For years, free speech advocates (including myself) have criticized the new rationalization for censorship in the cause of combating disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation. As discussed in my new book, The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage, there is a burgeoning cottage industry in academia in helping corporations and government agencies to target certain political, social, and scientific viewpoints. One of those centers is located at the Harvard University’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy. Now, however, the faculty are accusing each other of misinformation over the departure of “misinformation and disinformation” expert Joan Donovan.
According to an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Donovan is in a spat with her former colleagues over the events and accusations leading up to her departure. She has released a 248-page document from December 2022 in which she alleged that Meta (formerly Facebook) was behind a campaign targeting her and her team, the Technology and Social Change Project. She alleged that her position was eliminated at the behest of Elliot Schrage, a former Facebook executive and Harvard alumnus, as well as other Meta executives.
Donovan cites a Zoom call in October 2021 in which she alleges that Schrage dominated the discussion and accused her of inaccurately reading documents related to Facebook. However, a recording of the meeting shows that Schrage spoke for only three minutes and that the Facebook files were never discussed.
Facebook was long accused of a massive censorship program but, unlike Twitter, never voluntarily released its files for public scrutiny.
Now various Harvard staff and former staff are accusing Donovan of spreading misinformation or disinformation. They insist that Meta never exerted pressure on the group and accuse Donovan of lying in making such claims as Harvard owning the copyright to her book “Meme Wars.”
They also say that it is untrue that the university stole her plans to publish confidential Facebook documents. Latanya Sweeney, a professor who worked on the project, called Donovan’s version of events “gross mischaracterizations and misstatements.” Sweeny maintains that the vast majority of the work on the project was done by Sweeney and her team.
Fortunately, none of these adversaries will be banned or throttled on social media for alleged disinformation or misinformation. Free speech protects such disagreements and allows the truth to be established by open debate and discourse.
Big Tech Companies announced Job opportunities for everyone! Work from the comfort of your home, on your computer And you can work with your own working hours. ssa You can work this job part-time or As a full-time job. For more info check here……….
https://aiboot2up22.blogspot.com/
Here ya go, despicable POS, take your pick about what Biden can do
LMAO would i love to watch you curl up into a ball on Nov 6.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/
https://www.270towin.com/2024-presidential-election-polls/
Here is another one for you to chew on, when you are done eating the peanuts out of Trumps shit.
https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/president/general/2024/trump-vs-biden
. . . her and her team, the Technology and Social Change Project.
I say, who cares? Let the whole project die. Whenever academic lefties use the term “social change” I roll my eyes. The phrase is one of those bogus commie constructions, the giveaway being the word “social” – as also in “social justice” for example.
Whenever you hear the phrase “social change” just realize it is essentially socialism masquerading as something more benign. It has proven a failure everywhere it has been tried. Academics should realize that and embrace free markets, trade, energy development, property rights, and the rule of law – all of which have been responsible for lifting billions out of extreme poverty in the last 200 or so years. Socialism has done nothing but plunge otherwise wealthy countries, like Russia with its vast natural resources, into poverty.
“Whenever academic lefties use the term ‘social change’ I roll my eyes.”
– OMFK
__________
Did you say “academic lefties” and “social change?” Voila!
Now you grasp the inflection point of the introduction of communism into America, which was Lincoln.
Lincoln’s “dictatorship of the proletariat,” his “Reign of Terror,” was justified by communism.
Now you see what Karl Marx saw: The essential communist truth of Lincoln.
__________________________________________________________________________________
“They consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the RECONSTRUCTION OF A SOCIAL WORLD.” [B]
– Letter From Karl Marx to Abraham Lincoln, 1865
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/iwma/documents/1864/lincoln-letter.htm
________________________________________________________________________________________
Lincoln threw the baby out with the bathwater; he threw the Constitution out with reprehensible slavery.
Reprehensible slavery, which was waning, must have been legislatively abrogated, and the sole rational resolution of slavery, Lincoln’s previous plan of compassionate repatriation for the benefit of the long-suffering freed slaves, must have been funded and implemented—America owed them that.
Complete constitutional American freedom persisted for a mere 71 years and will never exist or otherwise be known again.
It does not matter what the goal is.
None of us are free to attempt to change others by FORCE.
Nor are we free to use FORCE to disrupt a working if less than perfect system for the unproven (and never delivered) promise of something better
There is a reason that Change is the domain of the free market – not government.
