PayPal Demonetises the Daily Sceptic(dailysceptic.org)
dailysceptic.org
PayPal Demonetises the Daily Sceptic
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/21/paypal-demonetises-the-daily-sceptic/
202 comments
This is completely misunderstanding the problem.
https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/ua/useragreement-full
> PayPal [...] reserves the right to suspend or terminate [...] access [...] for any reason and at any time upon notice to you...
PayPal never said they broke any terms. PayPal has openly declared war on "hate groups", as defined by the ADL, which is an organization funded by the U.S. oligarchy[0][1]. That's the reason.
PayPal is on the side of the political establishment that is interested in consolidating power and manufacturing consent. Corporate and government power have merged a long time ago; it's not gonna reverse itself.
Liberals need to read Popper's Open Society and its Enemies, and realize that oligarchy is just as big a threat as fascism, if not bigger due to the population not being innoculated against it (https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1039842312061374464).
[0]: https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/paypal-partners-with...
[1]: https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/anti-defamation-le... (J.P. Morgan, hello!)
https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/ua/useragreement-full
> PayPal [...] reserves the right to suspend or terminate [...] access [...] for any reason and at any time upon notice to you...
PayPal never said they broke any terms. PayPal has openly declared war on "hate groups", as defined by the ADL, which is an organization funded by the U.S. oligarchy[0][1]. That's the reason.
PayPal is on the side of the political establishment that is interested in consolidating power and manufacturing consent. Corporate and government power have merged a long time ago; it's not gonna reverse itself.
Liberals need to read Popper's Open Society and its Enemies, and realize that oligarchy is just as big a threat as fascism, if not bigger due to the population not being innoculated against it (https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1039842312061374464).
[0]: https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/paypal-partners-with...
[1]: https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/anti-defamation-le... (J.P. Morgan, hello!)
> ADL
Of course they'd be involved. ADL has long ceased to be independant and has become an arm of politicians.
Of course they'd be involved. ADL has long ceased to be independant and has become an arm of politicians.
>> "The majority of uses of Pepe the Frog have been, and continue to be, non-bigoted."
>> "However, because so many Pepe the Frog memes are not bigoted in nature, it is important to examine use of the meme only in context. The mere fact of posting a Pepe meme does not mean that someone is racist or white supremacist."
That's a much more balanced take than I would have.
>> "However, because so many Pepe the Frog memes are not bigoted in nature, it is important to examine use of the meme only in context. The mere fact of posting a Pepe meme does not mean that someone is racist or white supremacist."
That's a much more balanced take than I would have.
I assume you are not a lawyer. Anyone can pull out of a contract for any reason. You can then get sued for damages and in specific scenarios (property sales for example), specific performance. Most scenarios do not allow a remedy of specific performance. So in general if you pay, you can walk away.
For example you can’t hold someone to their employment contract and force them to work for you.
An example of a massive walkaway https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-61770012. You think they wouldn’t try to enforce the contract if they could?
I’m an Australian lawyer, although this is first year level knowledge.
For example you can’t hold someone to their employment contract and force them to work for you.
An example of a massive walkaway https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-61770012. You think they wouldn’t try to enforce the contract if they could?
I’m an Australian lawyer, although this is first year level knowledge.
I think that would end in a situation similar to parallel construction, where people end the contract for reasons that are basically "we don't like you" but find some token violation to blame, helped by very loosely defined contracts that don't clearly define what is and isn't a violation.
The problem there is that the terms are often ambiguous, and thus an explanation of how the terms were violated will be ambiguous. "Some sort of legislation ... to force companies to explain decisions ..." will be useless unless the terms are unambiguous. Look for example at youtube where there is a lot of subjective wiggle room in their definition of acceptable content.
Let's face it, the decisions of Paypal and others (Youtube, Twitter, etc) when deciding who stays and who goes on its platform are ideologically and politically motivated. The leaders of these companies are basing their decisions on their own political leanings. And in the vast majority of cases like the Daily Sceptic where a user or service is being deplatformed, the reason is idealogical (rather than a case where the user is for example defrauding the platform or service provider).
I believe a better solution would be for the government to penalize companies that are repressive to the rights granted to us in the bill of rights (for example free speech). This whole "but it is a private company who gets to dictate what speech they want and don't want on their site" needs to go out the window. If a company wants to operate within the US, it needs to respect the rights of the country's population (rather than define its own set of rights).
Let's face it, the decisions of Paypal and others (Youtube, Twitter, etc) when deciding who stays and who goes on its platform are ideologically and politically motivated. The leaders of these companies are basing their decisions on their own political leanings. And in the vast majority of cases like the Daily Sceptic where a user or service is being deplatformed, the reason is idealogical (rather than a case where the user is for example defrauding the platform or service provider).
I believe a better solution would be for the government to penalize companies that are repressive to the rights granted to us in the bill of rights (for example free speech). This whole "but it is a private company who gets to dictate what speech they want and don't want on their site" needs to go out the window. If a company wants to operate within the US, it needs to respect the rights of the country's population (rather than define its own set of rights).
Freedoms only apply to governments. Period. On purpose. It’s convenient that you preempted the argument that kills your entire comment, you made everyone else’s job easier.
The fact that private businesses can choose who to do business with, without stepping on these freedoms like free speech is a feature, not a bug.
You cannot force someone to agree with your speech. You especially cannot force a business to deal with you if they don’t want to.
The fact that private businesses can choose who to do business with, without stepping on these freedoms like free speech is a feature, not a bug.
You cannot force someone to agree with your speech. You especially cannot force a business to deal with you if they don’t want to.
There is existing precedent for requiring companies to deal with people they don’t want to in order to enhance freedom of speech. For instance the broadcast “equal time rule”: https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/949/equal-time-...
> Freedoms only apply to governments. Period.
Then why was segregation outlawed?
Then why was segregation outlawed?
It wasn't? Private clubs obviously exist.
Exceptions exist for private clubs according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 but with regard to businesses getting to decide which customers they serve, it looks kinda like segregation on the basis of race (or gender, religion, or nationality) was outlawed.
Segregation isn't outlawed.
Just try to join a branch of the KKK as a person of color, and see how far you'll get...
Just try to join a branch of the KKK as a person of color, and see how far you'll get...
Or the military has someone who is disabled, or literally any service or group that has specific physical needs such as Amazon Warehouses or UPS/USPS, race isn't the only segregation method.
> Freedoms only apply to governments. Period. On purpose
> It’s convenient that you preempted the argument that kills your entire comment, you made everyone else’s job easier.
Ironic, you just did the thing you accused me of.
Putting that aside, "You especially cannot force a business to deal with you if they don’t want to" is where I disagree with you. In the case of a bakery, I agree with you. In the case of what could be classified as a public utility, such as a payment system, is where I disagree with you. Certain services which have monopolistic or near monopolistic positions and being necessary to participate in the economy (paypal) or society (facebook) should not be in the business of policing speech. And it is the governments role in making sure this is the case (as the collective muscle of the people to ensure their rights are maintained). We've been indoctrinated for decades to fear and limit the ability of the government to do as such, as well as indoctrinated for decades to place the rights of business interests above our own rights as citizens. I argue to break this position of slavery and place our rights first. Why shouldn't Paypal be forced to do business with me?
> It’s convenient that you preempted the argument that kills your entire comment, you made everyone else’s job easier.
Ironic, you just did the thing you accused me of.
Putting that aside, "You especially cannot force a business to deal with you if they don’t want to" is where I disagree with you. In the case of a bakery, I agree with you. In the case of what could be classified as a public utility, such as a payment system, is where I disagree with you. Certain services which have monopolistic or near monopolistic positions and being necessary to participate in the economy (paypal) or society (facebook) should not be in the business of policing speech. And it is the governments role in making sure this is the case (as the collective muscle of the people to ensure their rights are maintained). We've been indoctrinated for decades to fear and limit the ability of the government to do as such, as well as indoctrinated for decades to place the rights of business interests above our own rights as citizens. I argue to break this position of slavery and place our rights first. Why shouldn't Paypal be forced to do business with me?
If the government wants a public payment system it should create one.
I can much easier leave a corporation and not give them money. The government has “a legal monopoly on violence”.
I can much easier leave a corporation and not give them money. The government has “a legal monopoly on violence”.
PayPal is not a public utility, as much as you’d want it to be one. Until the government determines it is one, then the rules of public utilities don’t apply. Once again, regardless how much you wish it were so.
It shouldn’t be forced to do business with you because it is a private business and not the government.
It also is nowhere near a monopoly. Plenty of payment processors exist. Another comment here literally talks about new ones springing up.
It is equivalent to the bakery store in your example.
It shouldn’t be forced to do business with you because it is a private business and not the government.
It also is nowhere near a monopoly. Plenty of payment processors exist. Another comment here literally talks about new ones springing up.
It is equivalent to the bakery store in your example.
What are we here debating? The way things are or the way we think they should be? I think the latter, you seem to be debating the former.
> This whole "but it is a private company who gets to dictate what speech they want and don't want on their site" needs to go out the window.
But deciding what and what not to publish on your own website is protected by the First Amendment, is it not?
But deciding what and what not to publish on your own website is protected by the First Amendment, is it not?
Money transmitters don't have much discretion over their customer list. There are rules (PATRIOT Act AML provisions) that punish their executives with jail time if they have customers who turn out to be criminals, even if said executives didn't know anything about that at the time. And in some countries like France there are laws saying everyone has a right to a bank account. The courts will force a bank to open an account if someone can't get an account due to de-platforming. It was used by the ex-bitcoin exchange MtGox in the past, I think.
but it is not a forum, PayPal more like bank, how can author of this article put any content on PayPal's website?
This is a valid question, and I was responding to another more speech oriented question earlier and I think got my signals crossed.
So in this case, I suppose the question is when must a business serve a customer they don't want?
Frankly, I'd like to see PayPal more heavily regulated for things like this, since I doubt they'll take action on their own.
So in this case, I suppose the question is when must a business serve a customer they don't want?
Frankly, I'd like to see PayPal more heavily regulated for things like this, since I doubt they'll take action on their own.
>If a company wants to operate within the US, it needs to respect the rights of the country's population.
Umm, the first amendment says nothing about "rights of the country's population," it is, specifically, a restriction on the types of laws Congress is allowed to make where "Congress" has been interrupted broadly to include state and local legislative bodies.
>Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It's not a positive right, it's written, specifically, to be a restriction of government.
Umm, the first amendment says nothing about "rights of the country's population," it is, specifically, a restriction on the types of laws Congress is allowed to make where "Congress" has been interrupted broadly to include state and local legislative bodies.
>Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It's not a positive right, it's written, specifically, to be a restriction of government.
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Are you also against Truth Social setting it’s own policies?
Should a Christian website be forced to allow comments that go against its ideals?
Would you want the government telling you what to publish on your own website?
If the government wants a platform that allows anyone to post anything, it’s free to create its own platform.
Should a Christian website be forced to allow comments that go against its ideals?
Would you want the government telling you what to publish on your own website?
If the government wants a platform that allows anyone to post anything, it’s free to create its own platform.
You can't force me to host your content if I don't like your content. I don't care what rights you think you have. It's my server and I decide what goes on it.
Exactly so. Your decision not to host certain content you find odious is a valid exercise of your freedom of speech, as well as your freedom of association.
When you provide that server out as a service, those rights change. Like how owing a house doesn’t give you unlimited rights when you decide to rent it out.
There are special rules for a public companies. I do not see any reason why dominant platforms should not be prevented from terminating customer's accounts for anything that is legal. Alternatively we would have a society which democratic by name but where your life is controlled by few big corporations. Looks like we are heading there anyways.
