Yeah, this is more like if Trump gave a shout out to one of those people who like to regularly stand on milk crates and yell at passersby about [topic].
But otherwise the point stands, I think.
I suppose to be scrupulously fair, I should have said at the rally he just said the fuck CNN part while it was later revealed he had a history of hate speech aimed at Jews. But I wanted to heighten the absurdity, because this is ridiculous.
No, I meant milk crate guy has no control over whether Trump decides to suddenly make him national news.
That statement by CNN is basically "Nice identity, shame if something were to happen to it". The kind of thing we shit on Trump for all the time.
If any threat was unintentional, then CNN are imbeciles. It reads like a ransom note. They blew the chance to take the high road and come out smelling of roses.
It's really, really not. It's "we decided not to destroy this person's life by exposing them as someone who thinks genocide is hilarious."
It's excessively generous to the asshole.
Like watch this story:
KENOSHA, WISCONSIN - A man invited to speak at President Donald Trump's campaign rally in Kenosha said today that he media was controlled by Jews and that they should be thrown into gas ovens reminiscent of the Holocaust. He then compared the President to a wrestler body slamming CNN in an increasingly unhinged rant.
The man has since apologized stating that when he said those things he was angry and had become addicted to violent rhetoric and seeing what kind of approval he could get from the crowd. Now that he understands the pain his words caused he swears he will never say anything like that again and that everyone else should learn a lesson from his experience.
We have decided to grant the man anonymity out of respect for his apology, but if he appears at another rally saying similar things next time we'll tell you who the speaker was.
The White House had no comment on the man's remarks.
If you take out the internet, it becomes absurd and only the silliest of geese would protest.
1) Invited to speak at a Trump event and then saying those things
does not even come close to being the same thing as
2) Trump taking a shitpost and retweeting it without asking the guy's permission.
And only the silliest of geese would try to equate the two.
Maybe... but then he said this:
Holy s***!! I wake up and have my morning coffee and who retweets my s***post but the MAGA EMPORER himself!!! I am honored!!
Which makes me comfortable making the comparison.
He was honored his non-offensive shitpost got retweeted by Trump yes.
That said nothing about the entirety of his Reddit posting history.
Which again, why are we ok with a NEWS organization combing through anyone's internet history? I mean we all post on a site made by two dudes who "make rape jokes." Does that mean we should be held accountable for everything we've said on here in the off-chance a post of ours gets picked up by a public figure?
Did we say those things? No, we did not. That would be like holding this dude accountable for everything Steve Huffman ever said.
I think the mainstreaming by this President of violent hate speech is a huge story and in the public interest. Major trends are often reported using individual examples, like the guy the Times keeps interviewing to see if the right has turned on Trump yet rather than exclusively relying on polling data. This guy got into the public eye when the President irresponsibly retweeted him.
Also that shitpost was offensive (against the First Amendment), for the record.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
Publishing newsworthy events (which the creation of a meme advocating violence against the media that was co-opted by the President of the United States most assuredly is) falls right under the freedom of the press
Reporting the facts is not in any way analogous to doxxing
One of those things is accurately reporting the 5 W's of a story -- "Who" being the salient W here
The other is publishing as much damaging information on a person as you possibly can, including things like address, phone number, social security number, etc.
It is meant to encourage hostile, bullying action towards an individual (and in some cases has led to suicides), and in many cases is accompanied by, "Here's X person's information, now go make their life a living hell"
Whereas reporting is meant to inform the public
Unless you feel like the media can't report on anything bad anyone ever does because they might be embarrassed, you should be able to recognize the major differences between these actions, the intent behind them, and the methods that go into their implementation
It isn't like CNN went all CSI on Reddit, the guy's profile was practically three or four clicks away from his real identity
The expectation of privacy on the Internet is far beyond the scope of this thread but the takeaway here is if you want to be anonymous, it's not exactly good OPSEC practices to attach your Facebook profile to your Reddit username
tl;dr: Never post anything on the Internet you would be uncomfortable saying openly to real people
Joshofalltrades, that is a counter to an argument nobody here is making.
CNN outing him or not isn't the issue. Their statement declaring his repentance acceptable and so they won't publish so long as he's good is an entirely different thing and not grounded in journalistic ethics at all.
