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For Tweets, I think the minimum requirements should be: - If the author is not a well-known figure or institution, tell us who they are and why they are qualified to comment on said subject - Quote what you think is the evidence or the lede in any linked articles In combination, these two guidelines should help both the poster and the audience better identify tweets that are misrepresentations of the underlying source. For example, if you post a tweet about a proposed tax bill, then you should say "this guy/gal is the senior fellow at such and such institute, which is a liberal/conservative think tank, and here's the bit that stood out to me from the linked article". This is not to say that the only opinions that matter in a political debate are those from experts, but in my opinion if we want to improve the quality of sources then we should try to clamp down on hot and intentionally inflammatory takes from total randos.
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Jan 30, 2021 19:12
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Cefte posted:If they're relying on a 'bad' source on a point of fact, you can refute them with multiple 'good' sources. No, this absolutely should not become the expectation, because it takes far more effort to refute a bad source with multiple good sources, than to post that bad source in the first place. This is such a widespread problem that there is even a name for it: Bullshit Asymmetry Principle Just like how the burden of proof lies with the person making a claim, the burden of showing that the source being posted is a good source should lie with the person posting it. Expecting others to do the harder work of refuting that source is ridiculous.
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Jan 31, 2021 03:16
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Deteriorata posted:I would much rather see people post a link to the article itself, with a bit of the relevant content from it, rather than a tweet about it. If the thread is to be news oriented, then sticking to original content rather than commentary about it would sure help. It's aggravating to have to find and click through to the article to find out what it actually says. I think the main reason people post tweets is because they get automatically embedded, along with any articles linked in the tweet it's visually pleasing and easy to parse. If SA had the ability to embed snippets from non-twitter URLs, you would see a noticeable reduction in posted tweets.
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Jan 31, 2021 19:40
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Cefte posted:You seem to be confusing the act of 'debate' with something that can be replaced with moderation. Yes, debate is difficult! Yes, it takes effort to nail a slippery character! That's the point! Where did you get the idea that I am calling for blacklisting sources?
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Jan 31, 2021 21:38
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You sound unnecessarily combative. Maybe you didn't intend to come across that way, but you do. I stated my position in the first reply to the OP. I don't have a strong stance on whether mods should blacklist certain sources that are intended to be propaganda; I can see the arguments going both ways. I simply demonstrated why your particular argument opposing it is a deeply and fundamentally flawed one. That is why I quoted that part of your post specifically, not because I am strongly in favor of blacklisting, but because I object to the suggestion that bad sources should be refuted using multiple good ones, and that it is not a problem if this places a disproportionate burden on posters who are objecting to the bad source. Your follow-up response of "yes, debate is difficult" is not a convincing one either.
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Jan 31, 2021 23:39
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Cefte posted:So, to clarify, you object to the assertion that the appropriate management of the use of a 'bad' source on a point of fact is counter-citation and debate. What do you propose is the appropriate management? Cefte, the entire thing that makes a source 'bad' in the context of debate and discourse is that it routinely mixes lies with facts, and truth with fiction. That is what makes propaganda effective in the first place. It is simply not reasonable to expect the other side to put in overwhelmingly more effort to pick apart and respond to each point said source presents with counter-citations. So yes, I object to the idea that that is a normal or acceptable expectation. Furthermore, this right here: Cefte posted:You seem to be confusing the act of 'debate' with something that can be replaced with moderation. Yes, debate is difficult! Yes, it takes effort to nail a slippery character! That's the point! ...is horseshit. Having to tediously refute idiotic hot takes from posters who deliberately or unwittingly spread propaganda on a constant basis is not "the point" of debate. We should strive for a higher level of discourse than that, and should expect moderators to enforce those standards. Regarding what I propose, again, I already posted it: require users to identify who the author of a source is (whether it's a tweet or an article) and what their qualifications are, as well as the important sections from the source. This addresses the problem with bad-sourcing too, albeit indirectly: doing so should reduce bad source usage noticeably, both because the poster themselves might identify the flaws with it and decide not to post it, and because it would somewhat equalize the playing field in terms of effort.
