Also In The News

[UPinCarolina]

The number of Trump people I know who are clinging tighter today than they were yesterday to their literal and metaphorical guns is proof enough that what ails my country is something so insidious and pernicious that it cannot be dealt with through normal means. It’s the very root and core and stem that has to be dealt with. 

[Kopfkino]

I really think the US understanding of freedom is somewhat convoluted. Why does the right to bear arms still trump the right to live in a gunless society? 

 

Not that guns are the sole problem but changes to the law would go part of the way to solving it. 

[leicsmac]

From elsewhere:

 

"Stochastic terrorism is defined as the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifics cannot be predicted."

 

My own twopennies to add: this sounds exactly like what happened yesterday and the really good thing about stochastic terrorism is that's it's then deniable by those doing the inciting. After all, I didn't tell them to go out and kill people and I certainly didn't inspire an Internet network, did I? Prove it!

Edited 5 August 2019 by leicsmac

[Jattdogg]

6 hours ago, Kopfkino said:

I really think the US understanding of freedom is somewhat convoluted. Why does the right to bear arms still trump the right to live in a gunless society? 

 

Not that guns are the sole problem but changes to the law would go part of the way to solving it. 

The dumbest yet "most advanced" society ever. They are too thick to get it. It's sad for those advanced enough to understand normal folk should not carry guns. They have to live a majority of t w a t s.

Edited 5 August 2019 by Jattdogg

[spacemunky]

The US shootings now are barely a blip on the news. It's just how it is and how's it always going to be.

 

I used to race online with a group of guys from southern USA and still post on a forum with them. Most of them are from "Nascar" country. A lot of them are intelligent guys and not your stereotypical "rednecks". But...they all own guns and carry them wherever they go. I don't touch the topic, as there is no point in doing so.

Edited 5 August 2019 by spacemunky

[Jattdogg]

32 minutes ago, spacemunky said:

The US shootings now are barely a blip on the news. It's just how it is and how's it always going to be.

 

I used to race online with a group of guys from southern USA and still post on a forum with them. Most of them are from "Nascar" country. A lot of them are intelligent guys and not your stereotypical "rednecks". But...they all own guns and carry them wherever they go. I don't touch the topic, as there is no point in doing so.

My guns bigger than yours.

[spacemunky]

Just now, Jattdogg said:

My guns bigger than yours.

Yeah, but I drive a monster truck!

[Jattdogg]

2 minutes ago, spacemunky said:

Yeah, but I drive a monster truck!

All balls, no....

[urban.spaceman]

He doesn’t seem all that bothered Millie. 

[StanSP]

2 minutes ago, urban.spaceman said:

He doesn’t seem all that bothered Millie. 

Wears a gilet as well. Fashion problems too. 

[urban.spaceman]

2 minutes ago, StanSP said:

Wears a gilet as well. Fashion problems too. 

I’ve always been suspicious if Tim Sherwood. 

[Strokes]

3 hours ago, urban.spaceman said:

He doesn’t seem all that bothered Millie. 

Satanist/Atheist hmmmm

 

Black/white

 

Wet/Dry

 

[Carl the Llama]

Cloudflare have released 8chan as a customer and written an interesting blog about it.

Quote

Terminating Service for 8Chan

05 Aug 2019 by Matthew Prince.

 

The mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio are horrific tragedies. In the case of the El Paso shooting, the suspected terrorist gunman appears to have been inspired by the forum website known as 8chan. Based on evidence we've seen, it appears that he posted a screed to the site immediately before beginning his terrifying attack on the El Paso Walmart killing 20 people.

 

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident. Nearly the same thing happened on 8chan before the terror attack in Christchurch, New Zealand. The El Paso shooter specifically referenced the Christchurch incident and appears to have been inspired by the largely unmoderated discussions on 8chan which glorified the previous massacre. In a separate tragedy, the suspected killer in the Poway, California synagogue shooting also posted a hate-filled “open letter” on 8chan. 8chan has repeatedly proven itself to be a cesspool of hate.

 

8chan is among the more than 19 million Internet properties that use Cloudflare's service. We just sent notice that we are terminating 8chan as a customer effective at midnight tonight Pacific Time. The rationale is simple: they have proven themselves to be lawless and that lawlessness has caused multiple tragic deaths. Even if 8chan may not have violated the letter of the law in refusing to moderate their hate-filled community, they have created an environment that revels in violating its spirit.

