I get that you don’t want misinformation happening on certain topics. The scary part comes when you’re going to decide to police it. Can you still share info on the health journey of you or your loved one? Can you still ask people to buy your products that are meant to save more money in the long run than they cost? Can you tell people you had a bad experience with a certain bank? Not a fan of the approach, but I do understand the basic concept of why they’d want to do something.
seems like a way to silence dissident speak, or rhetoric, anything critical of the CCP.
That’s banned by default. They are targeting uneducated nonsense.
I’m sure there’s ways to see it as a bad thing, but the idea of only letting experts on a subject speak publicly about the subjects sounds like it could be really beneficial, particularly in some areas.
Of course if universities are corrupted or controlled it’s definitely a bad thing. And of course shitty people are always going to be trying to control whatever mechanism or criteria keeps certain people from speaking.
But it’s a nice idea.
Is it a nice idea?
Of course, I see the good side, too. However, besides the possible negatives you’ve already mentioned, I feel like this measure begs the question: Should everyday people be allowed to sway public opinion?
I think the answer is, unequivocally, YES! I think it is wrong to say that you need a degree to comment on a topic or that you need a degree to say what you think, publicly, about a topic.
I very much appreciate stricter regulation on misinformation, but this is concerning.
I suppose it will depend on how and how much they enforce this.
I also have mixed feelings about it but come out on the side of this is bad.
I feel like this measure begs the question: Should everyday people be allowed to sway public opinion?
They should be able to sway public opinion on things that are a matter of opinion, not on things that are proven facts.
I’m specifically thinking of anti-vaxxers here. The US is currently suffering from its largest measles outbreak since 1992 when the disease was declared eliminated in 2000. We shouldn’t be having this problem and it’s caused by people sharing opinions that contradict with scientifically proven facts.
The reason that I come out on the side of the law being bad is that the line between things that should require a degree to talk about and things that shouldn’t isn’t an easily defined one so the law is very open to abuse.
not on things that are proven facts.
I think this is much, much harder to pin down than you seem to be implying.
It isn’t particularly hard to find research that, at least partially, seems to corroborate or lend credence to some of the more asinine beliefs ripping US public health to shreds. It’s also not particularly hard to find people with degrees or certificates, people in positions of authority, that spout that stuff. Tylenol? Yeah. If people take this law to mean that “if you see the Qualified ExpertTM badge on a video, you can trust the information,” then I fear misinformation might have a new weapon.
What I mean to say is that, at the end of the day, it seems like it’ll be up to the state authorities to decide (1) who counts as a qualified expert, and (2) what subjects require qualifications to be discussed, and I do think that both are dangerous premises.
I’m not certain it’s a bad idea though, I really can’t say which side I land on, for now.
Disclaimer: I didn’t read the article
I think it depends on how you define “influencer”. Talking about these topics should absolutely be possible and forbidding it is censorship. But influencer with ten thousands or more followers have a responsibility and I think it’s necessary to enforce some kind of quality and to prevent misinformation.
If the way China does it is the right way I don’t know, but I can see why they are doing it.
I think it depends on how you define “influencer”.
It seems to me that it’s basically anyone that posts content. I read both the linked article and the referenced CNBC article, and there doesn’t seem to be any clarification on the issue…
It’s one thing to curb misinfo, but this smell like trying to control the population. You can’t just blanket ban people from speaking a certain topic, that’s like saying all science communicator now need to have science degree to talk about science. Now they say only people with degree able to talk about it, then if someone talk about topic not permitted, they lose their privilege. It’s a very basic tactic for authoritarian.
Personally I’d like to see a total global ban of social media.
Humans aren’t designed to communicate with this many people at once, and it shows.
I don’t think we’d lose anything of value even if we banned all influencers from speaking online on social media on any topic, so I can see why China’s done this.
The idea is great on paper, but execution is everything.
It’s China. I’m sure there will be executions.
Is this really true? I cast suspicion because to me it sounds like they are trying to convince the world that whatever comes out of their influencers about the topics they are interested to push is of higher quality than the rest of the world.
Oh the media keeps reporting that there are human rights abuse going on some place remote. Those are obvious lies because our double MBA PhD influencer is quite clear that everyone is happy.
