The Great Debate

[Darth_Payn]

Doubly so when trying to debate a complicated, delicate issue in under 500 characters.

This is what kills me about the idea of Youtube "discussion."

Oh, you guys want to see moronic comments on something? Go too any Yahoo!News article and read THEIR comments section. It's where conspiracy theories are born.

Why? Why would you wish that upon people?

I didn't mean to do that, I was warning against reading the comments on YahoO!News articles. in fact, don't read them at all. They'll just angry up the blood.

 

[Knight Templar]

No, that's called Youtube and if they're putting a public video up on a public website and disabling comments then yes, they're silencing discussion/debates/general nonsense about it.

But they are not doing that, no attempt is made to infringe on the rights or space of others, there is nobody who has been stopped from saying what they wish to.

 

[The Lugz]

you realize the irony here, of-course? you're basically just saying nobody matters but me all your opinions are stupid, because lol reasons!

and that's Exactly the sort of comment you get on youtube...

 

[Olas]

It always annoys me when comments are disabled, the worst part is you can't even write a complaint about it in the comments because the comments are disabled.

Also, reading other peoples' comments on youtube makes me feel more intelligent.

 

[Imp_Emissary]

The OP is a gay ******.

Good comic, I laughed.

So, you're saying this is Grey?

Spoiler: A Gay ******

A Happy Cigarette.

:/ Well, he is British, so I guess that makes sense.

Great Comic. Keep up the good work!

 

[Evil Smurf]

The OP is a gay ******.

Good comic, I laughed.

So, you're saying this is Grey?

Spoiler: A Gay ******

A Happy Cigarette.

:/ Well, he is British, so I guess that makes sense.

Great Comic. Keep up the good work!

I was thinking more a bundle of sticks

 

[Griffolion]

You're not wrong in that people should not have to feel compelled to open the comments section for the sake of debate due to harassment etc. But that wasn't the reason why AS disabled the comments in some of her videos.

 

[Xisin]

Some people will argue that youtube comments are anonymous and therefore carry no weight because the shit people say would never be said to someone's face. They can easily be ignored because the majority will be shit. This attitude will eventually result in stifling actual debates that might pop up or simply silencing dissenting voices. Oh sure it's easy to crap on youtube but the same can be said for the escapist or any other forum or site where despite the rules of conduct there is still a large amount of crap.

Think back to for example the early Jimquisition days where the majority of the responses were hateful, vulgar, stupid, unintelligible, unintelligent or spam and they weren't just turned off. What if they had been turned off? What if those 1/10 posts that actually offered suggestions, explanation and analyses of the flaws were ignored all for the sake of not having to read the other 9/10 comments that read something like:

"Who is this fat stupid fuck and why is he on this site with his crappy show regurgitating whatever the community says?"

We wouldn't have our Wednesday poetry jam or our Monday show because the people that didn't talk with their posts would have talked with their views and nobody would have gained anything because nobody would know why the views went down.

Just because you don't want to hear someone tell you that you should be raped is no justification to also silence the person that would tell you why he disagrees with you in a well thought out argument. That is just the excuse for you to avoid any dissenting comments.

The difference for me is moderation. If after watching Jim's first episode, I commented with "Get raped Jim!" I would be banned or at least given a warning. So the next time, I wouldn't be there to add irrelevant comments. Freedom of speech or a lack of censorship doesn't mean a freedom from consequences.

Besides, I always have the right to say something and walk away. Why can't I have that option on youtube? Not even the default setting. Gosh knows I use that setting all the time in League. There was a Zilean 2 days ago pretending to be an Islamic Bomber... I hit the mute option.

 

[Xanex]

Anita doesn't know what she is talking about. Poor research and biased conculsions.

I know I am right, because I am. So I am going to turn off comments and ratings to ths post because there is nothing to say. I am right.


