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Newspeak

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Clarissa

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I’ve been weeping with laughter for 5 minutes over this: 

When comic Marcia Belsky sarcastically replied “men are scum” to a friend’s Facebook post back in October, she never anticipated being banned from the platform for 30 days. 

That was exactly what happened. 

Belsky was shocked at the severity of the punishment considering her relatively innocuous comment, and immediately spoke to her fellow female friends about the ordeal.

Severe punishment! Shocked! Ordeal! 
I had the same bout of uncontrollable laughter yesterday when a newscaster asked an interviewee, “Have you pondered the genesis of this tweet?” 

People are taking social media way too seriously.

9 responses to “Newspeak”

  1. Stringer Bell Avatar
    Stringer Bell

    I would agree with you, but social media platforms are literally the equivalent of storefronts for comics. This isn’t a bored housewife complaining she can’t post baby pictures for a month. This is business.

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    1. cliff arroyo Avatar
      cliff arroyo

      “This is business”

      Odd…. I agree. I detest social media but they’ve become a necessary part of a lot of businesses which means that they’re more like utilities that need to serve everyone rather than blocking people on a whim the way bloggers can (and should be able to). I wish that weren’t the case but at present it is.

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      1. Stringer bell Avatar
        Stringer bell

        “they’re more like utilities that need to serve everyone”

        Odd…not really. This is exactly the same argument that neo-nazis have been making lately after getting booted from multiple webhosting platforms.

        Fuck them. My comment pertained to comics only, fyi.

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        1. Clarissa Avatar
          Clarissa

          FB belongs to Zuckerberg. Ultimately, it’s his decision what he finds objectionable. If people choose to outsource the work of drumming up custom to him, they should live with the consequences. These people destroyed the enormous liberatory potential the internet had 20 years ago to enrich this bastard. This is the world they created. And now they are unhappy it’s biting them in the ass.

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          1. tired old hag Avatar
            tired old hag

            Totally agree: excellent and important point, and people should bear this in mind and get a grip and not allow social media to dominate their lives. (On the other hand, if you’re weeping with laughter over this maybe you need to seek out better sources of humor.)

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          2. cliff arroyo Avatar
            cliff arroyo

            “FB belongs to Zuckerberg”

            Yeah, it’s very dumb for businesses to rely much on a facebook page but on the other hand neither Zuckerberg (nor other figures in Big Social) have ever marketed themselves as private individuals who let you use their platform at their pleasure but as public utilities (that metaphor comes from a twitter executive iirc).

            I’ve never understood facebook not least because the format is confusing and random and generally terrible for doing or finding anything (its worse than geocities). But I can understand why commercial people feel they need a presence there and will be upset that faceless sociocrats start hurting their business.

            While I can see the humor in the situation part of me is also feeling a little bad for the poor performer who just needs to make her nut*.

            *an old carnie-circus term

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            1. Clarissa Avatar
              Clarissa

              Of course, that’s their marketing strategy. But nobody should believe them.

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      2. Clarissa Avatar
        Clarissa

        I can’t imagine a dumber business decision than placing one’s business entirely at the mercy of a behemoth like FB. But if one does that, one should act business-like and remember that saying “all men are scum” in a business context tends to result in a loss customers. I rant against Trump and Rauner in private but I don’t bring it to my place of business. If I do, I should absolutely be banned from the classroom.

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        1. UDR Avatar
          UDR

          For business and government offices, there’s also a worry that a fake profile for your agency could be created if you don’t already have a Facebook page. I don’t imagine Facebook is very helpful at resolving the issue if you aren’t already a customer.

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A conservative literary critic and college professor

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