 

We do not take this decision lightly. Cloudflare is a network provider. In pursuit of our goal of helping build a better internet, we’ve considered it important to provide our security services broadly to make sure as many users as possible are secure, and thereby making cyberattacks less attractive — regardless of the content of those websites.  Many of our customers run platforms of their own on top of our network. If our policies are more conservative than theirs it effectively undercuts their ability to run their services and set their own policies. We reluctantly tolerate content that we find reprehensible, but we draw the line at platforms that have demonstrated they directly inspire tragic events and are lawless by design. 8chan has crossed that line. It will therefore no longer be allowed to use our services.

 

What Will Happen Next

 

Unfortunately, we have seen this situation before and so we have a good sense of what will play out. Almost exactly two years ago we made the determination to kick another disgusting site off Cloudflare's network: the Daily Stormer. That caused a brief interruption in the site's operations but they quickly came back online using a Cloudflare competitor. That competitor at the time promoted as a feature the fact that they didn't respond to legal process. Today, the Daily Stormer is still available and still disgusting. They have bragged that they have more readers than ever. They are no longer Cloudflare's problem, but they remain the Internet's problem.

 

I have little doubt we'll see the same happen with 8chan. While removing 8chan from our network takes heat off of us, it does nothing to address why hateful sites fester online. It does nothing to address why mass shootings occur. It does nothing to address why portions of the population feel so disenchanted they turn to hate. In taking this action we've solved our own problem, but we haven't solved the Internet's.

 

In the two years since the Daily Stormer what we have done to try and solve the Internet’s deeper problem is engage with law enforcement and civil society organizations to try and find solutions. Among other things, that resulted in us cooperating around monitoring potential hate sites on our network and notifying law enforcement when there was content that contained an indication of potential violence. We will continue to work within the legal process to share information when we can to hopefully prevent horrific acts of violence. We believe this is our responsibility and, given Cloudflare's scale and reach, we are hopeful we will continue to make progress toward solving the deeper problem.

 

Rule of Law

 

We continue to feel incredibly uncomfortable about playing the role of content arbiter and do not plan to exercise it often. Some have wrongly speculated this is due to some conception of the United States' First Amendment. That is incorrect. First, we are a private company and not bound by the First Amendment. Second, the vast majority of our customers, and more than 50% of our revenue, comes from outside the United States where the First Amendment and similarly libertarian freedom of speech protections do not apply. The only relevance of the First Amendment in this case and others is that it allows us to choose who we do and do not do business with; it does not obligate us to do business with everyone.

 

Instead our concern has centered around another much more universal idea: the Rule of Law. The Rule of Law requires policies be transparent and consistent. While it has been articulated as a framework for how governments ensure their legitimacy, we have used it as a touchstone when we think about our own policies.

 

We have been successful because we have a very effective technological solution that provides security, performance, and reliability in an affordable and easy-to-use way. As a result of that, a huge portion of the Internet now sits behind our network. 10% of the top million, 17% of the top 100,000, and 19% of the top 10,000 Internet properties use us today. 10% of the Fortune 1,000 are paying Cloudflare customers.

 

Cloudflare is not a government. While we've been successful as a company, that does not give us the political legitimacy to make determinations on what content is good and bad. Nor should it. Questions around content are real societal issues that need politically legitimate solutions. We will continue to engage with lawmakers around the world as they set the boundaries of what is acceptable in their countries through due process of law. And we will comply with those boundaries when and where they are set.

 

Europe, for example, has taken a lead in this area. As we've seen governments there attempt to address hate and terror content online, there is recognition that different obligations should be placed on companies that organize and promote content — like Facebook and YouTube — rather than those that are mere conduits for that content. Conduits, like Cloudflare, are not visible to users and therefore cannot be transparent and consistent about their policies.

 

The unresolved question is how should the law deal with platforms that ignore or actively thwart the Rule of Law? That's closer to the situation we have seen with the Daily Stormer and 8chan. They are lawless platforms. In cases like these, where platforms have been designed to be lawless and unmoderated, and where the platforms have demonstrated their ability to cause real harm, the law may need additional remedies. We and other technology companies need to work with policy makers in order to help them understand the problem and define these remedies. And, in some cases, it may mean moving enforcement mechanisms further down the technical stack.