CNN put out some extremely bad writing that reads very, very differently than they thought it would. People defending the guy propped up the idea of him as a teenager shitposting to get sympathy and make them seem like intentional bullies.
It's probably unethical to threaten him but CNN has a legitimate "we were stupid and explained why we aren't IDing him in a bad way" defense.
The story is that a random racist posted a meme the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES turned into an Official White House statement by retweeting it.
The story then took an interesting turn when, instead of embracing what would be a big amount of internet fame when the President endorses your work, he asked to remain anonymous and renounced everything he had done and vowed to be a better person.
Including that he asked to remain anonymous, and then explaining why they honored that request, is a big part of the story.
Also explaining that if the reasons they decided to leave him anonymous change, they feel his name would be newsworthy, is important.
This logic appears to make CNN an activist organization rather than a news organization. It feels a lot more Gawker than CNN.
Why?
What is in any way activist about it?
The ethical dilemma CNN faced when they learned his identity was - what good comes from telling the world who this horrible guy is? Does it make it a better story? Does it add anything to the context of his comments? Does it help convey the facts better?
And the answer to all the above is no.
Journalism isn't black and white. You wield immense power when you report on anything. When you tell the world something, entire lives, families and communities change. You can bring down governments.
So when you are faced with something like this, you have to decide. In my journalism ethics class we did an exercise debating about suicide. Do you report on a suicide? If it's a lone adult? What if it's the son of someone famous? What if it caused an even bigger accident somehow? You have to balance informing people what's going on in the world with just being a decent human being and not putting people like family members, who did nothing wrong, through pain and suffering for no reason.
How does having a name change anything about this story?
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
After posting his apology, "HanA**holeSolo" called CNN's KFile and confirmed his identity. In the interview, "HanA**holeSolo" sounded nervous about his identity being revealed and asked to not be named out of fear for his personal safety and for the public embarrassment it would bring to him and his family.
CNN is not publishing "HanA**holeSolo's" name because he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology, showed his remorse by saying he has taken down all his offending posts, and because he said he is not going to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again. In addition, he said his statement could serve as an example to others not to do the same.
CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change.
Let us read the paragraph directly preceding the "threat."
Guy calls CNN, asks them not to publish his name.
CNN provides explanation as to the thought process that went into not publishing his name, states that they did not agree to never publish his name.
This is not a note at the end of the article, it is a clarification of their response to his request (or their lack of a response: that they are not withholding his name due to his request or as part of any agreement).
They probably should have just left out the fact that he asked them to not publish his name and avoided everything following that.
Yeah I think it's important to remember here that news organizations and journalists frequently do make agreements to not reveal names. Which can potentially provide ground for legal action if broken, and would certainly cause a pr disaster. What they did here is simply choose to not publish relevantish information for good reasons.
"reserve the right" just means "hey we didn't agree to shit"
Joshofalltrades, that is a counter to an argument nobody here is making.
CNN outing him or not isn't the issue. Their statement declaring his repentance acceptable and so they won't publish so long as he's good is an entirely different thing and not grounded in journalistic ethics at all.
CNN is well within their rights to publish his name regardless of whether he has offered up a mea culpa or not
I read that line as them being gracious and giving him the benefit of the doubt, but if he pops up elsewhere advocating violence towards the media there will be no reason for them to keep his name out of the story anymore
I think the fact that this guy was inciting violence against CNN is getting forgotten in the hubbub here
If somebody threatened me with physical violence I would probably out them immediately, so as far as I'm concerned CNN went above and beyond here
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SurfpossumA nonentitytrying to preserve the anonymity he so richly deserves.Registered Userregular
Joshofalltrades, that is a counter to an argument nobody here is making.
CNN outing him or not isn't the issue. Their statement declaring his repentance acceptable and so they won't publish so long as he's good is an entirely different thing and not grounded in journalistic ethics at all.
If I asked CNN why they didn't publish the guy's name, what should they say instead of what they actually said?
Especially if those factors really did make the actual human beings writing the story and making the decision feel more sympathetic to not publishing the guy's name?
Publishing newsworthy events (which the creation of a meme advocating violence against the media that was co-opted by the President of the United States most assuredly is) falls right under the freedom of the press
Reporting the facts is not in any way analogous to doxxing
One of those things is accurately reporting the 5 W's of a story -- "Who" being the salient W here
The other is publishing as much damaging information on a person as you possibly can, including things like address, phone number, social security number, etc.
