Complaint Thread

[CosmicSpeed]

Weaponizing Social Media is scary.
What if the heads of the Federal Reserve started to tweet what he/she was planning to vote? That would be clear misconduct because of the market moving power of their office.
How is this any different than the President using it to advance his re-election?
when Musk can tweet to his followers to join another platform and then the stocks for that platform take off...this stuff is getting really scary. 

I personally love stamps and what they represented. It gave a certain validity to ones correspondence. Sorting my grandfather's collection recently has given me more appreciation for more thought out messaging because of the speed in which it would arrive.

[Donut]

Just found out i am working 4 blocks from the white house for the rest of the week . . . and all of next week.  And apparently it's a good size construction site.  Normally I'm a residential guys.  I guess I'll be sick next week.

[TANV]

7 minutes ago, Donut said:

Just found out i am working 4 blocks from the white house for the rest of the week . . . and all of next week.  And apparently it's a good size construction site.  Normally I'm a residential guys.  I guess I'll be sick next week.

Ooof. If you have to work, make sure you got a mask, a wieldable blunt object, some heavy duty ear plugs, kevlar, and bottled water...

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/13/national-guardsmen-capitol-threats-459002

This is frickin' nuts, man.

[chinothegeeko]

Just found out i am working 4 blocks from the white house for the rest of the week . . . and all of next week.  And apparently it's a good size construction site.  Normally I'm a residential guys.  I guess I'll be sick next week.

I’d stay as far away as I could.

[Mark Twain]

1 hour ago, Alpinemaps said:

It's definitely interesting, because it's similar to Apple deplatforming Epic for their end around on the Apple TOS for making in-game purchases.  For those of you that don't know, Epic, who makes FortNite, implemented their own in-game payment system, which goes around the iOS store.  Which has resulted in Apple banning Epic, and Epic suing Apple.

As for Trump creating his own platform, I have a couple of comments to say about that.  If you were banned, would you be able to afford your own platform?

And isn't that, to a degree, what Parler is?  It's it's own platform?  And it's been pulled.  I guess you could go the way of Gab, and completely do it all yourself.  But the cost barrier to that is immense.  And when you have single company that has such a complete control over a market or a service...you might be getting into monopoly territory.

One more thing about Trump - if this was "private citizen Trump", I wouldn't care.  But this is the President of the United States.  And like him or not, approve of what he says or not, ALL of our elected public officials should be granted access to these platforms.  Otherwise, these public officials are being censored.  And it's not in the best interest of our fellow citizens, not to have access to our elected officials.  Trump was even ordered by the courts to NOT block people on Twitter, to allow them free and equal access to him.  Let our elected officials stick their foot in their mouth; the consequences of that are not getting re-elected to public office.  We're a week away from him becoming a private citizen once again.  We really can't stomach one more week?

Would I be able to create my own platform? I am a billionaire? I am capable of raising millions of dollars? No, obviously, and the point is silly frankly. If you or I or anyone violates a companies TOS they have a right to ban us and remove access to that service. Period. Full stop.  If you disagree with that, then you can take it to court, but you likely won't have standing because there's nothing illegal about it. 

I hope you realize that Twitter didn't actually ban the White House twitter account and also understand that the person who holds the office of president is still more than capable of tweeting and posting videos from that account as Trump just did 45 minutes ago. And I guarantee you he didn't write one word of this speech. 

 

[Alpinemaps]

47 minutes ago, Donut said:

Just found out i am working 4 blocks from the white house for the rest of the week . . . and all of next week.  And apparently it's a good size construction site.  Normally I'm a residential guys.  I guess I'll be sick next week.

Oof.  I wouldn't want to be anywhere near DC next week.

23 minutes ago, Mark Twain said:

Would I be able to create my own platform? I am a billionaire? I am capable of raising millions of dollars? No, obviously, and the point is silly frankly. If you or I or anyone violates a companies TOS they have a right to ban us and remove access to that service. Period. Full stop.  If you disagree with that, then you can take it to court, but you likely won't have standing because there's nothing illegal about it. 

I hope you realize that Twitter didn't actually ban the White House twitter account and also understand that the person who holds the office of president is still more than capable of tweeting and posting videos from that account as Trump just did 45 minutes ago. And I guarantee you he didn't write one word of this speech. 