Private corporations are not the government.
We’ve done fine with the current rights and freedoms, applied to governments only, for the past 200 years. I think we’ll manage for another few.
We’ve done fine with the current rights and freedoms, applied to governments only, for the past 200 years. I think we’ll manage for another few.
>"Private corporations are not the government."
With all lobbying power? Yeah sure. Also publicly traded companies that are also near monopolies are not really "private companies". They have way too much power over people's lives.
>"We’ve done fine with the current rights and freedoms"
No we have not and what rights we have are deteriorating
With all lobbying power? Yeah sure. Also publicly traded companies that are also near monopolies are not really "private companies". They have way too much power over people's lives.
>"We’ve done fine with the current rights and freedoms"
No we have not and what rights we have are deteriorating
> With all lobbying power? Yeah sure. Also publicly traded companies that are also near monopolies are not really "private companies". They have way too much power over people's lives.
None of that makes them the government or makes the rights and freedoms associated with the BoR applicable to them.
They are also not a monopoly or anywhere near one. Many payment processors exist, as evidenced by the fact that literally even in the article itself the author mentions that any non-PayPal subscription is still active. Or the comment which shows a brand new one that seems to be targeted towards “free speech bastions” like this.
> No we have not and what rights we have are deteriorating
Source. Especially on the latter, which you clearly see this as.
None of that makes them the government or makes the rights and freedoms associated with the BoR applicable to them.
They are also not a monopoly or anywhere near one. Many payment processors exist, as evidenced by the fact that literally even in the article itself the author mentions that any non-PayPal subscription is still active. Or the comment which shows a brand new one that seems to be targeted towards “free speech bastions” like this.
> No we have not and what rights we have are deteriorating
Source. Especially on the latter, which you clearly see this as.
The established remedy for abusive monopolies is enforcement of antitrust laws.
I am sure that you are wrong. For example, imagine if Facebook would promote pro-Russian content and hide pro-Ukranian or pro-NATO content in the newsfeed. Perfectly legal, but how long they will be able to pull it? I don't think it will be more than 1 or 2 weeks.
So it is your server only as long as you ban outcasts like 8chan and don't cross paths with people in the power.
So it is your server only as long as you ban outcasts like 8chan and don't cross paths with people in the power.
How would something like that work? If a company gets demonetized and provides an answer that you don't think is satisfactory, then what? All you'd be doing in this case is creating another opportunity for a lawyer to put out some legalese BS.
Otherwise, we're living in a world where contracts between two parties mean nothing. Anyone can pull out of anything at any time for any reason, with no notice.
Not if the contract stipulates that both parties must agree to unwind the relationship. We already live in a world where anyone can pull out of anything at any time for any reason, with no notice - however if the contract says you can't do that then you open yourself up to legal liability. That doesn't stop most folks.
Not if the contract stipulates that both parties must agree to unwind the relationship. We already live in a world where anyone can pull out of anything at any time for any reason, with no notice - however if the contract says you can't do that then you open yourself up to legal liability. That doesn't stop most folks.
Yes, this! Perfectly stated. Why can't this be codified in law?
Bitcoin and crypto currency unironically solve this
> Oh, and by the way, it would be keeping the money in that account for up to 180 days while it decided whether it was entitled to “damages” for my yet-to-be-explained breach of its Acceptable Use Policy.
This is so unbelievably unacceptable and yet I’ve seen PayPal do it time and time again.
This is so unbelievably unacceptable and yet I’ve seen PayPal do it time and time again.
At least PayPal is making a show of deciding. YouTube will demonetise your vid and pretend keeping running ads for free is not a problem.
Isn't your balance gone when PayPal cancels your account? Also what's with people having recurring payments to the cancelled PayPal account? Honest questions.
IDK. "Normal" financial institutions like banks have obligation to send the balance to the account of your choosing upon closing the account unless it is frozen. But the money can only be frozen for a specific reason and the bank has no ability to claim those money for themselves.
There is a good chance we will get a resolution because there is a potential class action brewing: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-13/paypal-su...
There is a good chance we will get a resolution because there is a potential class action brewing: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-13/paypal-su...
In our case, yes. Our balance of around $4k was frozen for 180 days then PayPal said they will keep it all due to "damages", which they did not specify. Subscriptions will fail to be renewed.
It's mostly to account for potential chargebacks and fraud reversals.
They have always done it, and it has always infuriated people affected by it.
They have always done it, and it has always infuriated people affected by it.
Makes sense for potential chargebacks / fraud reversals... but PayPal is saying they're terminating the Daily Sceptic's account for political reasons.
Why would there be a flood of chargebacks for a termination like that?
It seems like PayPal doesn't have a very strong policy in place for how/why they freeze someone's account and take their money. They just do it willy-nilly whenever they want to close someone's account.
Why would there be a flood of chargebacks for a termination like that?
It seems like PayPal doesn't have a very strong policy in place for how/why they freeze someone's account and take their money. They just do it willy-nilly whenever they want to close someone's account.
Terms and Conditions that you agree to before using a service are a thing.
The contract you sign is not absolutely binding and can be invalidated in part or in whole for variety of reasons.
I personally feel that if ToS is too long and too complex for most people to read and understand it should be possible argument towards invalidating that ToS.
I personally feel that if ToS is too long and too complex for most people to read and understand it should be possible argument towards invalidating that ToS.
Contract law is a thing. Contracts are deemed void and unenforceable for all manner of reasons.
Protip: they should file a Notice of Dispute (https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/ua/pp-notice-dispute). This will bypass the usual customer support chain of command and go straight to PayPal's legal department. While this does not guarantee a more reasonable response, it does mean your case will be scrutinized more heavily by an actual human and is more likely to lead to at least getting an explanation. It is also a required prerequisite before for proceeding further to third-party arbitration.
This behavior is causing new companies to get spawned as a response to fill the void created by censorship. A recent one mentioned by a Youtuber is Parallel Economy [1]. I have no idea how good/bad they are but I expect more of these to start popping up.
I am curious how people will vet these new alternatives to PayPal. PayPal for its good and bad at least have a known history and a myriad of discussion about the known behavior. Will people have a way to rate the alternatives, like a Dun & Bradstreet credit score or something like Yelp? How are people validating the behavior and reputation of these businesses?
[1] - https://www.paralleleconomy.com/about/
I am curious how people will vet these new alternatives to PayPal. PayPal for its good and bad at least have a known history and a myriad of discussion about the known behavior. Will people have a way to rate the alternatives, like a Dun & Bradstreet credit score or something like Yelp? How are people validating the behavior and reputation of these businesses?
[1] - https://www.paralleleconomy.com/about/
>I suspect what’s really going on is that someone at PayPal – possibly the entire C-suite – doesn’t like what the Daily Sceptic or the Free Speech Union stands for.
I absolutely guarantee that there isn't a single person in the Paypal C-suite who knows who Toby Young or Daily Sceptic is.
I absolutely guarantee that there isn't a single person in the Paypal C-suite who knows who Toby Young or Daily Sceptic is.
So what? He didn't claim that they personally targeted him.
It's an absolutely asinine thing to assert. That the entire C-suite of Paypal disagrees with him, and implying that they're shutting his account because of that. Not only is there no evidence of that, it's a laughable claim. The entire C-suite of Paypal don't know anything about his views, let alone have an opinion about banning him.
As jaywalk has pointed out, he isn't saying they disagree with him. They disagree with what he and the FSU stands for, i.e. the underlying principles and positions. Not that the FSU really has many positions beyond free speech being good - they defend people on both sides of the political spectrum which is why it's hard to figure out what PayPal are upset about here.
It doesn't matter whether you're saying they disagree with him or disagree with what the organization he runs stands for. It's an equally absurd claim, because he has no idea what they believe.
He has irrefutable information about what they believe - he knows that either the words published on his site, or the legal defences mounted by the FSU, or both, have upset PayPal's beliefs significantly enough to result in account termination.
Ok first of all, the board of Paypal isn't in any way involved in terminating people's accounts. Secondly, it could for example be that Paypal's entire board believes deeply in an incredibly expansive definition of Free Speech and they personally donate and subscribe to the FSU. But that they've made a decision as fiduciaries for paypal that they cannot have a policy to conduct business with people like this person. You quite literally have no idea. And secondly, he has no idea why they suspended his account and their reason absolutely could be in line with a broad understanding of Free Speech.
He didn't talk about PayPal's board, that's something you just came up with. He talked about the attitudes of the C-suite and it's fair to assume that account termination policy is indeed set by the C-suite. Who else would set such policies?
> he has no idea why they suspended his account
Yes he does. From the article:
"The only clue as to what might be going on was a message sent a couple of days ago from PayPal on the now closed Daily Sceptic account. The crucial passage read: PayPal’s policy is not to allow our services to be used for activities that promote hate, violence or racial intolerance"
This is clearly not a statement in favour of free speech, it's an enumeration of what types of speech they think they are banning. However, he disagrees that anything on the site promotes hate, violence or racial intolerance.
And he's right. So the question is what did trigger this. IMO it's very likely the work of the trans lobby. DS hasn't had any problems until now but they only started posting news about stuff like Tavistock very recently. To some people, disapproving of almost anything trans-related is the same thing as "hate".
> he has no idea why they suspended his account
Yes he does. From the article:
"The only clue as to what might be going on was a message sent a couple of days ago from PayPal on the now closed Daily Sceptic account. The crucial passage read: PayPal’s policy is not to allow our services to be used for activities that promote hate, violence or racial intolerance"
This is clearly not a statement in favour of free speech, it's an enumeration of what types of speech they think they are banning. However, he disagrees that anything on the site promotes hate, violence or racial intolerance.
And he's right. So the question is what did trigger this. IMO it's very likely the work of the trans lobby. DS hasn't had any problems until now but they only started posting news about stuff like Tavistock very recently. To some people, disapproving of almost anything trans-related is the same thing as "hate".
You're missing the point, anyone working at Paypal could have any view on Free Speech. That doesn't determine what they decide when determining what is the correct way to balance competing priorities when running a business. It's fine for Paypal Execs to be free speech maximalists, but if they think that will have an adverse business impact, for example due to reputational damage, that will determine how they run their business.
>This is clearly not a statement in favour of free speech, it's an enumeration of what types of speech they think they are banning.
Disregarding the fact that this one passage has been cherry picked from what will obviously be a pro-forma response, depending on the details of what they define as promoting hate, violence or racial intolerance, they could absolutely be taking a maximalist free speech approach. It depends what degree or definition of those terms Paypal is choosing to apply.
I don't read the daily sceptic, clearly you do, as you already have some topics in mind for what they might be in trouble for. I just looked it up, I think you're probably right, if as you claim the Daily Sceptic has been directing and encouraging harassment and violent threats against doctors at a hospital, I think even the most vociferous free speech advocate would understand Paypal's reasonable approach.
>This is clearly not a statement in favour of free speech, it's an enumeration of what types of speech they think they are banning.
Disregarding the fact that this one passage has been cherry picked from what will obviously be a pro-forma response, depending on the details of what they define as promoting hate, violence or racial intolerance, they could absolutely be taking a maximalist free speech approach. It depends what degree or definition of those terms Paypal is choosing to apply.
I don't read the daily sceptic, clearly you do, as you already have some topics in mind for what they might be in trouble for. I just looked it up, I think you're probably right, if as you claim the Daily Sceptic has been directing and encouraging harassment and violent threats against doctors at a hospital, I think even the most vociferous free speech advocate would understand Paypal's reasonable approach.
