
Facebook says it has removed promotion of anti-quarantine events - nickysielicki
https://twitter.com/donie/status/1252220943314927616
======
markbnj
I usually stay out of the political/topical threads on HN but this is personal
to me. From my point of view few if any of us commenting here are
knowledgeable enough to connect all the disparate data points we keep
snatching at and synthesize them into conclusions that are likely to be
correct. The people who can do that are working on it, and generally too busy
at the moment to post on forums or give interviews. The misinformation and
unfounded conclusions that are flying around, and especially the atmosphere of
political strife and mistrust are very frustrating to them (and all of us I'm
sure). Most of us here have chafed at similar situations when people who don't
really understand what we do express strong opinions about how we should do
it. They understand how people are being impacted, but they can't give us
certainty at the moment however badly we want it.

The mortality rate in this place or that; the experience on a cruise ship, or
in Sweden, or in North Dakota vs. that in New York or Italy; the percentage of
people who are positive and asymptomatic vs. presymptomatic vs. symptomatic;
whether this or that drug seems to have a good effect on outcomes; they
absolutely don't know how all of this fits together yet. All of them, doctors,
nurses, researchers, are going in every day, treating patients, participating
in daily conference calls to share information on outcomes, trying different
therapies. They're figuring this out and all they have asked us for is some
time. All these studies and hypotheses and numbers from various places don't
always reflect what's actually happening on the ground.

Someone mentioned quarantining the "vulnerable" people and letting everyone
else get back to work and develop our "herd immunity." Are researchers certain
we gain long term immunity? Can they precisely define "vulnerable?" My wife is
clinical care coordinator on a covid unit in northern New Jersey (that's the
personal part). Her first patient was 51. I bet that's younger than most of
you are thinking when you think "vulnerable." It looks like he's going to make
it and drop into that large "didn't die" bucket I see referred to here over
and over, but to get there he spent _five weeks_ in an ICU bed on a
ventilator. My wife has treated lots of elderly people. She's also treated
people in their 30's and 40's. People in those age groups have died. Children
have died, too. How many of each type of person will be affected by this or
that containment policy? We don't know.

When this thing started my wife's hospital was running about 2:1 patients to
nurses. They're now flirting with 4-6:1. They don't have proper PPE. At
another hospital near us a nurse was suspended for bringing her own to work.
The general opinion is that the system can't handle much additional strain,
and I don't think any of us are in a position to argue the point with them.
It's been a month. We can absolutely make it through a few months if we have
to, while they do their work. I personally think that would be easier with
strong and consistent federal leadership, but that's a separate discussion. At
the very least we should be willing to heed the people we expect to save our
lives if we get sick.

~~~
sneak
> _It 's been a month. We can absolutely make it through a few months if we
> have to, while they do their work._

You and I can. Many of my friends have missed a rent or car payment, and may
soon miss another. Most people cannot work from home.

~~~
Angostura
And that's why government action to shut down businesses, should absolutely be
coupled with action to protect workers salaries. In the UK, government is
paying 80% of furloughed workers pay up to a certain amount, and there is
relief on property taxes etc for businesses.

In my opinion the two (shutdown and relief) go hand in hand.

~~~
thu2111
Except for self employed people. Except for businesses that are supposedly
just weeks away from running out of cash on a huge scale.

The idea you can simply shut down the economy at will and balance it with
relief doesn't make economic sense.

~~~
samdamsam
>The idea you can simply shut down the economy at will and balance it with
relief doesn't make economic sense.

Funny you say that because it seems to be no problem when it comes to bailing
out corporate investors. Of course, near-zero federal interest rates didn’t
make “economic sense” either, but yet here we are.

~~~
thu2111
Bailing them out of what?

The term "bail out" is usually understood to mean replacing funds after the
owner of them lost them through bad decision making. What's happening here
isn't a conventional bailout. Governments have destroyed the businesses of
private investors deliberately and explicitly - reductions in the damage
aren't bail outs.

~~~
ModernMech
The virus would have shut them down anyway if they had stayed open and their
employees and customers became ill. The bad decision making here is the lack
of foresight to keep cash on hand to weather a storm like this, despite making
record profits in the billions. We are all told if we don’t keep 6 months of
cash on hand we are financially negligent. Large companies were begging for
money within two weeks of shutdowns happening, after spending so much of their
cash on stock buybacks to pump up stock prices.

~~~
thu2111
Sweden shows that view is wrong.

