Tucker Carlson. How? Just how???

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Tucker Carlson. How? Just how???

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Regarde Aduck: Oct 19, 2012; c l o u d k i t t e n; Grimey Drawer

Dog King posted:

This is old now, but Tucker did a great segment on Musk's acquisition of Twitter:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGlP9pSfmzM

His main rhetorical point is that free speech definitionally benefits the less powerful more than the powerful, because if you have the ability to abridge someone's speech you have more power than them. I think there's more nuance to it than that because people have different levels of power in different contexts, but Twitter is obviously part of the public square so if you control the limits of speech there you have a significant, possibly even unconstitutional amount of power.

My favorite part is when he talks about how even though the outcome is good, it's bad that we have to rely on Musk to do this because our system is so dysfunctional. It's not oversimplifying the issue like Musk fanboys do.

'free speech' on social media platforms should be examined in terms of regulation vs deregulation. In a deregulated environment the already powerful absolutely do enjoy dominance. We've seen this happen many times before with unregulated spaces quickly becoming infested with the far right and quickly becoming transphobic. This pattern has repeated many times because there is power pushing these viewpoints. Power that the common individual does not have. The 'free speech' allows them to shout into the void all day long but they will achieve the same amount of reach as the rich and powerful who can employ bot nets, marketing organisations, AstroTurfing, targeted ads and a whole range of other expensive tricks to promote their agenda.

For Musk, the benefit is obvious. He already has a massive following. Anything he says reaches millions of people without any cost or effort. He, one man, can promote his ideas to most of the world, and in return most of the world can disagree, but their voices will not be heard. 'Free speech' does not level the playing field. It just turns it into the wild west where the billionaires already run the biggest meanest bandit gangs.

# ? Oct 12, 2022 17:46

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# ? Apr 29, 2024 08:37

CocoaNuts: Jun 12, 2020

https://twitter.com/RpsAgainstTrump/status/1606106199757307905

The only answer is DEFINITELY NOT!!!

# ? Dec 23, 2022 11:45

Tesseraction: Apr 5, 2009

Tuckedy Crumblums hatred for Zelenskiy is weird. I know he's tended to kiss Putin's arse but support for Ukraine is pretty high even amongst the mushbrains who religiously watch Fox News.

# ? Dec 23, 2022 12:55

ZZT the Fifth: Dec 6, 2006; I shot the invisible swordsman.

Tesseraction posted:

Tuckedy Crumblums hatred for Zelenskiy is weird. I know he's tended to kiss Putin's arse but support for Ukraine is pretty high even amongst the mushbrains who religiously watch Fox News.

Zelensky is Jewish; that's reason enough for Tucker, Son of Carl.

# ? Dec 23, 2022 14:34

Tesseraction: Apr 5, 2009

ZZT the Fifth posted:

Zelensky is Jewish; that's reason enough for Tucker, Son of Carl.

True enough.

Incidentally Greg Sargent has an interesting piece about how Carlson's mostly had a pretty bad year in terms of his narrative eating poo poo (the Italian election being the obvious counterexample) https://twitter.com/ThePlumLineGS/status/1606280936575975426

# ? Dec 23, 2022 16:00

je1 healthcare: Sep 29, 2015

Regarde Aduck posted:

'free speech' on social media platforms should be examined in terms of regulation vs deregulation. In a deregulated environment the already powerful absolutely do enjoy dominance. We've seen this happen many times before with unregulated spaces quickly becoming infested with the far right and quickly becoming transphobic. This pattern has repeated many times because there is power pushing these viewpoints. Power that the common individual does not have. The 'free speech' allows them to shout into the void all day long but they will achieve the same amount of reach as the rich and powerful who can employ bot nets, marketing organisations, AstroTurfing, targeted ads and a whole range of other expensive tricks to promote their agenda.

What power does the far-right have in unregulated spaces that everyone else lacks? Too much spare time?

Private companies can approach the definition of "censorship" when they conspire to monopolize an entire medium or an entire industry, like the old Hollywood studios did back when they were blacklisting suspected gays or communists. Or when the Comics Code Authority got stores to stop stocking independent artists that violated their moral standards.

But less than 5% of Americans admit to even checking twitter once a month, so meh

# ? Dec 24, 2022 07:59

Panzeh: Nov 27, 2006; "..The high ground"

je1 healthcare posted:

What power does the far-right have in unregulated spaces that everyone else lacks? Too much spare time?

Private companies can approach the definition of "censorship" when they conspire to monopolize an entire medium or an entire industry, like the old Hollywood studios did back when they were blacklisting suspected gays or communists. Or when the Comics Code Authority got stores to stop stocking independent artists that violated their moral standards.