"if as you claim the Daily Sceptic has been directing and encouraging harassment and violent threats against doctors"
I didn't say anywhere that the DS has been "directing and encouraging harassment". I didn't even imply it, because it's not true. That's something that, again, you just made up right now. You keep doing this: please respond to what people actually say, not what you wish they'd said.
"this one passage has been cherry picked from what will obviously be a pro-forma response"
Your original claim was that he had no idea why he was banned, but he cited an explanation from PayPal. You now reject PayPal's own words on the grounds that you don't believe it's meaningful. In other words, having made an incorrect claim you're now trying to make it unfalsifiable. But PayPal can easily say nothing and did so for the other terminations. For this one, they cited a specific part of their ToS. We can assume that is the reason.
Finally, a "maximalist" is by definition not someone who suppresses free speech because they think it's the best for their business.
I didn't say anywhere that the DS has been "directing and encouraging harassment". I didn't even imply it, because it's not true. That's something that, again, you just made up right now. You keep doing this: please respond to what people actually say, not what you wish they'd said.
"this one passage has been cherry picked from what will obviously be a pro-forma response"
Your original claim was that he had no idea why he was banned, but he cited an explanation from PayPal. You now reject PayPal's own words on the grounds that you don't believe it's meaningful. In other words, having made an incorrect claim you're now trying to make it unfalsifiable. But PayPal can easily say nothing and did so for the other terminations. For this one, they cited a specific part of their ToS. We can assume that is the reason.
Finally, a "maximalist" is by definition not someone who suppresses free speech because they think it's the best for their business.
No, I mean you talked about the hospital so I googled it and found all these stories about doctors receiving death threats. Isn't that what you were talking about? Sorry if I mis-read something, but go Google it, there's a shit-tonne of stuff about people harassing and threatening to kill doctors that treat gender-dysphoria. if that's not what you meant I'm a bit confused why you referenced it. It's the exact thing we're talking about - that even a free speech maximalist probably draws the line before advocating the murder of medical practitioners.
Here we go again: you stated that the Daily Sceptic specifically - the site this thread is about - had been "directing and encouraging harassment and violent threats against doctors". When pointed out that this is isn't true you fall back on "I googled and found some mention of some people doing that", which isn't the same thing. At all. Not even close. If two groups of people both disagree with another group of people, that doesn't mean the first two groups can be arbitrarily treated as the same or blamed for the actions of the other.
The extraordinary level of slippage your replies on this thread involve makes it very hard for people to debate with you, are you aware of that? You keep asserting that various people or groups have said things that they never said, or that they didn't say things when they did, based apparently on ad-hoc or arbitrary connections in your own mind. It's not surprising that you're feeling confused!
The problem you're displaying here crops up frequently in discussions about censorship. It's what Matt Taibbi calls "the transitive property of whatever". I was arguing a week ago with someone else on this forum who was claiming that Facebook was somehow implicated in the Rohingya Genocide. It's a form of overly-transitive reasoning in which belief in the power of words strengthens to the point at which everything appears connected to everything else. To invert the argument to a form you may recognize from the 'other side' it's like arguing that because a few Muslims have blown themselves up in response to religious teachings, therefore all mosques should be shut down.
So if you have a specific and precise problem with the website in question, let's hear it. And if you want to reply with an assertion that X said Y, please quote their exact words where they say that.
The extraordinary level of slippage your replies on this thread involve makes it very hard for people to debate with you, are you aware of that? You keep asserting that various people or groups have said things that they never said, or that they didn't say things when they did, based apparently on ad-hoc or arbitrary connections in your own mind. It's not surprising that you're feeling confused!
The problem you're displaying here crops up frequently in discussions about censorship. It's what Matt Taibbi calls "the transitive property of whatever". I was arguing a week ago with someone else on this forum who was claiming that Facebook was somehow implicated in the Rohingya Genocide. It's a form of overly-transitive reasoning in which belief in the power of words strengthens to the point at which everything appears connected to everything else. To invert the argument to a form you may recognize from the 'other side' it's like arguing that because a few Muslims have blown themselves up in response to religious teachings, therefore all mosques should be shut down.
So if you have a specific and precise problem with the website in question, let's hear it. And if you want to reply with an assertion that X said Y, please quote their exact words where they say that.
What a surprise, more big tech censoring speech they don't like.
We need better unregulated money transfer services
We need better unregulated money transfer services
> unregulated money transfer services
I'm not gonna go so far as to leave a "username checks out" comment on HN, but are you joking/trolling, or just completely insane? Money transfer services are regulated for a reason, and that is to protect consumers from outright fraud and blatant fleecing. Why would you think "unregulated money transfer services" would be any better than regulated ones? I don't see any problem they're not solving currently that having a "freer" market would solve; in fact, quite the opposite seems to be the case.
I'm not gonna go so far as to leave a "username checks out" comment on HN, but are you joking/trolling, or just completely insane? Money transfer services are regulated for a reason, and that is to protect consumers from outright fraud and blatant fleecing. Why would you think "unregulated money transfer services" would be any better than regulated ones? I don't see any problem they're not solving currently that having a "freer" market would solve; in fact, quite the opposite seems to be the case.
antifragility. Regulation through a central authority can only make big mistakes, the harder it clamps down to avoid smaller mistakes, the bigger the mistakes that eventually get made. Much harder to learn when you have full control, etc.
If anything you need MORE regulation. To prevent services to impose their arbitrary rules via TOS.
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coming to the banks you use pretty soon
Why do people use PayPal? I looked at it as a way to collect payments and it seemed the worst option to me. What is the attraction?
Everyone has PayPal.
Just few days ago in that site was article telling some negative points about Gates and WHO.
That what happens. Speak wrongly about big pharma, alphabet, Nestle or WHO, you will get cancelled.
Why ?
Because it's all the same Black Rock.
I think I understand gates about this needing to decrease the world population. After he made so much money he travelled with hes wife and contributed huge amounts of money and energy into the poor countries... then I think what happened was that he saw that helping he actually made things worse because there were just millions of more people killing animals, destroying the planet and making more babies and needing more food & medical aid. Now he wants to cancel this.. because human is the worst being in this rock and causes more harm than anything else.
I think I understand gates about this needing to decrease the world population. After he made so much money he travelled with hes wife and contributed huge amounts of money and energy into the poor countries... then I think what happened was that he saw that helping he actually made things worse because there were just millions of more people killing animals, destroying the planet and making more babies and needing more food & medical aid. Now he wants to cancel this.. because human is the worst being in this rock and causes more harm than anything else.
I think we can both have less people and help people who currently suffer. I don't see those two things as being incompatible
> human is the worst being in this rock
I recently learned that this view is called "misanthropy" or "misanthropism". It's related to philosophical pessimism and antinatalism (that people should not be born). I suppose it also supports population control.
> Misanthropy involves a negative evaluative attitude towards humanity that is based on a negative judgment concerning mankind's flaws. These flaws are seen as ubiquitous, i.e. possessed by almost everyone to a serious degree and not just by a few extreme cases
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misanthropy
I recently learned that this view is called "misanthropy" or "misanthropism". It's related to philosophical pessimism and antinatalism (that people should not be born). I suppose it also supports population control.
> Misanthropy involves a negative evaluative attitude towards humanity that is based on a negative judgment concerning mankind's flaws. These flaws are seen as ubiquitous, i.e. possessed by almost everyone to a serious degree and not just by a few extreme cases
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misanthropy
Say what you will about whether or not a private company like Paypal should have the ability to do this.
What clearly is true based on this example is that if we ever gave this power to the government they would use it and use it in a dangerous way.
What clearly is true based on this example is that if we ever gave this power to the government they would use it and use it in a dangerous way.
So, these decisions ought to be entrusted to an entity whose responsibilities are to its shareholders rather than elected representatives of the general population?
honestly, amorality seems less scary than self-righteousness to me at this point in history.
If you live in western Europe that is a point in favor of the government. Compared to the self rightousness of private companies the government are amoral buteacrats just following the regulations. Sure, there is some personal selrightousness but nowhere close to the levels at American tech companies.
>If you live in western Europe that is a point in favor of the government.
Maybe if history started in 1947 it would. Righteousness tends to do much better at the ballot box than the stock market. And self-righteous as American tech is for advertising purposes, I'd still say it has an order of magnitude more self-awareness than American politics for advertising purposes.
Maybe if history started in 1947 it would. Righteousness tends to do much better at the ballot box than the stock market. And self-righteous as American tech is for advertising purposes, I'd still say it has an order of magnitude more self-awareness than American politics for advertising purposes.
The representatives of the US are not “elected by the general population”. If that were the case, Montana wouldn’t have the same number of Senators as California, the President of the United States in 2016 would have been the one who received the most popular votes and gerrymandering wouldn’t be a thing.
The last thing I want is to give the government more power. Have you been paying attention to laws in conservative states that want to regulate speech on Facebook and Twitter but go out of their way to make sure that sites like Truth Social aren’t affected, the “Stop Woke” act in Florida, the laws passed in GA and Florida to punish corporations who speak out against the government (Delta and Disney specifically).
The last thing I want is to give the government more power. Have you been paying attention to laws in conservative states that want to regulate speech on Facebook and Twitter but go out of their way to make sure that sites like Truth Social aren’t affected, the “Stop Woke” act in Florida, the laws passed in GA and Florida to punish corporations who speak out against the government (Delta and Disney specifically).
Private companies, especially US based, tend to ban everyone based on keeping every pressure group out there happy.
At this point I'm pretty sure a government would ban less.
At this point I'm pretty sure a government would ban less.
? Government does have this power, because they have courts, police, and the army.
Who knows, like Twitter, government officials are not sitting in the same Slack channel as Paypal employees?
The thing about free speech is, that you are not entitled to be agreed with.
And it seems, paypal really doesn't agree with the rhetoric on the daily sceptic - just at a glance this looks to be completely understandable. If, as a private company, paypal doesn't want to be associated with a website that thrives on misinformation and fearmongering, you can't really be surprised - that's just bad for business.
I completely get the argument, that free speech shall not be limited by anyone. But as a society we have to decide if free speech should also cover blatant lies and deliberate misinformation.
just as a free society should fight any movement that wants to limit the freedoms of others, sews hate or doesn't follow the principles of a free society, free speech advocates should probably fight against peddlers of misinformation.
It's not all black and white, not all or nothing with this one... we can have nuance in this debate.
And it seems, paypal really doesn't agree with the rhetoric on the daily sceptic - just at a glance this looks to be completely understandable. If, as a private company, paypal doesn't want to be associated with a website that thrives on misinformation and fearmongering, you can't really be surprised - that's just bad for business.
I completely get the argument, that free speech shall not be limited by anyone. But as a society we have to decide if free speech should also cover blatant lies and deliberate misinformation.
just as a free society should fight any movement that wants to limit the freedoms of others, sews hate or doesn't follow the principles of a free society, free speech advocates should probably fight against peddlers of misinformation.
It's not all black and white, not all or nothing with this one... we can have nuance in this debate.
> I completely get the argument, that free speech shall not be limited by anyone. But as a society we have to decide if free speech should also cover blatant lies and deliberate misinformation.
I hear this position a lot in relation to free speech and it's one I can't understand for the life of me. I guess I don't know what a blatant lie is, and further I know it's something I've been accused of many times in my life when attempting to speak the truth.
I have two questions for you:
* 1: If I say something that I genuinely believe, but is strongly contradicted by evidence that I may or may not be aware of do I have a right to say it?
* 2: If I say something that I believe is factually incorrect would I not have any right to say it?