It is meant to encourage hostile, bullying action towards an individual (and in some cases has led to suicides), and in many cases is accompanied by, "Here's X person's information, now go make their life a living hell"
Whereas reporting is meant to inform the public
Unless you feel like the media can't report on anything bad anyone ever does because they might be embarrassed, you should be able to recognize the major differences between these actions, the intent behind them, and the methods that go into their implementation
It isn't like CNN went all CSI on Reddit, the guy's profile was practically three or four clicks away from his real identity
The expectation of privacy on the Internet is far beyond the scope of this thread but the takeaway here is if you want to be anonymous, it's not exactly good OPSEC practices to attach your Facebook profile to your Reddit username
tl;dr: Never post anything on the Internet you would be uncomfortable saying openly to real people
How is the poster's real name relevant to the public? Would that actually improve the story or is it just encouraging people to harass them? A name can often be enough to get an address, phone number, etc.
The story surely should be focused on the president's actions, no? He is the newsworthy individual here
Publishing newsworthy events (which the creation of a meme advocating violence against the media that was co-opted by the President of the United States most assuredly is) falls right under the freedom of the press
Reporting the facts is not in any way analogous to doxxing
One of those things is accurately reporting the 5 W's of a story -- "Who" being the salient W here
The other is publishing as much damaging information on a person as you possibly can, including things like address, phone number, social security number, etc.
It is meant to encourage hostile, bullying action towards an individual (and in some cases has led to suicides), and in many cases is accompanied by, "Here's X person's information, now go make their life a living hell"
Whereas reporting is meant to inform the public
Unless you feel like the media can't report on anything bad anyone ever does because they might be embarrassed, you should be able to recognize the major differences between these actions, the intent behind them, and the methods that go into their implementation
It isn't like CNN went all CSI on Reddit, the guy's profile was practically three or four clicks away from his real identity
The expectation of privacy on the Internet is far beyond the scope of this thread but the takeaway here is if you want to be anonymous, it's not exactly good OPSEC practices to attach your Facebook profile to your Reddit username
tl;dr: Never post anything on the Internet you would be uncomfortable saying openly to real people
How is the poster's real name relevant to the public? Would that actually improve the story or is it just encouraging people to harass them? A name can often be enough to get an address, phone number, etc.
The story surely should be focused on the president's actions, no? He is the newsworthy individual here
This is all moot because they didn't post his name in the piece
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
The guy's name is relevant because he created something inflammatory and detrimental to the free press which the President ran with to further his agenda of silencing any news that he hasn't given his own personal stamp of approval as NOT FAKE to
Sorry but when the POTUS uses something anti-1st Amendment you made you are suddenly thrust into the national spotlight
If that thought scares you maybe don't be so publicly anti-1st Amendment?
This is the price we pay for having a free press and a free exchange of ideas
Free speech does not mean freedom from consequences of speech
Also CNN is in super uncharted territory here as I highly doubt anyone posting on Reddit is expected to suddenly become a public figure. While it's true you shouldn't expect anything you post to stay anonymous - there's a massive leap from "local news found out about me being racist and even though I'm sorry and have changed I should move a town over." And "the fucking president endorsed my racism and my face is on CNN."
Also, the private citizen thing is the biggest deal. Almost all racist assholes get exposed by trying to get bigger, run for office or live a public life and this stuff comes up. This guy literally did none of that.
Journalism is facing some really weird challenges.
PSN: mxmarks - WiiU: mxmarks - twitter: @ MikesPS4 - twitch.tv/mxmarks - "Yes, mxmarks is the King of Queens" - Unbreakable Vow
CNN doesn't have a history of making veiled threats trying to force people to act the way they want, and they interact with a lot of people, so picking on this one random nobody is just ridiculous on its face.
Unlike, say, a politician making veiled threats to stop legal proceedings against him and his friends.
So it's a little ridiculous to see outrage and claims that this was DEFINITELY a threat from certain circles. I can see how it could be perceived as a threat because there's a huge power imbalance between the two, but CNN deserves the benefit of the doubt since they do not have even the glimmer of a pattern of doing this.
That statement by CNN is basically "Nice identity, shame if something were to happen to it". The kind of thing we shit on Trump for all the time.