 

But you and I aren't elected officials, let alone POTUS.  I think there's a bit of an exception there.  I even qualified my statement to say that all public, elected officials should have access.  If Twitter wants to ban is account at 12:00:01 on January 20, 2021, go for it.  But any sooner than that I think is wrong.

I was wondering about the official White House account.  And I believe there's also an official POTUS account, as well.  My own personal issue is Trump historically has posted from his personal account.

So, what happens if Trump starts using either of those accounts in the same manner as he has his personal account?  If he violates the TOS with those accounts?  Do those accounts get banned as well?

I get it.  I know you personally hate that man.  I've seen you say as much, and it's even evident in your writing (you seem to refuse to say his name).  Got it.  But if this was Biden, and Twitter did the same thing, wouldn't you be screaming?  It's that hypocritical attitude that bothers me.  To me, that's more emotion based than objective based.  From an objective, non-political POV, I am very worried about this slippery slope.

[$20 on joe vs dan]

30 minutes ago, Alpinemaps said:

Oof.  I wouldn't want to be anywhere near DC next week.

But you and I aren't elected officials, let alone POTUS.  I think there's a bit of an exception there.  I even qualified my statement to say that all public, elected officials should have access.  If Twitter wants to ban is account at 12:00:01 on January 20, 2021, go for it.  But any sooner than that I think is wrong.

I was wondering about the official White House account.  And I believe there's also an official POTUS account, as well.  My own personal issue is Trump historically has posted from his personal account.

So, what happens if Trump starts using either of those accounts in the same manner as he has his personal account?  If he violates the TOS with those accounts?  Do those accounts get banned as well?

I get it.  I know you personally hate that man.  I've seen you say as much, and it's even evident in your writing (you seem to refuse to say his name).  Got it.  But if this was Biden, and Twitter did the same thing, wouldn't you be screaming?  It's that hypocritical attitude that bothers me.  To me, that's more emotion based than objective based.  From an objective, non-political POV, I am very worried about this slippery slope.

Unofficial channels of communication that reach millions from public offices that hold a great amount of influence...it's actually very dangerous.

What if a Fed Reserve member tweeted something and that caused the stock market to crash.  There is nothing stopping Chairman Powell from tweeting something right now that would shock markets around the world in less than a few minutes.  And the only reason he doesn't is 100% up to him.  Millions of  retirement accts  could get  tanked?  How would you feel about it?  Wouldn't you want something done?  

[Mark Twain]

14 minutes ago, Alpinemaps said:

Oof.  I wouldn't want to be anywhere near DC next week.

But you and I aren't elected officials, let alone POTUS.  I think there's a bit of an exception there.  I even qualified my statement to say that all public, elected officials should have access.  If Twitter wants to ban is account at 12:00:01 on January 20, 2021, go for it.  But any sooner than that I think is wrong.

I was wondering about the official White House account.  And I believe there's also an official POTUS account, as well.  My own personal issue is Trump historically has posted from his personal account.

So, what happens if Trump starts using either of those accounts in the same manner as he has his personal account?  If he violates the TOS with those accounts?  Do those accounts get banned as well?

I get it.  I know you personally hate that man.  I've seen you say as much, and it's even evident in your writing (you seem to refuse to say his name).  Got it.  But if this was Biden, and Twitter did the same thing, wouldn't you be screaming?  It's that hypocritical attitude that bothers me.  To me, that's more emotion based than objective based.  From an objective, non-political POV, I am very worried about this slippery slope.

Dude, I have no issue saying Donald Trump's name and actually did just that at the end of my post that you quoted so I have no clue what you are talking about. I honestly don't think a democrat or republican would act like Trump while in the office of the presidency and that's my hand's down honest opinion of the situation and it's one I think a number of people share. I'm an independent politically. I voted for Clinton, but supported his impeachment because he clearly broke the law by lying. I also voted for McCain when he ran for president. I have no problem calling out BS on either side of the political spectrum and Trump's baseless claims over election fraud went too far and incited a mob.

The issue I have with these slippery slope arguments that you propose and that a number of others have posted is that they reach too many hypothetical Orwellian conclusions that are not represented by the events at hand and engage in "Whataboutism" to try a gain traction and in doing so deflect from the real problem at hand--Trump used his social media presence to incite people to violence.

I think you are an intelligent person. I think everyone who has posted to this thread over the past week is also an intelligent person and that your opinions are valid and matter. I don't think assumptions or rabbit holes are going to help. 