Perhaps an example here would help. So something I've noticed is there are a lot of conspiracy theory websites which talk about an invisible man that can cure sick people. As far as I can tell this seems to be contradicted by the evidence and these people seem to be either blatantly lying or just completely ignorant of current scientific data. In some cases people who run these website are causing real world harm by convincing people that they shouldn't seek professional medical treatment for their illnesses because the invisible man will take care of them. My understanding is that in some cases conspiracy theorists are even refusing to get vaccinated because they believe the invisible man doesn't want them to get vaccinated.
I'm just wondering if you believe that websites dedicated to the invisible man conspiracy theory should be banned? And if so should those causing real world harm by lying about the invisible man be held to account for their actions?
I hear this position a lot in relation to free speech and it's one I can't understand for the life of me. I guess I don't know what a blatant lie is, and further I know it's something I've been accused of many times in my life when attempting to speak the truth.
I have two questions for you:
* 1: If I say something that I genuinely believe, but is strongly contradicted by evidence that I may or may not be aware of do I have a right to say it?
* 2: If I say something that I believe is factually incorrect would I not have any right to say it?
Perhaps an example here would help. So something I've noticed is there are a lot of conspiracy theory websites which talk about an invisible man that can cure sick people. As far as I can tell this seems to be contradicted by the evidence and these people seem to be either blatantly lying or just completely ignorant of current scientific data. In some cases people who run these website are causing real world harm by convincing people that they shouldn't seek professional medical treatment for their illnesses because the invisible man will take care of them. My understanding is that in some cases conspiracy theorists are even refusing to get vaccinated because they believe the invisible man doesn't want them to get vaccinated.
I'm just wondering if you believe that websites dedicated to the invisible man conspiracy theory should be banned? And if so should those causing real world harm by lying about the invisible man be held to account for their actions?
What you consider “misinformation” today may turn out to be the truth tomorrow. I am not familiar with this site, but do you have examples of the “blatant lies and deliberate misinformation”?
Imagine if in 2001 everyone used your argument to deplatform anyone who said that Iraq did not have WMDs. Imagine if anyone who claimed that the U.S. recruited Nazi scientists to work in the U.S. government after World War II had their funds cut off. Imagine if anyone who suggested that smoking cigarettes was unhealthy or could lead to cancer in the 1940s was banned. There are countless examples of things like this.
Your line of thinking here is very dangerous because the justification to ban or deplatform people you disagree with today will be the same one used to ban people you agree with tomorrow.
The other thing is, as you pointed out, the issue is not black and white. Neither is the classification about what is considered “hate speech” or “misinformation”. Are you comfortable with big tech giants making those decisions?
Imagine if in 2001 everyone used your argument to deplatform anyone who said that Iraq did not have WMDs. Imagine if anyone who claimed that the U.S. recruited Nazi scientists to work in the U.S. government after World War II had their funds cut off. Imagine if anyone who suggested that smoking cigarettes was unhealthy or could lead to cancer in the 1940s was banned. There are countless examples of things like this.
Your line of thinking here is very dangerous because the justification to ban or deplatform people you disagree with today will be the same one used to ban people you agree with tomorrow.
The other thing is, as you pointed out, the issue is not black and white. Neither is the classification about what is considered “hate speech” or “misinformation”. Are you comfortable with big tech giants making those decisions?
I want the right to deplatform people for any reason. It my money I'm using to run my site and I should get to choose who uses it for what, with any rationale, or no rationale.
If society feels there's some gain to be had by restricting this, then let's legislate (because the platforms already ban people to maximize their profit, they're not giving that up willingly). Though, honestly, that's such a minefield I have trouble imagining the form effective legislation would take.
If society feels there's some gain to be had by restricting this, then let's legislate (because the platforms already ban people to maximize their profit, they're not giving that up willingly). Though, honestly, that's such a minefield I have trouble imagining the form effective legislation would take.
I think there is a fine line between a tech company and a financial services company.
Do you think it is okay for a bank to restrict people access to their own money or deny bank accounts because of opinions they hold or things they say?
It’s really easy to make claims like this when you don’t think the rules would ever apply to you. “Oh they are just targeting some fringe site on the internet. That’s perfectly within their rights”.
The precedent is what is dangerous. Imagine a world where if anyone says anything bad about billionaires, they are no longer allowed to use financial services.
Do you think it is okay for a bank to restrict people access to their own money or deny bank accounts because of opinions they hold or things they say?
It’s really easy to make claims like this when you don’t think the rules would ever apply to you. “Oh they are just targeting some fringe site on the internet. That’s perfectly within their rights”.
The precedent is what is dangerous. Imagine a world where if anyone says anything bad about billionaires, they are no longer allowed to use financial services.
I don't think it's ok in this case. I say we regulate PayPal.
But also that we steer clear of any talk of the right to use other people's sites in general. That's far too far.
But also that we steer clear of any talk of the right to use other people's sites in general. That's far too far.
The precedent was already set, but the people screaming about free speech today didn't care then because it was queers and sex workers losing their livelihoods.
I only read the DS occasionally these days, but to accuse this particular site of fear-mongering is really just a knee jerk reaction that shows you don't know anything about it.
The site was originally born as Lockdown Sceptics in ~March 2020 and has historically been devoted to combating fear, not engaging in it. The site's history consists mostly of articles arguing that lockdowns and other COVID countermeasures were an overreaction based on hysteria and bad assumptions by governments/academics. In 2020 of course this was considered incredible heresy and "misinformation" even though a lot of the people writing for it were actual doctors, scientists and researchers themselves.
Since the UK PM leadership contest, several high ranking members of the Johnson administration have walked back their previous support for lockdowns and judging from the Spectator/Telegraph the feeling inside the ruling party is now much more aligned with the Daily Sceptic's writers - the Cabinet woke up to the fact that SAGE were feeding them misinformation and the scale of the problem was being regularly exaggerated. E.g. Rishi Sunak said the Treasury had someone on SAGE conf calls for a while who didn't speak, so they didn't realize she was there, and she fed notes back to Sunak who then compared then to the official minutes the government was being sent. What a surprise, the official minutes expunged any mention of dissent or disagreement with whatever the most extreme proposals were.
At some point Lockdown Sceptics became the Daily Sceptic and it branched out. Since then it covers not only COVID topics but also generic anti-woke stuff, debate about the situation in Ukraine (with Ian Rons and Toby Young taking up the more conventional side of the argument and others arguing against), and a bunch of other stuff I'm not so interested in.
Nonetheless the idea that they spread misinformation let alone "hate" is absurd. The writers are mostly a bunch of middle aged academics and journalists making various counter-cultural points, who use graphs and data tables 10x more than the average journalist does.
The site was originally born as Lockdown Sceptics in ~March 2020 and has historically been devoted to combating fear, not engaging in it. The site's history consists mostly of articles arguing that lockdowns and other COVID countermeasures were an overreaction based on hysteria and bad assumptions by governments/academics. In 2020 of course this was considered incredible heresy and "misinformation" even though a lot of the people writing for it were actual doctors, scientists and researchers themselves.
Since the UK PM leadership contest, several high ranking members of the Johnson administration have walked back their previous support for lockdowns and judging from the Spectator/Telegraph the feeling inside the ruling party is now much more aligned with the Daily Sceptic's writers - the Cabinet woke up to the fact that SAGE were feeding them misinformation and the scale of the problem was being regularly exaggerated. E.g. Rishi Sunak said the Treasury had someone on SAGE conf calls for a while who didn't speak, so they didn't realize she was there, and she fed notes back to Sunak who then compared then to the official minutes the government was being sent. What a surprise, the official minutes expunged any mention of dissent or disagreement with whatever the most extreme proposals were.
At some point Lockdown Sceptics became the Daily Sceptic and it branched out. Since then it covers not only COVID topics but also generic anti-woke stuff, debate about the situation in Ukraine (with Ian Rons and Toby Young taking up the more conventional side of the argument and others arguing against), and a bunch of other stuff I'm not so interested in.
Nonetheless the idea that they spread misinformation let alone "hate" is absurd. The writers are mostly a bunch of middle aged academics and journalists making various counter-cultural points, who use graphs and data tables 10x more than the average journalist does.
Speech is one thing, taking money that lawfully belongs to somebody else is another.
Who exactly decides what misinformation is? Remember when Twitter started banning people for discussing the lab leak theory, which turned out to be true?
> Remember when Twitter started banning people for discussing the lab leak theory, which turned out to be true?
The lab leak theory hasn't turned out to be true, so no.
The lab leak theory hasn't turned out to be true, so no.
> which turned out to be true?
Now that’s a bold claim.
Now that’s a bold claim.
The lab leak theory has not been proven nor is there any evidence
It pains me to defend antivaccine idiots, but it's not the payment processor's business. Be it paypal, visa or anyone else.
Sure, but PayPal entered a contract, and there should be a legal means to break the contract, not just by a whim because of something seen on Twitter.
Sure, which PayPal used:
> If we believe that you’ve engaged in any of these activities, we may take a number of actions to protect PayPal, its customers and others at any time in our sole discretion. The actions we may take include, but are not limited to, the following:
> Terminating this user agreement, limiting your PayPal account (and any linked Balance Account), and/or closing or suspending your PayPal account (and any linked Balance Account), immediately and without penalty to us;
> If we believe that you’ve engaged in any of these activities, we may take a number of actions to protect PayPal, its customers and others at any time in our sole discretion. The actions we may take include, but are not limited to, the following:
> Terminating this user agreement, limiting your PayPal account (and any linked Balance Account), and/or closing or suspending your PayPal account (and any linked Balance Account), immediately and without penalty to us;
I just bet the PayPal terms also included words to the effect of "We can alter this deal, already couched in the vaguest possible terms, whenever we please without any notice other than this."
Those are among the first actually.
Fun fact is they disclose them differently for personal and business accounts.
Fun fact is they disclose them differently for personal and business accounts.
Given the Paypal "contract" (T&Cs) is longer than most published works, I suspect there are 4,122 "outs" specifically written into the contract that let's Payal do practically whatever the hell they want.
You don't know if they didn't have a valid reason
By your own logic, Paypal may decide not to be associated with anyone based on any random criteria, including opinions, race, sex, age etc. It can be black and white, of course, just not today.
No, state and federal law explicitly create protected classes, and describe the scope of protections granted. A service provider would be opening itself up to huge liability if it cut someone’s service based on, for instance, race or gender.
You are missing the point: PayPal does NOT provide any specific reason for the termination, so there is NO protected class as you cannot prove they terminated an account for speech, race or gender.
Giving no reason, absent a contractual or legal requirement to provide one, falls far short of offering up a blatantly illegal explanation. Even so, companies have clearly been found guilty of illegal discrimination, even when they went out of their way to hide their unlawful motivations.
But not political stance? Seems a glaring oversight. Unless the people who wrote the regulations like being able to request a payment processor shut off campaign donations to any newcomer with better ideas than them.
But that would make them beholden to the business interests that actually control the money, and leave them helpless to enforce any real regulations on the same. Surely no elected representative would be so shortsighted ;o)
start accepting crypto donations. problem solved.
The problems go further than that. Kiwi farms has had their cdn, hosting provider, domain name, owners personal phone number, post box, and legal team cancel them all within a week.
Once big corporate decides to act against you, it’s basically impossible to continue existing.
Once big corporate decides to act against you, it’s basically impossible to continue existing.
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While I agree with this in principal, it is still not practical. Crypto is still too clunky to be used by many potential donors. A site would take a heavy hit to their income by only allowing crypto donations.
That might be true, but it also moves the problem into another domain.
If nobody can force the hand of payment service, they aren't to blame anymore.
If nobody can force the hand of payment service, they aren't to blame anymore.
I'm no longer sitting around waiting to get bitten by these rogue companies. My Paypal account will be closed today.
