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RE: Flags = Censorship!? - Are Flags On Steemit Similar Or Equal To Censorship?

in #steemit7 years ago

Censorship and Free Speech is a slippery beast, at the best of times. Where does it begin and end?

If my sense of "freedom" is that I can set your house on fire when I feel like it because I happen to think it's "fun" am I being "censored" when the cops haul me off to jail when I show up with a bucket of gasoline and a match?

Just the morning, I inadvertently found myself looking the "birth" of a new Steemit scam... flags were used extensively to send a would-be password thief into invisibility. But were we "censoring" that user by not giving them the freedom to do what THEY felt like doing?

I bring these up to look at the question of who the "injured party" is in different situations. Specifically, the discussion of whether or not complete freedom from censorship is possible assumes that there IS no such thing as "injured parties."

Here's the thing: I believe in free speech, but I ALSO believe in "mindfulness," in the sense that I "own" that any choice of action I take will have some kind of impact on others. And so, I censor myself in service of the "do no harm" ideal. But many people don't... and that's where we run into trouble.

On Steemit we have "whales" with a lot of voting power... which could be used for good or for bad. "Bad" here, meaning flagging someone to invisibility, simply because they disagree with your line of thinking. Which begs the question of whether these situations are simply a part of BEING HUMAN in the sense that most of us don't have the consciousness to separate egos and personal axes to grind out of a greater picture. Not saying that I have any answers here... just adding more questions, really.

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I think we could go on and add another hundred questions to the list on that topic. In the end we'd probably recognize though that we can currently just hope that the whales won't misuse their power.

thanks for stoping by & leaving your thoughts on this topic :)