Most change FAILS.
In the free market failure is an order of magnitude more common than success.
But failure clears quickly and often produces learning that brings us closer to success.
None of that is true of change driven by govenrment. The failure rate is absurdly high.
Failure is never cleared quickly and often never cleared at all.
And there is little or no learning.
evry record has been destroyed or falsified every book rewritten every picture has been repainted every statue and street building has been renamed every date has been altered walter 1984 now 2024
prole said: “evry record has been destroyed or falsified every book rewritten every picture has been repainted every statue and street building has been renamed every date has been altered walter 1984 now 2024”
Unfortunately that is only a slight exaggeration…
Communist professors arguing with other communist professors about who should be the “Censor in Chief” at Harvard. Joe Stalin would be so proud of his new Harvard alumni Jonathan.
The most important piece of misinformation in my lifetime has got to be the notion that there is such a thing as a “misinformation expert”.
“Harvard University’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy. Now, however, the faculty are accusing each other of misinformation . . .” (JT)
That debacle is a great illustration of how the mis/disinformation scam is a power play among loathsome personalities, for the prize of who gets to control speech.
Just t he mere fact that a university of higher learning would need a “disinformation” department speaks volumes about the failed mission of this institution…case closed.
whimsicalmama said: “Just t he mere fact that a university of higher learning would need a “disinformation” department speaks volumes about the failed mission of this institution…case closed.”
“University of bottom-scraping indoctrination” (UBSI) is more like it…
So, three minutes is dominating a conversation and the FB files were never actually discussed?
The irony a misinformation expert, spreading misinformation?
Has everyone noticed that almost to a person, those using the words “Disinformation” and “ misinformation” are the very ones dispersing absolute BS almost everytime they type or open their mouths??????
Your right trump never disseminates misinformation. I mean just the other day he said he never said lock her up in reference to Hillary Clinton. A fact easily proven wrong by numerous tapes of trump actually saying lock her up. Oh wait, Did I just show that trump lies and spreads misinformation?
Regardless, the piano-legged Hildebeast should be locked up for the rest of her despicable existence.
Trump has taken up residence in your head. Are you charging rent?
Mp he said he did NOT lock Clinton up and never intended to. That is quite different.
didn’t you get the memo…we aren’t supposed to notice that; those taking note will be the first into the boxcars heading to this re-education camps that Elise Stefanik’s democrat challenger said will be necessary should there be a “blue wave” come November.
Time to END all Federal Aid and loan backing for colleges, cities, states and non-profits
Defund Democrats TAKE away centralized POWER!
Just remember that the team behind Biden are the people that said the flu was started by a bat, the border was secure, the vaccine will prevent you from getting and/or passing covid, inflation will be transitory, inflation is good, inflation was at 9% in Jan. 2021, crime is going down, Republicans will jail their opponents, that Trump said if he loses there will be a blood bath, that Trump said good people on both sides, that the laptop is Russian, that Trump colluded with Russia, that Biden is sharp as a tack in closed meetings, that every cabinet member says they can’t keep up with Biden, that Biden knew nothing about Hunter’s “business”, that there is not one scintilla of evidence of Biden making money off of China, Russia, Ukraine, that climate change is the only existential threat to us, etc etc etc.
Now here is the part that really kills me, the same people that gave us the above lies tried to set up a DISINFORMATION Agency with a far left partisan that herself has been shown to be pushing false narratives. the same people that pushed all of the above lies want to be in charge of information because they claim others push information.
This is what happens when you have a weak leader being advised by young partisan activists who have been indoctrinated in our universities being supported by their like-minded leftists in the media. Half the country won’t see Biden being led around like a 7 year old in France, learn about Biden’s 3rd highest plant at the DOJ leaving to go work in a NYC DA’s office, that all of the above were lies and that the economy isn’t actually great for people.
The premise of Richard Russo’s novel “Straight Man” is that, in the English department, everybody competes for the role of straight man. The straight man, in a comedy routine, used to be the guy who got the pie in the face. He was the one who teed up the joke, through his stupidity and lack of self-awareness, for the comedian to put it in the hole. I would say that the premise of Russo’s novel now applies to all of academia as well as a large swath of American society.
Power and falsehood are inextricably linked. Power is obtained partly through falsehood, and, once obtained, is protected by falsehood. The greatest of the protective falsehoods is that the people holding power 1) know the difference between truth and falsehood, and 2) desire to eliminate falsehood.
