
F-Droids statement on their ban of Gab - s9w
https://f-droid.org/en/2019/07/16/statement.html
======
rvz
> F-Droid is taking a political stance here.

Very bad decision here.

> "F-Droid won’t tolerate oppression or harassment against marginalized
> groups. Because of this, it won’t package nor distribute apps that promote
> any of these things."

You might as well not package FLOSS (Free Libre Open Source Software)
Facebook/Twitter/Mastodon clients because there are also bad actors on those
platforms who harass others based on their religion, race, gender and other
differences.

What is the point of totally banning them when they are just going to keep
forking open-source projects. Doing this sort of censorship defeats the
purpose of FLOSS and violates the first freedom on how a user should use their
software as they wish for any purpose.

As a result, Gab is just going to exercise freedom 4.

~~~
a254613e
There is a difference between facebook/twitter that disallow those things,
will remove them and app that when presented with those behaviours says that
they are welcome. You know that.

Unfortunately nobody taking a stance will lead to that horrible behaviour
increasing.

The argument "Because X and Y have similar technical implementations in what
users can do" is irrelevant here, it's about the intent/goals/policies/how
widespread it is.

I welcome anything that reduces hate speech that is officially accepted on
some platforms. That is a real problem and one that needs to be dealt with in
any way possible.

~~~
Mirioron
So you'd welcome restrictions on freedom of expression (a human right)?

------
phoe-krk
A lot of Gabfolk seem to want the freedom of speech while directly denying
others' freedom to not listen to what they say. That's... a literal lack of
consequence in their train of thought, to put it lightly.

Gab is free to speak everything they speak: yayyyyy that is the right way we
are indestructible

F-Droid is free to remove their app: what the fuck do these <a paragraph of
notmentionworthy stuff here> this is unlawful and illegal and mandates prison

And when it comes to "not all Gab people are like that": these Gab users don't
seem to perform much action against the harassers that exist on that platform
- contrary to many other places on the Internet, whose communities actually do
something about the hate speech problem.

~~~
SuperNinKenDo
There's nothing about allowing Gab apps on F-Droid that denies anybody "the
right not to hear something". Just don't install the app, and you won't see
what people post on Gab.

~~~
phoe-krk
The removal of Gab app from F-Droid is precisely exercising of the freedom of
the right not to hear something.

Gab is just like any other Fediverse client - with an important difference. To
show it, let's use an example: for instance, Firefox doesn't brand itself with
the logo of a company that abuses free speech to promote and benefit off hate
speech. This is exactly what Gab does and - at least for me - which is the
elephant in the room that hardly anyone talks about. Free speech, free speech,
but why is Gab so proud of performing and/or tolerating gestures that actively
harm other people?

Gab, as a company, focuses on monetizing hate speech that it propagates via
free speech. That's what I called the abuse of free speech previously in the
discussion.

Since Gab is a corporate instance and access is offered for free, then I am
the product, even if I'm just a number in their user count; it means that if I
join Gab, I help Gab in its goals, also in the one that I stated above. I do
not want to do this, and I consider other people who stay there complicit or
supportive of that behaviour. If they were not okay with what Gab does, they
would not stay there.

~~~
RickSanchez2600
Gab allows Free Speech and does not have a code of conduct or ban or censor
anyone. They claim this is freedom and the code of conduct is fascism.

Anyone who writes a racist comment usually gets called out on it and called an
idiot and mocked anyway on Gab.

You cannot have both free speech and a code of conduct at the same time. You
either allow everything or censor and ban things to a degree.

Most of these racist comments are made by teenagers who think the N-word is
funny and trolling people. So they post it over and over again.

~~~
phoe-krk
Gab, via their free speech and unwillingness to take down content in general,
promotes content that is racist, misogynyst, antifeminist, islamophobic,
xenophobic, homophobic, transphobic, classist, ableist, authoritariant,
supremacist, and pretty much anti-intellectual. This is why I oppose that
platform.