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Considering they're called "The Daily Sceptic", I'm surprised they weren't more sceptical about using PayPal in the first place.
The Daily Sceptic is such a piece of shit, I try very hard to feel sad but I can't.
I know that it's a question of big principles etc... but still.
I know that it's a question of big principles etc... but still.
Yes, it is a question of big principles and that's what matters.
"principle: a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behaviour or for a chain of reasoning."
"principle: a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behaviour or for a chain of reasoning."
The Daily Sceptic has demonstrated greater integrity than the BBC, The Financial Time, The Econcomist.
It is a question of big principles.
To quote Orwell: "If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people things they do not want to hear."
To quote Orwell: "If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people things they do not want to hear."
Technically, PayPal told them "we don't want your business", and DailySceptic doesn't want to hear about it
(Yeah, freedom goes both ways)
(Yeah, freedom goes both ways)
Yeah, all the counterfactual bad faith bullshit actors of chaos suddenly cry for rules when it hurts them. Conveniently forget any rules and decency when they stir up shit.
Not saying paypal isn't shit but there is some schadenfreude to be had for sure.
Not saying paypal isn't shit but there is some schadenfreude to be had for sure.
I don’t know anything about The Daily Sceptic. what makes it such a piece?
Just look at their front page: it's full of AGW denialism and anti-ecologism, conspiracy theories (e.g. Bill Gates and global health...), use of terms like "covid propaganda", ...
What makes Bill Gates' well timed and well documented investments in vaccine companies and donations to public health organizations a conspiracy theory?
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/14/global-covid-pandem...
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/14/global-covid-pandem...
"Oh look!! He knew there would be a pandemic!!"
So you see where is the conspiracy theory in that, now?
So you see where is the conspiracy theory in that, now?
I assume you are referring to this article: https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/20/the-growing-menace-of-bi...
Can you point out where it says he knew there would be a pandemic?
Do you think the public deserves to know that Bill Gates and his foundation contributed $789 million to the World Health Organization in 2021 (more than the U.S. Government)?
Can you point out where it says he knew there would be a pandemic?
Do you think the public deserves to know that Bill Gates and his foundation contributed $789 million to the World Health Organization in 2021 (more than the U.S. Government)?
The tone of the article is "ohlolo Bill Gates is evil, look at how he is the one who finances thus controls the WHO", which is false, as this financial contribution gives him ZERO control on it. Yet it is implied in the tone of the article.
The part "he knew there was a pandemic" is actually a reply to the previous commentator speaking about "well timed and well documented investments" from Bill Gates related to the pandemic, which is a way to present it as "he knew what was coming, how weird". Now I hope you see why, at least in that commentator post, that sounded extremely conspiracy theoretical.
The part "he knew there was a pandemic" is actually a reply to the previous commentator speaking about "well timed and well documented investments" from Bill Gates related to the pandemic, which is a way to present it as "he knew what was coming, how weird". Now I hope you see why, at least in that commentator post, that sounded extremely conspiracy theoretical.
I hadn't heard about it before either, but you can get a good overview by following the link and having a look at the sidebar where their typical content seems to be featured.
Or just reading the article, which features some things the author feels caused them to be “cancelled”.
They’re a right wing “bastion of free speech” and proud of it.
They’re a right wing “bastion of free speech” and proud of it.
Is there something intrinsically bad about "right wing" now?
I believe there was a worldwide war specifically to stop some right wing extremists from taking over and killing anyone they didn't like
Yes. See literally the world around you.
Probably the same kind of people who replied to me "and so what is bad about nationalism?" a few weeks ago on HN...
Seems like a very balanced perspective.
Do you have a counter-argument?
Anything at all to show how right wing ideology is not literally and figuratively destroying the world?
Anything at all to show how right wing ideology is not literally and figuratively destroying the world?
And the cure for this is driving it underground via censorship?
You asked if there is something bad about “right wing”, I explained there is, you disagreed and have no counter-arguments to hold up.
Stick to the topic you yourself established, don’t move the goal posts.
If you have nothing more to contribute, then don’t.
Stick to the topic you yourself established, don’t move the goal posts.
If you have nothing more to contribute, then don’t.
where did you hear such a good idea?
Careful now. "Right" and "left" are over-simplified labels covering a very broad range of preferences, and sometimes used as badges of self-identity in order to make arbitrary ideologies more palatable to the general public. For example, the actual literal Nazi party's name translates as "nationalist socialist", even though they hated communism so much that communists were one of the groups sent to the death camps, and they chose this name because socialism was a vote-winner in Weimar-era Germany.
> literally [...] destroying the world
Left-wing ideology is trying to drive five billion people, as fast as possible, to first-world living standards (via either open borders fanaticism, direct aid, or economic globalization), with the accompanying carbon footprint implied by a first-world lifestyle.
All whilst bemoaning carbon emissions.
Yawn. Wake me when your own ideological compatriots demonstrate your concern for the climate with policies that won't absolutely destroy it. As it currently stands, you're actively trying for 500ppm.
Left-wing ideology is trying to drive five billion people, as fast as possible, to first-world living standards (via either open borders fanaticism, direct aid, or economic globalization), with the accompanying carbon footprint implied by a first-world lifestyle.
All whilst bemoaning carbon emissions.
Yawn. Wake me when your own ideological compatriots demonstrate your concern for the climate with policies that won't absolutely destroy it. As it currently stands, you're actively trying for 500ppm.
>Left-wing ideology is trying to drive five billion people, as fast as possible, to first-world living standards (via either open borders fanaticism, direct aid, or economic globalization), with the accompanying carbon footprint implied by a first-world lifestyle.
what you're describing here is capitalism.
what you're describing here is capitalism.
who is Spee Chunion and why does he need to be freed?
It's just your run of the mill far right misinformation laundered into a slightly more respectable look by pretending to be "sceptics" - but their scepticism is only ever applied to positions they already disagreed with and entirely absent when the view is politically expedient.
They're associated with the Free Speech Union which is happy to fight for the left.
Please restrain your misinformation. You agree you should now have your bank accounts closed?
Please restrain your misinformation. You agree you should now have your bank accounts closed?
They mentioned that their covid denialist partners got banned before them :)
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True. There is a real argument to be made here that this site is actively causing harm. Payment providers, especially credit card companies, have banned sites and services for far less, for example because they decided porn was incompatible with their public image.
But this illustrates the dilemma quite well: ideally we would like payment providers to be a public utility that is not allowed to make whimsical judgement calls, on the other hand we would like them to employ good judgement about facilitating things that are clearly detrimental.
While I share your schadenfreude in this case, I don't see how this is solvable in the general case.
But this illustrates the dilemma quite well: ideally we would like payment providers to be a public utility that is not allowed to make whimsical judgement calls, on the other hand we would like them to employ good judgement about facilitating things that are clearly detrimental.
While I share your schadenfreude in this case, I don't see how this is solvable in the general case.
> There is a real argument to be made here that this site is actively causing harm.
Who or what is this site harming?
Who or what is this site harming?
After a quick scan of the site, it does seem to have an anti-scientific bias (i.e. in opposition to scientific consensus) on COVID and climate change, which contributes to the harm caused by those things.
> in opposition to scientific consensus
At what stage of the scientific method is inquiry no longer permitted?
> COVID and climate change,
Are the authorities 100% right about both of these topics?
> which contributes to the harm caused by those things.
Have you considered that trying to shut down free inquiry into these things makes many people even more distrustful of what you have to say?
At what stage of the scientific method is inquiry no longer permitted?
> COVID and climate change,
Are the authorities 100% right about both of these topics?
> which contributes to the harm caused by those things.
Have you considered that trying to shut down free inquiry into these things makes many people even more distrustful of what you have to say?
> At what stage of the scientific method is inquiry no longer permitted?
Well, this is media reporting rather than scientific inquiry. There certainly are ethical limits to what can be published if it goes against fact or scientific consensus. For a more clearcut example, it's harmful if a publication reports that drinking urine cures cancer. I don't think you'd disagree that this would be hamrful (maybe you do?) but perhaps you differ on whether we have the same confidence about climate change and COVID. Which I suppose ties into your next question.
> Are the authorities 100% right about COVID and climate change?
Not sure what you mean by "authorities", but the current scientific consensus that the Earth is warming due to human activity is so strong, that it's practically comparable with statements like "the Earth goes round the sun". These are the people whose job it is to be objective and sceptical. Not everyone has the time and inclination to read the literature and understand the models ourselves, so we either trust in the science, or we think that the whole of science is caught up in some kind of mass hysteria or conspiracy.
> Have you considered that trying to shut down free inquiry into these things makes many people even more distrustful of what you have to say?
Sure, but I'm not sure I consider one company distancing itself from another to be the same as shutting down free inquiry. And anyway, the question I was considering was "is there an argument that the DailySceptic is harmful". I was simply proposing ways in which it may well be causing a social harm. Balancing that harm against the harm caused by restricting free speech is much trickier.
Well, this is media reporting rather than scientific inquiry. There certainly are ethical limits to what can be published if it goes against fact or scientific consensus. For a more clearcut example, it's harmful if a publication reports that drinking urine cures cancer. I don't think you'd disagree that this would be hamrful (maybe you do?) but perhaps you differ on whether we have the same confidence about climate change and COVID. Which I suppose ties into your next question.
> Are the authorities 100% right about COVID and climate change?
Not sure what you mean by "authorities", but the current scientific consensus that the Earth is warming due to human activity is so strong, that it's practically comparable with statements like "the Earth goes round the sun". These are the people whose job it is to be objective and sceptical. Not everyone has the time and inclination to read the literature and understand the models ourselves, so we either trust in the science, or we think that the whole of science is caught up in some kind of mass hysteria or conspiracy.
> Have you considered that trying to shut down free inquiry into these things makes many people even more distrustful of what you have to say?
Sure, but I'm not sure I consider one company distancing itself from another to be the same as shutting down free inquiry. And anyway, the question I was considering was "is there an argument that the DailySceptic is harmful". I was simply proposing ways in which it may well be causing a social harm. Balancing that harm against the harm caused by restricting free speech is much trickier.
> Well, this is media reporting rather than scientific inquiry.
The first step of the scientific method is observing and questioning reality. Whether this action is performed by somebody with "researcher" in their job title or not doesn't change that.
> There certainly are ethical limits to what can be published if it goes against fact or scientific consensus.
It was also scientific fact at one time that the Earth was the center of the universe, or that washing your hands before surgery was pointless. How do we know when it becomes ok to question fact or scientific consensus or not?
> the current scientific consensus that the Earth is warming due to human activity is so strong
For the sake of argument, if we take that statement as an iron-clad fact, we're still left with a wide range of outcomes within the reality of climate change.
1) How much is earth warming?
2) What level of harm would that cause? Might some areas of the globe benefit while others are harmed?
3) What if the proposed solutions to climate change cause more problems for humans than benefits?
Is there not room to disagree with many proposed climate change solutions without being labeled as anti-scientific?
> And anyway, the question I was considering was "is there an argument that the DailySceptic is harmful".
Since you seem to be focusing on utilitarian outcomes, have you even considered the ways in that skepticism of what you're told to believe might perform a social good?
The first step of the scientific method is observing and questioning reality. Whether this action is performed by somebody with "researcher" in their job title or not doesn't change that.
> There certainly are ethical limits to what can be published if it goes against fact or scientific consensus.
It was also scientific fact at one time that the Earth was the center of the universe, or that washing your hands before surgery was pointless. How do we know when it becomes ok to question fact or scientific consensus or not?
> the current scientific consensus that the Earth is warming due to human activity is so strong
For the sake of argument, if we take that statement as an iron-clad fact, we're still left with a wide range of outcomes within the reality of climate change.
