
Amazon Removed Anti-Vax Documentaries from Prime Video - tareqak
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/amazon-removes-anti-vaccine-videos
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pbreit
Unpopular opinion: I don’t like this. Would much prefer that ideas compete. Id
sort of give Amazon a pass since, unlike twitter, Reddit, Facebook & YouTube,
it doesn’t make many promises regarding the free exchange of ideas. But still.

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asteli
To me, this action says "We have chosen not to publish material, that is based
on indisputably false premises, that may harm viewers and the public at
large."

That sounds like an acceptable line to me.

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chrismcb
But is that true? Did they remove all videos based on false premises? And how
did they decide the premise was false?

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throwawaymath
They need not decide the premise is false; they can rely on scientific
consensus. It's not a perfect heuristic but it's the most useful one we have.
If they're transparent about the sources they use and they're impartial and
consistent in their application (read: no videos given special treatment),
they're not arbitrating. They're (actively) reporting.

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pbreit
Arguable that sugar is more harmful than a video.

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throwawaymath
It sure is! Tell you what, I'm all on board for a massive awareness campaign
by Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Netflix on the dangers of sugar intake
as well.

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lugg
That's like the tobacco industry advertising the dangers of skin cancer.

Sure, good, I guess, but I'm left very confused.

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lugg
It would be better to leave them up but force a disclaimer to scroll along the
bottom the entire doco proclaiming factless and fictional in nature.

I don't think hiding from these issues is the appropriate response.

Nor is pouring gasoline on the fire fueling these conspiracy theories.

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pbreit
Isn’t there an in-between of doing nothing? Asking Amazon to publish an
opinion is a pretty big ask. At least deleting the item doesn’t necessarily
imply a position.

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throwawaymath
_> Asking Amazon to publish an opinion is a pretty big ask._

It's not an opinion.

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throwawaymath
Fantastic. I would be thrilled to see other tech companies declare a holy war
against this kind of misinformation. In fact, it would make me ecstatic if
they started doing the same with other topics that have overwhelming
scientific consensus, like climate change.

I frankly don't care if it's censorship. It's a hill I'll happily die on.

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ThrowawayR2
Phlogiston, luminiferous aether, and Newtonian mechanics also once had
"overwhelming scientific consensus".

" _The ends do not justify the means._ " Even for something as important as
addressing climate change.

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throwawaymath
Are you implying classical mechanics is comparable to the anti-vaccination
movement? Are you aware we've successfully landed people on the Moon using
calculations derived by classical mechanics? That example has harmed your
argument, not supported it. Just because we have quantum mechanics doesn't
mean we can't make true statements about the world using Newtonian mechanics.

As for phlogiston and luminiferous aether - yes, science is not omniscient.
But those hypotheses are attributable to insufficiently precise instruments
and knowledge.

More importantly, they were _positive_ statements about the world. You're
comparing them to the demand for evidence that vaccinations are harmful, to
which the best rebuttal is a counter-demand to prove a negative (that they're
_not_ harmful).

What else you got?

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ThrowawayR2
> _Just because we have quantum mechanics doesn 't mean we can't make true
> statements about the world using Newtonian mechanics._

True statements? A scientist would acknowledge them as adequate
approximations, not true statements.

And by the way, let's see you build GPS (relativity) or computers (QM by way
of semiconductor physics) using Newtonian mechanics.

> _More importantly, they were positive statements about the world. You 're
> comparing them to the demand for evidence that vaccinations are harmful, to
> which the best rebuttal is a counter-demand to prove a negative (that
> they're not harmful)._

That's precisely the point. Science doesn't need self-appointed police
squashing silly ideas like anti-vax precisely because science makes "positive
statements about the world." Repeatable results speak for themselves.

[EDIT] To clarify further, allowing squashing of ideas because they don't
agree with current scientific consensus will just make Planck's lament all the
worse. (" _A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents
and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually
die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it._ ")

> _What else you got?_

After that last line, a slightly lower opinion of your ability to debate in a
civil fashion.

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throwawaymath
Your first sentence nitpicks the word "truth" and ignores the spirit of the
point. Your second ignores my point about the validity of Newtonian mechanics
and, in the process, detracts from _your own_ point about approximations
instead of absolutes. It's also wrong for what it's worth - again, NASA used
computers to get us on the Moon. Computers need not be digital.

I don't really care what your opinion is of my ability to debate in a civil
fashion. That you are incorrect is not an opportunity for me to persuade _you_
; your arguments are simply a vehicle for convincing the onlookers reading the
back-and-forth. And to be blunt, when you're resorting to nitpicking words,
ignoring points and comparing Newtonian mechanics to anti-vaccination, I also
don't really care about abandoning civility.

And if I'm being honest I _do_ get a certain satisfaction from challenging
your examples in such a cavalier fashion, because they're frankly silly and
incomparable. Considering the stakes (compromising herd immunity, implicitly
defending harmful ignorance) I am all-in on censorship and abandoning decorum.

But you're free not to debate with me if you consider me gauche or impolite,
just as Amazon is free to censor all the videos on its own platform.

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tedajax
Good

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goostavos
Silencing ideas is not the way to correct them...

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lern_too_spel
How well has letting people air these ideas worked? Compare the number of
Nazis in Germany (and hate crimes committed by same) vs. Lost Causers in the
American South and their hate crimes.

It's one thing to hold a belief in a certain threshold for freedom of speech.
It's another thing to state without evidence that it has better outcomes.

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freedomben
There's a really nice place you may consider as an option that tightly
controls information. No need to worry about encountering bad ideas in the
People's Republic of Korea. There's also China. They have a much safer
internet there. Not as safe as DPRK's internet, but still pretty good.

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lern_too_spel
And yet Germany is nothing like DPRK or PRC. Maybe there exist freedom of
speech thresholds in between the extremes of Somalia (where you are free to
shout "fire!" in crowded theaters) and DPRK?

It amazes me how many Americans religiously believe that their thresholds are
the only ones that work and that the only other option is some ridiculous
extreme. You can see the same religiosity in weapons freedoms. Somalians have
more. North Koreans have less. Yet there are many working thresholds in
between, most of which empirically perform better than the US's.

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Graham67
[https://youtu.be/RJh3TiCFJH4?t=30](https://youtu.be/RJh3TiCFJH4?t=30)

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rdtsc
I wonder if they inadvertently strengthened the conspiracy theory by doing it.
Sometimes censorship has that perverse effect. I easily see someone hearing
from their "friend" about how Amazon has removed the video because they know
it's true, and how it just validates all the bullshit claims presented there.

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throwawaymath
It's a balance. Banning books has been known to make them more widely
consumed, but reading is intrinsically less viral (and more informationally
dense, typically) than watching a video.

I think it's easier to attain a critical mass of followers if these kinds of
_videos_ go unchallenged.

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hugh4life
Amazon is starting to ban some far right books. Sexual Utopia in Power is
currently banned(it's on libgen) likely as a compete blacklist on it's
publisher. The author had published a book on Kojeve for an academic publisher
and the book has received positive feedback from many conservatives who have
nothing to do with the far right. I see no reason whatsoever for it to be
banned. It may be coming back because it's page is up and not completely
deleted like many other books though it's still not up for sale.

[https://www.amazon.com/Sexual-Utopia-Power-Feminist-
Civiliza...](https://www.amazon.com/Sexual-Utopia-Power-Feminist-Civilization-
ebook/product-
reviews/B00ZTENZZ4/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_show_all_btm?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews)