Of course you can have free speech as a person _and_ a code of conduct for
your service. You are free to say anything, and your platform has a right to
not want to hear or spread anything.

~~~
smsm42
> promotes content that is racist

There's worlds of difference between hosting content and promoting content.
The first is act of broad tolerance, the second is act of encouragement and
agreement. This distinction is so important that the very first Amendment of
US Constitution is based on it - the US government is obliged to tolerate any
religion, but is explicitly forbidden to promote any.

> and your platform has a right to not want to hear or spread anything.

Once platform takes control over the right to hear, it ceases to be a neutral
platform and becomes an editorial force. With private companies, it's usually
not a problem - even if an unpopular opinion is suppressed and censored on one
platform, it can be published on another. With growing monopolization of
social networking, and with low-level infrastructure providers being slowly
roped into facilitating censorship, this is becoming less and less true. And
then we have to remind ourselves - why exactly do we have that First
Amendment? If censorship is so good, why not let the government do it - after
all, they are the ones that can do it best! Obviously, there are some bad
downsides to it. We should remind ourselves from time to time what are those.

------
Smithalicious
The message here seems clear: F-Droid is not a free platform. The software on
it might be free software, but it is curated by F-Droid. If you wish to
exercise your free speech, you should use another platform, since F-Droid can
and will censor it.

I for one am deciding now never to use F-Droid for anything important enough
that it risks being censored. I do not use Gab myself, but I think such
platforms are very important to a free society.

It is ridiculous to try to censor a free speech-centered platform because
people say disagreeable things on there; that is the point! We can not have
"free speech, but only if I agree with you".

~~~
majewsky
Exactly. Most people don't agree with the principle of "free speech without
any asterisks". Die-hard free speech advocates are a fringe group (which is
why they need to use a fringe service like Gab).

(Side-note: Of course, you can probably come up with a poll where a majority
of people respond that they support free speech, but you know how easy it is
to skew polls. Asking for "Yes" or "No" does not make people consider the
ramifications of their answer.)

~~~
repolfx
That's a self-contradiction.

You say most people don't agree with free speech, then you state if you ask
people if they agree with it actually most will say yes, but that's
meaningless because their opinion would be ill considered.

I think all this shows is you don't care what other people think. Either they
agree with you in which case they're right, or they disagree in which case it
doesn't matter because they aren't smart enough to have an opinion, indeed,
it's not even worth asking them because you can get any answer you want. That
is the hallmark of totalitarian thinking throughout time.

~~~
majewsky
I've been called a lot of things, but totalitarian? That's a new one.

My point is that free-speech advocates use opinion polls as an argument,
saying that a majority supports free speech. But this argument is misguided
because when you actually talk to people and make them consider the
ramifications of radically free speech (e.g. "Do you support the right of
other people to call for you being murdered?"), their opinions usually become
much more nuanced.

~~~
repolfx
Yes, asking more precise questions will give more nuanced answers. But that
doesn't invalidate the vaguer statement - most people _do_ support speech
being much more free than restricted, especially in America. That matters: you
can't say "ah ha, but sometimes when given extreme examples people have doubt,
so banning speech is totally OK". That's not what they said when they were
asked.

And by the way, I'm sure I can easily take that person prevaricating because
they were given the "calling for you to be murdered" example and bring them
back to supporting "radically" free speech. Just ask if they've ever said
something like, "Damnit, I'm going to kill that guy!" when they got frustrated
or upset. And if the answer is yes, point out that if they're against "other
people calling for someone to be murdered" then they'd themselves be in
prison. They'd object by saying something like, yes but of course I didn't
really _mean_ it, that isn't the same thing at all, and then you ask how
anyone could tell and how sure they are they could defend themselves in court,
if an enemy was claiming it should be taken seriously.

In the end the reason for "radical" protections for free speech are logical -
the consequences of not having it are worse than the consequences for having
it. Genuine mob-raising "let's murder this guy" speech is so incredibly rare
compared to political suppression it's not worth worrying about.

------
mhd
I'm quite surprised by the rhetoric surrounding this, coming from a few
posters. Much less Stallman-esque (or even ESR-ish) and closer to Gamergaters,
/pols and other alt-right-adjacent folks.

~~~
panpanna
Because this sort of stuff _really_ triggers certain people.

~~~
mhd
Not surprised that certain people are outraged about this, more that there's a
significant part of those people in the "free software" community. I thought
that ESR is pretty much the end of the spectrum there and that the younger
AnCaps don't care that much about GNU.

~~~
ScottFree
Most of the FSF are free speech advocates and always have been. Those who are
defending gab now are merely showing that they have the integrity to stand by
what they believe even though they find gab itself reprehensible.

------
beshrkayali
Banning Gab will only make it more "exciting" and increase its exclusive
allure to those who seek something like this. I'm not sure I buy their
reasoning (or Mastodon's for that matter). I think all of this is either just
a way to avoid controversy (which is silly, but people would be more receptive
to it, if they just came out and said that, without the virtue signaling); or
it's just that they feel like they cannot argue against those faulty/evil
ideologies (which is concerning). I feel like I'm stating the obvious here but
racisim and racisit propaganda won't just go away if you ban it, quite the
opposite, it'll fester and gain new grounds and people. Banning (especially
from supposedly free software groups) is indirectly doing a service to their
propaganda.

~~~
phoe-krk
Yes, some people are unable to deal with the faulty/evil ideologies, simply
because they run out of spoons. This is exactly why bans like this come into
place.

Nobody is forced to deal with the kind of people who post and stay on Gab. The
action that you see here is the direct effect of many, many people exercising
_their_ freedom of speech to say that they do not want to deal with the people
who follow the brand of this software.

Gab has the right to speak freely; it does not have the right to a free
audience and/or megaphone. The decision you see here is a direct consequence
of them refusing to address the problem of hate speech festering on their
platform.

