Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

alfred's not wrong here guys lol

okay mayyybee with the "this is the worst thing all year" that might be a bit of an exaggeration. but this shit is dangerous. whether the horowitz center is a bunch of jerks or not isn't the issue

weren't you all mad when some baker said it was his constitutional right not to make a cake for a gay couple? no matter how you see it, if you boil the stories down to their essence they're the same deal

also i love y'all so please stop this isn't tgb don't gotta spread the hate into chit chat
sayin' this to everyone
you can argue w/o being mad
spread the love

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

I can't wait to find out what crucial piece of information is selectively being omitted from this scenario to artificially spark outrage

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

your concern is in the right place. the horowitz organization is undoubtedly leaving something out, so it's a question of what.

I want it to be bullshit, because then that's one less thing to worry about

paypal's actions are concerning, but ultimately, you can start a competitor to paypal. it is difficult, but it exists.

for VISA/mastercard there is very little alternative. both go through merchant services. starting a new alternative is similar to starting a new ISP.

the actual nature of the organization is unrelated. VISA could block the SPLC itself and this would still be a big deal. mccarthism was bad when applied to communists, and it's bad when applied to the opposite of communists.

what I suspect will happen is that horowitz will have to sue the organization in a similar way to how the SPLC was sued for defamation, and this will have to happen a fuckton more times, and then this shit will stop.

but it's unreal that people here think in the universe they thought existed it was okay for VISA to selectively block payment to organizations based on speech. what the fuck.

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

something someyhi g slipery slope falachie

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

oh yeah depending on the merchant service that horowitz is using they may be getting browned out due to lack of pci compliance

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

that's a fair criticism to make, because I know where you are coming from

but the slippery slope fallacy is causal, not categorical. i.e. "if gays get married, then snakes will get married to people." the precedent does not allow for the cause of gay marriage --> snake marriage.

however, it is justifiable to say something like "if we accept that dwarf planets like pluto can be exploded by the Death Star for fun, it's not a stretch to explode the whole solar system" because the planet category can be stretched, it's not jumping from cause to cause.

here, "hate group" is vague, so anything can be defined as a hate group, or the category can be re-defined later on once the group defining it is no longer in power. muslim groups were targeted unfairly post-9/11, and black groups during the civil rights era, and so on. you cannot predict what group will be undesirable next and it is immensely arrogant to think you are invulnerable. (I don't mean you = choof, but you = hypothetical person.)

this is super dry and boring, but it's roughly how the fallacy works and it's the best I can do in a pinch.

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

yes but what if pluto was filled with a bunch of white supremacists who'd have no issue death starring a multicultural planet

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

omg

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

lmao

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

I kind of agree with this sentiment -- situationally

For me it boils down to power dynamics: institutions with more power have a disproportionate amount of influence when it comes to... well, a lot of things. YouTube in particular has a similar kind of problem, where content creators get flagged whenever they portray certain IPs in a negative light, regardless of whether or not Fair Use is invoked. The ones that flag the videos (the "complainers" in this case) almost exclusively win these fights because YouTube just automatically sides with the flagging party, regardless of context -- this is, more or less, because the flagging party tends to have more power: they're executives, back by legal teams, etc.

Sure, free market and blah blah, but "with great power comes great responsibility" -- and, obviously, Visa/Mastercard have a lot of power.

With that said.

That doesn't vindicate Horowitz in this kind of case --- I'm pretty sure there's something we're not privy to at the moment, some subtlety that justifies whatever is going on here. Perhaps the complaints were legitimate, perhaps Visa/Mastercard already have performed an investigation, whatever. I have the feeling that something like this doesn't "just happen" arbitrarily, especially at these higher tiers of corporation (compared against the bakery situation, which was rather arbitrary, occurring a low corporate level).

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

to break from the tone of the first page for a second:

thank you, backpack, for taking the time to read this and comment thoughtfully. I appreciate it.

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

I think this is a false equivalence but yeah

If I can give my two cents on a larger matter.

I think there are just some situations that are impossible to reconcile in a logically consistent manner. The government emboldening these hate groups hurts the civil liberties of others. The government denying these hate groups -potentially- hurts free speech. Is there a middle ground? Probably, but I sincerely doubt that any concessions made will result in a logically consistent system.

As a specific example:

I've started to think that sexual assault cases are fundamentally incompatible with the current legal system (or, at the very least, the legal system's reliance on forensic science). Somewhat axiomatic in forensic science is "Locard's Exchange Principle", which states that any two bodies that come in contact leave trace evidence of the contact. This is remarkably difficult to apply in sexual assault cases for obvious reasons. Rape kits are unreliable, and other trace evidence is difficult to prove "beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt".

And yet, a fundamental principle of law is that defendants are innocent until proven guilty.

I've been thinking for a while that something's gotta give here. Should there be a different protocol for handling sexual assault cases? Maybe. It just seems as if the legal system is inherently contradictory sometimes. "Justice for the victims" and "innocent until proven guilty" can sometimes be diametrically opposed.

Coming back to this example:

There is a philosophical incompatibility with "securing the civil liberties of Americans" and "free speech." That's why the meaning of free speech has changed over history -- we now know that you can't incite violence, directly endanger others, etc. So I would imagine that in cases like this, censoring hate groups might be a thing that happens. It -does-, strictly speaking, violate free speech, but it instead values "civil liberties" for historically oppressed groups.

I know Arch is more well-versed in law than I am and he probably won't like this answer, but, I wholeheartedly believe that philosophical incompatibilities exist, and, through some means, we as a society dictate what values are more valuable than others.

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

If it helps contextualize my responses, my background is in mathematics and formal logics.

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

the sexual assault thing is an interesting side-discussion and if you post it in a separate thread I am more than willing to have that argument. you're a good interlocutor so I wouldn't mind.

I do have one comment to make here though:

there is some writing about this worth reading:

1. most important: https://freespeechdebate.com/case/th...t-to-violence/
2. important: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...rst-amendment/
3. less important, but still good: https://www.theatlantic.com/national...-quote/264449/

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

I'm kind of bothered by the amount of people who are for taking down opinions they don't agree with
Let people believe and think what they want to, diversity in thought keeps humanity thinking
It's not they their fault if you're too stupid to give counterarguments
Resorting to filthy backhanded tactics that graze the edges of the law is disgusting

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

I'm bothered by the amount of people who think a meaningful discussion can even arise from the assholes on this site

Oh wait the point isn't convo it's for everyone to stroke their egos

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

ok bye

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

Oh wow everyone agrees with me on "insert moral dilemma here that has obvious solution and implications" someone debate me.LOL JK I just wanted to tell u all how right I am xD

Plot twist none of you are smart, none of you are nice, everything anyone has said in any thread has been repeated from things that have already been said

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

If it helps contexualize my responses my background is dealing with pompous assholes

Re: VISA/Mastercard blocks payment to Horowitz Center because of SPLC
 

Ya bye see ya nerd