Now after that let me say. Anita markets herself and her approach to this subject as academic. As another youtuber said "In acadimia peer review is a essential part of the academic proccess". Without it all she is doing is presenting her opinion.

 

[Simonism451]

Anita doesn't know what she is talking about. Poor research and biased conculsions.

I know I am right, because I am. So I am going to turn off comments and ratings to ths post because there is nothing to say. I am right.


Now after that let me say. Anita markets herself and her approach to this subject as academic. As another youtuber said "In acadimia peer review is a essential part of the academic proccess". Without it all she is doing is presenting her opinion.

I can still however send you a private message, start a thread in which I write about your opinion and why I think it's wrong, I can make a blogpost, a Video reply or post on reddit or a similar platform: basically every form of communication available on the internet that requires more thought than writing "lol, aspie fag" in a box at the bottom of the page.
Additionally, for peer review to work, there needs to be a certain level of competence present in the reviewing peers which is more likely to be true for chimpanzees than the average youtube commenter.

 

[Malisteen]

disabling youtube comments isn't censorship. Not by any meaningful definition of the word. Freedom of speech doesn't guarantee the right to speak in someone else's private space.

No meaningful definition of censorship limits it to anti-democratic government-instituted censorship.

Censorship is the ereasal or limitation of communication. If I'm quoting your post, and replacing a word with asterisks, then by most common definitions, I am "censoring" your line. If I'm asterisking out my own words, I am prcticing "self-censorship". When the Escapist is deleting forum posts, they are censoring commenters.

I'm not saying that all these forms of censorship are wrong, they might be necessary, but first of all we need to admit what it is. If you are blocking comments from your youtube page, then you are censoring your youtube page. You are limiting other people's communication. And just because you do it in a way that is within your legal rights, doesn't change that basic fact.

To deny that, just because censorship sounds like such an unpleasant word, is a pointless euphemism.

The New York Times isn't practicing censorship when it chooses not to print a letter sent to it, you aren't practicing censorship when you choose not to forward a chain letter to 10 of your friends, I'm not practicing censorship when I choose not to scream every thought that comes into my head stream of consciousness style while I'm walking down the street, and Anita isn't practicing censorship when she turns off youtube comments on her videos.

A definition of censorship that would apply to those situations is meaninglessly broad. Part of freedom of speech is the freedom to choose what you don't say, what opinions you don't express in your own words or your own publications or spaces.

 

[Entitled]

The New York Times isn't practicing censorship when it chooses not to print a letter sent to it, you aren't practicing censorship when you choose not to forward a chain letter to 10 of your friends, I'm not practicing censorship when I choose not to scream every thought that comes into my head stream of consciousness style while I'm walking down the street, and Anita isn't practicing censorship when she turns off youtube comments on her videos.

One of these is not like the others. Not saing something, is not the same thing as actively stopping something from being said.

Anita isn't just not posting misogynist rants against herself, but categorically bans the posibility of those rants being said by others in a cerain context

A definition of censorship that would apply to those situations is meaninglessly broad. Part of freedom of speech is the freedom to choose what you don't say, what opinions you don't express in your own words or your own publications or spaces.

Censorship is not just a "freedom of speech" issue. Governments that allow freedom of speech, still practice censorship.

While the opposite of "being censored" would be "being able to speak freely", the informal concept of being able to speak freely is not the same thing as the legal concept of "Freedom of Speech", which has it's limits, and these limits are what censorship enforces.

Just as the government can censor obscenity, or hate speech, because that way of speaking freely is not protected by freedom of speech, likewise, individuals and corporations can censor their forums because that isn't protected by Freedom of Speech either.

You imagine that as if it would work like this: North Korea doesn't have Freedom of Sppech, therefore North Korea has censorship. The USA has freedom of speech, therefore the USA can't have censorship. Posting comments is not a Freedom of Spech issue, therefore banning comments can't be censorship.

"Censorship" is not a meaningless word, just because it's not the legal opposite of Freedom of Speech, it's still a useful phrase for all cases of communication being forcefully silenced, with or without violating freedom of speech.

