https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/01/06/us/p...
looks like there are some legit questions on Parler and its origins.
To compare it to "George Soros is paying hundreds of thousands of crisis actors to show up at BLM protests" is begging the question, with respect to what a conspiracy theory actually is.
The fact is, you don't need foreign interference for radical right wing domestic extremism to make sense, they exist, they have existed, they will continue to. Russia was a FOMO investor, not the guy holding coins since they were $3 a pop, and very much opportunistic. The operation screams of a deranged naivete. They figured they could host a completely unmoderated site on AWS? Even soccer streaming pirates leave DMCA contacts on their pages for crissakes, not to mention directory traversal, not knowing what "bulletproof" hosting is (which probably cost less than AWS if bandwidth was really what they were worried about). It's not that suspicious that they went to a Russian host - Chinese hosting either plays by western rules on Alicloud and the likes or requires local police to issue a permit, and the best you can do is probably buy from a Russian reseller anyway - and getting hosting for free speech in countries where free speech doesn't exist requires just enough doublespeak that took them 10 whole days to figure out? it's inept that it took them so long, really.
With the caveat that obviously my sample is skewed, during my time as a public defender I've seen a lot of conspiracy cases and most of them are incredibly poorly planned out. This isn't exactly a conspiracy as your typical criminal conspiracy to steal a couple of big screen TVs from Walmart and then return them with receipts you found in the parking lot (this happened, we didn't go to trial) but it's certainly only a notch above that in planning out their platform and scaling and potential legal matters. If Russia is in such a dire state that they are throwing their dwindling funds (a country with NYC's GDP, 60x the pop, that mostly exports timber? Ouch) at an amateur hour production like this then we should just all start running shoddy Twitter clones on cheap VPSes because it sounds like the easiest scam in the world to pull from a nation-state. And maybe they'll buy the Brooklyn Bridge too.
The Russian M.O. seems to be to maximize chaos. I don't think they care about the details very much, and I doubt Putin cares one bit what random net-dwellers outside Russia say about him. He cares about:
-Control in Russia
-Making life difficult for opposing states.
It's been rumoured (with very good sources) that he happily complied with FBI requests to turn over data. So it wouldn't surprise me if was more than happy to comply with whatever Putin wanted so long as it was kept quiet.
Better understanding why people believe in the conspiracy theories and fixing the social ills that radicalize portions of the population will be critical factors during my entire adult lifetime. For the US, and for the world at large.
We need to learn how to prevent terrorists from being created and in so doing advance as a global society.
The first generation of response to this was to tweak the algorithm to favor "trusted" sources, but still promote controversy. This seems to be going extremely poorly, because it's encouraging the "trusted" sources to become radicalized in an effort to get promoted by the algorithms.
The actual solution probably involves not optimizing for engagement anymore, but that's a business model change.
All we did so far is just ignoring the problem really. Fire is still smoldering under the ashes, and I hope we don't ignore this for the next 4 years.
Maybe we should start running government like a company. You can't survive as a bad manager for a long time. But, bad politicians can stay in politics for their entire life while their mistakes costs much more than a manager.
I did mention one basic thing that I think would help. Better critical thinking education. Help people understand common logical fallacies. Help people consider critically that others might be lying out of self benefit and to focus added skepticism against any claims that might align with such incentives. Focus on emotion as a tool for knowing where to focus more of that light of logic on the situation and examine why those feelings arose. To not blindly believe but to seek the truth of a situation.
Goal #1 of a radical organisation: create a division. Your narrative is that you represent a downtrodden demographic - "us" - whose misfortune is caused by those in power - "them".
Goal #2: invite hatred and repression The worst thing that can happen for you is for your division to dissolve. You have to work to make membership in your "us" group a stain on its perceived members.
Example: Islamic terrorism. Only a small group of radicals is actually involved in operations, but because they are so deliberately monstrous, and constantly claim to represent all Muslims (factionalism notwithstanding), the stain of their deeds gets spread on all Muslims. This drives a wedge between "Muslims" and "non-Muslims", eventually making that the #1 defining identity for any given Muslim.
The worse the atrocities e.g. ISIS commits in, say, the EU, the louder the voices that demand society be protected against islamic radicalism get. People start to demand that Muslims take responsibility for stopping violence committed by "their" brethren. Muslims start to lose standing in society. This breeds resentment, and reinforces the ISIS message that Muslims are a repressed group who need to fight back. This increases radicalisation, which increases violence, which increases repression, which increases resentment.
By deliberately being monstrous, a radical group can leverage a society's self-defense mechanisms as a recruitment aid. So I'm sceptical of hard-line solutions to these kinds of problems. They seem more likely to make things worse than better.
What should be done, then? I sure don't know, but some things I think should be considered:
1: Do not acknowledge the division. Certainly do not reinforce it. It is an illusion that serves the radicals.
2:Fix the root causes. The radicals' goals are irrelevant. There's no Muslim majority fervently longing for a Caliphate. There's no widespread desire for a whites-only USA among the white conservative-leaning population. What people care about is food on the table, opportunities to progress in life and better their lot, and not being singled out for ridicule and punishment day in, day out. It's the economy. When the economic prospects for large demographics tank, bad things start to happen.