~~~
ModernMech
These data show that retail, travel, and restaurants were all taking huge hits
before lockdowns went in to wide effect:
[https://www.ft.com/content/d184fa0a-6904-11ea-800d-da70cff6e...](https://www.ft.com/content/d184fa0a-6904-11ea-800d-da70cff6e4d3)

Bay area issued the first national stay at home order on March 13. By then
demand had already dropped precipitously. If your restaurant is seeing 60%
fewer bookings, are you going to keep as many wait staff? Are you going to
order as much food? How is that going to impact your supplier? And their
supplier?

On the flip side we have places like Smithfield food that stayed open and
their workforce became infected. Smithfield alone has as many infected as the
entire country of Sweden reported newly infected yesterday. These are problems
of different orders of magnitutde. How does a factory stay open with 500
people infected at once?

~~~
thu2111
Given how many people have mild symptoms and how age-dependent it is, it's
entirely plausible that 500 infections would yield only a handful of employees
to sick to work.

And yet Sweden still disproves your point. Businesses have stayed open,
including restaurants and other such businesses, and yet Swedish companies are
not evaporating due to their workforces being too sick to work. That's not
even close to happening, is it?

~~~
ModernMech
Again, Sweden is not the US, they have not been hit nearly as hard. More
people will die today in the US than have died total in all of Sweden. Sweden
is not immune from the effects of Covid. They have imposed measures to limit
the size of gatherings, have closed secondary schools and colleges, and have
imposed restrictions on restaurants. Despite their looser restrictions they
are still expecting to see the economy contract and have experienced record
unemployment:

``` A record 36,800 people were handed their notice in March, more than 10
times the number from the same month last year.

The government has offered loans and guarantees and expects to increase
expenditure by around 84 billion Swedish crowns ($8.35 billion) this year.

At the same time, the central bank has poured money into the financial system,
offering 500 billion Swedish crowns in loans to companies via banks and
boosting its purchases of securities by 300 billion crowns.

Banking group Swedbank said recently it expected the economy to contract 4%
this year. ``` [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-
sweden...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-sweden-
economy/swedish-economy-seen-shrinking-4-in-2020-as-pandemic-hits-
idUSKBN21I149)

------
duchenne
I guess it is easy to dismiss the message from ordinary people, since they do
not express themselves as well as the professional speakers we are used to
listen to. If instead of saying "I want a haircut.", they would say like
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a
little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." would they be
taken more seriously?

In the movie version of "I Robot", since the three laws of robotics prioritize
saving life over following humans' wishes, the AI ends up locking down every
humans in their own homes for their own safety. Could facebook sensor this
movie since it pictures the lockdown as an evil action?

For instance, in France, more than _half_ of private sector employees have
already been furloughed. This is unprecedented. So, who could predict what
would be the consequences, including in terms of life? The food production in
Southern Europe is down. Can we know for sure that their will be no
starvation?

Several countries have not decided to do a stay-at-home-lockdown including
Sweden, most of Germany, Japan, South Korea, 95% of China. Praising the
strategy of these countries should be authorized. Several eastern and northern
Europeans countries are opening up as well, even though the disease is still
there.

People should be able to take a calculated risk. When people drive to their
job, they consider the risk of having an accident, and the benefits of being
able to reach their work place, then they take a decision.

The most accurate data about the fatality rate of covid-19 may come from the
Diamond Princess cruise boat where everyone has been tested. The 60-to-80 year
old infected passengers had a fatality rate of ~2%. There was no fatality
among the infected much younger crew.

Now, the government should inform people with data, and let them take a
decision. For now, it seems that the overwhelming majority of people in
France, Italy, and Spain want the lockdown, so they should be able to get it.
But people who want the opposite should be able to express their voice as
well. Otherwise, the democracy cannot work.

(Sorry for the bad English, it is not my native language.)

~~~
staticassertion
> If instead of saying "I want a haircut.", they would say like Benjamin
> Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little
> temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." would they be taken
> more seriously?