1) How much is earth warming?
2) What level of harm would that cause? Might some areas of the globe benefit while others are harmed?
3) What if the proposed solutions to climate change cause more problems for humans than benefits?
Is there not room to disagree with many proposed climate change solutions without being labeled as anti-scientific?
> And anyway, the question I was considering was "is there an argument that the DailySceptic is harmful".
Since you seem to be focusing on utilitarian outcomes, have you even considered the ways in that skepticism of what you're told to believe might perform a social good?
The one with "researcher" title is one of those who spent most of their life learning about the subject, comparing and simulating different theories, and weighing the odds using statistical models, which by the way is also why they are aware of the uncertainty of their conclusions.
So, when those people gather and are in a consensus about a specific question, it means a lot.
Whereas when a lay person without such title or background questions the consensus, it really means little.
A great way to be helpful to Humanity, for the Daily Sceptic, would have been to take important things brought by researchers on, say, AGW, and make an effort to transform it in a format more easily understandable to the public.
In place of that, they pick articles bearing ultra-minority opinions against the consensuses, and they propulse them to the rank of "just another opinion in a controversial problem", although the problem is not at all controversial, it's just that there always exist people who say anything.
So, when those people gather and are in a consensus about a specific question, it means a lot.
Whereas when a lay person without such title or background questions the consensus, it really means little.
A great way to be helpful to Humanity, for the Daily Sceptic, would have been to take important things brought by researchers on, say, AGW, and make an effort to transform it in a format more easily understandable to the public.
In place of that, they pick articles bearing ultra-minority opinions against the consensuses, and they propulse them to the rank of "just another opinion in a controversial problem", although the problem is not at all controversial, it's just that there always exist people who say anything.
> How do we know when it becomes ok to question fact or scientific consensus or not?
I mean, the straightforward answer to this is "when there is a high degree of confidence that the claims are harmful, incorrect, politically motivated, and reported in the media rather than scientific publication". At some point we have to draw an epistemological line and say we're sure about this, and we're sure what you're saying would cause suffering. The fact that humanity has been wrong in the past doesn't mean we should stop trying to prevent harm.
> Is there not room to disagree with many proposed climate change solutions without being labeled as anti-scientific?
There is, but that's not all that this website is doing. A very quick search brings up two articles where it publicises very fringe claims by people who are not climate scientists:
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/14/climate-emergency-not-su...
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/06/24/climate-scientist-says-h...
The second of these is particularly bizarre. The title actually says "climate scientist" and in the slightly more measured footnote calls him an "atmospheric scientist". It neglects to point out that he is a retired researcher in laser engineering who has apparently conducted his own investigations - neither published nor peer reviewed as far as I can tell - http://hharde.de/#xl_xr_page_index . This is very typical of presenting a false balance in order to push an agenda.
I mean, the straightforward answer to this is "when there is a high degree of confidence that the claims are harmful, incorrect, politically motivated, and reported in the media rather than scientific publication". At some point we have to draw an epistemological line and say we're sure about this, and we're sure what you're saying would cause suffering. The fact that humanity has been wrong in the past doesn't mean we should stop trying to prevent harm.
> Is there not room to disagree with many proposed climate change solutions without being labeled as anti-scientific?
There is, but that's not all that this website is doing. A very quick search brings up two articles where it publicises very fringe claims by people who are not climate scientists:
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/14/climate-emergency-not-su...
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/06/24/climate-scientist-says-h...
The second of these is particularly bizarre. The title actually says "climate scientist" and in the slightly more measured footnote calls him an "atmospheric scientist". It neglects to point out that he is a retired researcher in laser engineering who has apparently conducted his own investigations - neither published nor peer reviewed as far as I can tell - http://hharde.de/#xl_xr_page_index . This is very typical of presenting a false balance in order to push an agenda.
> For a more clearcut example, it's harmful if a publication reports that drinking urine cures cancer.
I wonder…
Well, urine isn't on this list: http://kill-or-cure.herokuapp.com/a-z/u
But as this is about the principle and not just the specific, the Daily Mail is famous for saying things cause or cure cancer and the UK seems to let them get away with this without much in the way of noticeable impact on life expectancy ranking.
I wonder…
Well, urine isn't on this list: http://kill-or-cure.herokuapp.com/a-z/u
But as this is about the principle and not just the specific, the Daily Mail is famous for saying things cause or cure cancer and the UK seems to let them get away with this without much in the way of noticeable impact on life expectancy ranking.
Fair point. Although the Daily Mail does have to issue corrections and retractions if IPSO finds them in breach of Clause 1. And I don't know if there's an easy way to actually measure the impact on life expectancy.
Why do people have be pro-science? Historically the scientific method had been a powerful tool, but it isn’t proscriptive.
The site has a pro-science bias. Lots of its articles argue based on scientific principles that positions being advertised as a "scientific consensus" aren't reached using the scientific method. Look at this article from the front page for an example:
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/20/status-bias-in-peer-revi...
It reports on some claims (pre-print) that changing the name and title on a paper between a nobody and a Nobel Prize winner radically changes the likelihood of paper acceptance, i.e. scientific journals are relying mostly on reputation and not paper quality in their peer review process. If true that's not scientific and can lead to "consensus" that just reflects the opinions of a tiny handful of people through inertia.
Here's an article by an anonymous academic criticizing a group of scientists who were engaging in political lobbying:
https://dailysceptic.org/archive/when-did-scientists-turn-in...
In general, consider how much COVID science was advertised as a consensus right up until the moment it inverted or was proven false. The lab leak was a disproven conspiracy theory right up until the Biden administration admitted it could be true and should be investigated. Vaccine mandates were required to stop the spread, then it was admitted vaccines didn't stop transmission. In the UK, Omicron had the same IFR as Delta and refusal to lock down over Christmas would create 4000 deaths a day, except that it didn't.
The DS started as a blog for people who scratched the surface of these claims and went looking for the papers. When found they were invariably either missing or pseudo-scientific so there was a need for people to exchange notes and demonstrate their arguments for why this wasn't really science. It's important that such sites exist.
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/20/status-bias-in-peer-revi...
It reports on some claims (pre-print) that changing the name and title on a paper between a nobody and a Nobel Prize winner radically changes the likelihood of paper acceptance, i.e. scientific journals are relying mostly on reputation and not paper quality in their peer review process. If true that's not scientific and can lead to "consensus" that just reflects the opinions of a tiny handful of people through inertia.
Here's an article by an anonymous academic criticizing a group of scientists who were engaging in political lobbying:
https://dailysceptic.org/archive/when-did-scientists-turn-in...
In general, consider how much COVID science was advertised as a consensus right up until the moment it inverted or was proven false. The lab leak was a disproven conspiracy theory right up until the Biden administration admitted it could be true and should be investigated. Vaccine mandates were required to stop the spread, then it was admitted vaccines didn't stop transmission. In the UK, Omicron had the same IFR as Delta and refusal to lock down over Christmas would create 4000 deaths a day, except that it didn't.
The DS started as a blog for people who scratched the surface of these claims and went looking for the papers. When found they were invariably either missing or pseudo-scientific so there was a need for people to exchange notes and demonstrate their arguments for why this wasn't really science. It's important that such sites exist.
If they attack positions that are widely recognized as scientific consensuses, then they clearly are NOT pro-science.
I'd say further, the clearest sign that somebody or some organisation is not listening to science, is that they are actively questioning scientific consensuses.
I'd say further, the clearest sign that somebody or some organisation is not listening to science, is that they are actively questioning scientific consensuses.
"If they attack positions that are widely recognized as scientific consensuses, then they clearly are NOT pro-science."
This is the authoritarian pseudo-science that has been corrupting actual scientific progress for some time now. You are wrong for three reasons:
1. There's no such thing as a scientific consensus because science is a method, not a set of people, but a method can't have a consensus about something.
2. None of the positions they attack are actually a consensus anyway even if we replace the word "scientific" with "academics/scientists", and they like to prove it from time to time by pointing to scientists or entire groups of scientists stating that they disagree with those positions (see other comment).
3. Their writers provide data backed and scientific [counter-]arguments for their positions.
There's also lots of articles there sounding the alarm about corruption of scientific institutions. Like this recent one [1] about bias in the peer review process. Here's another where they decry ideological bias in Nature [2]. They pretty regularly cover cases where scientific institutions are clearly acting in unscientific ways.
[1] https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/20/status-bias-in-peer-revi...
[2] https://dailysceptic.org/2022/07/02/the-ideological-capture-...
This is the authoritarian pseudo-science that has been corrupting actual scientific progress for some time now. You are wrong for three reasons:
1. There's no such thing as a scientific consensus because science is a method, not a set of people, but a method can't have a consensus about something.
2. None of the positions they attack are actually a consensus anyway even if we replace the word "scientific" with "academics/scientists", and they like to prove it from time to time by pointing to scientists or entire groups of scientists stating that they disagree with those positions (see other comment).
3. Their writers provide data backed and scientific [counter-]arguments for their positions.
There's also lots of articles there sounding the alarm about corruption of scientific institutions. Like this recent one [1] about bias in the peer review process. Here's another where they decry ideological bias in Nature [2]. They pretty regularly cover cases where scientific institutions are clearly acting in unscientific ways.
[1] https://dailysceptic.org/2022/09/20/status-bias-in-peer-revi...
[2] https://dailysceptic.org/2022/07/02/the-ideological-capture-...
A/ "Scientific consensus" means that the specialists of the subject overwhelmingly agree, and moreover they give a high statistical confidence in their conclusion (because, yes, they also quantify certainty/uncertainty).
You seem to think that science is way more than what it is.
Science is just knowledge + logic. The presence of logic gives a highly structured architecture to it, true, but it is guided by logic so it all has a reason to be.
B/ I would add: very nice for them to play the Knights of the Lost Cause with minor theories, but they seem to ignore the adage "choose your fights". Which is most important, highlight a very unlikely small possibility that AGW does not exist, or help people understand the known mechanisms of it and organize themselves to counter it? Yeah rhetorical much.
You seem to think that science is way more than what it is.
Science is just knowledge + logic. The presence of logic gives a highly structured architecture to it, true, but it is guided by logic so it all has a reason to be.
B/ I would add: very nice for them to play the Knights of the Lost Cause with minor theories, but they seem to ignore the adage "choose your fights". Which is most important, highlight a very unlikely small possibility that AGW does not exist, or help people understand the known mechanisms of it and organize themselves to counter it? Yeah rhetorical much.
Experts in drilling oil wells agree with 95% certainty that oil wells are beneficial and we should have more of them. There's a consensus of specialists, so you have to accept this is true and adopt their position, right?
"[consensus means] the specialists of the subject overwhelmingly agree ... Science is just knowledge + logic"
So is science what specialists say it is, or is it just knowledge+logic? If the latter then what specialists say doesn't matter, because anyone can obtain knowledge and apply logic.
"[consensus means] the specialists of the subject overwhelmingly agree ... Science is just knowledge + logic"
So is science what specialists say it is, or is it just knowledge+logic? If the latter then what specialists say doesn't matter, because anyone can obtain knowledge and apply logic.
Experts in drilling oil wells do not have an extended knowledge on Earth's climate mechanisms, and usually they don't even make reports about this subject. When they do, it is seen suspiciously because it is not their domain of expertise.
So, people expressing themselves outside their domain of expertise are not to be trusted.
In your example "that oil wells are beneficial" means probably "also beneficial for the climate"? "for our future as Humanity"? "for health"? So you see, it is vague and probably wrong.
So, people expressing themselves outside their domain of expertise are not to be trusted.