[Shortbus311]

I would encourage all to read Amazon's response to Parler's lawsuit over being deplatformed. In it, Amazon cites the multiple breaches of their agreement and a number of threats posted by users that go well beyond hate speech and cross the line into breaking the law by calling for the murder of police, teachers, execution and assassination of elected officials, and genocide. 
https://www.pacermonitor.com/view/LHNWTAI/Parler_LLC_v_Amazon_Web_Services_Inc__wawdce-21-00031__0010.0.pdf?mcid=tGE3TEOA
As for trump being banned- He is free to start his own platform, buy his own server space, and create his own app where he can say what he wants to people who can stomach him. 

Yeah, I have read through that before, and yes, there are some truly horrible, disgusting things said. Of course any call to violence or action that is illegal should be treated as such. There is a vast difference between voicing your opinion on politics and calling for the murder of the opposition. I am also not saying that Parler shouldn't have been removed for failure to follow the terms of service. They obviously did violate the terms of service. The only part that has me interested really is how it is overlooked by the hosting services when it is done by people who are calling for the Vice President to be hung.

I know that I am mixing two different situations here, but if you read through the explanations given by FB and Twitter as to why they deactivated the President's accounts they state that some of his posts could be construed as a call to action. #hangmikepence needs no construing. It is a blatant call to violence. Yet none of those people had their accounts deactivated.

[Jessekidd13]

Granted the bar is really low, but this discussion has been among the most mature/least absurd that I've seen regarding anything political online in the last few months.  All this by a bunch of grown dude(tte)s who buy plastic toys to sell on the Internet.

[Phil B]

But you and I aren't elected officials, let alone POTUS.  I think there's a bit of an exception there.  I even qualified my statement to say that all public, elected officials should have access.  If Twitter wants to ban is account at 12:00:01 on January 20, 2021, go for it.  But any sooner than that I think is wrong.
I was wondering about the official White House account.  And I believe there's also an official POTUS account, as well.  My own personal issue is Trump historically has posted from his personal account.
So, what happens if Trump starts using either of those accounts in the same manner as he has his personal account?  If he violates the TOS with those accounts?  Do those accounts get banned as well?
I get it.  I know you personally hate that man.  I've seen you say as much, and it's even evident in your writing (you seem to refuse to say his name).  Got it.  But if this was Biden, and Twitter did the same thing, wouldn't you be screaming?  It's that hypocritical attitude that bothers me.  To me, that's more emotion based than objective based.  From an objective, non-political POV, I am very worried about this slippery slope.

Actually, after his personal account got banned, Trump switched to the POTUS account to continue his rhetoric and approval of the riot. That account did NOT get banned, because that is the official account of the President of the United States. However, the posts he made did get removed for incitement of violence.

[KShine]

24 minutes ago, Phil B said:

Actually, after his personal account got banned, Trump switched to the POTUS account to continue his rhetoric and approval of the riot. That account did NOT get banned, because that is the official account of the President of the United States. However, the posts he made did get removed for incitement of violence.

Yes, I believe that they determined it as being obvious that his stating that he wasn't going to be attending the inaugural ceremony, was nothing more than him communicating to his army that violence was welcome at the event (since he won't be there). 

After a summer of death and destruction, during what was deemed to be "mostly peaceful protests", you would think it would get harder for people to be so hypocritical regarding the reality of events, but no.

[chinothegeeko]

I guess y’all forgot about this summer all the tweets from Pelosi, Kamala, and others definitely inciting violence. They were not banned. How convenient.

[Mark Twain]

1 hour ago, Shortbus311 said:

Yeah, I have read through that before, and yes, there are some truly horrible, disgusting things said. Of course any call to violence or action that is illegal should be treated as such. There is a vast difference between voicing your opinion on politics and calling for the murder of the opposition. I am also not saying that Parler shouldn't have been removed for failure to follow the terms of service. They obviously did violate the terms of service. The only part that has me interested really is how it is overlooked by the hosting services when it is done by people who are calling for the Vice President to be hung.

I know that I am mixing two different situations here, but if you read through the explanations given by FB and Twitter as to why they deactivated the President's accounts they state that some of his posts could be construed as a call to action. #hangmikepence needs no construing. It is a blatant call to violence. Yet none of those people had their accounts deactivated.

I don't disagree. I doubt twitter has the capacity to conduct human review on several thousand accounts in such a short time and ban them/ report them to law enforcement. 

