XenForo revokes KiwiFarms' license

[Oh!]

Even utilities have provisions to refuse you service, even the regulated ones.

Indeed they do. As you say, they are regulated. But even with essential services, there are some limits (depending upon legal jurisdiction). Obviously, XF are not a utility; nor should it be. The proposition is absurd.

 

[Slavik]

Amazing you would even admit that, as if there is nothing bad and truly awful about it. That's pretty sick. The phrase I'm looking for where I come from is called DUE PROCESS.

So just to be clear here, you are openly supporting a site full of racists, antisemitism, online hate, abuse, doxing, encouraging people to kill themselves and similar and think we should re-instate their license?

Just confirming so I can accurately assess your moral compass as you sit there trying to preach about "free speech".

The site is "free" to continue its speech on other software. However freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequence. In this case the consequence of the content posted on that site is we use our freedom to decide not to do business with them anymore.

As you bought up due process (not relevant in non judicial proceedings, but none the less)

This is something the UK Supreme Court has ruled on: https://www.supremecourt.uk/cases/uksc-2017-0020.html that we are free to refuse our business to any person for any reason as long as it is not a protected status.

 

[\o/]

I learned about the existence of KiwiFarms by reading this thread. Thank you, everyone.
I just had a quick scroll through their forums and my impressions are that they are mostly an offspring of /b/: Bored rich kids who waste their free time making fun of others. Schoolyard vibes, but their schoolyard is virtual.

Now the problem seems to be that some people are easier to mentally disturb than others. There's a Stephen Fry quote on that.
Freedom of speech - or freedom of consequences for speech - on the internet is worthless if it only applies to nice people.

When someone decides to take their lives just because strangers on the internet are being mean, the freedom of the internet is not the relevant issue here.

Your mileage may vary.

 

[Oh!]

I learned about the existence of KiwiFarms by reading this thread. Thank you, everyone.
I just had a quick scroll through their forums and my impressions are that they are mostly an offspring of /b/: Bored rich kids who waste their free time making fun of others. Schoolyard vibes, but their schoolyard is virtual.

Now the problem seems to be that some people are easier to mentally disturb than others. There's a Stephen Fry quote on that.
Freedom of speech - or freedom of consequences for speech - on the internet is worthless if it only applies to nice people.

When someone decides to take their lives just because strangers on the internet are being mean, the freedom of the internet is not the relevant issue here.

Your mileage may vary.

I am mostly in agreement with Stephen Fry on such matters. But does Stephen Fry argue that a particular business should be forced to do business with another business or individual whose practices it finds antithetical to the core values of its shareholders, management and employees? Kiwi Forums have not been censored. You will note that I have had little to say about the nature of KF. Rather, my main point in this discussion has been that XF should not be forced to do business with them.

 

[\o/]

Rather, my main point in this discussion has been that XF should not be forced to do business with them.

Should car manufacturers have to do business with the landlord of thieves? Because the KiwiFarms admins are not the ones who showed unfriendly behavior.

 

[Oh!]

Should car manufacturers have to do business with the landlord of thieves? Because the KiwiFarms admins are not the ones who showed unfriendly behavior.

I am probably missing something obvious, but I have no idea what that means.

 

[\o/]

It was my attempt at creating an analogy. I am not good at this, it seems.

 

[sbjsbj]

I think this whole thread was intended to hurt XF's public relations.

But to me it has the opposite effect.

Good for XF treating dirt like dirt.

All the people who "find it extremely worrying" can stay like that. We don't care.

It is one thing to be courageous by just sitting behind a keyboard. But it is on another level to act publicly like XF did. Kudos to them.

I think the majority supports this decision, or at least I do. Thanks for revoking that license.

 

[Pete]

Just confirming so I can accurately assess your moral compass as you sit there trying to preach about "free speech".

I continue to note the correlation between those who preach about free speech and those who would say things that they probably know are considered inappropriate and leveraging “free speech” for their own opinions.

Note that such advocates almost never agree with “free speech” when it is used on things they don’t agree with, like here. It is only free speech if it agrees with their viewpoint - if they were truly in favour of actually free speech, they would be supporting XF’s right to choose not to do business as XF’s freedom, but that’s simply inconvenient.

 

[\o/]

if they were truly in favour of actually free speech, they would be supporting XF’s right to choose not to do business as XF’s freedom

There is a difference between free speech and a free market. Nobody here argues against a free market.

 

[Oh!]

There is a difference between free speech and a free market. Nobody here argues against a free market.

If a company is not free (discrimination against protected groups excepted) to decide whith whom and on what basis they do business, how can this be described as being in keeping 'free market' principles?

 

[sbjsbj]

There is a difference between free speech and a free market. Nobody here argues against a free market.

Then what is argued about? If it s a free market, then they decided not to do any business with them, done.

 

[\o/]

Then what is argued about?

Primarily, the arguing is about the (too many) comments in this thread which directly refer to the commenter's personal opinion of what members of other forums should be allowed to post in those forums.

 

[\o/]

If a company is not free (discrimination against protected groups excepted) to decide whith whom and on what basis they do business, how can this be described as being in keeping 'free market' principles?

In my opinion, it sends a devastating signal when companies decide to stop doing business with former business partners just because the customers of those business partners express free speech on the internet in a way the companies don't like.

 

[Pete]

Let me try to get at this from a different angle.

Imagine you are a baker, you bake cakes. Someone asks for a cake to celebrate a gay wedding but this goes against your personal values (in whatever direction). Should you be forced to make the cake or are you allowed to turn them away? (Whose freedom of speech is paramount here?)

