this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2023
935 points (97.3% liked)

Technology

58303 readers
8 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

Anas Haqqani, a senior leader in the Taliban, has officially endorsed Twitter over Facebook-owned competitor Threads.

“Twitter has two important advantages over other social media platforms,” Haqqani said in an English post on Twitter. “The first privilege is the freedom of speech. The second privilege is the public nature & credibility of Twitter. Twitter doesn't have an intolerant policy like Meta. Other platforms cannot replace it.”

Twitter has fallen out of favor with many people since Elon Musk took over the company last year...The Taliban, however, seems to love it. Two Taliban officials even bought blue verification check marks after Musk started selling them in January.

Haqqani noted that the biggest draw of Twitter was this lax moderation policy...Facebook and TikTok both view the Taliban as a terrorist organization and disallow them from posting. It’s a ban that persists to this day.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 169 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Pretty funny to see a member of the Taliban espouse freedom of speech. I really doubt that

[–] [email protected] 139 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's just like Elons definition. To these people freedom of speech means freedom to say what they want and not be challenged by pesky things like facts.

[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 year ago

Freedom from consequence for me but not for thee

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago

Freedom of their speech

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] [email protected] 123 points 1 year ago (8 children)

This is not a good look. The Taliban supporting something is never good.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (5 children)

A handful of years ago, US Republicans were losing their shit over Muslims and the Taliban, basically saying they were the biggest threat. I'm honestly waiting for them to realize that their views are almost completely aligned with the Taliban's. Both against abortion and LGBTQ rights, both want religion in schools and to get rid of the separation of church and state, etc. It doesn't at all surprise me that Republicans and the Taliban have the same preferred social media.

load more comments (5 replies)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Funnily enough they also endorsed Trump before the 2020 election.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

Twitter, the only social network endorsed by the Taliban and caturd! What's not to love?

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] [email protected] 78 points 1 year ago (4 children)
[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Sweet. Thank you for the link! Is there an ate the onion community out there yet?

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] [email protected] 63 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

"Two Taliban officials even bought blue verification check marks after Musk started selling them in January"

I am dead

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 59 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Twitter: The terrorist's choice.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 59 points 1 year ago (4 children)

“Twitter has two important advantages over other social media platforms,” Haqqani said in an English post on Twitter. “The first privilege is the freedom of speech.

I know it's the Taliban but I cannot believe how braindead they are. They don't even remember that they're so anti free speech, they'll hunt down and kill dissidents especially women who have the guts to get an education.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 year ago

The taliban and Musk share the same values, then - to both of them, free speech means "you can say anything, as long as its what I like".

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

See also: The CIA award for excellence in journalism.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 53 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I remember back around 2012-2013 ISIS using twitter to post gore videos and twitter was lazy asf about dealing with it

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (2 children)

social media sites give 0 fucks about properly moderating anything but popular euro languages

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

At the time Facebook fueled a genocide in Myanmar they had practically no moderation for Burmese content, if I recall correctly.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Hahahaha this is genuinely HILARIOUS.

Thank you, I needed that.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] [email protected] 41 points 1 year ago

Terrorists like Elon Musk. That seems like his plan.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 year ago (2 children)

But the real question is: which platform would Hitler use?

...not that I'd expect the answer to differ.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (19 children)

Not that this changes anything but it's worth noting that the Taliban were provided a platform on Twitter even before they took power and before even Elon acquired it.

Right now Facebook is also full of hate-speech by Islamists who circumvent hate-speech filters by writing in Arabic or Parsi, as Meta's AI in those languages is a complete failure, very biased as it's trained on hateful content already as laws in those countries favor hate-speech (as an example, in Saudi Arabia being an atheist is considered "terrorism" and in most MENA countries homophobic content is normal) and moderators are sourced locally and hence also very biased.

There's a disturbing trend of big tech being comfortable hosting extremists and borderline terrorist spokespeople. And my unpopular guess is that it is obviously because the US wants the Taliban and other Islamist groups to be legitimized. Why? I'm not sure, geopolitics is totally above my pay grade. But it is clear that historically the US had no issues siding with hardcore Islamists in the MENA region and right now there is a clear trend to normalize Islamist propaganda online.

Reminder that the Taliban are still preventing girls from going to school since they took over, despite a certain president assuring us that the US isn't abandoning Afghan women and that the Taliban have "changed" anyway, and they cracked down on female university students too.

load more comments (19 replies)
[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago

I'm speechless at how ludicrous this headline is. I feel like even the Onion would reject it for being too bonkers.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago

I mean, total clickbait article but hilarious nontheless.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This was a title I didn't expect to read today.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

This may seem surprising, but Parag Agarwal, the Twitter CEO before elongated muskrat had a history of supporting isis views from his old tweets (there was a whole news article on it that has sadly been deleted). Really twitter CEOs have been fucked up politically since the beginning.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (9 children)

if they really want freedom of speech, then they should use gab.com

load more comments (9 replies)
[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (2 children)

So I read threads google play store reviews and most of them are bots. I think meta is using bots to hype threads downloads and stupid media might have taken money from zuck to post the news. Influencers and celebrities are definitely paid to use threads and the sheeps follow.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

This is so sad that it's fucking hilarious. Now we have social media competing for the fucking worst human beings on the planet to join their platform. It just goes to show how being an evil asshole is profitable. 😼

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

Do they also drink Wolf Cola?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago

Twitter: owned by Saudi Arabia, endorsed by the Taliban. Great new tagline!

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ah, yes, I was waiting for the Taliban to tell me which one of these two online clusterfucks to start using.

I'm surprised they even care about Twitter, wouldn't they want to be underground?

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

Why endorse a social media app? What kind of war are they fighting

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think the Dear Leader KJU should also hop on the Musk train.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

The Talliban accusing a company (Meta) of having intolerant policies is perhaps the most insanely hypocritical thing I've heard. I love it! "They don't tolerate our intolerance"

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Two Taliban officials even bought blue verification check marks after Musk started selling them in January.

Isn't it illegal to take money from terrorist organizations?

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The Taliban should spin up their own Mastodon instance.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

Have the Taliban considered self hosting a Mastodon instance?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

"Twitter doesn’t have an intolerant policy like Meta. Other platforms cannot replace it.” -- if your brain shutdown at this point as well, I'd like to welcome you to... if your brain shutdown at this point as well

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Zuck flying to Kabul for urgent talks over this critical endorsement deal

load more comments
view more: next ›