Most people sound more like the latter than the former. If people were saying
"We have a need for haircuts etc, this is serious", they'd get a lot more
consideration than some appeal to "but our freedoms". Most people sensibly
realize that a lock-down in the face of a pandemic is not a regression in our
fundamental rights as US citizens, but _just a temporary measure to save
lives_.

If instead you argue that you're legitimately going to see more harm done due
to closures, and you back that up sensibly, people will care a lot more.
You'll probably be wrong, but people might listen and take that seriously. In
fact, they _very obviously_ already are listening to this feedback, and it's a
huge part of the communications from govt officials right now - how we are
balancing saving lives via lockin vs dealing with the fallout of that exact
policy. They're hardly ignoring the issue!

> Could facebook sensor this movie since it pictures the lockdown as a evil
> action?

Sure they could take it down, it's their platform. Would they? No, probably
not, that would be really silly?

> Now, the government should inform people with data, and let them take a
> decision.

The role of our government is not to provide data but then otherwise let
people do whatever.

You say "People should be able to take a calculated risk." \- how would they
calculate it? Most are not capable of making an informed decision like that,
and likening this situation to driving is just ridiculous (and ironic, given
that car safety was heavily regulated due to huge numbers of people dying
while car manufacturers were left unaccountable. The government stepped in
with license requirements, manufacturing requirements, etc.).

~~~
projektfu
I just learned that Facebook censors gifs from Team America World Police, so
I’m not sure that it should be relied on for a conversation about anything
critical.

~~~
fragmede
America is strange. The _idea_ of censorship seems to rile up more than the
practicalities of it. Facebook is _hugely_ censored, and has been for _years_.
There's a distinct lack of gore, of child porn, or even just porn in general.
There aren't torrent links to download the latest TV show or video game. And,
dare I say it, it's better for it.

~~~
orbifold
That is not censorship but removal of illegal content (with the exception of
non-child porn)

------
downerending
It's worth noting that there is a lot of discussion in serious circles
(including here on HN) about the balance between too much and not enough with
respect to quarantine, lockdown, etc., both in terms of where we are now and
what we should do in the near future.

I see little reason to doubt that all involved are trying to minimize general
death and misery, even if they may disagree radically about how to do that.

It'd be pretty wild if (say) Google decided that Chrome would no longer
display pages that were "too far" in their discussion and advocacy of the
options.

~~~
gdubs
I’m too tired at the moment to figure out where I stand on this [issue of free
speech / assembly] but I have a general question: I thought the Supreme Court
has already shown that there are limits to speech, such as yelling “Fire” in a
crowded theater. I guess the distinction is how directly the speech leads to
harm. Would that apply in this situation where most medical experts would
agree that the quarantine is necessary for saving lives? Or is the thinking
that this is too far removed — like telling people they can’t protest seat-
belts.

Edit: I’ll clarify by saying that (my personal opinion) is that the protests
are at best ... misguided. My question is about precedent on free speech /
assembly under circumstances where harm might occur or it violates something
like a quarantine or shelter-in-place order. The Atlantic article linked below
is fascinating because I definitely have always thought of the “fire in a
crowded theater example.”

~~~
dahart
> I thought the Supreme Court has already shown that there are limits to
> speech

Yes correct, freedom of speech is not absolute, there are a lot of limitations
in the U.S.: “libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement,
fighting words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets,
food labeling, non-disclosure agreements, the right to privacy, dignity, the
right to be forgotten, public security, and perjury.”
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech#Limitations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech#Limitations)

The problem in this case is it can be reasonably argued that quarantine is
damaging to some people, and not quarantining is damaging to other people.
Even if it really is a bad idea to protest, it might be really difficult to
establish clearly and legally that protesting is causing unnecessary harm, and
greater harm than not protesting.

I’ve read the Wikipedia page on Freedom of Speech before, but I just noticed
for the first time the interesting criteria called “Imminent lawless action”.
I’m not a lawyer, but it seems possible this could apply even if harm can’t be
demonstrated.

“Under the imminent lawless action test, speech is not protected by the First
Amendment if the speaker intends to incite a violation of the law that is both
imminent and likely.”
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imminent_lawless_action](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imminent_lawless_action)

~~~
hartator
> libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting
> words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets, food
> labeling, non-disclosure agreements, the right to privacy, dignity, the
> right to be forgotten, public security, and perjury.”