[chinothegeeko]

I don't disagree. I doubt twitter has the capacity to conduct human review on several thousand accounts in such a short time and ban them/ report them to law enforcement. 

Sure. It was trending. Why was general Flynn and Sidney Powell suspended too? Trunks White House account was suspended for a bit but is now back up. Why was Ron Paul censored on Facebook?

[Lukish]

12 minutes ago, chinothegeeko said:

I guess y’all forgot about this summer all the tweets from Pelosi, Kamala, and others definitely inciting violence. They were not banned. How convenient.

I don't support these guys. Whoch of their tweets were inciting violence?

 

I'm from the left and have been very unnerved by the silencing of the left that's happened by the media and internet firms. So much so you have no idea what the left is in the US.

[Shortbus311]

I don't disagree. I doubt twitter has the capacity to conduct human review on several thousand accounts in such a short time and ban them/ report them to law enforcement. 

I guess the social media overlords just look at who you are calling for the murder of, then they decide if it is okay or not.

[Alpinemaps]

1 hour ago, Mark Twain said:

Dude, I have no issue saying Donald Trump's name and actually did just that at the end of my post that you quoted so I have no clue what you are talking about. I honestly don't think a democrat or republican would act like Trump while in the office of the presidency and that's my hand's down honest opinion of the situation and it's one I think a number of people share. I'm an independent politically. I voted for Clinton, but supported his impeachment because he clearly broke the law by lying. I also voted for McCain when he ran for president. I have no problem calling out BS on either side of the political spectrum and Trump's baseless claims over election fraud went too far and incited a mob.

The issue I have with these slippery slope arguments that you propose and that a number of others have posted is that they reach too many hypothetical Orwellian conclusions that are not represented by the events at hand and engage in "Whataboutism" to try a gain traction and in doing so deflect from the real problem at hand--Trump used his social media presence to incite people to violence.

I think you are an intelligent person. I think everyone who has posted to this thread over the past week is also an intelligent person and that your opinions are valid and matter. I don't think assumptions or rabbit holes are going to help. 

I apologize then about the Trump remark.  You're right, I didn't notice that you mentioned his name in there.  I thought I remembered you as having a particular aversion to saying his name, so my bad.  And yes - Trump is unique in the way he speaks, and that's his appeal to a lot of people.

I think you and I are probably a lot closer politically than you might think.  I have personally only ever been registered as anything other than "unaffiliated" once - the 2000 primary.  I registered Republican for that primary, just to vote for McCain over GWB.

I know it's a bit of a slippery slope talking about slippery slopes, lol.  But in all seriousness, it's a concern.  Only because we've seen that happen in history.  And if you don't at least consider some of the slippery slope, it may be too late before we realize it.

I hope this is it.  I hope that turning Trump off is as far as this goes.  But Cancel Culture is a thing, and it's dividing us, and the more we dig in our heals to cancel people, the more they're going to dig in their heals to say they're not wrong.  We're lacking an ability to dialogue, and things have become far to black and white for my tastes.  What happened to the nuisance?

[Alpinemaps]

1 hour ago, Jessekidd13 said:

Granted the bar is really low, but this discussion has been among the most mature/least absurd that I've seen regarding anything political online in the last few months.  All this by a bunch of grown dude(tte)s who buy plastic toys to sell on the Internet.

I think (hope) it's because we all have this common love for this plastic toy - whether because it's fun to build, makes us money, both, or whatever - that we can step back and say, "okay, we've got to be cool when this is over."

Because honestly, I don't want to be "not cool" with anyone here.  This place is really the only message board that I participate on (and I've been online since the 80s).  And care much more to discuss LEGO with you folks, than politics.

[$20 on joe vs dan]

1 hour ago, Alpinemaps said:

I think (hope) it's because we all have this common love for this plastic toy - whether because it's fun to build, makes us money, both, or whatever - that we can step back and say, "okay, we've got to be cool when this is over."

Because honestly, I don't want to be "not cool" with anyone here.  This place is really the only message board that I participate on (and I've been online since the 80s).  And care much more to discuss LEGO with you folks, than politics.