3. Hope for the best. It may take a generation to see meaningful improvement in quality of life for the disaffected population under risk of radicalisation. In the mean time, the political apparatus needs to stay afloat long enough to see those results.
Otherwise you will likely end up poisoned like Navalny or happen to fall off a balcony like so many Russian journalists.
And of course the Left is upset. The Right were supposed to become friendless losers with imaginary friends[0]! Not befriend other people! That's cheating!
you can be deplatformed on a whim, as a result of petty internal ideological resistance anywhere in your supply chain. no infrastructure partner will go to bat for you, they'd rather forgo your money in favor of passing a regime's purity test
you might also be subject to sweeping legislation that allows the US govt to act against you if you are not politically aligned
if this continues, the US will be an unfavorable jurisdiction for infrastructure. its just easier to find a less charged environment where you have clarity
Any countries without one e.g. China, Russia, Saudi Arabia would also not tolerate it as it could equally be used to incite an insurrection.
So very curious where you think this "safe" place is in the world.
Twitter has said _for years, during his "regime"_ (funny that you used that word) that if Trump wasn't a "public figure", he would have been banned.
Then there is the thought-policing of big tech and social media. 2021 is definitely shaping up to be a crucial year, a time when people need to wake up, get informed and defend freedom while they still have it.
The most influence it will exert is in mainstream news articles about its fate, and opinion pieces about free speech from American philosophy majors.
When I use Twitter or Facebook, I do so exclusively via Chrome on mobile. I want to give adtech companies as few native hooks as possible into my smartphone.
It is however a huge hurdle to user acquisition, which is the angle I was referring to. The obscurity of Gab kind of supports that point. All kinds of products and services can exist, but if you get booted of all the main channels you are doomed to be an obscure niche at best.
While Twitter allowed the trending of #AssassinateTrump and #killtrump plus all the violence and destruction orchestrated on Twitter during the BLM protests on hundreds of small businesses in America where far more damage and fatalities occurred then the capital riots and big tech especially Apple, Amazon and Facebook were quite about.
This is a collaboration against conservatives and the greatest form of censorship America has ever experienced. This is how democracy dies.
Name the fatalities from BLM activities.
David Dorn [0], Lorenzo Anderson [1], Antonio Mays Jr. [2], Barry Perkins [3], Chris Beaty [4], Marquis M. Tousant [5], Oscar Lee Stewart Jr. [6], Jessica Doty Whitaker [7], Italia Marie Kelly [8].
Regular shootings and killings also spiked this summer in cities with significant BLM activity [9][10][11]. In the midst of protests and looting in Chicago, that city saw 18 murders within a 24-hour period, its deadliest single day in six decades [12].
These figures exclude excess “deaths of despair” such as from suicide, alcoholism and drug overdose that may result from the $2 billion in economic damage done mostly to private businesses [13].
[0] https://www.kiro7.com/news/trending/retired-police-captain-k...
[1] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/teen-who-died-in-c...
[2] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/everybody-down-wha...
[3] https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/local/protester-run-over-k...
[4] https://www.indystar.com/story/news/local/indianapolis/2020/...
[5] https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-court...
[6] https://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2020/10/21/authorit...
[7] https://www.foxnews.com/us/indiana-woman-shot-killed-argumen...
[8] https://apnews.com/article/18e8ec5a9b8e7175a128254d55df41e3
[9] https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2020/07/portland-sees-spike...
[10] https://www.wsbtv.com/news/2-investigates/atlanta-police-act...
[11] https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/minneapolis-police-s...
[12] https://chicago.suntimes.com/crime/2020/6/8/21281998/chicago...
[13] https://fee.org/articles/george-floyd-riots-caused-record-se...
> This is a collaboration against conservatives and the greatest form of censorship America has ever experienced. This is how democracy dies.
The US Electoral system is measurably biased towards conservatives, get some perspective.
2. Plenty of conservatives right now on Twitter, Facebook etc. In fact most of them became well-known through those services. Just those who have continued to incite people have been banned (after having been warned on multiple ocassions).
Parler is/was essentially a free speech libertarian site with strict rules and guidelines for posts.
I find it disturbing that the overwhelmingly US neo conservative liberal media companies slap the label 'far right' on just abut anything that doesn't fit their world view and agenda. Any sort of recognition there are center right or moderate conservatives appears to have been cancelled.
Regarding extremists, It's the old story - ban it and it will go underground. Free speech is always better and is also a cornerstone of western democracy. The irony of Parler having to be hosted in fascist Russia is extreme and embarrassing for the western world.
This is because "far right" has become a code-word for "neo-nazi" and/or "white supremacist/racist", so labeling everything that does no fit their preferred world view as "far right" automatically sets it up to be something so obscene that it should be banned in the minds of their viewership.
And of course, what you see is the beginning of the banning happening right before your eyes.
There are also many comments from Parler moderators, and staff, and examples of left-wing positive commentary being deleted.
So it seems that there's definitely a suitability to the "right" label, if not "far right".
Let's be very clear, Parler is not a free-speech site.
