July 2, 2021

Facebook's warnings that you may have been exposed to extremism — pleasantly helpful, obtusely creepy, or forebodingly dangerous?

4 comments:

Ann Althouse said...

Tina writes:

Forebodings dangerous.

Insidiously threatening.

Overtly stating: we are watching you.

Do you actually need any other evidence, or are you ready to submit?

Ann Althouse said...

Gregor Samsa writes:

A similar warning message, on a red background, appeared on top of an email I received from an outspoken conservative friend a few weeks ago. (I use gmail.)

As it turns out, I reflexively deleted it. It resembled an advertising banner, the sort of thing I never read, and I didn't notice the warning about dangerous content until too late.

My friend was writing about BLM and antifa riots and about his increased difficulty in getting published since he doesn't support the leftwing narrative.

Next time I'll get a screen capture.

Ann Althouse said...

Chris writes:

I am wondering what the difference is between extremist and radical. My American Heritage Dictionary says an extremist acts outside norms and a radical wants to overthrow norms.

But extremist and radical also seem similar to me, except that extremist has a negative connotation and radical a positive one. Are not radicals extremists, and extremists radicals? I suspect the word extremist is used to give a negative feel to persons or positions that might also be called radical. Both major political parties are becoming more radical.

The word radical comes from the Latin radix, or root. It makes me think of radishes, which my mother served in salads at dinner time. So maybe my mother was a secret radical.

Ann Althouse said...


LA_Bob writes;

"In the screenshot, I notice the "Tim Graney" post is in reply to Alex Berenson. Berenson is, at a minimum, a COVID-panic critic. I've read most of his Twitter feed for the last few months. I've been pleasantly surprised Twitter hasn't suspended his account.

"If there's one ray of hope in this creepy and foreboding social media censorship environment, it's that the tech giants don't seem to be too good at it."