~~~
beshrkayali
Gab users already have the audience/megaphone, aka "the means" to practice
their free speech. I'm not saying that fdroid is not allowed to remove gab if
they want to, but it's still going to indirectly benefit gab. Same as Alex
Jones fiasco. Bans don't work. And if we've all collectively ran out of spoons
like you say to argue against their weak propaganda, then we have a more
severe problem on our hands than having gab on this store or that one. Just
out of curiosity, have you seen what's on Gab? Faulty ideologies need to be
discussed in the open.

------
s9w
Gabs response:
[https://twitter.com/getongab/status/1151559127681916928](https://twitter.com/getongab/status/1151559127681916928)

~~~
majkinetor
> Fork you !

Thats hilarious :)

------
isakkeyten
But they already have 4chan viewers and that's fine? lol

~~~
zaarn
4chan isn't as bad as Gab and gets grandfather treatment in a lot of places.

------
lwhalen
I look forward to F-Droid banning Firefox as well as any and all web-browsers
that don't implement a blocklist that perfectly matches their ideology.

~~~
kuschku
F-Droid never bans apps like that – F-Droid also allows Fedilab and the
FreeTusky clients which let you connect to gab.

But just like F-Droid would never allow a Stormfront app, it won’t allow a Gab
app.

------
eighthave
Any claims that F-Droid will ban, censor, etc. are wrong and based on
misunderstandings. F-Droid will never block the ability to subscribe to any
repo that the user wants to, or to install any app from all the included
repos. So the user will always be able to get secure access to any software
they want to use via any network or even thumb drives:
[https://f-droid.org/2019/06/20/two-new-ways-to-get-apps-
near...](https://f-droid.org/2019/06/20/two-new-ways-to-get-apps-nearby-
without-internet.html)

The main f-droid.org repo is a contributor-curated collection of apps, just
like every other F-Droid repo, so it will never include every single app. This
is not censorship, this is curation.

------
jasonvorhe
Their work, their infrastructure, their call.

And a good one as well.

Don't provide nazis with anything.

~~~
inawarminister
Would you support the same thing done by, say, Christian bakers not providing
a customer for religious-ideological reason?

~~~
lvturner
I'll bite - but first some caveats.

I didn't follow the case and I'm only tangentially aware of it, I don't know
who said what to whom and to how any of it is handled. I can't say with 100%
certainty knowing the full explanation of the case that I would side with
either the Christian bakers or the customer.

However though, it should be within a business owners right to deny someone
access to a paid service or good on essentially any grounds.

~~~
kthejoker2
Even if that business receives public benefits (directly or otherwise)?

Homosexuals pay taxes for streets and cops and electricity, under threat of
violence.

Using those taxpayer services to then deny some taxpayers the same service you
provide others is the functioeconomical equivalent of slavery.

~~~
beatgammit
Only if it's directly receiving government funds or dealing on behalf of the
government should there be any restriction on whom they serve. Most businesses
don't directly receive government funds.

For example, it should be illegal for a charter school to refuse to accept a
gay student because they receive funding directly from the government. Same
with a vehicle emissions test business that provides registrations. Or a
hospital that has an emergency room.

Every business gets some amount of benefit from government services, but that
isn't the same as it being funded by or operating in behalf of government.

------
jokowueu
I don't know what to say I'm quite shocked that this happened .

------
Semaphor
Can we get the title changed mods? Nothing seems to indicate F-Droid banned
Gab. At least not in the linked article.

~~~
SuperNinKenDo
>Because of this, it won’t package nor distribute apps that promote any of
these things. This includes that it won’t distribute an app that promotes the
usage of previously mentioned website, by either its branding, its pre-filled
instance domain or any other direct promotion.

Pretty clearly a ban, whatever you think of it.

~~~
Semaphor
You are right, I missed that part. Seems it was a proactive ban for a not yet
existing app?

~~~
BubuIIC
The app exists and is going to be banned from google play in the next few
days.

It wasn't yet submitted to F-Droid when this piece was published.

------
gdhbcc
What's a free f-droid alternative?

~~~
beatgammit
I'm hoping the librem 5 goes well. I'm tired of Google and Fdroid, I just want
to be able to pull up a shell and install whatever I want.

