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Comment on Exclusive: ByteDance prefers TikTok shutdown in US if legal options fail, sources say

kava@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

There’s always a back and forth between a government respecting personal freedoms and their responsibility to protect it’s people.

There are justified limitations on personal freedoms and unjustified ones. For the classic example, yelling fire in a movie theater. That is a crime because it can cause people to get harmed. It is only a minor infringement on speech, therefore the benefits outweigh the infringement.

Every single time we infringe on personal freedoms, we need to do this calculation.

So there are 3 main justifications for this TikTok ban.

A) stop Chinese data collection. I think this is just misdirection. You say it’s conspiracy, but just like the PATRIOT Act had nothing to do with patriotism or protecting children and the Iraqi war had nothing to do with WMD… the government often misleads or outright lies.

Much of our data is for sale to anyone who wants to buy it. In fact, our law enforcement loves buying data instead of going through the process for a warrant.

There are so many apps out there with less than scrupulous devs who are more than willing to scrape for as much data as possible and sell that off. China can easily acquire massive amounts of data regardless.

stop Chinese influence on Americans. I think this one makes more sense than the first one. China is able to quietly suppress or encourage certain points of views - subtly pushing the 170 million Americans into directions that are beneficial for China’s interests. For example, perhaps media discouraging support for Taiwan.
connected to 2, by banning TikTok the US leaves only the main tech companies which have a proven track record of cooperating with the federal government. Not only in criminal cases but suppressing and amplifying specific types of media.

So what are benefits? US has better control of the digital media landscape. Cost? Americans are being restricting from accessing media they would otherwise access.

I don’t see this as a worthwhile exchange. I think federal government should stay out of the media space. I believe this because we are a free society.

You are right that we don’t always live up to that term, and never really have. But we get a hell of a lot closer than China or Russia. We shouldn’t be moving towards them in ideological terms, but away from them.

As for the young people, there are 170 million people on the app and it skews younger. A large portion of these people use Tiktok as their primary social media. A lot of these will be pushed towards anti-establishment and radical ideologies. Tiktok already leans leftist (and not neoliberal left).

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makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

Every single time we infringe on personal freedoms, we need to do this calculation.

What freedom do you have that you think this is infringing on?

Stop Chinese data collection. I think this is just misdirection. You say it’s conspiracy, but just like the PATRIOT Act had nothing to do with patriotism or protecting children and the Iraqi war had nothing to do with WMD… the government often misleads or outright lies.

Correct, it had nothing to do with patriotism or protecting children. It had to do with war profiteering. That’s the simple answer to basically every question that starts with “why did the American government do…” It made wealthy Americans richer. That’s the default US policy

Much of our data is for sale to anyone who wants to buy it. In fact, our law enforcement loves buying data instead of going through the process for a warrant.

There are so many apps out there with less than scrupulous devs who are more than willing to scrape for as much data as possible and sell that off. China can easily acquire massive amounts of data regardless.

Yup, and that’s fine in the way that it’s fine for us to ship oil, soybeans, and semiconductors to China. As long as America gets the first bite of the pie, what happens after that is mostly fine

Chinese influence on Americans. I think this one makes more sense than the first one. China is able to quietly suppress or encourage certain points of views - subtly pushing the 170 million Americans into directions that are beneficial for China’s interests. For example, perhaps media discouraging support for Taiwan.

I think this is ancillary benefit that is mostly being pushed by our military. I know it’s the “reason” they’re giving but I agree this is not the primary purpose

I believe this because we are a free society.

We do not. By basically every measurable metric of “freedom” the US doesn’t even crack the top 10 in the world and on a lot of lists we don’t make the top 20. I don’t know what Americans think “freedom” means but whenever I hear people talk about it I often wonder if we live in the same country

You are right that we don’t always live up to that term, and never really have. But we get a hell of a lot closer than China or Russia. We shouldn’t be moving towards them in ideological terms, but away from them.

It’s pretty hyperbolic to say that banning the Chinese pipeline of disinformation and spyware makes America ideologically similar to Russia

As for the young people, there are 170 million people on the app and it skews younger. A large portion of these people use Tiktok as their primary social media. A lot of these will be pushed towards anti-establishment and radical ideologies. Tiktok already leans leftist (and not neoliberal left).

That’s just conjecture. Do you know how many social media sites we’ve seen come and go? You assert people will become anti-establishment, I assert they’ll just move on to other social media. Both of our assertions are equally valid without evidence

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- aniki@lemm.ee ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  We’ve seen what happens when services are shut down – it’s consolidation. The whole fucking internet has been a consolidation of thousands of independent websites.
  
  The web wasn’t just better back then, it was diverse.
  
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- Fal@yiffit.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  What freedom do you have that you think this is infringing on?
  
  You really don’t see the answer to this or are you just being intentionally ignorant. Would you feel the same way if the government banned lemmy?
  
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  - makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    No actually, in America we don’t actually have all that many rights. I was specifically asking him what right we have as citizens that he feels we are being denied by this decision. Because I would be hard pressed to identify a right we have that is harmed by this decision
    
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    Fal@yiffit.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Did you just not question my post or are you just intentionally not answering it?
    
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