Turkey requires a college degree to become president. Then they started revoking the college degrees of the opposition candidates.
lol
Yikes
It’s incredible that despite how shit the US has become It’s still a better place than 1984 land
A real communist country would have a UBI that doesn’t pressure people to become scammers and grifters, just to make a wage in a shit economy with little financial opportunities.
Its so funny to see people fleeing the US, meanwhile my maternal grandmother from China has a US naturalization oath ceremony like next week.
Jumping from one burning pot to another is so awkward, but objectively speaking, it’s still a slight improvement.
This is quintessential “Modern CPP”
Take a real problem screwing up the western world bad (like influencer mis/disinformation), and smash it in a way only their massive state apparatus can…
Superficially.
It’s “proof” their party line works and, as always, a good way to control the populace, if abused. It’s probably effective, but not as effective as it appears on the surface.
I’m sympathetic here.
In past years I was a “free internet” libertarian leaning diehard, but something has to be done about algos boosting shameless outrage peddlers; it’s literally destroying the planet and our collective psyche, just for short term corporate benefit (Or corpo-state benefit in China’s case, as its “Big Tech” is under the party’s thumb). But China just took the problem and used it as an excuse for more control.
The issue is our society encourages it. When the most important thing in life is money, people are gonna do shit like this to exploit others. Take away the possibility of profit for grifting people and the incentive to do this drops. Would it completely go away? No, there will always be stupid grifters striving to gain popularity or attention, but I think that without the monetary factor it would be a negligible presence.
I don’t agree. Tons of folks spend tons of time influencing for basically no financial gain (or the platform taking the vast majority of it). Attention is everything.
In other cases, people are just tribal, and like following someone.
That’s always been (and will always be) an issue, but the monster of this story is engagement optimizing design. Technology has made this human tendency extremly dangerous, and “engagement at any cost” needs to be a social taboo.
There’s no shortage of bad faith influencers who have degrees and misinform anyway. Such laws shouldn’t be centered on pressuring people into expensive educational programs. They should focus on outlawing claims that are demonstrably false and harmful.
Does a degree cost anything in China other than time and effort?
Apparently people with degrees cannot lie
I’d imagine the number of people with degrees who are confidently incorrect on the subject of their major is much smaller than those without a formal education.
While I don’t agree with China’s tactics, something needs to be done about people like Joe Rogan peddling harmful misinformation to millions of people.
I once worked for a CPA who asked me what a balance sheet was for.
He was from a wealthy Tibetan family dynasty and clearly paid his way into the industry, but who knows why he would choose to do that because he clearly was completely over his head.
We used to call him Michael Scott sans charisma.
I can see how this would play out in the states. First you make it so only degreed people can talk about certain things. Then you dismiss them as educated elite ivory tower academics. Because we live in a nation that scorns experience and expertise.
Someone asked for an example the other day of something that didn’t believe was true and I listed seven. They dismissed me with “I didn’t ask for an encyclopedia.” It was the best way they could ignore that someone knew more than them and not have to actually process the information they explicitly asked for.
Nah, if this happened in the US someone would just set up a diploma mill and rake in the money.
But then you can’t claim to be fighting the system against all those academics. You lose credibility once you have credentials, even diploma mill ones.
Sounds like they thought they could just argue on easy mode by putting the burden of proof on you. When you accommodated their request, that blew up their spot. Having no other recourse, they retreated to an insult since there was nothing else for them to do (but they were seething to get the last word, so you got that response).
Good on ya for making the fucker squirm.
I know that there is absolutely zero chance of educating some that doesn’t want to learn. But I also know that online others are reading and those people are either looking for information they can use in future conversations or they don’t have a vested interest in the conversation and can be reached even if they don’t poke their heads up to be seen.
That’s 100% the reason I’ll bother with these idiots when i do. Sometimes it’s also a chance for me to further prove out my logic and refine my arguments and understanding of the topic as well, so it can be a win-win-win in the best case scenario (troll proven wrong+me learning something new/refining my knowledge+bystanders learning why the troll is wrong)
I think the main focus here should be the word “influencers”.
One thing is for a relatively unknown person to speak about any kind of topic even if they know nothing about it.
But when someone with millions of followers spreads misinfo, that is dangerous as it can end up killing lots of people.
People with a certain amount of followers should be held accountable for what they say the same way that a newspaper should.
There’s a lot of nuance to be discussed and Republicans shouldn’t be in the room at all when it is, but yeah this is objectively true. We used to have laws regulating the news for a reason.
Yeah I gotta agree with you on this, there’s a frankly insane amount of pull these people have in society and as we saw during the pandemic not only did it cause people to endanger their own health, but those of others around them.