Yes it would be nice if only knowledgeable people spoke on complex subjects in a language that allows less knowledgeable people to understand. But one has to be able to trust what is being said.
I like the idea of not letting stupid people spread misinformation on the internet (unless it’s myself), but this is just gatekeeping the right to speak out in public about certain topics which I find deeply problematic.
There’s got to be something to do for accountability, but ….
Just want to point out the guy who made up the whole vaccine-autism scare was a scientist. All of the propaganda against anti-smoking, anti-climate change, anti-pollution, anti-lead efforts over the years has been produced by scientists
Educated people are people too. Just because they should know better doesn’t mean they are
You’re spot on with accountability. Why not just legally allow people harmed by following the advice to be ableto sue the influencers and allow those with proper credentials to become certified in the topic and certification protects from lawsuits?
Or maybe not the second part. Anybody giving bad advice should be sued.
“This isn’t medical advice, but drinking battery acid will allow you to live forever.” Would never hold up in court.
Freedom of speech seems to be the most misunderstood right.
The challenging part is a lot of it is indirect. General incitement to violence or misinformation is difficult to tie back to directly causing harm.
Freedom of speech was simpler before internet when you were likely singled out as a kook and ignored. Now with the internet you have a much bigger audience as well as other kooks where you can build on each other. Your reach is farther, you can more easily appear to have common opinion, you can do more harm, and yet are more distanced from the harm you do.
I have no idea what to do differently but we’ve seen free speech in an online world without any accountability has been able to do a lot of harm.
Yeah, I think more is being lost here than “solved”. Sometimes you need to ask simple questions about complex things. Ask any teacher and they’ll say that students deepen their own understanding just as much as they teach back. It’s part of the flow of creative ideas and inspiration. Everybody should have the right to be curious, ask questions, learn and make new discoveries.
Instead, this feels like “You are only allowed to have ideas once you’ve gone through the propogandization program to have the right ones”. But I still do agree that we need to start trying lots of things to combat misinformation. Maybe a rebrand of education to show how much more interesting reality is than conspiracy theories. A focus on the truth that so much remains unknown, and conspiracy theories are like unhealthy junk food that never satiates that truth.
Turkey requires a college degree to become president. Then they started revoking the college degrees of the opposition candidates.
Pro gamer move.
everyone loves censorship
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.
Hope she’s doing ok. <3
I know moving is a huge pain for the elderly.
She’s been here for nearly a decade, she’s fine I think. She lived with us, and she’s very annoying, but she did take care of me back when we were in China and my parents were busy working, so I guess I should probably be more grateful. I’m although I don’t exactly like her, I’m glad it’d become more difficult for this admin to target her with the soon-to-be citizenship status (not completely safe tho, but it’s relatively safer)
I hope 2026 and 2028 goes well in terms of politics, because like… we have a lot of relatives in the US, it’d be very impractical for us all to like… move to Canada for example (because I doubt Canadian immigration officials would take American asylum cases seriously).
(Pls, some future time traveler come course-correct this timeline)
lol
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.
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.
Yup, as someone who loosely follows streamer drama, this is kinda based.
Imagine the h3h3/Hasan drama if this was a thing
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.
If we held news accountable for misinformation then fox and all the other fascist networks wouldn’t even exist.
That sounds desirable.
I don’t see the problem with that.
It just becomes a question who decides what is and isn’t mis/disinformation. Imagine the trump regime doing this.
main focus here should be the word “influencers”
So, anyone: got it.
Is that what your attention span lasts? Or are you leaving the rest of the comment out on purpose for some reason?
When an influencer is literally anyone online, then yes: anyone. Nothing else you wrote matters, because anyone can be an influencer.
People should be held accountable for their lapses in judgement to believe whatever: they aren’t mindless automatons. We can’t depend on anyone (certainly not big daddy government) but ourselves to think critically for us.
So you didn’t read past the first sentence, got it.
Nah, your point is worthless. Here’s a nice picture.
Ah… I see… My bad, I understood it too late that I wasn’t talking with someone able to fully read a comment before making a “sharp” remark about it.
Get butthurt all you want about others not caring about & disagreeing with your point.
Someone’s lack of sense to question unreliable information is entirely their fault. That’s no justification to violate a fundamental right.
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.
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.
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?
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