If any threat was unintentional, then CNN are imbeciles. It reads like a ransom note. They blew the chance to take the high road and come out smelling of roses.
It's really, really not. It's "we decided not to destroy this person's life by exposing them as someone who thinks genocide is hilarious."
It's excessively generous to the asshole.
Like watch this story:
KENOSHA, WISCONSIN - A man invited to speak at President Donald Trump's campaign rally in Kenosha said today that he media was controlled by Jews and that they should be thrown into gas ovens reminiscent of the Holocaust. He then compared the President to a wrestler body slamming CNN in an increasingly unhinged rant.
The man has since apologized stating that when he said those things he was angry and had become addicted to violent rhetoric and seeing what kind of approval he could get from the crowd. Now that he understands the pain his words caused he swears he will never say anything like that again and that everyone else should learn a lesson from his experience.
We have decided to grant the man anonymity out of respect for his apology, but if he appears at another rally saying similar things next time we'll tell you who the speaker was.
The White House had no comment on the man's remarks.
If you take out the internet, it becomes absurd and only the silliest of geese would protest.
1) Invited to speak at a Trump event and then saying those things
does not even come close to being the same thing as
2) Trump taking a shitpost and retweeting it without asking the guy's permission.
And only the silliest of geese would try to equate the two.
Maybe... but then he said this:
Holy s***!! I wake up and have my morning coffee and who retweets my s***post but the MAGA EMPORER himself!!! I am honored!!
Which makes me comfortable making the comparison.
He was honored his non-offensive shitpost got retweeted by Trump yes.
That said nothing about the entirety of his Reddit posting history.
Which again, why are we ok with a NEWS organization combing through anyone's internet history? I mean we all post on a site made by two dudes who "make rape jokes." Does that mean we should be held accountable for everything we've said on here in the off-chance a post of ours gets picked up by a public figure?
When the President tweets your content, your publicly accessible reddit profile isn't exactly a private thing.
Also CNN is in super uncharted territory here as I highly doubt anyone posting on Reddit is expected to suddenly become a public figure. While it's true you shouldn't expect anything you post to stay anonymous - there's a massive leap from "local news found out about me being racist and even though I'm sorry and have changed I should move a town over." And "the fucking president endorsed my racism and my face is on CNN."
Also, the private citizen thing is the biggest deal. Almost all racist assholes get exposed by trying to get bigger, run for office or live a public life and this stuff comes up. This guy literally did none of that.
Journalism is facing some really weird challenges.
But it's not!
That isn't what happened!
And if it did happen, there would be nothing wrong with that!
I wouldn't post the political stuff I do if I had to do it under my real name. Too much risk of some alt-righter suddenly taking exception to me and harassing my family or small business. Most of my views are generic left, not anything shocking.
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
I think everyone agrees that it is stupid for CNN to blackmail an internet troll. Most people in this thread seem to agree that's not CNN's actual intent. Unfortunately they worded it in such a way as to make it seem like that to anyone who is inclined to dislike CNN, which is a lot of people. It's not a good look for CNN, regardless of how dumb it actually is. They needed to word that differently to avoid allowing everyone with a grudge to immediately grab it and run the wrong way.
Also CNN is in super uncharted territory here as I highly doubt anyone posting on Reddit is expected to suddenly become a public figure. While it's true you shouldn't expect anything you post to stay anonymous - there's a massive leap from "local news found out about me being racist and even though I'm sorry and have changed I should move a town over." And "the fucking president endorsed my racism and my face is on CNN."
Also, the private citizen thing is the biggest deal. Almost all racist assholes get exposed by trying to get bigger, run for office or live a public life and this stuff comes up. This guy literally did none of that.
Journalism is facing some really weird challenges.
But it's not!
That isn't what happened!
And if it did happen, there would be nothing wrong with that!
True, but they're a television network.
They're not just going to say his name without putting up his Facebook photo.
I was making a leap to prove a point, but I don't think it's that big of a leap.
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
CNN is not publishing "HanA**holeSolo's" name because he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology, showed his remorse by saying he has taken down all his offending posts, and because he said he is not going to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again. In addition, he said his statement could serve as an example to others not to do the same.
CNN provides explanation as to the thought process that went into not publishing his name, states that they did not agree to never publish his name.