In your example "that oil wells are beneficial" means probably "also beneficial for the climate"? "for our future as Humanity"? "for health"? So you see, it is vague and probably wrong.
Ah, but I didn't say anything about the climate. I understand why you extrapolated that given that it's the example of "not pro-science" that you originally picked, but in my example they were merely certain that oil wells are beneficial and we should have more of them. Beneficial for whom? Well, our straw oilmen could easily argue that human progress has always increased energy usage, oil wells deliver energy, therefore more oil wells are beneficial for humanity.
The point here is you can't go from "specialists assert something about their field" to "and therefore it's true and we should do it". But this is how you're defining science - an unquestioning belief in whatever specialists say, as long as seems to be about their specialism.
That's a mental shortcut and it often fails. All scientists - climatologists included - have to master all kinds of skills from outside their own field. For example scientists routinely use statistics and programming yet they aren't specialists in those fields. In the early days, the Daily Sceptic carried a series of articles by a software developer who showed that the COVID models were full of ordinary coding bugs. They didn't generate correct results because they were doing things like using buggy random number generators, they had buffer overflows, race conditions and other stuff. So in that dispute over models who wins? Is it the specialist in programming or the specialist in the thing the model is supposed to represent?
In reality, although academia strongly encourages this kind of silo-ization you can't actually do it. You always need multi-disciplinary teams, you need people who have different incentive structures to poke and prod at claims. The platonic ideal of an unbiased scientist specialized in one domain who issues proclamations of consensus is all too often a fantasy that we try to cling on to even when it becomes untenable. If you use counting experts as a way to decide what's true you can't resolve disputes correctly. If you apply rational skepticism, you can. Although the Daily Sceptic is nowadays mostly just news, it's historically focused on dispelling this fantasy in the realm of COVID science, where "specialists" often turned out to have no deep understanding of disease, and be amateurs in skills you'd think were essential.
The point here is you can't go from "specialists assert something about their field" to "and therefore it's true and we should do it". But this is how you're defining science - an unquestioning belief in whatever specialists say, as long as seems to be about their specialism.
That's a mental shortcut and it often fails. All scientists - climatologists included - have to master all kinds of skills from outside their own field. For example scientists routinely use statistics and programming yet they aren't specialists in those fields. In the early days, the Daily Sceptic carried a series of articles by a software developer who showed that the COVID models were full of ordinary coding bugs. They didn't generate correct results because they were doing things like using buggy random number generators, they had buffer overflows, race conditions and other stuff. So in that dispute over models who wins? Is it the specialist in programming or the specialist in the thing the model is supposed to represent?
In reality, although academia strongly encourages this kind of silo-ization you can't actually do it. You always need multi-disciplinary teams, you need people who have different incentive structures to poke and prod at claims. The platonic ideal of an unbiased scientist specialized in one domain who issues proclamations of consensus is all too often a fantasy that we try to cling on to even when it becomes untenable. If you use counting experts as a way to decide what's true you can't resolve disputes correctly. If you apply rational skepticism, you can. Although the Daily Sceptic is nowadays mostly just news, it's historically focused on dispelling this fantasy in the realm of COVID science, where "specialists" often turned out to have no deep understanding of disease, and be amateurs in skills you'd think were essential.
Sorry but I don't buy it. The website has a clear agenda focusing on right-wing talking points and being selective or misrepresentative of the actual science. For example, if anyone searched "Ivermectin" without any prior knowledge and read Will Jones' four articles, they would think that the research is overwhelmingly that it is effective, when in fact the opposite is true [0,1] . Similarly, anyone searching for "climate change" would think that scientists all over the world are speaking out in denial of there being any climate urgency, when again that's not the case [2].
[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9215332/
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01535-y
[2] https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac2774/...
[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9215332/
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01535-y
[2] https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac2774/...
There are plenty of websites that focus on left-wing talking points that selectively misrepresent actual science. Do you want to ban those too? If so then public health agencies like the NIH and CDC will be the first to lose their bank accounts, because they've repeatedly outright lied about scientific issues (masks, herd immunity, etc) and then even admitted doing so in public. It would be amusing to have a government department get de-platformed for spreading left wing anti-science misinformation, wouldn't it? Or maybe not that amusing actually.
Re: climate. Scientists are in fact speaking out against the ever more unhinged rhetoric around climate. Here's Zeke Hausfather, a well known climatologist - who bizarrely and very problematically given this story is a climate research lead at Stripe - saying that even he is now being called a "climate denier":
https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1533875297220587520
That's a guy who's very much done his part to stoke those sorts of claims! Yet he now argues that "Doomerism is a disease, and a self-fulfilling prophesy"! Go outside the field and you can find lots of scientists and people with scientific training who disagree that there's much urgency at all, here's just one example:
https://clintel.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/WCD-version-0...
The point is, actual science is a methodology, not a set of people in a set of institutions. The Daily Sceptic has consistently defended this view against people like henearkr above, who is literally arguing that being pro-science means blindly agreeing with whatever someone (him) has declared is the "scientific consensus". It's the opposite of science to believe this. It's pseudo-scientific authoritarianism of the sort that enabled Lysenko and worse.
Re: climate. Scientists are in fact speaking out against the ever more unhinged rhetoric around climate. Here's Zeke Hausfather, a well known climatologist - who bizarrely and very problematically given this story is a climate research lead at Stripe - saying that even he is now being called a "climate denier":
https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1533875297220587520
That's a guy who's very much done his part to stoke those sorts of claims! Yet he now argues that "Doomerism is a disease, and a self-fulfilling prophesy"! Go outside the field and you can find lots of scientists and people with scientific training who disagree that there's much urgency at all, here's just one example:
https://clintel.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/WCD-version-0...
The point is, actual science is a methodology, not a set of people in a set of institutions. The Daily Sceptic has consistently defended this view against people like henearkr above, who is literally arguing that being pro-science means blindly agreeing with whatever someone (him) has declared is the "scientific consensus". It's the opposite of science to believe this. It's pseudo-scientific authoritarianism of the sort that enabled Lysenko and worse.
> Do you want to ban those too?
I've not been calling for banning anything, I'm arguing about whether misrepresenting science causes harm. This whole thread is a response to logicalmonster asking "Who or what is this site harming?". Now it feels like the goalposts are being shifted to "okay but these other things are harmful too!"
I've not seen evidence of CDC lying about mask wearing etc.. so you'd have to reference what you're talking about there (I'm not from the US).
Re Zeke Hausfather tweet, interestingly he's not denying there's an emergency, he's just saying that doomism is not an appropriate response. Elsewhere he writes:
> The environmental crisis is one of the most serious and pressing issues facing the world today. We are already living with impacts of human-caused global heating, and the world is not doing nearly enough yet to put us on a pathway to avoiding potentially dire impacts later in the century to both humans and the natural world.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/06/global...
This is in line with the consensus claimed (correctly) by henearkr, as evidenced by reference [2] in my post above.
I've not been calling for banning anything, I'm arguing about whether misrepresenting science causes harm. This whole thread is a response to logicalmonster asking "Who or what is this site harming?". Now it feels like the goalposts are being shifted to "okay but these other things are harmful too!"
I've not seen evidence of CDC lying about mask wearing etc.. so you'd have to reference what you're talking about there (I'm not from the US).
Re Zeke Hausfather tweet, interestingly he's not denying there's an emergency, he's just saying that doomism is not an appropriate response. Elsewhere he writes:
> The environmental crisis is one of the most serious and pressing issues facing the world today. We are already living with impacts of human-caused global heating, and the world is not doing nearly enough yet to put us on a pathway to avoiding potentially dire impacts later in the century to both humans and the natural world.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/06/global...
This is in line with the consensus claimed (correctly) by henearkr, as evidenced by reference [2] in my post above.
Fair enough. You're right, you didn't call for anyone to be banned, I take that back.
The CDC lied about a different topic, whether they would monitor the VAERS database. The NIH lied about masks (Fauci stated in the NYT that he had lied to try and preserve masks for healthcare workers), and herd immunity (Fauci in the NYT again, he changed his claims about the herd immunity threshold based on opinion polling).
"Re Zeke Hausfather tweet, interestingly he's not denying there's an emergency"
Yes as I said, he's a well known climatologist who very much has done his bit to stoke claims of doom. I picked him as someone who can in no way be labelled as out-of-field, not a specialist or in some way a minority scientist. Yet he is now pushing back on claims that are to be found all over media, politics and even this forum e.g. a well known US politician has claimed that "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change". That's clearly nonsense but saying so means now even Hausfather finds himself labelled a "denier" who is outside the consensus. If he can be, anyone can.
So he's a good illustration of the risks of this ban-anyone-who-disagrees-with-whatever approach, which to your credit you aren't proposing, but obviously PayPal and others are implementing.
The CDC lied about a different topic, whether they would monitor the VAERS database. The NIH lied about masks (Fauci stated in the NYT that he had lied to try and preserve masks for healthcare workers), and herd immunity (Fauci in the NYT again, he changed his claims about the herd immunity threshold based on opinion polling).
"Re Zeke Hausfather tweet, interestingly he's not denying there's an emergency"
Yes as I said, he's a well known climatologist who very much has done his bit to stoke claims of doom. I picked him as someone who can in no way be labelled as out-of-field, not a specialist or in some way a minority scientist. Yet he is now pushing back on claims that are to be found all over media, politics and even this forum e.g. a well known US politician has claimed that "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change". That's clearly nonsense but saying so means now even Hausfather finds himself labelled a "denier" who is outside the consensus. If he can be, anyone can.
So he's a good illustration of the risks of this ban-anyone-who-disagrees-with-whatever approach, which to your credit you aren't proposing, but obviously PayPal and others are implementing.
Thanks. I looked up the Fauci mask-wearing incident. So apparently as the Chief Medical Advisor in March 2020 he advised against wearing masks, then shortly afterwards revised it to recommending mask-wearing, and said that his initial advice was based on a lack of data as well as preserving masks for healthcare.
I can't find his exact quote, but so far I'm not sure that he actually lied about what the science shows? I mean it does all sound pretty weaselly, but it's not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing. We genuinely didn't have much reliable data at the time.
So to me this seems like a separate issue, what should the government advise, based on the science? There are lots of other factors coming in to play; it becomes a game of predicting how the public will respond to what's said and whether to advise things "just in case". Here in the UK it certainly felt like the government was basically playing catch-up and giving out advice only if they thought it had a high chance of being followed.
I can't find his exact quote, but so far I'm not sure that he actually lied about what the science shows? I mean it does all sound pretty weaselly, but it's not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing. We genuinely didn't have much reliable data at the time.
So to me this seems like a separate issue, what should the government advise, based on the science? There are lots of other factors coming in to play; it becomes a game of predicting how the public will respond to what's said and whether to advise things "just in case". Here in the UK it certainly felt like the government was basically playing catch-up and giving out advice only if they thought it had a high chance of being followed.
Yeah it's a little bit like saying that Copernicus was lying about the Solar System.
In the end, the aim of the Daily Sceptic seems more to undermine and weaken (by discrediting them) the ways of action that exist to address the current crises.
In the end, the aim of the Daily Sceptic seems more to undermine and weaken (by discrediting them) the ways of action that exist to address the current crises.
He definitely lied without question. Like I said, he admitted it outright, and has done so more than once. There's an article here about it that provides all the links needed to verify this, written by an epidemiologist:
https://slate.com/technology/2021/07/noble-lies-covid-fauci-...