I tried to replace "AYYY!" with LEGO!...but failed ☹️

[Alpinemaps]

1 hour ago, $20 on joe vs dan said:

I tried to replace "AYYY!" with LEGO!...but failed ☹️

I got ya

[exracer327]

9 hours ago, Alpinemaps said:

I hope this is it.  I hope that turning Trump off is as far as this goes.  But Cancel Culture is a thing, and it's dividing us, and the more we dig in our heals to cancel people, the more they're going to dig in their heals to say they're not wrong.  We're lacking an ability to dialogue, and things have become far to black and white for my tastes.  What happened to the nuisance?

This is my concern as well - cancel culture and the inability to have real conversations and debate. 

Several Democrats have been planning to impeach Donald Trump since before he took office in 2016.  Sadly, he keeps teeing the ball up for them to do so.  But then it moved from Trump himself by calling to "cancel" anyone who has worked for the Trump admin.  Now people are "cancelling" any contracts with the Trump org - a company that Donald Trump was forced to divest himself of before taking office in 2016.  How long before people begin "cancelling" anyone who works(ed) for the Trump brand all together?  Where does it end?

Every movement to "cancel" people starts with an arguably good motive but ALWAYS ends tragically.

The NAZI political party began as a way to create a better Germany but ended by cancelling everyone except the upper echelon of the NAZI party members.  (By the way, everyone should have seen that coming.  Hitler solidified his position as leader of the NAZI party by having hundreds of NAZI party members assassinated who did not solely support him.  It is called the "Night of Long Knives" but really took place over ONE weekend the end of June, 1934).  Joseph Stalin (Former Soviet Union leader during WWII) is quoted as  complimenting Hitler in his ability to take control.  Soviet Russia admired the NAZIs.  That says something about the former Soviet Union.

The Spanish Inquisition was started by the Catholic Church in Spain to root out heretics but ended tragically by killing thousands of Christians who differed with the leadership of the church in Spain.  Fun history fact; Columbus delayed his departure from Spain by one day.  His actual departure date aligns with the same day Jewish people were expelled from Spain.  Coincidence?  I doubt it.

The Crusades set out to "free the Holy Land" but ended tragically by looting, pillaging, raping, and destroying towns and cities regardless of their "faith".  There was also rampant child trafficking.

Granted these are extreme cases, but they are the ones history has remembered.

Now Alexandria Casio-Cortez via Instagram has admitted that people in our current government are discussing more media control.  Control by who; her?, the "squad"?, democrats?  I highly doubt any republicans are in that conversation, let alone true independents or people from any other political background.  I found this article which has her full (1+ hour) video imbedded so you can see it for yourself.  ttps://www.foxnews.com/politics/dave-rubin-slams-aoc-commission-media. 

The Golden Rule says, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."  The vengeful of our world have their own version, "As you have done to me, I will now do to you," and that really scares me.  It takes a lot of grace (undeserved forgiveness) to NOT seek retribution.

You can claim I'm being an alarmist, but "those who are ignorant of history are destined to repeat it" (unknown author). 

Thank you for letting me get this off my chest.  Now, back to your regularly scheduled complaint thread. 

[BricksBrotha]

Similar to how the Tea Party movement started out wanting lower taxes and reduction of national debt and no doubt ends with illiterates storming the Capital and waving Confederation flags.

[House Schubert]

Not going to touch the rest of it, but..Check your facts... he didn’t divest himself of anything. Just stood by a stack of blank papers, said some words, and promised His sons would run it an not tell him anything. 
 

complaint: social media sucks, and it’s killing us. 

52 minutes ago, exracer327 said:

Now people are "cancelling" any contracts with the Trump org - a company that Donald Trump was forced to divest himself of before taking office in 2016.

[$20 on joe vs dan]

50 minutes ago, exracer327 said:

  Soviet Russia admired the NAZIs.  That says something about the former Soviet Union.

re this; I believe an awful lot of Russian soldiers died fighting Germany...so I get that some Russian Leaders may have their extreme views but Russia was a key factor in beating Germany.

Overall my view is somewhat opposite.  Not about cancel culture; but more about what's going on w/ Trump of which you cite Trump's situation.

I feel like seeing what Trump was able to do and how he was enabled is closer to the forces that resulted in the atrocities you cite.  I see the current backlash against Trump as more of a "market correction" to use an analogy.

It's no secret that if you spout racist rhetoric you get censored; if you take violent positions you lose your job or get impacted financially.

My sentiment is more of "It's about damn time".  Trump is more poster child of a dictator than victim...thank goodness some folks came to their senses.