Half of this doesn’t apply to the US.

In the same Wikipedia article:

> The opinion in Brandenburg discarded the previous test of "clear and present
> danger" and made the right to freedom of (political) speech's protections in
> the United States almost absolute.

~~~
dahart
> Brandenburg [...] made the right to freedom of (political) speech's
> protections in the United States almost absolute.

Ah, yeah that is a good point, since these protests are political speech. Does
it matter that the protests are assembling? I could imagine the protected
ability to say anything you want about politics, while reserving some rights
about the ability to _do_ anything.

Personally, I don’t think it should be illegal to protest this. It doesn’t
seem like a particularly bright idea though.

This situation doesn’t have a lot of legal precedent, and it might cause some
to occur right now. But since communicable disease is a threat to life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and the law and constitution weren’t
exactly written with global pandemic in mind, do you think the ability to
assemble should be absolute?

> Half of this doesn’t apply to the US.

Here’s the US specific list... it’s still long

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exce...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions)

* Actually, would you mind listing the specific exceptions above that you believe do not apply to the US? I could be wrong, but I scrubbed through all of them and can’t find a single one that doesn’t seem to apply at least partially.

In the US, fighting words, obscenity and pornography are there explicitly;
false statements of fact covers things like libel, slander, dignity and
perjury; the imminent lawless action exception covers sedition and incitement;
commercial speech and speech owned by others covers classified information,
copyright violation, trade secrets, food labeling, and non-disclosure
agreements; right to privacy is implicitly granted by several amendments in
the constitution, and the right to be forgotten has legal precedent. I think
that’s all of them. What did I miss?

------
chrisco255
These are Americans exercising their constitutional rights to freedom of
speech and assembly. Whether you agree with the protestors or not is
irrelevant. Your rights are impacted, too, by this arbitrary platform bias.
This cannot stand for long. We have to move away from centralized monopolies
on the web.

~~~
phakding
You should know that this is not a grass root movement rather someone
astroturfing.

[https://krebsonsecurity.com/2020/04/whos-behind-the-
reopen-d...](https://krebsonsecurity.com/2020/04/whos-behind-the-reopen-
domain-surge/)

[https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/salvadorhernandez/coron...](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/salvadorhernandez/coronavirus-
quarantine-protests-facebook-groups)

Also take a look at this Reddit comment

[https://www.reddit.com/r/maryland/comments/g3niq3/comment/fn...](https://www.reddit.com/r/maryland/comments/g3niq3/comment/fnstpyl)

If you don't trust BuzzFeed you can go look at the domain registration
information for open[enter state name].com domains.

~~~
chrisco255
This is not astroturfing. I saw the protest in Austin this weekend. 22 million
people have been laid off in the last 4 weeks. I've seen the footage of tens
of thousands lining up at food banks across the country. This is just getting
started.

~~~
phakding
I don't see the link here. Yes there are 22 million laid off. But given a
choice between being alive and being jobless, I think people would choose
being jobless. The people protesting are not the same people lining up at food
banks.

I have seen wapo video of Michigan protest. People there were angry because
they want to get their hair done or buy paint and fertilizer. They want others
to go to work to they can stay home.

~~~
pacala
The disease does not affect age groups equally. From what I've seen, most
victims are in the 60+ age groups. From NYC fatality report [0]:

    
    
        0-9: 1 0%
        10-19: 6 0.1%
        20-29: 56 0.4%
        30-39: 227 1.6%
        40-49: 535 3.7%
        50-59: 1410 9.8%
        60-69: 2863 20.0%
        70-79: 3811 26.6%
        80-89: 1753 25.4%
        90+: 12.2%
    

Think of people having a "vitality score" that decreases with age, and of
disease as a stressor that kills people with the "vitality score" under a
certain threshold. That's how the yearly flu works, by culling people under
the threshold. We attribute the death to "the flu", but we could easily also
call it "death by old age".

Most working age people will be just fine. Except they are jobless. Terrible
times.

[0] [https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-
COVID19-Track...](https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-
COVID19-Tracker/NYSDOHCOVID-19Tracker-
Fatalities?%3Aembed=yes&%3Atoolbar=no&%3Atabs=n)

------
stanfordkid
As we do serological testing, it is being revealed that the death rate was
even lower than previously imagined -- potentially by a factor of 50x [1].

[1]
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01095-0](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01095-0)

Most places (outside of super dense metros) actually don't need quarantine at
all. Maybe for people working in eldercare.

With these new statistics the risk of death for those <65 is about the same as
the normal risk of random death through other circumstances over the course of
2 months.