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Feb 1, 2021 01:36
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sexpig by night posted:what about Maggie Haberman who also used nothing but anonymous sources to say dumb vague poo poo like 'Trump plans something big on immigration, also he's never been more isolated' Access journalism, and the bad behaviors it results in, is definitely an issue. It is not an issue that makes the New York Times a propaganda source like RT or Epoch Times. The reason is simple: New York Times has many journalists and op-ed authors and they are all able to, and indeed frequently do, criticize the government and highlight its mistakes and shortcomings without being disappeared; and they themselves are called out and held to account by prominent figures and also other outlets when they gently caress up. Sometimes that does not happen for years, like with the role they played with regards to the Iraq War, but it almost always happens. They are a paper of record for a reason. In any case, these types of issues should be easy to pinpoint if my and Discendo Vox's suggestion ends up becoming the standard: when something is posted, identify the author and try to point out their potential biases, and post the actual article or snippets from it. In fact, people have done this in the past and it is how we have collectively come to determine that Haberman regularly acted as the Trump family's mouthpiece.
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Feb 1, 2021 16:29
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OwlFancier posted:If you're going to start ruling out sources based on whether or not they're pushing an agenda you could probably save time and skip straight to applying that rule to posters as well. Having an agenda != Pushing propaganda In all honesty, perhaps we need a thread discussing how to identify the latter because there seems to be a lot of confusion.
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Feb 1, 2021 17:20
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Jaxyon posted:It's bullshit that the Tara Reade accusations on the sitting president are forbidden discussion in the USPOL thread. The issue is that there is nothing left to "address." It's a polarizing subject, and everyone who might actually be interested in discussing it has already made up their mind about it, so the only thing talking about it will do is cause pages and pages of derails and reports, at the expense of actual news discussions. The reason Trump's rape accusations are/were frequently brought up is that several of them have active lawsuits, and new developments happening in those lawsuits, such as when a judge orders that Trump can't postpone deposition. They are, in other words, news, and it was decided that USPol's focus was going to change to primarily news coverage. If you're interested in talking about Reade stuff, make a new thread (ask mods and admins first, probably).
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Feb 4, 2021 20:27
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Fritz the Horse posted:I might suggest you try and apply the media criticism questions (just a couple posts back) to Reade's editorial in RT since this is after all a thread about discussing sources. Yeah, pretty much. There's a reason RT published Reade's column, and it directly pertains to what this thread is about. As someone stated earlier, it perfectly fits Russia's propaganda model of using state-backed sources to give voice to and/or amplify anti-American dissent, when credible and higher caliber sources won't touch it with a ten foot pole. It's also a wonderful example of why such sources virtually always lead to pages upon pages of inflammatory and acrimounous posting: because infiltrating domestic conversations like that is their goal.
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Feb 4, 2021 21:21
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Rockit posted:Just the simpstic Knee-jerk of "source bad" lead people to defend an Islamophobic Russian nationalist who only opposed an annexation and supports others while condoning race riots. If you don't think that's necessarily counts as being an "Far right insurrectionist" fine that there was more to it than russia fake news. Sure one of my sources was indeed the hill but i just looked at what they sourced and confirmed for myself what he said. Didn't even bother to read the hill. If something that is published or reported by a bad source is both correct and credible, there will virtually always be a better source reporting on it because it has passed the threshold for verifiability. That better source should be used instead, especially if the bad source is a well-known propaganda outlet and/or has been shown to frequently misrepresent the information for click-bating purposes. The exception to this is news that the bad source happens to break, which will be rare, and in such cases, again, it is better to wait until a better source reports on it. I'm okay with not blacklisting sources, but IMO there should be a more stringent requirement for the poster to answer axeil's questions if they insist on using a bad source: quote:Who created this?
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Feb 4, 2021 22:26
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Mainstream vs. non-mainstream is a meaningless distinction in this context. There are a lot of non-mainstream sources that also happen to both be high quality and do their reporting in good faith. RT, Newsmax, OAN, Breitbart, etc. have neither of those qualities. There is zero reason to use them as sources, regardless of what argument they are pushing and whether you personally agree with that argument. I'm okay if the mod team decides not to maintain a blacklist, but it should be acceptable to treat posters who use such trashy sources with high levels of suspicion and disdain.
