Well, if you ignore all the evidence you consider inconvenient, you could, you know, read their own self-description as "right wing" and combine that with the observation of them being too right wing for the other right wing parties.
Whitewashing nazi issues(not the casual nazi labels we have seen these days, but the actual Nazi Germany) would be considered far right
Calling everyone you don’t are far right and nazi is belittling of the real nazis.
Edit since I can’t answer: I’m not referring to this thread. It’s German regime outlets calling their opponents Nazis and far right.
To you edit: Again, you are ignoring the issue I raised: Whitewashing nazi issues(not the casual nazi labels we have seen these days, but the actual Nazi Germany) would be considered far right.
This is about the actual fact about whitewashing the actual historical Nazi Germany. So I would take it as you are dodging the question and you are agreeing with my previous criteria:
The people or organization whitewashing the actual historical Nazi Germany issues would be considered as far right.
I am saying the act of whitewashing nazi issues(not the casual nazi labels we have seen these days, but the actual Nazi Germany) would be considered far right. Do you agree that this happened?
No one is calling everyone nazi in this thread. Who are you referring to?
you are here https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/innenpolitik/afd-verfassung... "EDIT: I am ignoring this link since its main source is Corrective, propaganda outlet funded by the German regime" Maybe they just publish what you don't like. They are a left outlet but certainly not pro government.
"Far right" isn't a euphemism for anything, it's exactly what it is. Countries that collapsed into actual fascism (e.g. Germany, Italy, Spain) within living memory, which then spent the subsequent century abutting the monstrosity of a totalitarian Communist regime ("far left") are indeed reluctant to air "far right" and "far left" views because they understand how they play out in practice: global war killing tens of millions, millions of civilians dead at the hands of their own state-sponsored militaries, a legacy of atrocity that will never wash clean, utter economic and cultural devastation echoing for decades... just an absolutely sickening inversion of the human spirit and what people want to believe in as citizens.
"Far right" views are far right views. They are morally repulsive in the extreme. We've witnessed the consequences before.
Somehow the modern right are the most opposed to government intervention these days, so I would expect them to be the majority in opposition to almost any proposed regulation or legislation, regardless of the contents.
EU commision has a centre right head. Germany has a centre right head. Italy has Meloni. Yet most people in these countries want more social media regulation.
media structures can be used as arms. most of the current media content is not "speech" (opinion, human talk, etc.) but targeted consumer or political product. both of them are regulated on their traditional platforms but not on new tech, and the big tech tries to avoid it, escaping behind the "free speech" lie.
I think we should shut down the current crop of social media but that isn't going to happen anytime soon.
I think an easier way to achieves instead of imposing this on everyone. Social media companies should be required to add paid tier where the individual user can block the types of the user does not want to see, (or just block all of them).
In some places perhaps the government would ban "free social media" and only allow the paid tier to operate.
This in the best case would make the price reasonably low, if the social media company does not want to lose a lot of users. Perhaps even subsidised. At which point the goal set above is achieved.
It should be regulated similar to online gambling in the UK (so barely, but it is a start).
The key being age verification. Under 18, or maybe 16 accounts have: Mandatory blackout periods (after 9pm most account functions stop working, parents could set this more aggressively if they cared about the child's studies). Interaction limits like time spent on feeds, type of content that will appear in feeds, number of friends, visibility of comments ect. Only one account allowed and enforcement taken seriously.
Over 16/18s should have the option to "time themselves out" for a chosen period with their account going into a limited mode where feeds no longer work . Similar to the option problem gamblers have where gambling sites are supposed to stop them playing if they block themselves. Maybe when someone needs to focus for exams or a work commitment.
Sure kids will try and get round limits, but I think when you have investment in a main account it would be something you would want to keep, so the threat of loosing it would be real.
> we should shut down the current crop of social media but that isn't going to happen anytime soon
If you concede in your first sentence, obviously not.
It’s happened in Australia. It’s building in America. And I think there are enough European countries
My pet idea (which I'm also reluctant to fully get behind):
Participation in social media (including comments sections in newspapers, etc) only with verified identities but behind some sort of escrow (so that you're anonymous to the public and also the platform... until you break the law by threatening SA or similar).
Why?
Bots, trolls, etc are a huge problem and if only actual people could post, this would a bit harder for bad actors.
There are plenty of "easy money working from home" scams where the victim/patsy is a regular person duped into criminal activities like mail forwarding packages bought with stolen credit cards. I wonder if the same ecosystem would crop up around such an identity scheme.
Good thing that "“The Internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.”.
I've changed the title to be more precise (from tech regulation to social media regulation).
It's important though, that attempts from foreign governmental entities (you might guess which country) might backfire if it's against popular policy decisions. I'm not sure if this foreign government is aware of it.
The questions seem more focused around social media but I wish there were more safeguards to stop us (I’m talking as an EU citizen) from crashing and burning when the AI bubble pops.
I don't condone more regulation if it means decreasing the public's voice. Some things a society should endure in order to LEARN or GROW as a society or a person. There are things worth keeping out of that sphere but it's minimally relevant to this legal push. After all "far right" is not the issue, it's far left.
Make no mistake nor be mislead that this is the slippery slope to Huxley + Orwel's 84
You need different slippery slopes as they're two different visions of a future (or rather past in Orwell's case)
With the slop slope everywhere goes to the same thing, which is how the poster could write that comment: by thinking sloppily.
This is the reason the UK voted for Brexit /s
Yeah, the EU isn't quite authoritarian enough for the UK anymore.
Europe: <does something authoritarian> UK: "Hold my tea."
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Europe who? We're doing great on this side of the pond.
so you are positive on the Trump administration?