 

Our Obligation

 

Cloudflare's mission is to help build a better Internet. At some level firing 8chan as a customer is easy. They are uniquely lawless and that lawlessness has contributed to multiple horrific tragedies. Enough is enough.

 

What's hard is defining the policy that we can enforce transparently and consistently going forward. We, and other technology companies like us that enable the great parts of the Internet, have an obligation to help propose solutions to deal with the parts we're not proud of. That's our obligation and we're committed to it.

 

Unfortunately the action we take today won’t fix hate online. It will almost certainly not even remove 8chan from the Internet. But it is the right thing to do. Hate online is a real issue. Here are some organizations that have active work to help address it:

 

• Anti-Defamation League
• Gen Next Foundation
• Perspective API
• 7 Cups

 

Our whole Cloudflare team’s thoughts are with the families grieving in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio this evening.

 

[MC Prussian]

7 hours ago, urban.spaceman said:

He doesn’t seem all that bothered Millie. 

Coming from a devout Christian, no surprise.

The US most definitely have a violence problem still, that much is clear.

 

I like this assessment of the shooter, though:

Quote

The common denominator is not political ideology, it’s mental illness & moral nihilism.

You don't need to be Christian to be a moral person, religion to me is too often a disguise, an excuse for the lack of morality.

Also, the shooter apparently got advice from the "Socialist Rifle Association"... Seriously, I shouldn't laugh given the crime, but...

And he allegedly was left-leaning and flirted with Antifa:

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/dayton-shooter-reportedly-supported-gun-control-elizabeth-warren-and-socialism

[Trav Le Bleu]

4 hours ago, Strokes said:

Satanist/Atheist hmmmm

 

Black/white

 

Wet/Dry

 

 Correct. A Satanist believes in God (generally) in much the same way most religions believe in Satan. Which means they can't be an atheist.

 

Weighing into a complex problem with ignorance, there Millie.

[MC Prussian]

On 04/08/2019 at 16:38, lifted*fox said:

 

guns are only part of the problem... mmmhmm.

The numbers here only tell half of the truth, though.

Population comes into play. Other crimes cost more lives in other countries. Some crimes aren't reported, not even officially.

 

In half of these cases in the US, luckily nobody died. Three incidents had more than ten deaths and ten more than five. Among those mostly acts of crime connected to other forms of criminality, such as drug-related incidents.

 

62 incidents took place in only eight US cities - Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Houston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia. All of those feature at least three times, Chicago 22 times... And out of those incidents, almost all of them have to do with (organized) crime and the social issues of the lower classes in larger cities.

 

[Izzy]

2 minutes ago, MC Prussian said:

The numbers here only tell half of the truth, though.

Population comes into play. Other crimes cost more lives in other countries. Some crimes aren't reported, not even officially.

 

In half of these cases in the US, luckily nobody died. Three incidents had more than ten deaths and ten more than five. Among those mostly acts of crime connected to other forms of criminality, such as drug-related incidents.

 

62 incidents took place in only eight US cities - Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Houston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia. All of those feature at least three times, Chicago 22 times... And out of those incidents, almost all of them have to do with (organized) crime and the social issues of the lower classes in larger cities.

 

So.......everything's O.K. then? 

[MC Prussian]

1 minute ago, Izzy said:

So.......everything's O.K. then? 

Depends on your definition of "OK".

 

I think pretty much everyone can and should be appalled by these US numbers, I just don't like twisting facts based on political ideologies, trying to fabricate connections to the current US president or his political affiliation or one party alone. Or the omission of background information and nuance. Too much populism for my liking.

[spacemunky]

They were quite lucky in that Dayton Ohio incident. That is if it's possible to be lucky when 9 people were killed. I saw the video on liveleak and he was headed into a building were a whole lot of people escaped the initial shooting. The police happened to be near by and shot him dead just before he went in.

[Carl the Llama]

14 minutes ago, MC Prussian said:

Depends on your definition of "OK".

 

I think pretty much everyone can and should be appalled by these US numbers, I just don't like twisting facts based on political ideologies, trying to fabricate connections to the current US president or his political affiliation or one party alone. Or the omission of background information and nuance. Too much populism for my liking.