So my problem here is that those reasons are all moral judgement of the speech itself. They are not avoiding publishing the name because they don't do that, they are not publishing the name because he showed contrition for posting "unacceptable" speech and they find that morally acceptable. They are acting as a moral authority instead of reporters. That is where I think CNN fucked up.
"we don't publish names" is also a moral stance. Journalists make ethical decisions all the time. The decision whether or not to publish a name is one of the most frequent ethical questions a journalist encounters.
In fact, choosing whether or not to publish someone's name for ethical or moral reasons using only their own morality and ethics as a compass is some of the most basic forms of journalism
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
I think everyone agrees that it is stupid for CNN to blackmail an internet troll. Most people in this thread seem to agree that's not CNN's actual intent. Unfortunately they worded it in such a way as to make it seem like that to anyone who is inclined to dislike CNN, which is a lot of people. It's not a good look for CNN, regardless of how dumb it actually is. They needed to word that differently to avoid allowing everyone with a grudge to immediately grab it and run the wrong way.
I put my CNN hate up against anyone on the forum. I consistently say they're more dangerous than Fox, after all. :P
But this story is ridiculous.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
I think everyone agrees that it is stupid for CNN to blackmail an internet troll. Most people in this thread seem to agree that's not CNN's actual intent. Unfortunately they worded it in such a way as to make it seem like that to anyone who is inclined to dislike CNN, which is a lot of people. It's not a good look for CNN, regardless of how dumb it actually is. They needed to word that differently to avoid allowing everyone with a grudge to immediately grab it and run the wrong way.
I put my CNN hate up against anyone on the forum. I consistently say they're more dangerous than Fox, after all. :P
But this story is ridiculous.
Ridiculous or not, it's an easy target for the right. An easy thing to call out and say to people "CNN is trying to blackmail this person because they disagree with CNN." People without the time or inclination to learn the nuance just see this statement CNN put out that comes off as pretty hostile. That's not good. Reddit is awash with this story right now for one, and there's a lot of people saying "not a trump supporter, but this isn't cool CNN" or the equivalent.
Which again gives the President a little more weight when he throws around "fake news" and talks about the tactics of the media.
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
I think everyone agrees that it is stupid for CNN to blackmail an internet troll. Most people in this thread seem to agree that's not CNN's actual intent. Unfortunately they worded it in such a way as to make it seem like that to anyone who is inclined to dislike CNN, which is a lot of people. It's not a good look for CNN, regardless of how dumb it actually is. They needed to word that differently to avoid allowing everyone with a grudge to immediately grab it and run the wrong way.
I am very tired of the left hemming and hawing over how people who are already predisposed to a position are going to dislike how something is phrased
Our side (the side that thinks we should have a free press in this country) has to be absolutely perfect and concerned over how trolls and bigots will interpret our phrasing and, meanwhile, they can openly celebrate a video of the media getting bodyslammed
I am fucking unapologetic about my desire for a free press, and if CNN is making the choice to refrain from publishing this guy's name unless he continues being a shitburger, then that's their prerogative as a member of said press
And I'm pretty much done hand-wringing over how those guys that are inclined to prefer having only national propaganda outlets feel about how CNN constructs sentences explaining the reasoning for their choices about how to exercise their First Amendment rights
From a perspective of "we can still win them over" it's a problem because it just sets up CNN as being even more an enemy, and doesn't particularly benefit CNN in any way. That's my issue with it. I think they could have handled it better without basically painting a target on themselves.
But in general joshofalltrades, I agree. I think maybe they should have just published the name instead of this weird statement.
The last sentence of the statement sounds to me like they are withholding the name out of respect for privacy unless this person's identity becomes specifically newsworthy. Which makes total sense. If he runs for Congress or something this will turn into a slam dunk piece of reporting. The statement is just poorly phrased and that makes it seem like CNN wants to play nanny to the Twittersphere which is clearly ridiculous given all other context.
That statement by CNN is basically "Nice identity, shame if something were to happen to it". The kind of thing we shit on Trump for all the time.
If any threat was unintentional, then CNN are imbeciles. It reads like a ransom note. They blew the chance to take the high road and come out smelling of roses.
It's really, really not. It's "we decided not to destroy this person's life by exposing them as someone who thinks genocide is hilarious."
It's excessively generous to the asshole.