If we held news accountable for misinformation then fox and all the other fascist networks wouldn’t even exist.
main focus here should be the word “influencers”
So, anyone: got it.
sure, but that’s not what this is doing. it doesn’t say they’ll be held accountable. it just places a high barrier to entry.
i understand the sentiment behind it, but I don’t think this will be effective at curtailing disinformation. it would, however, be a very useful tool for controlling online speech. especially with a government that has so much control over its universities.
Yup, as someone who loosely follows streamer drama, this is kinda based.
Yeah, I think if it’s more about policing the misinformation influencers spread, then I can calm down a bit, although it still makes me nervous to think about the government picking and choosing what a person with a crowd can say.
For now, it’s making sure influencers don’t spread anti-vax bullshit, but what if tomorrow it’s no talking about Palestine?
Even then, medical professionals themselves can fall to propaganda and spread lies, so we can’t use a single person as an arbiter of truth.
Curious to see if this leads to licenses or degrees being revoked as universities have their name tied to what people are saying.
I’m conflicted. On one hand, I’m American and believe in free speech. On the other hand, I want assholes to be held accountable for lying.
So conflicted.
America is already censoring free speech indirectly. Censorship from platforms. Shadowbans. Now even directly arresting and deporting it.
But look at Julian Assagne or Edward Snowden to see the myth of free speech.
Go with free speech. People usually get what they deserve, one way or another.
Can we skip to the part where Trump, Putin, Netanyahu, Farage, Wilders, Musk, Le Pen, the ICE agent that lives down the street, Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg, etc etc etc get what they deserve please?
It doesn’t seem to have happened yet.
Skip it? It might not be until eternity, but they will reap what they have sown.
What they deserve
Like heading the department of health and human services?
Usually due to laws rules and regulations holding their words/actions to account…
Not really.
Genuinely curious if anyone has info on how something like this is enforced.
Selectively. If there are enough laws on the books that everyone is in violation all the time you can justify taking down anyone at any time.
Yeah, that’s what the law is. Im curious about the mechanics of this, this certainly is not a new issue and AI could feasibly make mass surveillance necessary to enforce such a law easier. If that’s the case though, what kind of process would exist to confirm the person’s qualifications? Just some examples but that is more of what I’m talking about.
Arbitrary laws as a form of suppression is centuries old here in NA.
There’s so much where this could be used to silence people, I can’t trust this. What if you’re an expert in a related field to the “serious” topic and disagree with the mainstream opinion held by experts within that field? Who gets to decide what constitutes a “serious” topic?
I just keep thinking of the recent Ms. Rachel controversy where conservative voices basically said she should stay out of talking on Palestine because she was “only” a children’s educator. But one should be able to express their opinion on this serious matter even if you aren’t an expert, and yeah, even if you’re a major influencer.
I want societies to address misinformation and disinformation campaigns as much as the next person, but to be clear, I just don’t trust governments to be the ones to do that. Granted governments are admittedly experts in misinformation and disinformation, so at least we can rest assured that experts have eyes on it though…
There are plenty of dumb as doornails graduates as well so …
Are there plenty of dumb as door nails graduates with millions of followers on social media though? Because this is what this legislation is supposed to target. Basically if Trump was in “Chyna”, he’d be in jail already for spewing nonsense non-stop on stuff that he knows nothing about, because he’s not actually educated on it.
yes lol, look at any conservative influencer on American tv. they all have degrees.
i don’t think this law would actualy change much here in the states. almost every dangerous spreader of misinfo i can think of did in fact graduate college in some way.
i can’t possibly see this law s anything but a tool to control online speech rather than a tool to fight disinformation.
if the goal of to reduce disinformation then this law will be ineffective.
They have to have a degree on the relevant topic. I assume most of those influences have business degrees or whatever that wouldn’t qualify them to speak on the dangers of vaccines.
MBA’s and nursing degrees come to mind. Is there a group as educated and just as likely to fall for a MLM scam?
Idk how to feel about this. If this news came from the UK, the replies would’ve been:
you got a loicense for that, mate?
But because it’s China, people will gladly glaze this move.
“Nanny State”
Somehow we don’t get memed on for that, even though it’s all the same downunder.
While I am pretty skeptical of US-style polemics on free speech, I of course support free expression, strong journalistic culture, limiting the influence of oligarch propaganda and significant safeguards to censorship.
That being said there are clear externalities to easy access to digital content distribution platforms that prioritize engagement above all else and do not bear responsibility for their actions.
I of course would never trust the CCP on this, but I think in the long term the externalities inherent to social media distribution will have to be accounted for.