~~~
elgenie
That preprint [1] is a great example of how far ahead of the skis you can get
with motivated reasoning, bad math, and no peer review.

They recruited people over Facebook at a time that California's COVID tests
were backlogged (with ads not presented in the paper, with links to signup
that could, anecdotally, be shared out); in that situation, avoiding selection
bias towards people that were sick with something previously and want to know
about potential immunity would be rather tough. (Per WTO protocol, they asked
about symptoms in their sample but _poof_ for some reason that data isn't in
the paper).

They got a 1.5% positive rate in their sample with 50 individuals testing
positive. They then immediately applied demographic weighing to move that raw
number to around 3%. Only then did they contemplate the false positive rate,
taking the data of the manufacturer and 30 samples as a _point estimate_ to
figure out a 95% CI of positives around that 3%.

That's a no-no for correctly propagating uncertainty. The statistically
legitimate way to do that would've been to generate the 95% confidence
interval for belief about the test's false positive rate and carry that
forward in the demographic reweighing. That basic math would've avoided the
frankly laughable result that a randomly selected person in Santa Clara county
could have a 5% chance of having had COVID-19 while in the same county people
seeing a doctor and getting tests through their doctor are only around 10%
positive for COVID-19 [2].

Another critique: [3]

[1]
[https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v...](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v1)
[2]
[https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#te...](https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#testing)
[3] [https://medium.com/@balajis/peer-review-of-
covid-19-antibody...](https://medium.com/@balajis/peer-review-of-
covid-19-antibody-seroprevalence-in-santa-clara-county-
california-1f6382258c25)

~~~
stanfordkid
Wow -- really enjoyed the write up by Balaji S. -- I had heard about these
flaws earlier, but didn't realize how great they really were.

I still maintain the gist of my point though -- we don't have sufficient
evidence for widespread quarantine. New York and Italy are outliers, and
should be understood as such. Even if the results are 5x or 10x instead of 50x
-- it still means decisions were made on grossly inflated worst case data.

~~~
52-6F-62
There is some data.

[https://toronto.citynews.ca/2020/04/20/new-modelling-
shows-p...](https://toronto.citynews.ca/2020/04/20/new-modelling-shows-peak-
in-community-spread-of-coronavirus-growth-in-long-term-care-homes/)

Ontario is largely a rural province.

> _New modelling predictions show that the wave of new, community spread cases
> of coronavirus in Ontario appears to have peaked, but the spread in long-
> term care homes and other group settings is still growing._

> _Earlier models predicted the peak would be hit in May, however according to
> data released by the province’s Ministry of Health, public health measures
> and social distancing have brought it forward._

In spite of this we are not yet moving to reopen, rather deciding not to cut
the parachute just because it started to slow our fall.

~~~
stanfordkid
Totally... no one is saying that we get off scot-free if we stop quarantine.
The quarantine can't last forever, and the virus at some point _will_
spread... so even if you are at-risk if you don't get it now you might get it
6 months from now -- unless of course, younger folks get out there and build
herd immunity.

------
Press2forEN
For those of you cheering this move, imagine it applied to the causes you care
about and decide if you still think its a good idea.

~~~
elicash
Never understood this argument. Let's take a cause I disagree with. I'm pro-
equality, but still think Christian Mingle shouldn't be forced to match up
same-sex couples. Because I disagree with their values, of course, I'd never
use their website. OF COURSE conservative Christians should be allowed to have
a website that aligns with their values. Not only don't I think this website
should be outlawed -- I also don't think it's a "bad idea" that shouldn't
exist. I simply disagree with the values, so I don't belong to it.

Moving back to the current situation...