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Please don't post in the flamewar style to HN. This is against the site guidelines in so many ways I can't bring myself to list them.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
We ban accounts that post like this, regardless of how right they are or feel they are, so it would be good if you'd review the rules and stick to them.
> as the European Union (and former EU states like the UK) are transparently run like banana republics whose barely-elected bureaucrats run them like their own little ramshackle empire for their personal enrichment
Bold Statement. I wonder though, could you offer examples of places in the world today where it is being done otherwise?
This doesn't add anything to the discussion.
Also someone whose name is Earl (norsk-germanic for King) and King.. you seem to be hell bent on an anti-european slant.. whilst having a pretty European name.
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Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.
"Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead."
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Sorry! Actually I am glad to be reassured that the comment I replied to is still considered egregious. The sentiments being expressed in that comment seemed genuinely similar to those of US secretary of state Marco Rubio when he revoked the US visas of two European CEOs from the "Centre for Countering Digital Hate" and the "Global Disinformation Index" today. The reason he gave was "Extraterritorial overreach by foreign censors targeting American speech". Perhaps that act was egregious too. But in this context a comment which accused Europeans of meddling in US affairs and threatening to kick them out did seem plausible.
Of course the comment I replied to went much further than kicking people out of America and into crazy land with a suggestion that we kick Europeans off the internet! This should have been a give away... Again I'm sorry and will refrain in future.
People in glass houses and all.
Seriously, though, it's not that we don't have our own problems... just that I'm tired of europeans telling the rest of us how we should run our own affairs. Inviting Europe into the Internet was a mistake.
I'm not sure this article is really about Europeans trying to tell Americans how to run their affairs.
It's the results of a survey where yougov (A European organisation) asked other Europeans how they think European social media should be regulated.
No suggestion that laws would/could/should be changed anywhere, and especially not in America.
Never underestimate the level of grievance these people wallow in every day. Legitimately a big part of it is making up stories so they can feel like they have been victimised and can therefore say and do what they want in response because they were wronged first. The account you’re replying to is a masterclass in this exact behaviour
> People in glass houses and all
Ok, this level of self-denial is funny!
> I'm tired of europeans telling the rest of us how we should run our own affairs. Inviting Europe into the Internet was a mistake
the bottomless irony of this statement XD
DSA only applies to Social Media doing in Europe. X can leave if they want. But since you believe gay men or jews aren't threated by nazis in Germany i'm not sure how to convince you anyway.
Social media makes teens suicidal. The companies know, but burry it. People defend those companies on the internet.
For what it's worth, I'm European, and I disagree with the US on many things, but I'm not gonna dismiss all Americans' point of view because of that, regardless of how bad I think the country does things. Even the most horrible practices, can have small helpful ideas, that you can cherry-pick. But, no one is forcing you to do so, just like no one can really force us off the internet either.
Well, technically, yes, you can be forced off the internet ... insofar as no one on this side of the pond wants to connect to you. Bam. You're gone. I long for that day so that I don't have to listen to eurocrats whinging about our politics.
Why are you reading European media in the first place? We aren't forcing you and would genuinely like it of you stopped.
.....because it was posted on an American site?
> the freedom of speech, the right to privacy, obscenity, or indeed anything of import online
That's funny - the EU has better digital laws protecting the average Joe than the US could ever muster in the current climate... GDPR, DMA, etc. You decry 'censorship' and 'barely-elected bureaucrats' while the US is controlled by the billionaire class.
If you don't care, why do you comment? Recent actions show the US government cares. And it might be good to know how people would act on the actions. (Also check your assumption about other countries.)
> run them like their own little ramshackle empire for their personal enrichment
If you are from the US, I’m laughing my butt off, the irony is not lost on me.
OK?
Let me guess, you only see freedom of speech from the perspective of those who speak and not of those who don’t dare to speak because of online harassment. Strangely enough their freedom of speech doesn’t seem to matter for people who justify things like hate speech under the label of free speech.
In a society freedoms are compromises. Absolute freedoms means all for some and nothing for the rest. The EU at least tries a balance. Countries like the US don’t seem to care and seem to favor the strongest or even sociopaths.
> you only see freedom of speech from the perspective of those who speak and not of those who don’t dare to speak
By this logic, when government suppresses speech that is a violation of one's rights?
If they suppress legal speech then yes.
Since the government holds a monopoly on the legal system, that can be simplified to "no".
In a democracy that not a no. A government is made by people and laws aren’t usually made against the will of the voters.
Democracy is majority rule, so perhaps it can be simplified to speech that the majority approve of.
That's how society works
Is, not ought.
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Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.
"Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead."
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[flagged]
Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.
"Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead."
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
As a European, I think we should block X and Meta.
They're cesspools of far-right propaganda, American and Russian disinformation and psychological warfare on our population.
Democracy has to defend itself. We shouldn't just let foreign despots and their oligarchs walk all over us with their cyberweapons.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_democracy
A good start would be government officials and institutions to stop relying on and promoting (on) them. Ministers in office shouldn't be using them to communicate with their constituents. Public service broadcasters shouldn't be publishing on them.
Then it would be great of the population follows.
But it is certainly not the role of government to decide what foreign communications services their citizens can access.
Autoritarian censorship is not a democratic tool even if other apparently democratic countries are doing it.
Any democracy should. Good lemma, seems to implement the more general principle of Paradox of Tolerance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
I think you're either misinformed or a far-left troll. The issue I see is demonization of a vision of a single company but the way I see it X has truth-first approach objectively. Meta is a cesspool of lies. I see my post can be seen in the same way. Can we find a middle ground? That could perhaps solve the issue on larger scale.
That is just straight up not true.
https://news.sky.com/story/the-x-effect-how-elon-musk-is-boo...
yes, majority of EU censorship is in favor of mainstream propaganda