Like watch this story:
KENOSHA, WISCONSIN - A man invited to speak at President Donald Trump's campaign rally in Kenosha said today that he media was controlled by Jews and that they should be thrown into gas ovens reminiscent of the Holocaust. He then compared the President to a wrestler body slamming CNN in an increasingly unhinged rant.
The man has since apologized stating that when he said those things he was angry and had become addicted to violent rhetoric and seeing what kind of approval he could get from the crowd. Now that he understands the pain his words caused he swears he will never say anything like that again and that everyone else should learn a lesson from his experience.
We have decided to grant the man anonymity out of respect for his apology, but if he appears at another rally saying similar things next time we'll tell you who the speaker was.
The White House had no comment on the man's remarks.
If you take out the internet, it becomes absurd and only the silliest of geese would protest.
1) Invited to speak at a Trump event and then saying those things
does not even come close to being the same thing as
2) Trump taking a shitpost and retweeting it without asking the guy's permission.
And only the silliest of geese would try to equate the two.
Maybe... but then he said this:
Holy s***!! I wake up and have my morning coffee and who retweets my s***post but the MAGA EMPORER himself!!! I am honored!!
Which makes me comfortable making the comparison.
He was honored his non-offensive shitpost got retweeted by Trump yes.
That said nothing about the entirety of his Reddit posting history.
Which again, why are we ok with a NEWS organization combing through anyone's internet history? I mean we all post on a site made by two dudes who "make rape jokes." Does that mean we should be held accountable for everything we've said on here in the off-chance a post of ours gets picked up by a public figure?
When the President tweets your content, your publicly accessible reddit profile isn't exactly a private thing.
If the President starts tweeting out far-left shitposts, I am totally not comfortable with NEWS organizations combing through their history and then using said history to doxx them so that they become a target for the alt-right.
Aside from this being an internet thing, this is absolutely no different from all the times that politicians utilize some random private citizen as a political prop for themselves.
Remember Joe the Plumber? Nobody had a problem publishing that guy's real name and shit. Now, in that case, Joe seized upon his fifteen minutes of fame and sank his teeth in, and maybe NaziMemester420 doesn't want to do that. Lots of times when private citizens get the Eye of Sauron of the political press on them, they don't want to do that. Happens all the time.
But somehow, because it's The Internet, it's different? Baloney.
Aside from this being an internet thing, this is absolutely no different from all the times that politicians utilize some random private citizen as a political prop for themselves.
Remember Joe the Plumber? Nobody had a problem publishing that guy's real name and shit. Now, in that case, Joe seized upon his fifteen minutes of fame and sank his teeth in, and maybe NaziMemester420 doesn't want to do that. Lots of times when private citizens get the Eye of Sauron of the political press on them, they don't want to do that. Happens all the time.
But somehow, because it's The Internet, it's different? Baloney.
We are done with this discussion about CNN's actions on this story now. It has run its course and spawned many off topic comments. This remains a thread where jumping in to shout your hate for certain news channels is not on topic.
If the President starts tweeting out far-left shitposts, I am totally not comfortable with NEWS organizations combing through their history and then using said history to doxx them so that they become a target for the alt-right.
So then we all agree it's for the best that CNN didn't release his name?
Hooray?
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
From a perspective of "we can still win them over" it's a problem because it just sets up CNN as being even more an enemy, and doesn't particularly benefit CNN in any way. That's my issue with it. I think they could have handled it better without basically painting a target on themselves.
But in general joshofalltrades, I agree. I think maybe they should have just published the name instead of this weird statement.
I'm not sure anyone who would be swayed by this can be won over.
I find it very difficult to see what CNN has to gain from holding something over the head of a random internet nazi troll. They're gonna blackmail him to stop making stupid memes? Just, to what end?
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
What they have to gain is a deterrent for future internet trolls to involve them in such memes. By making it clear that they have the means and the willingness to track down someone who makes such a post, and hold the possibility of an info leak over their heads, it potentially scares others away from doing the same.
What CNN's article says, quite explicitly, is that they could have released his information but they didn't because he apologized. If I'm an internet troll I read that as an unspoken warning that next time they might not be so generous. If the author of that article truly didn't intend it to be taken that way then it was incompetently written, and I don't know why it hasn't been updated by now.
