Why Is Our First Reaction To Mass Shootings To Talk About Censorship?

Why Is Our First Reaction To Mass Shootings To Talk About Censorship?

4 years ago
Anonymous $ZuTig1gZkQ

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20190804/20554042718/why-is-our-first-reaction-to-mass-shootings-to-talk-about-censorship.shtml

There were more mass shootings this weekend in the US. The Onion has been busy running more copies of its infamous

But it's not just Republicans with an aversion to having any sort of actual discussion about gun control who jump to censorship. Given that some of the most recent shootings have involved angry, ignorant, idiotic rants posted on 8chan (stop calling them manifestos, guys), there's been a vocal discussion this past weekend on whether or not 8chan should be censored or shut down. 8chan, as you may recall, was founded as something of an alternative to 4chan, after some people (somewhat ridiculously) felt that that site was moderated too much. It was founded with the same hubris as the ignorant people who insist that there should never be any content moderation on any site, without realizing what that means in reality. And now, with even the site's own founder saying that it should be shut down (people might want to go back and look at what he was saying during the GamerGate era...), Cloudflare has now been pressured into cutting off its services for 8chan as well.