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Feb 6, 2021 20:30
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OwlFancier posted:Yes, literally, it is. Even if we assume, as I like to, that there is a concrete reality which we can discern through application of reason, the process by which we do that is inherently political, our ideas, our experiences, our pre-understood assumptions and beliefs about how the world work create a political lens through which we interpret the things we see and go on to influence the theories and ideas we form of our own, and the ones we expound to others. I think this is the part where you take a huge hit from your bong and go "what even is truth, maaaan"
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Feb 6, 2021 21:38
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A Buttery Pastry posted:I very much get the feeling that some people here want to just blacklist "known propaganda outlets" without ever being forced to question establishment outlets, or even seeing others do the same. The objective reality is that USPol regularly, and I mean frequently, questions and shits on both mainstream outlets and specific journalists and authors. It is why we know Maggie Haberman is terrible, for example: because we have in fact questioned the veracity of her reporting, and the answers we found were less than ideal. Similarly, through the same mechanism, we have come to determine that The Hill regularly posts clickbait trash. What we don't want to have to do, however, is spend enormous amounts of time and energy tediously refuting sources like Russia Today, which hasbecome very good at mixing truth with fiction because it exists for the sole purpose of pushing propaganda. The reason we don't want to have to do it is because of this wonderful post Epinephrine made on page 2 (which everyone seems to have ignored): Epinephrine posted:While I agree that bad posting behavior is what needs to be moderated, posting misinformation, including hot takes on twitter that either misrepresent their source or spout bullshit about it, actively poisons debate in such a way that actively refuting bullshit often contributes to the problem. Debate and discussion doesn't help, it often hurts, and moderation is therefore necessary to stop it. Posting misinformation should be an automatic probe, full stop. The core phenomenon at play here is the backfire effect: the finding that refuting false information reinforces memory for the false information and, in the process, makes the falsehoods more likely to be believed by those who hear it. This isn't the only reason why lies and bullshit poison debate, but it's the most pernicious in my view. Thorn Wishes Talon fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Feb 6, 2021 |
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Feb 6, 2021 21:56
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awesmoe posted:people dont like maggie habberman disproportionately compared to everyone else in her role who is equally guilty of the sins of their profession because she's a woman who tweets badly People don't like Haberman because she spent four years humanizing Trump and his family, especially Jared and Ivanka, in an effort to maintain her access to them. You can argue that people dislike her more than other journalists who participate in access journalism. I don't know how you could prove that, but even if it is true, that is probably because they hate Trump, not because she's "a woman who tweets badly".
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Feb 6, 2021 22:52
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A Buttery Pastry posted:You dont have to have a couple of pages. Like, the moment you see 2-3 of those replies you can just ignore it. "Just ignore it" is not a solution to brigading and attempted thread sabotage, and never has been. Because even if you ignore it, someone else won't, and it will result in pages of derail, and you'll be forced to skim through it to separate the wheat from the chaff. Maybe this doesn't happen in the threads you post in, but take it from me: it happens constantly in USPol.
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Feb 6, 2021 23:22
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OwlFancier posted:If you don't like the predominant posting style of a thread perhaps you're just not a good fit for it? I find all of mine to be quite agreeable places. For someone who doesn't even post in USPol, you sure have strong opinions about it.
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Feb 6, 2021 23:37
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OwlFancier posted:I don't give a poo poo where you post information from if the information is usable. If the information is available elswhere then... ok? I don't care either way. It's disappointing to read this because being able to critically evaluate the credibility of a source, and analyze how their motivations affect that credibility, is Media Literacy 101 stuff.
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Feb 7, 2021 03:02
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A Buttery Pastry posted:The premise here is that the information has already been vetted. I think OwlFancier is perhaps reacting to the unstated belief that information coming from a "propaganda outlet" is automatically invalid because it comes from a "propaganda outlet", and should thus be distrusted or even dismissed if you find it elsewhere too. Information coming from a foreign propaganda outlet (no need to use scare quotes, we know for a fact that RT and Epoch Times are propaganda outlets) absolutely and definitely cannot be trusted. The entire point of propaganda is that it mixes truth with fiction to the point where the line becomes very blurry, and the truthy bits (that often can be verified via other sources) make it much more likely that the fictional bits will also be accepted and internalized. This is especially true when the message has been carefully crafted and fine-tuned for a specific audience who may have a propensity to not question it because it fits their existing worldview and biases. Therefore, you shouldn't use propaganda outlets as sources even if the stuff they are reporting has been confirmed by other sources (this is extremely rare by the way these outlets are almost never the ones breaking important news or doing original investigative reporting that can be verified). As someone who has studied this, I can tell you that there are people whose full-time job is to pick apart things reported by foreign propaganda outlets and trace their various elements to their origin. It is painstaking and tedious work that requires training. It is not something that your average poster can be expected to do reliably (either as the person using the source, or the person consuming it), because you need access to specialized tools and third-party expertise to do it. Adopting a "I will read it and make up my own mind" approach will quickly lead you off a cliff and make you an unwitting vector for the propaganda (such people actually tend to be the easiest targets).