Who's claiming that all gun attacks are Trump's fault?  You're conflating two issues:

 

One is the (no longer) shockingly high levels of gun violence in the USA and the persistent refusal to do anything meaningful about it.

 

The other issue is that it's pretty clear that Trump's rhetoric had a direct influence on the El Paso shooter based on the jargon used in his manifesto.  

[lifted*fox]

24 minutes ago, MC Prussian said:

Depends on your definition of "OK".

 

I think pretty much everyone can and should be appalled by these US numbers, I just don't like twisting facts based on political ideologies, trying to fabricate connections to the current US president or his political affiliation or one party alone. Or the omission of background information and nuance. Too much populism for my liking.

 

Considering this kid's 'manifesto' was full of Trump-isms about the invasion of Hispanic people into the US and calling them vermin and infested, etc. You've got to be off your rocker tbh to not see the links between his rhetoric and these shootings. 

 

There's no twisting of facts for political agenda - the numbers are what they are. Just because another country has a higher crime rate of a different type - does that make it OK for America to have 250 reported mass shootings in 215 days? 

 

Trump literally stood in front of a crowd of people and said he couldn't personally see off the immigrants but people get away with it 'only in the pan-handle'. I'd dig out the video but there's no point, your defense of trump is borderline absurd. 

 

Mass shootings in the world get reported no matter what country they happen in. You follow any news outlet or keep up with world news on reddit and whether they're in India, China, Japan or USA they're all covered in detail. It's not about emitting detail and nuance - no other country has mass gun related shootings in the numbers that the USA does. 

 

The current president is a sexist, racist piece of shit. No matter how you want to frame it. It's not about previous administrations and what they did or didn't do. A progressive president should look to put in place changes to the second amendment to stop this from repeatedly happening. I don't give a **** if he's no better than Obama in this regard. Someone eventually has to come to power who is willing to be better than those who've gone before and start changing things. 

 

Stop making weird excuses for the orange cvnt. 

[shailen]

A lot of the gun violence is a mixture of some sort of supremacy- be it race, class, wealth but I think video games has a lot to do with it. Kids are growing up, playing games like grand theft auto, using vehicles to run people over and going on random killing sprees. The amount of time some kids spend on these games can create the disillusion that this is reality. I've heard people using gaming as a way of venting anger, but some people are taking it to the next level. 

 

Obviously, the run to bear arms, was always a stupid law and its virtually impossible to retract all the guns in issue, but I think the next best thing is to put a ban on some of these games either totally or enforce a better way to ensure it's not getting into the hands of kids who could be indoctrinated or brainwashed.

[Wymsey]

'Money isn't everything.'..

https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/uks-youngest-ever-lottery-winner-3174280

[Grebfromgrebland]

41 minutes ago, shailen said:

A lot of the gun violence is a mixture of some sort of supremacy- be it race, class, wealth but I think video games has a lot to do with it. Kids are growing up, playing games like grand theft auto, using vehicles to run people over and going on random killing sprees. The amount of time some kids spend on these games can create the disillusion that this is reality. I've heard people using gaming as a way of venting anger, but some people are taking it to the next level. 

 

Obviously, the run to bear arms, was always a stupid law and its virtually impossible to retract all the guns in issue, but I think the next best thing is to put a ban on some of these games either totally or enforce a better way to ensure it's not getting into the hands of kids who could be indoctrinated or brainwashed.

Computer gamess have nothing to do with it.

[Jaspa]

4 hours ago, Carl the Llama said:

Cloudflare have released 8chan as a customer and written an interesting blog about it.

 

Basically just censorship. There's far more goes on with that website, it's always just been a place for outsiders to start a message board about whatever and chat openly in their own safe space without a spotlight being on them or being held accountable, any topic is fair game and open to discussion. So the majority of boards & people on that site which weren't hurting anyone will be looking for a new place and with their general options currently being Discord, Reddit, 4chan, Facebook & Twitter - all of which these groups already struggle to agree with - I don't see how this helps the internet by completely taking this down. The loonies will just find another newer place which could make itself more culturally accessible and longstanding healthy cultures die for their sake.

 

The internet as we've known it will continue to be dismantled piece by piece, it's future is looking more and more like Demolition Man, Stallone & Snipes.