 

[1337mokro]

The difference for me is moderation. If after watching Jim's first episode, I commented with "Get raped Jim!" I would be banned or at least given a warning. So the next time, I wouldn't be there to add irrelevant comments. Freedom of speech or a lack of censorship doesn't mean a freedom from consequences.

Besides, I always have the right to say something and walk away. Why can't I have that option on youtube? Not even the default setting. Gosh knows I use that setting all the time in League. There was a Zilean 2 days ago pretending to be an Islamic Bomber... I hit the mute option.

It was just a rebuttal restating what had been said in the thread.

My point was that youtube has certain rules. Which allow people to tell you that they are going to "Put on a strap on and screw you in the ass", apparently the Escapist is fine with that to so as long as it's between ""

The Escapist has a different code of conduct. They are both forums owned by businesses, they are not public areas so yes they are allowed to refuse users based on certain things.

But that is also the difference between blocking/filtering comments and following a set of rules to use the service provided by the company. Youtube has no such moderation, therefore using the services of youtube should go along with the expectation of getting allot of crap.

If you don't want to hear it you can switch off notifications. Your video could be BOMBED with rape threats, peanut butter innuendo's and whatever else and you would be none the wiser. However that is the again the difference between the mute button and kicking someone from the server. People seem to defend disabling comments when at the same time if they don't want to hear them, they could just flick on the no notifications switch. You don't have to deal with the shit and people are still able to spew the shit. Everybody wins!

 

[Malisteen]

Anita isn't just not posting misogynist rants against herself, but categorically bans the posibility of those rants being said by others in a cerain context

When that context is 'in my space that I have implicitly endorsed by making available and that I must subject anyone to by linking to my video' no, that situation isn't any different from the others I mentioned. The comments section of Anita's videos is Anita's space, and if she doesn't want to make it available to you, that's her business.

You are responsible for your own speech, but when you publish someone else's speech, you're taking responsibility for it, too. You are effectively re-saying what they say by broadcasting it. Speech in youtube comments is the responsibility of the speaker, but also of those who chose to give them that platform in the first place - both youtube itself and the video poster in whose comment section the speech is taking place, in exactly the same way as a newspaper still shares responsibility for the speech within letters that they choose to publish. It doesn't matter what the 'default' settings are. Checking a 'don't allow comments' box when comments are the default is no different from not checking the 'allow comments' box when they aren't, and its no different from simply choosing not to go out of your way to set up a commentary method when one isn't built in.

Where individual moderation is unfeasible - as is often the case on the internet - the options are either to make space available or not, but neither choice constitutes censorship, because there is no reasonable obligation for that particular space to be open in the first place. Censorship is restrictions on speech imposed by an outside force, but while you're in Anita's space you're the outsider, not her. Nothing she can do in her own space is censorship, even choosing to block only the posts that disagree with her, because that's her space and her speech as much as it's the speech of those allowed to comment.


There's this assumption in the internet generation that everyone is entitled not only to say anything they want, but to say it any where they want, including other people's private spaces, and that other people are obligated to make their spaces available to you. And that's just ridiculous. As mentioned earlier in the thread, "preventing you from shitting on my lawn isn't policing your toilet."

 

[Entitled]

The comments section of Anita's videos is Anita's space, and if she doesn't want to make it available to you, that's her business.

Yes, it is her business. She can choose to leave such comments be uncensored, or she can, you know... censor them.

Censorship is restrictions on speech imposed by an outside force but while you're in Anita's space you're the outsider, not her.

That's both a spectacular case of moving the goalposts, and one that is ridiculously incompatible with the common usage of the word "censorship".

