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Comment by ericmay | Hacker News Reader

Or they were banned for spreading disinformation, or being traced back to Russian state sponsored agents. You didn’t see anyone get banned for anything specific unless you monitor everything they do including their source IP, because Twitter doesn’t send you a message and say “hey we banned this person because of their anti-American propaganda”.

> I'm not saying I necessarily agree with the claim myself, though Victoria Nuland's "denial"

Yea this tactic is called “simply asking the question” and it’s always done in poor faith.

I’m not saying Donald Trump is a child molester and eats babies, but that photo of him with Jeffery Epstein sure does seem fishy... [1]

[1] Random links that nobody clicks on but appears to give you credibility and creates doubt in the minds of others who scroll by and see it.

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> Or they were banned for spreading disinformation

"Disinformation" is a propaganda term. Unless you are Ministry of Truth, of course ;)

In practice, what is labeled "disinformation" is just what those in power do not want published. Or: "News Is What Somebody Does Not Want You To Print".

From personal experience, I have strong sense of deja-vu. I've seen all of this in 80's in my country. Exactly the same, except at the time it was reactionary propaganda.

> or being traced back to Russian state sponsored agents.

You see, for Chinese posting about Tiananmen Square is being traced back to US programs intended to undermine the statehood of independent countries. For them, it is the same thing pushed by state sponsored agents as you claim about Russians.

So either both are fine when censoring it, or neither is. (I personally take option two).

Except I can write all of the following statements and I could speak them publicly, but you cannot write or speak of all of these things publicly in China or Russia.

  The US sponsored terrorist biolabs in Ukraine to target Russian citizens.

  The US *didn't* sponsor terrorist biolabs in Ukraine to target Russian citizens and it's all fake misinformation.

and I can write:

  China has never genocided Uighur Muslims.

  Tiananmen Square didn't happen.

  The CCP is currently participating in a genocide of Uighur Muslims.

  Tiananmen Square did happen and the CCP murdered lots of people.

> For them, it is the same thing pushed by state sponsored agents as you claim about Russians.

This is called a false equivalence. I also demonstrated why it's false here in this very post. Ta-da!

Yes, you can say all of those things in isolation, where nothing is at stake. In practice, a response is triggered when the “wrong” narratives start to gain momentum.

I can say them regardless of whether something is at stake in or outside of isolation, as can others which is evidenced by the fact that people do spread disinformation and misinformation routinely in the United States.

Biolabs in Ukraine? That's just made up bullshit by Russia. Period. And despite the Sovereignty of the United States being very much against Russia, people go on television and broadcast things that are not only wrong but completely against the interests of the Sovereign and not a single bad thing happens.

Covid vaccine misinformation? That resulted in some tens of thousands (maybe hundreds) of dead Americans. I can go on Twitter or down to the state capitol building and hold up signs that say crazy things and not a single thing will happen to me from the government.

I can say anything I want about Donald Trump, or Joe Biden.

Now contrast that with the CCP or Russia. You can't do those things. Period.

So these attempts to try and draw equivalences are, in fact, false. Hence, false equivalence.

Tell that to Fred Hampton, Julian Assange, Gary Webb, Darren Seals, et al.

>China has never genocided Uighur Muslims.

now say that about the other genocide

>Or they were banned for spreading disinformation

yeah, that's the exact wording the Chinese, Russian and other authoritarian regimes use as well. "disinformation"

one would think 2016 should've taught you people that the power you give to the government will eventually end up in the hands of the people you don't like

>>Or they were banned for spreading disinformation,

New to this thread, and I may agree with your stance, but if this is how you defend it, please stop :D

More seriously though: "Spreading disinformation" is such a vaguely-defined, over-used phrase to justify any and all censorship, that any attempt to use it automatically invites suspicion of bad faith; and usually correctly so. Add to that my own personal perspective that censorship on account of spreading disinformation invariably backfires spectacularly .

If under discussion is "everybody censors" and our best defense is "but we do it to combat spreading disinformation", we have lost and catastrophically so. EVERYbody does it to combat "disinformation", however they choose to define it.

(I'm not taking some extreme "all truths are relative" approach here either; I'm merely focusing on this specific justification for censorship as utterly untenable)

My point wasn't "say something conspiratorial ergo get banned from Twitter" because if that were the case there would be far fewer people using Twitter. My point (and certainly I could make this more clear) was that it could be someone who is paid to say things that aren't true, for example, which would fall under this "spreading disinformation" category, but the OP has no idea because they don't have any information.

As an aside, it is also Russian propaganda and disinformation. But that's unrelated to the main point.

I'm sorry, but I don't think it's fair for you to imply that I'm posting in bad faith.

The link I posted is not a "random" link, and whether you click on it or not is up to you, but it's a real video of Victoria Nuland (a high ranking US government official) speaking to the US Congress. It's not Russian propaganda.

I honestly don't really care if the US has biological weapons labs in Ukraine. I don't live in the US, or Ukraine, or Russia. I don't have any skin in that game. When I first saw rumours of it I thought it was a nonsense conspiracy theory. It wasn't until I saw Victoria Nuland's "denial" that I thought "huh, maybe there's something to that".

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