I only want to belong to a social network that values science and public
health. Why shouldn't I be allowed to be a user of a website that has those
same values? You're going to tell me that the kind of website that I want to
belong to should be outlawed and not allowed to exist? Or, let's not even go
that far... that it's BAD that it exists?

Keep in mind, you can have any view you want. This is whether or not Facebook
wants to use their social network to help spread events that would endanger
the general public. A "keep things closed" event would be treated the same
way.

(I agree FB is too big and should be cut into multiple pieces. And they
shouldn't have been allowed to buy Instagram. But for very different reasons.
Mostly I worry about their impact, as well as Google's, on publisher ad
revenue.)

~~~
lone_haxx0r
> I only want to belong to a social network that values science and public
> health. Why shouldn't I be allowed to be a user of a website that has those
> same values?

I think it's a problem of expectations.

Some expect Facebook to just be a social network. Others, like you, expect it
to be a safe space where unapproved opinions aren't allowed. Neither kind is
bad per se, but I don't think most people expected Facebook to be of the
latter kind.

~~~
elicash
I'm rolling my eyes at your "safe space" ridiculousness and bizarre claim that
I think unapproved opinions shouldn't be allowed, but putting that aside....

We should both agree that the real problem is monopoly. That if Facebook (and
Google btw) weren't so powerful, people would be perfectly cool with the idea
that maybe different people can have different values from one another and
that maybe different companies could accommodate those different values.

------
kimsant
money is just a tool.

I'm a civil engineer. When we decide to buy, for example, protection side
fences for a road, we calculate how many people will pass the road, how many
will die with and without and how much cost the fence. If the price per life
is bigger than target, lets say, we spend 5M$ to save 1 life, we Don't put the
fence.

What you should do is to put a price to lifes, and then put a price to goods,
and then make simulation to see how much goods are produced and lifes are
taken in 2years range scenarios. Take in to account soft and harder measures,
risk of second waves, asymmetrical lockdown by regions and ages and genders,
inmunology ID, Testing, night work options to reduce contact... Anything!

Let the doctors do, let the engineers simulate, and let the best option
execute as planned

------
crankylinuxuser
I'd argue that the other HN story about Krebs doing investigative journalism
about who the players are behind the "reopen*.com" is a much more interesting
discussion.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22928292](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22928292)

This story is going to dig up the usual FB hatred, battles over "freedom of
speech" vs "corporate platform", and tired discussion topics that have been re
and rehashed again here.

------
hnburnsy
How does Facebook distinguish from those who are protesting because they want
to plant seeds, from those who want full reopening today?

------
anonymouswacker
Facebook will censor itself out of relevance as its usefulness for connection
and building relationships is replaced by insistence on creating a safe space
for pro-establishment propaganda.

It was already selectively flagging certain news articles as true or not,
countering certain misinformation while conveniently missing others. It's a
questionable practice to become the gatekeepers of fact when the fourth estate
itself is held to no such legal standard.

The centralized web needs to stop this subtle censorship. We can't rely on the
opinions of a few to censor the many in any fair or equitable way, look at
Twitter/Reddit/YouTube...

------
KorematsuFred
Personally this ventures into the same area of "baker refuses cake for gay
wedding". Facebook does not want to profit from what they see is a "bad
event". But do they have a right to refuse service on such bases ? (Of course
there are legal differences such as protected class vs unprotected class. But
either ways the moral principle is the same.)

I personally would side with Facebook on this one.

------
Gatsky
I guess Facebook has done some calculation about the potential fines/time
sitting in congressional hearings in the aftermath of this versus revenue.

I think it is strange to criticise this move as suppressing free speech. If
you value free speech you wouldn’t be using facebook, a for-profit venture
controlled by a few people with their own agenda.

------
jart
Fake news. Facebook communiqué actually reads "theories like physical
distancing is ineffective" is now considered "misinformation".
[https://about.fb.com/news/2020/04/covid-19-misinfo-
update/](https://about.fb.com/news/2020/04/covid-19-misinfo-update/) Facebook
goes too far. Communications company should not be forming its own opinions on
heartbreaking policies necessary during an emergency that academy is still
working to fully understand. If economy is asking people who didn't have 19b
cash on hand to make sacrifices then nouveau riche sysadmins should not be
denying them voice to express feelings online to friends and family too.