If your answer to the above is the customer is right, then consider the next.
Imagine you are a baker, you bake cakes. Someone asks for a cake with the message “Pete from TAZ should eff off and die”. Should you be forced to make the cake or are you allowed to turn them away? (Again, whose freedom of speech is paramount here?)

This is a freedom of speech issue whether you want to try to hand wave it away. in both of those scenarios, we have a freedom of speech being impinged upon by someone else’s choice to refuse service. You can conjure up any number of variants you like on these scenarios to specifically reference or dig at an individual’s situation, but remember the context here.

You are defending the right of a group of people to use a piece of software to issue death threats, hate speech, racism, all that fun stuff. Some of this material is actively illegal in the UK, just for context.

You may defend free speech but that necessarily includes things you don’t like. By extension, if you hold absolute freedom of speech sacrosanct, you necessarily cannot be against hate speech, because that’s their freedom of soeech being violated. Worse, you also have zero defence morally against CSAM and similar because, again, freedom of speech!

That’s the kicker with absolute defence against freedom of speech, you necessarily have to defend all the things you don’t like, as well, because you can’t argue for free speech otherwise!

So you need to agree on what is the common ground of prohibited speech, which inevitably raises the cry of censorship because some people on the edges will find their speech curtailed precisely because it’s not appropriate.

 

[sbjsbj]

Primarily, the arguing is about the (too many) comments in this thread which directly refer to the commenter's personal opinion of what members of other forums should be allowed to post in those forums.

Even if this was true, aren't we allowed to have our personal opinions now? What was that thing with free speech again? I can freely say what should be allowed or not in those forums. Whether someone follows our opinions is a different matter.

In my opinion, it sends a devastating signal when companies decide to stop doing business with former business partners just because the customers of those business partners express free speech on the internet in a way the companies don't like.

"Devastating"?
I don't know how I should take this seriously.

And how cutely written "... just because the customers of those business partners express free speech on the internet..."

Hate speech is not free speech. Free speech does not give you the right to insult, discriminate, etc. other people. That right stops when it enters other people's human rights. It is a misnomer. Free speech is not actually free. Like everything it is limited. Limited by other rights. Everything has boundaries, it must have. Otherwise it can be exploited. Those "but muh free speech" people try to exploit the freedom of expression by using it to hate on other people, to discriminate, to insult, to degrade, etc.
See:

Freedom of speech is not regarded as absolute by some, with most legal systems generally setting limits on the freedom of speech, particularly when freedom of speech conflicts with other rights and protections, such as in the cases of libel, slander, pornography, obscenity, fighting words, and intellectual property.

Some limitations to freedom of speech may occur through legal sanction, and others may occur through social disapprobation.[30]

 

[\o/]

You are defending the right of a group of people to use a piece of software to issue death threats, hate speech, racism, all that fun stuff.

Because the software is not the problem here and nobody with a sane mind would blame the makers of the software for it.
(For an incomplete list of people with an insane mind, see also: Telegram.)

By extension, if you hold absolute freedom of speech sacrosanct, you necessarily cannot be against hate speech, because that’s their freedom of soeech being violated.

I am fine with "hate speech". The problem with hate are not the words. Again in my opinion, society should finally come to a point where people who seriously think that there are "bad words" (including "bad phrases") which hurt their souls so badly that they are unable to just shrug them away should go see a psychiatrist instead of being supported for their fragility.

So yes, I hold absolute freedom of speech sacrosanct; believe me or not, this is although I have attracted quite some hate in the past and present. If you can't stand words, how could you even survive around strangers?

 

[sbjsbj]

If you can't stand words, how could you even survive around strangers?

Article 1 - Human dignity

fra.europa.eu

Article 1 - Human dignity​

Human dignity is inviolable. It must be respected and protected.

The dignity of the human person is not only a fundamental right in itself but constitutes the real basis of fundamental rights. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights enshrined human dignity in its preamble: ‘Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.’ In its judgment of 9 October 2001 in Case C-377/98 Netherlands v European Parliament and Council [2001] ECR I-7079, at grounds 70 — 77, the Court of Justice confirmed that a fundamental right to human dignity is part of Union law.
It results that none of the rights laid down in this Charter may be used to harm the dignity of another person, and that the dignity of the human person is part of the substance of the rights laid down in this Charter. It must therefore be respected, even where a right is restricted.

 

[\o/]

Yet, "there is no universal agreement on the meaning of the term, human dignity".

 

[Pete]

So yes, I hold absolute freedom of speech sacrosanct; believe me or not, this is although I have attracted quite some hate in the past and present. If you can't stand words, how could you even survive around strangers?

So you’re also OK with explicit writing of child pornography, explicit descriptions of how people would want to dismember other people and violate the remains, as well as material explicitly encouraging the rise of terrorism, not to mention espousing the wisdom and joy of ruthless eugenics programs and/or the rise of a superhuman species along the lines of the Aryan nation’s propaganda?

Because that’s what you’re saying. Are you *really* OK with that? And this isn’t a slippery slope fallacy, this is material that exists (and is often illegal in a lot of countries) but for your absolute right you have to *defend the existence of this material and the right of the people to create it*. Are you willing to assert that?

And here is the final kicker: if you are prepared to assert in absolute terms that you are OK with allowing people to produce this material and defend its creation against its opponents, I do not want to talk to you because that’s a level of moral reprehensibility I want nothing to do with.

Now do you see the problem?