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Feb 7, 2021 19:07
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fool of sound posted:This thread is relevant to all of D&D but is particularly important to the upcoming USNews thread. IMO whenever someone uses a well-known propaganda outlet, they should be asked to apply axeil's questions to it: quote:1. Who created this? Insanite posted:Should the Feb. 2 Tara Reade piece on RT have been banned from USPol and maybe all of D&D? Well, why don't we do this... apply the questions above to the RT column and try to answer them as honestly and dispassionately as possible.
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Feb 9, 2021 18:56
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Lester Shy posted:Those are certainly valid questions to ask, but if we want to be honest and dispassionate, they need to be applied equally to all sources. What qualifies as a "well-known propaganda outlet"? I already answered the question of what qualifies as propaganda outlet. As for your suggestion, sure, I'm definitely not stopping anyone from applying those questions to all sources!
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Feb 9, 2021 19:13
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SpiritOfLenin posted:I think you and Jarmak have missed that you have basically the same position, namely that people really should pay attention to from what source the news they just posted come from. Jarmak literally does not want people to post anything they want, he has been railing against RT the whole time he's been posting. I think one of you misread a post by the other, because from where I'm standing I don't think you are in disagreement? Yeah lol, I think they agree almost fully, not sure why they're railing against each other...
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Feb 9, 2021 19:55
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Insanite posted:It was flippant, but reading a propaganda outlet was the only way to see her editorial. It was not published elsewhere. Do you not have any reservations whatsoever about using a source that is obviously trying to weaponize what Reade went through to further their own nefarious agenda and goals, which almost certainly does not align with yours? Is making sure Reade's voice gets heard the only thing you care about? If you do care about Reade at all, then seeing her exploited like this by a mouthpiece of a monstrous totalitarian regime should make you disgusted. There is literally no reason to do a "gotta hand it to them" with regards to RT, ET or any similar outlet. They don't care about Reade, they don't care about you. By acting as a vector to spread their reporting, you're helping launder their image into a more legitimate one and that is one of their goals for having given her a platform.
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Feb 9, 2021 22:17
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A Buttery Pastry posted:Can the mod team clarify its position vis-a-vis "foreign" outlets then? Because this thread is heavily skewed towards an instinctual understanding of politics as being American or foreign, when in fact to a lot of goons, America is foreign. I think it's pretty obvious... if you're in USPol, non-American sources are considered foreign. If you're in UKMT, non-UK sources are foreign. This isn't to say that either country's news outlets are themselves perfect. Here in the US for example, Breitbart et al regularly peddle Russian propaganda, as it happens to be pro-Trump and anti-Democrat, which means it aligns with the outlet's own agenda. This propaganda doesn't always come from Russia directly; sometimes it comes from proxies such as pro-Russian elements in Ukraine or Crimea. But it is always obvious when either of these happen, and it's frankly not a lot of extra work to figure it out sometimes the article will even flat out say from where or whom the "news" originated. Regardless though, if a domestic source is publishing propaganda (which is different from bias/spin or even having an agenda, as we covered earlier), then it is worth bringing it up, ideally by the poster using the source.
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Feb 10, 2021 15:49
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There will be bad faith players in every environment, regardless of rules, and they will figure out ways to skirt around or even actively exploit those rules towards their own ends. That's absolutely not an argument against having rules or enforcing them regularly and with consistency.
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Feb 11, 2021 20:09
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A Buttery Pastry posted:Yes, there is a difference between deliberately trying to spread false information and doing it accidentally. However, and this is the core of the issue for me, the level of dereliction of duty that the US press manages time and time again is still at a level where you should question literally anything it puts out, especially for the kind of issues D&D can be bothered to talk about. Nobody seems to be saying "don't question mainstream sources," friend. Seriously, are you under the impression that people are advocating for unquestioningly swallowing anything CNN/NYTimes/WaPo/etc. reports hook, line and sinker? Because that impression is... false.
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Feb 13, 2021 16:28
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Main Paineframe posted:How can you sit here in 2021 and say it literally doesn't matter if stuff is true or not as long as it leads people to the ideological stance you desire? That's not a healthy stance for a debate forum or even a loving Facebook group. It's the same type of ends-justify-the-means-if-those-ends-are-obviously-good nonsense we've been seeing when these people discuss anything else, such as how Democrats should conduct themselves (e.g. ignore established norms and processes, quash coalitions, burn bridges, maybe even do obviously illegal things if the end results would be desirable).
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Feb 26, 2021 19:32
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