As the article states, there was no change in available data. That is yet another lie. If there was, he'd have pointed to the new study and everyone would have been looking at it, because it would be extremely famous as the study that upended mask science. No such study exists. One day "the science" changed, except it hadn't really changed, simple as that. He did the same with vaccine herd immunity:
"When polls said only about half of all Americans would take a vaccine, I was saying herd immunity would take 70 to 75 percent. Then, when newer surveys said 60 percent or more would take it, I thought, “I can nudge this up a bit,” so I went to 80, 85."
The man is a liar. He makes claims about scientific issues that he makes up on the spot to generate policy compliance. He ran most of the US COVID response, therefore nothing he said can be trusted, nor can anything said by anyone who reported to him. That makes him by far the biggest source of COVID misinformation out there, by his own admission!
"it's not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing"
That's right! The Daily Sceptic was created specifically to combat the sort of COVID misinformation government officials like Fauci, Ferguson and SAGE were spreading. I don't read it much anymore but I read it throughout COVID and its writers never lied, or at least I never caught it if they did. And they reply to people trying to "fact check" them, they don't ignore criticism. Every day, they downloaded the data, downloaded the papers, checked them against the claims being made and documented when they didn't match. They showed that "the science" was being made up on the fly and frequently built on bullshit. They are by far the best COVID fact checkers out there, which is why establishment authoritarians inside PayPal can't stand them.
"Here in the UK it certainly felt like the government was basically playing catch-up and giving out advice only if they thought it had a high chance of being followed."
The UK enforced its decisions via police power and fines, it wasn't voluntary. But regardless, the UK health authorities also routinely spread misinformation. As just one example SAGE claimed there was no data on Omicron severity so they'd assume it was as severe as delta, even though from the moment Omicron was discovered it was accompanied by data showing it was far less severe. They just ignored all of it, in an attempt to keep lockdowns going as long as possible. And they lied to the government about the contents of their own meetings (Sunak talked about this).
Fundamentally, if you want to crack down on COVID misinformation, government agencies have to be the first to go. Nobody else comes close to their impact.
https://slate.com/technology/2021/07/noble-lies-covid-fauci-...
As the article states, there was no change in available data. That is yet another lie. If there was, he'd have pointed to the new study and everyone would have been looking at it, because it would be extremely famous as the study that upended mask science. No such study exists. One day "the science" changed, except it hadn't really changed, simple as that. He did the same with vaccine herd immunity:
"When polls said only about half of all Americans would take a vaccine, I was saying herd immunity would take 70 to 75 percent. Then, when newer surveys said 60 percent or more would take it, I thought, “I can nudge this up a bit,” so I went to 80, 85."
The man is a liar. He makes claims about scientific issues that he makes up on the spot to generate policy compliance. He ran most of the US COVID response, therefore nothing he said can be trusted, nor can anything said by anyone who reported to him. That makes him by far the biggest source of COVID misinformation out there, by his own admission!
"it's not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing"
That's right! The Daily Sceptic was created specifically to combat the sort of COVID misinformation government officials like Fauci, Ferguson and SAGE were spreading. I don't read it much anymore but I read it throughout COVID and its writers never lied, or at least I never caught it if they did. And they reply to people trying to "fact check" them, they don't ignore criticism. Every day, they downloaded the data, downloaded the papers, checked them against the claims being made and documented when they didn't match. They showed that "the science" was being made up on the fly and frequently built on bullshit. They are by far the best COVID fact checkers out there, which is why establishment authoritarians inside PayPal can't stand them.
"Here in the UK it certainly felt like the government was basically playing catch-up and giving out advice only if they thought it had a high chance of being followed."
The UK enforced its decisions via police power and fines, it wasn't voluntary. But regardless, the UK health authorities also routinely spread misinformation. As just one example SAGE claimed there was no data on Omicron severity so they'd assume it was as severe as delta, even though from the moment Omicron was discovered it was accompanied by data showing it was far less severe. They just ignored all of it, in an attempt to keep lockdowns going as long as possible. And they lied to the government about the contents of their own meetings (Sunak talked about this).
Fundamentally, if you want to crack down on COVID misinformation, government agencies have to be the first to go. Nobody else comes close to their impact.
Yeesh, the herd immunity stuff is hard to justify. It feels like he started playing a PR game, with good intentions, but ended up eroding trust. I agree that government agencies ought to be held accountable just as much (if not more) than news organisations.
When I said "not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing" I meant that Daily Sceptic are currently pushing a dangerous anti-scientific agenda on several topics e.g. Ivermectin. I think you know what I meant and were being glib.
I don't know if this approach is different from their early days, but I would describe their current agenda as pretty harmful.
Re SAGE, I found one of their reports from Dec 2021 - early days of Omicron - which appears quite balanced to me. They didn't just ignore the available data, but they took a rational and critical approach towards what was quite preliminary at the time.
> It is still too early to reliably assess the severity of disease caused by Omicron compared to previous variants. Although a preliminary analysis from South Africa suggests that this wave may be less severe than previous waves, a comparison of SGTF (mainly Omicron) and SGTP (non-Omicron) cases within this wave suggests less difference between variants. Some severity estimates should start to become available in about a week as hospital data accumulate. Even if there were to be a modest reduction in severity compared to Delta, very high numbers of infections would still lead to significant pressure on hospitals.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sage-99-minutes-c...
Again, may be useful if you provided more of a reference for what you mean.
When I said "not on the same level as what the Daily Sceptic is publishing" I meant that Daily Sceptic are currently pushing a dangerous anti-scientific agenda on several topics e.g. Ivermectin. I think you know what I meant and were being glib.
I don't know if this approach is different from their early days, but I would describe their current agenda as pretty harmful.
Re SAGE, I found one of their reports from Dec 2021 - early days of Omicron - which appears quite balanced to me. They didn't just ignore the available data, but they took a rational and critical approach towards what was quite preliminary at the time.
> It is still too early to reliably assess the severity of disease caused by Omicron compared to previous variants. Although a preliminary analysis from South Africa suggests that this wave may be less severe than previous waves, a comparison of SGTF (mainly Omicron) and SGTP (non-Omicron) cases within this wave suggests less difference between variants. Some severity estimates should start to become available in about a week as hospital data accumulate. Even if there were to be a modest reduction in severity compared to Delta, very high numbers of infections would still lead to significant pressure on hospitals.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sage-99-minutes-c...
Again, may be useful if you provided more of a reference for what you mean.
It's actively propagating conspiracy theories, denialism of anthropogenic global warming, fear of vaccines, distrust of health authorities...
This is very harmful for everybody who read it without a critical mind (i.e. exactly the public it targets).
This is very harmful for everybody who read it without a critical mind (i.e. exactly the public it targets).
Is the fact that payment processors avoid adult content because it's "incompatible with their public image" or because the sites in question have a history of noticeably higher chargeback rates and fraud?
> Payment providers, especially credit card companies, have banned sites and services for far less, for example because they decided porn was incompatible with their public image.
... which should also be illegal.
... which should also be illegal.
I went through 10 articles and 100 headings and can't find an example of this.
What day was the harm posted?
What day was the harm posted?
Just from the sidebar:
The Growing Menace of Bill Gates’ ‘Global Health’
Whale Population Grows Despite Attenborough Climate Scaremongering
Headmistress of England’s Most Successful State School Reported to Police For ‘Hate Crime’ After Jordan Peterson Visit
Pentagon Launches Probe into Woke Diversity Officer After her Tweets Asking Where She Can “Get a Break From White Nonsense for a While”
Woke High School Defends Trans Teacher With Prosthetic Breasts in Name of Creating “Safe and Inclusive Environment”
So we should ban anything we don't agree with? A bunch of people don't agree with sex workers so it's OK to ban them from payment services too?
I'm just not sad about it lol, that's all.
I agree with the "big principle" that they should have access to basic internet services, in theory.
But I also think that there should be laws forbidding anti-science and conspiracy theory mindset, because it ruins everything brought by knowledge and rationality, and leads to stupidly destructive actions.
I agree with the "big principle" that they should have access to basic internet services, in theory.
But I also think that there should be laws forbidding anti-science and conspiracy theory mindset, because it ruins everything brought by knowledge and rationality, and leads to stupidly destructive actions.
"We" are not banning anything. PayPal does, and yes, it's most likely because of the positions held by this site. Refer to my earlier comment on why this is problematic. But yes, in this specific case, I agree with the ban because I believe the site to be part of a disinformation network.
Obviously, the positions held by the site are shared by a lot of people here, but that doesn't change my opinion of it. If you believe they are spreading worthwhile information on there, that's obviously your right and my beef is not with you - I think it should be possible to politically disagree with someone and still be able to go out and have a beer together. My beef is with sites like this which are causing harm on a societal scale.
Obviously, the positions held by the site are shared by a lot of people here, but that doesn't change my opinion of it. If you believe they are spreading worthwhile information on there, that's obviously your right and my beef is not with you - I think it should be possible to politically disagree with someone and still be able to go out and have a beer together. My beef is with sites like this which are causing harm on a societal scale.
No, I read some of the articles and it all sounds a bit stupid. But if you're ok with companies that should almost be utilities withholding their services because their choice matches your ethics. Then I expect you to also be ok when they make choices that don't match your ethics.
> withholding their services because their choice matches your ethics
I do actually think the site is unethical, yes. But those are not "my" ethics, just ethics in general. There is sufficient evidence to argue against the Daily Sceptic on purely humanist grounds. On top of that I do find the site personally objectionable, that is also true.
I also believe that the intent and consequences behind opinions matter. If there is a website that clearly influences a lot of people to be anti-science and that tries to promote social inequity then I don't view this neutrally as just another opinion. Ethically, this is not on the same level as, say, someone's opinions about the Game of Thrones finale.
> But if you're ok with companies that should almost be utilities withholding their services
I told you two times already that I'm not okay with this, only that this is one of the exceedingly rare cases where I welcome the way things have already been working for years.
I do actually think the site is unethical, yes. But those are not "my" ethics, just ethics in general. There is sufficient evidence to argue against the Daily Sceptic on purely humanist grounds. On top of that I do find the site personally objectionable, that is also true.
I also believe that the intent and consequences behind opinions matter. If there is a website that clearly influences a lot of people to be anti-science and that tries to promote social inequity then I don't view this neutrally as just another opinion. Ethically, this is not on the same level as, say, someone's opinions about the Game of Thrones finale.
> But if you're ok with companies that should almost be utilities withholding their services
I told you two times already that I'm not okay with this, only that this is one of the exceedingly rare cases where I welcome the way things have already been working for years.
clear rules that decide who's in and who's out seem acceptable to most... if credit card providers had decided that only certain types of porn were banned, that would have caused an outcry as well.
Why do you have to write an important article like a 6th grade schoolpaper… demonetized is also a rather manipulative wording.
They might be right in principle but how they go about conducting it… I am no fan it made me rather the opposite.
They might be right in principle but how they go about conducting it… I am no fan it made me rather the opposite.
This is one of the great failings of the constitution. It was meant to protect us from tyrants but the only tyrants contemplated were the government because they were the major tyrant at the time. We should be using a modern measure of potential to be a tyrant, like market power, and regulating these companies on a stepped system where the more market power they have the more they are subject to the exact same rules the government is.
Something like: If you end your contract with someone because you think that they were in violation of the terms, you have to clearly list what your reasoning is for it, with no tolerance for black box answers.
DMCA takedown requests include the list of offending URLs. This should be made similar. "We terminated our contract because this, this, and this signal, make us think that you're in violation of its terms". You can then appeal, and obviously if the two parties can't come to an agreement by themselves, you can at least use the legal system.
Otherwise, we're living in a world where contracts between two parties mean nothing. Anyone can pull out of anything at any time for any reason, with no notice.