But less than 5% of Americans admit to even checking twitter once a month, so meh

Honestly, freedom of speech doesn't really exist as a coherent concept, if it's going to become 'norms' and 'public squares' rather than its very specific definition, because at that point it could never be free speech unless everyone had equal and unlimited access to every communications platform, which is impossible. It's not even possible if you said 'everyone has equal access' because there's only so much attention to be had by the potential listeners.

Keeping it strictly in terms of government censorship at least has some basic coherent tenets, though it's still got a lot of grey area.

# ? Dec 24, 2022 12:52

CocoaNuts: Jun 12, 2020

OWNED!

https://twitter.com/MattGertz/status/1621625016570757120

# ? Feb 4, 2023 17:33

cat botherer: Jan 6, 2022; I am interested in most phases of data processing.

https://mobile.twitter.com/TheOnion/status/1618307839755182094

# ? Feb 5, 2023 00:45

Jesus III: May 23, 2007

Does anyone think the Dominion texts and emails will harm this chucklenut's power over old men at all?

# ? Feb 19, 2023 03:48

Shooting Blanks: Jun 6, 2007; Real bullets mess up how cool this thing looks.

-Blade

Jesus III posted:

Does anyone think the Dominion texts and emails will harm this chucklenut's power over old men at all?

Why on earth would they start acknowledging reality now? Anyone who has believed Carlson since Trump took office has no reason to change their behavior based on a lawsuit they won't read or care about. Because fake news.

# ? Feb 19, 2023 05:06

I AM GRANDO: Aug 20, 2006

A month ago he was ranting about the relative fuckability of m&m mascots and got away with that. I don�t think there�s a bottom. As long as he feeds their need, they won�t stop.

# ? Feb 19, 2023 06:06

OgNar: Oct 26, 2002; They tapdance not, neither do they fart

But it is a useful tool in arguments now with 'those' people, i.e. your uncles and coworkers.
Every single news outlet that isnt Fox news is talking about it, yet you dont hear Fox in any way calling everyone else liars.
Its on Reuters, APNews and even PBS.
They are using other misdirection and falsehoods to create other things to shout about but at no point do they try to refute it.
And you know thats something they would bitch about if it were in any way false.

Its not going to sway all of them.
But maybe a few will finally wise up. And thats really the best you can hope for.
But then at the rate they churn out kids, it may still be a losing battle.

e: LOL, just did a search for Dominion on Fox and all the articles are from 2020.

OgNar fucked around with this message at 06:50 on Feb 19, 2023

# ? Feb 19, 2023 06:45

The Islamic Shock: Apr 8, 2021

Jesus III posted:

Does anyone think the Dominion texts and emails will harm this chucklenut's power over old men at all?

No, but it would be nice if at least one of these idiots started to wonder why exactly it is that Fox and friends consistently say very different things when they're in the one setting where it's illegal to lie.

# ? Feb 19, 2023 14:39

Clarste: Apr 15, 2013; Just how many mistakes have you suffered on the way here?

An uncountable number, to be sure.

Deep State, obviously.

# ? Feb 19, 2023 21:42

CocoaNuts: Jun 12, 2020

Jesus III posted:

Does anyone think the Dominion texts and emails will harm this chucklenut's power over old men at all?

I honestly don't know what it would take to overcome the chasm between left and right these days. It seems that no matter how deep the scandal, the acolytes don't budge.

# ? Feb 24, 2023 12:50

Shooting Blanks: Jun 6, 2007; Real bullets mess up how cool this thing looks.

-Blade

OgNar posted:

But it is a useful tool in arguments now with 'those' people, i.e. your uncles and coworkers.
Every single news outlet that isnt Fox news is talking about it, yet you dont hear Fox in any way calling everyone else liars.
Its on Reuters, APNews and even PBS.
They are using other misdirection and falsehoods to create other things to shout about but at no point do they try to refute it.
And you know thats something they would bitch about if it were in any way false.

Its not going to sway all of them.
But maybe a few will finally wise up. And thats really the best you can hope for.
But then at the rate they churn out kids, it may still be a losing battle.

e: LOL, just did a search for Dominion on Fox and all the articles are from 2020.

It wouldn't matter if this were Politico, CNN, ProPublica, etc. - Fox is currently in a $1.6 billion lawsuit with Dominion. The entire network almost certainly has strict instructions from their litigators to not, under any circumstances, report on it until the trial is over. Especially don't offer any kind of opinion reporting (i.e. Tucker Carlson) as it may damage their case.

When CNN got sued by that MAGA hat kid, I'm pretty sure they stopped reporting on it entirely between "CNN being sued" and "Lawsuit with MAGA hit kid over."

# ? Feb 24, 2023 15:11