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guscost
Facebook is performing an editorial function on the information they
distribute by removing content that is not illegal. They're a publisher, it's
as clear as day. By stepping into this role they should forfeit any exemption
from liability[0] for the content that they publish. I'm sure that they pay a
bunch of lobbyists to distract lawmakers from this fact, but they won't be
able to escape it forever.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230_of_the_Communicati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230_of_the_Communications_Decency_Act)

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tehjoker
I think the anti-quarantine protests are motivated by the most idiotic non-
goals and were started by the Proud Boys before they were boosted by Fox News
and the administration which are desperate to reopen the economy at the cost
of any level of blood sacrifice on the altar of the DOW.

That said, allowing Zuckerberg to simply silence protest movements on a whim
is insane and will bite all of us incredibly hard in the future. He should not
have this kind of power.

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didibus
I'm curious what would currently be the statistic for the level of death I
cause as a consequence of choosing to socialize? Surely we should have some
idea by now?

I just think it be an interesting metric, if I decide to go get a hair cut,
did I also just decide for 2 person to die?

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mayim
Would not believe I'd ever say that but, kudos to you, Facebook.

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cambalache
Maybe I am too dumb or naive but for me, all these cases of
censorship/deplatforming etc come down to answering one simple question? Is
this post/tweet legal? Yes? Carry on.

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totetsu
It's like this pandemic is giving a biological counter argument to concepts of
ethics that assume a human being is an isolated unit.

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dimal
I disagree with all these reopen protests, but I wonder if suppressing them
will have the desired effect.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect)

This action will "prove" to some people that the tech industry has a liberal
bias. I don't know that there's a good counter action to these protests,
though.

~~~
rm_-rf_slash
The propaganda* play for the American right these days is to be absolutely
shameless, so any action to circumvent or suppress the protests will
inevitably be blown up as the last straw obliterating America-as-we-know-it
now and forevermore. In this light, the reaction to the reaction of the
protests should be disregarded as a matter of government and corporate policy,
because the organizers of the protests are acting in bad faith to simply
discredit democratically elected Democratic governorships.

*Propaganda is not meant to be used as a derogatory term in this context; it is a tool, like a gun that can shoot deer for food or humans for conquest.

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sjg007
Facebook should remove the groups promoting them too.

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throwaway122378
We _need_ an internet bill of rights. Something. Corporations with 100M, 200M,
1B, 2B+ reach need to be governed

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chasd00
Facebook censoring in favor of Trump. strange days

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boznz
good

~~~
dang
Please don't post unsubstantive comments here.

~~~
boznz
Do I seriously need to substantiate why anti-vax is bad?

~~~
dang
Please no.

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mrfusion
First they came for the lockdown protesters ...

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aaron695
This religion of 'lockdown' is righteousness is pretty indicative of normal
human behaviour now.

If you actually read the 'lockdown' scriptures it does state the 'lockdown'
will end, it also talks about how the devil of herd immunity will eventually
live amongst us.

The exact time of rapture of ending the 'lockdown' is not stated in the
scriptures but it's not totally unreasonable to think it's now.

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wiradikusuma
I'm overly simplifying, but I don't understand the fuss.

The incubation is ~14 days. So if _everyone_ can act together, stay at home
for 2-3 weeks, then it'll all be over and we can get on with our lives, right?

For those who don't want to follow (the deviants): force them to sign
agreement, "If COVID-19 happens to me, that's solely my problem." and let them
do whatever freedom they want, as long as they're not near non-deviants.

This is similar with smokers. In many countries, smoking is still allowed in
designated areas: closed room where all smokers smoke. You think smoking is
okay? Fine, do it with the rest of you, but don't inflict damage to non-
smokers.

Sorry for the rant, but I'm perplexed by the selfishness. You want it your
way? Go ahead, but don't risk others.

~~~
downerending
No, no group of ordinary humans can all act together at the same time, with
discipline. Occasionally this works in the military or something, but they're
heavily trained.

Plus, the problem with "deviants" as you put it, is that if they don't
"conform", they can infect a lot of other non-deviants.

The problem is a complex one, for sure.