Statement followed by a Question-With all the protests, lies and indiocy coming out of Harvard and its administration and faculty, does anyone really care anymore about what happens at Harvard now or in the future.
It would appear that Harvard was once the flagship of American higher education, but the newest crew running the flagship and it’s Officer in Charge have slipped all the safeguards, dropped the bow to the steepest angle down and are now racing past crush depth towards implosion and oblivion.
In the immortal words of the Titanic’s Captain, “Don’t worry, just a slight bump. I doubt it even scratched the paint. Bring me another glass of champagne.”
I now quote William F. Buckley: “I would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the telephone directory than by the Harvard University faculty.” This was a quote from decades ago.
GEB, I’m pretty sure the faculty of Harvard has always been completely, freaking nuts. Now that they’re trying to throw people in prison has made it a salient issue. The eggheads should have stuck to nattering in classrooms where they belong.
GEB said: “does anyone really care anymore about what happens at Harvard now or in the future.”
Only to the extent that the buzzards directly or indirectly suck up my tax dollars. Otherwise, they may all go take a very long walk off a very short pier, with my blessing and my thanks.
Hilarious! Harvard should be focusing on diseducation and miseducation.
Troll.^^^^DNR
Hilarious, that those who intentionally censor and push misinformation are caught-up in their own “realities” and lies. And very, very alarming that they participate in fraudulent endeavors. Harvard continues to destroy their own reputation.
Of all the Marxist movements in the United States, the one to silence free speech is the most dangerous and chilling, an existential threat to our Constitutional Republic. The free exchange of ideas is only a threat to totalitarians seeking control of false narratives in an attempt to control others. Those who seek such control are typically the most prolific purveyors of misinformation and disinformation, often claiming things as “debunked” that eventually turn out to be true. We’ve seen this clearly and repeatedly over the past couple decades with America’s Left, as they self-anointed as “fact-checkers”, their fact-check proclamations crumbled under the weight of time and then their incompetence, that in many cases destroyed lives and reputations, was merely shrugged off without retraction or apology. The biggest problem with this movement is the fallibility of man and the inability of any one man or organization to determine truth. When challenged on their inconsistencies and lies they use “Consensus” as a refuge to bully others into silence in order to further their specious agendas. It has become a dangerous and predictable pattern. A moral society does not fear disagreement and debate, it embraces it!
The biggest problem with this movement is the fallibility of man and the inability of any one man or organization to determine truth.
Bingo. This has been the constant teaching of Christianity. Even Plato argued as such in The Republic, Book IX regarding appetites, becoming a tyrant, what society called “freedom” was actually slavery.
If Americans spent time learning from the great classics, Greek, Roman and Scholastic, instead of doom scrolling on social media, we would be in a far better place today as a culture.
The Republic
By Plato
Book IX
Socrates – ADEIMANTUS
Last of all comes the tyrannical man; about whom we have once more to ask, how is he formed out of the democratical? and how does he live, in happiness or in misery?
I do not think that we have adequately determined the nature and number of the appetites, and until this is accomplished the enquiry will always be confused.
Certain of the unnecessary pleasures and appetites I conceive to be unlawful; every one appears to have them, but in some persons they are controlled by the laws and by reason, and the better desires prevail over them-either they are wholly banished or they become few and weak; while in the case of others they are stronger, and there are more of them.
Which appetites do you mean?
I mean those which are awake when the reasoning and human and ruling power is asleep; then the wild beast within us, gorged with meat or drink, starts up and having shaken off sleep, goes forth to satisfy his desires; and there is no conceivable folly or crime –….
But when a man’s pulse is healthy and temperate, and when before going to sleep he has awakened his rational powers, and fed them on noble thoughts and enquiries, collecting himself in meditation; after having first indulged his appetites neither too much nor too little, but just enough to lay them to sleep, and prevent them and their enjoyments and pains from interfering with the higher principle –which he leaves in the solitude of pure abstraction, free to contemplate and aspire to the knowledge of the unknown, whether in past, present, or future: when again he has allayed the passionate element, if he has a quarrel against any one –I say, when, after pacifying the two irrational principles, he rouses up the third, which is reason, before he takes his rest, then, as you know, he attains truth most nearly, and is least likely to be the sport of fantastic and lawless visions.
