Trolling, Free Speech and the Law

Is it "their fault"? Not exactly, but it's irresponsible on their part if others *are* harmed and they wash their hands of it. Blame is a continuum, not a binary thing. If you contribute to the general shittiness of the world, you own some part of that, whether you like it or not. If the folks on Kiwi Farms can live with that, okay then, but that also means that if people say that it's a crappy thing to do, they have to live with that opinion of them as well. But I'm going to guess that if they don't care about the people they hurt, most of them aren't going to give two shits what other random people on the internet think of them.

In your opinion, is hammering a picture of someone's head by itself constitutes a form of speech laced with physical threats?

I'm asking this because a local politician actually did that, but he was arrested only after he claimed that he will actually do the deed on the real person.

Have we reached the point of "importing drama from other websites" yet? Because after several pages of this, I am done. You're defending bigots' right to be loudly and publically bigoted, and I'm done listening.

I think that using a real person's photograph/likeness to do something violent to it might, technically be free speech in the US. I also think that the simple fact of doing so renders someone unfit to serve in public office.

This drama seems to be home grown, not imported, but I’m not sure.

Sure, the last few pages of this thread, where you (a KF user) have been trying to start a fight by defending bigotry and harassment. At this point I’m kinda assuming that there’s a KF thread about us here and that there are users saying stuff about us all, we’ve been targeted by other websites in the past.

You want an example of a KF user going out into the world and making it worse by exporting toxic views? Let me grab the fucking mirror for you mate.

I can also point to an example of a KF user going out and killing two people because of views KF helped grow within him, you know, the example that started this entire discussion.

edited 17th Dec '17 1:55:37 AM by Silasw

He's already said he's not a member. His devotion to defending them despite just being a lurker is odd, but it just sounds like he's trying to set the record straight about some misconceptions more than anything.

A lurker is just a non-posting member.

edited 17th Dec '17 2:42:11 AM by Silasw

Except he has also made multiple posts claiming Kiwi Farms is not bigoted. In general, they are trying (and failing) to convince us that Kiwi Farms is just harmless fun.

edited 17th Dec '17 2:42:25 AM by M84

He seems to have conceded on that. His current point of convincing everyone Kiwi Farms isn't some site that deliberately makes hits on individuals remains up in the air. There are cases of individuals from the site committing hate crimes, but not the actual site itself as a group organizing anything, which is what I believe he's trying to get at.

Thing is nobody has said that the site is putting out organised structures hits, just that it fosters and has created a culture that encourages and supports individual members when they carry out bigoted and hatful activities.

edited 17th Dec '17 2:59:13 AM by Silasw

Well, it's not so much a favor as it is the forum rules...

Alright, everyone, this is enough. Im calling off topic unless someone has something new to add. KF is just one site, and not even a very prominent one, so making it the focus of an angry debate is derailing productive conversation. Lets get back to "Trolling, Free Speech, and the Law."

No one had commented on it for four hours until you showed up, and the relevant posts have already been thumped. There's no need to try and lecture everyone else. We had already moved on from this.

De Marquis is not a mod.

edited 17th Dec '17 9:49:41 AM by M84

The mods are just doing their job. I think you're coming off a bit too aggressive there.
At this point, I think we should stop being pedantic about the differences between a "harassment site/group" and a "hate site/group". Kiwi Farm is a hate site. It Hates Everyone Equally "ironically", but it's still a hate site. And even if its hate doesn't reach the targeted people, it still has a negative effect on their users. An example outside of KF is the Incel subreddit (aka group of men who think they're entitled to sex) which, while has never organized any "real" harassment such as doxxing, has been known to encourage its users to commit suicide for not being able to pick up women. And I'm grateful that Reddit bans it before there are reported cases of that actually happening.

edited 17th Dec '17 9:44:06 AM by HottoKenai

The incel subreddit also encouraged men to act like misogynistic bastards to women IRL. Multiple cases of guys showing up there to brag about how they'd harassed women in real life, and then getting congratulated for it by the other users. Which, among other reasons, is why I'm glad it's gone.

?!

edited 17th Dec '17 9:54:45 AM by TheHandle

You know, typical Social Darwinist sexist things.

There is a "trolling culture" that typically claims to value meritocracy, but which usually reduces to "Winners are tough, losers are weak", where winners are the ones who can trashtalk everyone else.

New to this thread. Probably retreading old ground, but this is one of the topics I'm really into.

Probably share this opinion with a few other people and am hated (huh) by many more for this, but I say that you have the right to say whatever as long as I have the right to not listen. If you really want to organize a Klan rally or some stupidity like that, feel free to go get a permit, but don't expect there to be no protestors and neither aide gets to physically harm anybody or trespass on people's property.

I think that social media platforms and fora have the right to decide what content they want to host, whether it be relatively strict (eg this forum or Facebook) or freewheeling (4- and 8chan; Voat; Minds; Gab; BitChute). People have the right to use them or not; I mostly don't (I am on neither Twitter nor Facebook, for example).

That said, there are bad people who say terrible things and there are awful ideas that should be left to rest, but I for one believe more than a few things that put me in a small, disliked minority in many places including here. I don't think legislating what thoughts are okay to express is a good idea, because that puts the power thereof in the hands of a government and governments are by definition at least a little tyrannical. (Not an anarchist here — we need at least a little government; it got us this far — but my point still stands.)

So...yeah.

Ah, but did you get a permit to counter-protest?

As for that "protecting their speech so that mine is protected too", do you advocate genocide and/or the abolition of free speech?

Milo "Ephebophilia is actually a thing" Yiannapolous is suing Simon & Schuster for $10 million over the "Dangerous" book deal falling through.

What this means is that a manuscript of the book with editor's comments is now technically in the public domain.

Well, I mean, technically it is, it's just not very relevant morally. It's slightly less monstrous to take advantage of immature minds without power or money or experience than it is to do so with bodies that haven't even gotten their puberty and all the bodily functions and desires that go with it. The nuance is practically insignificant, but for me it's the difference between "this guy ought to go to jail for a long time" and "this guy ought to die".

Wait, why am I wasting saliva asking people to be fair to that monster? Was he ever fair or nuanced towards anyone? Carry on, please.

Also, how the GOP turned on Milo on that out of all his collection of monstrosities, while still supporting Roy Moore to the bitter end amazes me. Then again, Yannoupoulos didn't have a legislative seat.

EDIT: DAMN his editor is good. Those are some interesting comments!

edited 28th Dec '17 3:12:49 PM by TheHandle

Bah, I was expecting snark from that editor.

It's better than snark. It's schooling.