The problem is, that you are basically argue about semantics. You agree with the comic that youtube commets should be censored, and I agree with you about that, so all that you personally have contributed to this discussion is a terminology debate about whether we should call that "censorship", or make a new euphemism for it and limit the phrase censorship towhat is now known as "freedom of speech violating government censorship". So I guess the "bleep censor [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleep_censor]" that many TV programs use is actually misnamed since it's done by the programs' own self-censorship [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-censorship], and in fact, the concept of self-censorship itself is a contradiction.

Now let's start citing dictionaries, and debate about descriptive vs. prescriptive linguistics, as if this discussion wasn't pointless enough until now.

 

[duchaked]

I've completely stopped reading IGN article comments. It's just too terrible.
YouTube is...well I stick to channels where the viewers aren't usually huge crapheads. Yahoo is hilarious when it's the sarcastic cynics making jokes, but even then...

In general I avoid these 'debates' on the Interwebz. Of course being in a university where people are always arguing stuff, I just don't like it in general haha...but hey anyone who wants to debate on campus should do it in person and within punching range. >:/

 

[Yuuki]

I see nobody has managed to answer my question yet lol, so I'll ask again:

I see why Anita turned off comments, she wanted to avoid a huge sea of trolls and hurtful comments.

But then why did she turn off ratings?? EXPLAIN THAT.

There is no room for trolls or hurtful comments in ratings, you will only get an idea of how many people agree or disagree - nothing more. So there is no excuse (but please, do explain if you can come up with one).

As I said before, Anita is well-known for only speaking/presenting (or "preaching" as I prefer to call it) in events where feedback or debate isn't allowed. She does this with almost all her content to avoid getting criticism and I'm sick of people defending her bullshit. Her MESSAGE may not be bullshit, but her her PRACTICES certainly are bullshit.

Stop defending her poor practices Cory Rydell and Grey Carter (assuming both of you are responsible for this comic). Maybe I don't feel like uploading a whole fucking video because Anita's work is just not WORTH that much time/effort! Maybe I just want to drop in a rating after I've watched it. Writing some random article somewhere or posting in random forums doesn't have anywhere near the same amount of impact as leaving some form of feedback (if not comments then at least RATINGS) on the video itself.

I heartily disagree with the message in this comic and recommend the editors at least think for a minute before they post stuff like this. I'm not against opinions and stances, but I am against irrational opinions and teaspoon-narrow perspectives - especially coming from the more influential people on sites like these.

 

[Nurb]

I don't know see the issue as so much "obligations" as just being a good sport. Yea, you get the nasty comments but it comes with the territory. Gamers are a nasty bunch as a whole, we all know that, but it's some unwritten internet rule people have adopted where if you put yourself out there to say something, you put yourself out there for all responses. Unfortunately, there's a lot of shit mixed in with the non-offensive replies.

However, in the case of Anita Sarkeesian, she disabled comments on all videos, except for when her kickstarter was nearing the end of its run, THEN she enabled comments for her kickstarter video, getting all the trolls to do their thing and posting the results on feminist blogs.

Bam! Over $100K in the bank and interviews on TV to promote herself. From then on she hasn't enabled comments. She knew what she was doing. She knew she could rile up the gamer trolls and exploit the feminist community for money and exposure through victimhood. She's a good marketer, and a little underhanded in how she does things.

 

[KelDG]

If you can't take the heat, fair enough disable the comments. But who hasn't had "death threats" from kids who want so sound hard on the internet?

What's wrong with this situation is disabling the ratings. This obviously shows a lack of confidence in the validity of her work. Not everyone wants to send her hate mail, there are people who just think she is plain wrong and want to click a thumbs down to show their opinion.

 

[TTYTYTTYYTTYTTTY]

But then why did she turn off ratings?? EXPLAIN THAT.

Not very familiar with how YouTube videos work, but possibly after receiving too many down votes it'd be harder for people to find?

That's a pointless reason though as she knew everybody would know her name and YouTube channel, after the "trolls", interviews, articles about her and her tedx talk.

So in my personal opinion, she just doesn't care at all about any criticism or differing opinions.