… in all of us, even in good men, there is a lawless wild-beast nature, which peers out in sleep.
And now remember the character which we attributed to the democratic man. He was supposed from his youth upwards to have been trained under a miserly parent, who encouraged the saving appetites in him….
And then he got into the company of a more refined, licentious sort of people, and taking to all their wanton ways rushed into the opposite extreme from an abhorrence of his father’s meanness. At last, being a better man than his corruptors, he was drawn in both directions until he halted midway and led a life, not of vulgar and slavish passion, but of what he deemed moderate indulgence in various pleasures…
And now, I said, years will have passed away, and you must conceive this man, such as he is, to have a son, who is brought up in his father’s principles. …
Then you must further imagine the same thing to happen to the son which has already happened to the father: –he is drawn into a perfectly lawless life, which by his seducers is termed perfect liberty; and his father and friends take part with his moderate desires, and the opposite party assist the opposite ones. As soon as these dire magicians and tyrant-makers find that they are losing their hold on him, they contrive to implant in him a master passion, to be lord over his idle and spendthrift lusts –a sort of monstrous winged drone –that is the only image which will adequately describe him. …
And when his other lusts, amid clouds of incense and perfumes and garlands and wines, and all the pleasures of a dissolute life, now let loose, come buzzing around him, nourishing to the utmost the sting of desire which they implant in his drone-like nature, then at last this lord of the soul, having Madness for the captain of his guard, breaks out into a frenzy: and if he finds in himself any good opinions or appetites in process of formation, and there is in him any sense of shame remaining, to these better principles he puts an end, and casts them forth until he has purged away temperance and brought in madness to the full.
Yes, he said, that is the way in which the tyrannical man is generated.
And you know that a man who is deranged and not right in his mind, will fancy that he is able to rule, not only over men, but also over the gods? …
And the tyrannical man in the true sense of the word comes into being when, either under the influence of nature, or habit, or both, he becomes drunken, lustful, passionate? O my friend, is not that so?
Assuredly.
Such is the man and such is his origin. And next, how does he live?
Suppose, as people facetiously say, you were to tell me.
I imagine, I said, at the next step in his progress, that there will be feasts and carousals and revellings and courtezans, and all that sort of thing; Love is the lord of the house within him, and orders all the concerns of his soul.
That is certain.
Yes; and every day and every night desires grow up many and formidable, and their demands are many
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.10.ix.html
To Estovir-Maybe that’s why the founders was so brilliant and gave us the Declaration of Independence and The Consitution. An upscale educated man in the colonies in the late 18th century could usually read and write Latin and Greek as well as study many over “classical” treatises and works in History, economics, government (Like Plato above). No gender studies, Marxist economics (an oxymoron), DEI, 1619 project and such.
“The biggest problem with this movement is the fallibility of man and the inability of any one man or organization to determine truth.”
Which two supposed truths were arrived at how? — By one man? Committee? Divine insight? Seance?
Rick said: “Of all the Marxist movements in the United States, the one to silence free speech is the most dangerous and chilling, an existential threat to our Constitutional Republic.”
I would note that the Second Amendment was substantially gutted (over decades) before the First was attacked in earnest. A coincidence? I doubt that very much.
And the point of this is. . . . . .?
The advantage of proverbs is they are adaptable to alternate venues. Below is a blog I wrote based on the French Proverb, “Sure it works in practice, but will it work in theory?” Now let’s adapt it to Americana.
If It Works? — American style
“I don’t care if it works, it doesn’t fit the narrative.” – American Progressive
“If it works, the theory is pointless.” – American Pragmatist
“It may work, but I see no profit.” – American Capitalist
“It may work, but it won’t pass.” – American Congressman
“It works, I know, but is it God’s will?” – American Theologian
“It seems to work, but I don’t understand it.” – American Scientist
“It works ok, but I deny it.”- American Contrarian
“Even if it works, it is irrelevant.” – American Fanatic
“Sure it works in practice, but will it work in theory?” – French Proverb
In the first one you could substitute “Idon’t care if it is true, it doesn’t fit the narrative….or agenda”
My favorite French proverb: “Like Saturn, the revolution devours its children.”
It keeps coming up lately. A sure sign of late-stage leftwing dementia.
And from Voltaire: “It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster.”
The correct “capitalist” response would be
“if it works, it is profitable”