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SurfpossumA nonentitytrying to preserve the anonymity he so richly deserves.Registered Userregular
That statement by CNN is basically "Nice identity, shame if something were to happen to it". The kind of thing we shit on Trump for all the time.
If any threat was unintentional, then CNN are imbeciles. It reads like a ransom note. They blew the chance to take the high road and come out smelling of roses.
It's really, really not. It's "we decided not to destroy this person's life by exposing them as someone who thinks genocide is hilarious."
It's excessively generous to the asshole.
Like watch this story:
KENOSHA, WISCONSIN - A man invited to speak at President Donald Trump's campaign rally in Kenosha said today that he media was controlled by Jews and that they should be thrown into gas ovens reminiscent of the Holocaust. He then compared the President to a wrestler body slamming CNN in an increasingly unhinged rant.
The man has since apologized stating that when he said those things he was angry and had become addicted to violent rhetoric and seeing what kind of approval he could get from the crowd. Now that he understands the pain his words caused he swears he will never say anything like that again and that everyone else should learn a lesson from his experience.
We have decided to grant the man anonymity out of respect for his apology, but if he appears at another rally saying similar things next time we'll tell you who the speaker was.
The White House had no comment on the man's remarks.
If you take out the internet, it becomes absurd and only the silliest of geese would protest.
1) Invited to speak at a Trump event and then saying those things
does not even come close to being the same thing as
2) Trump taking a shitpost and retweeting it without asking the guy's permission.
And only the silliest of geese would try to equate the two.
Maybe... but then he said this:
Holy s***!! I wake up and have my morning coffee and who retweets my s***post but the MAGA EMPORER himself!!! I am honored!!
Which makes me comfortable making the comparison.
He was honored his non-offensive shitpost got retweeted by Trump yes.
That said nothing about the entirety of his Reddit posting history.
Which again, why are we ok with a NEWS organization combing through anyone's internet history? I mean we all post on a site made by two dudes who "make rape jokes." Does that mean we should be held accountable for everything we've said on here in the off-chance a post of ours gets picked up by a public figure?
When the President tweets your content, your publicly accessible reddit profile isn't exactly a private thing.
If the President starts tweeting out far-left shitposts, I am totally not comfortable with NEWS organizations combing through their history and then using said history to doxx them so that they become a target for the alt-right.
I genuinely feel like Mugatu and his crazy pills
This whole thing is about CNN not even naming the guy, let alone doxxing him.
The inference some are making that the reason they did NOT do that is to coerce the guy into apologizing and behave differently is ludicrous to me.
It's a few steps along the path of global Illuminati media conspiracy.
Aside from this being an internet thing, this is absolutely no different from all the times that politicians utilize some random private citizen as a political prop for themselves.
Remember Joe the Plumber? Nobody had a problem publishing that guy's real name and shit. Now, in that case, Joe seized upon his fifteen minutes of fame and sank his teeth in, and maybe NaziMemester420 doesn't want to do that. Lots of times when private citizens get the Eye of Sauron of the political press on them, they don't want to do that. Happens all the time.
But somehow, because it's The Internet, it's different? Baloney.
That's my read on it.
CNN went in expecting a guy who was going to tell them off, be vile and go MAGA all over them.
Instead they got a guy who it sounds like wants nothing to do with this and is terrified.
Then they had to decide how to handle that.
I also fully expect that they're staying in touch with him and hoping he keeps talking about what kind of stuff gets shared and the culture there. My parents don't even know what reddit is. The value of an in depth piece on how it all works and what happens and organized attacks on journalists with an exclusive interview from the guy the president retweeted is a pretty big get.
It will have more people screaming coercion but those screaming made up their minds already.
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But if Trump does, welp.
Did we say those things? No, we did not. That would be like holding this dude accountable for everything Steve Huffman ever said.
I think the mainstreaming by this President of violent hate speech is a huge story and in the public interest. Major trends are often reported using individual examples, like the guy the Times keeps interviewing to see if the right has turned on Trump yet rather than exclusively relying on polling data. This guy got into the public eye when the President irresponsibly retweeted him.
Also that shitpost was offensive (against the First Amendment), for the record.
Publishing newsworthy events (which the creation of a meme advocating violence against the media that was co-opted by the President of the United States most assuredly is) falls right under the freedom of the press
Reporting the facts is not in any way analogous to doxxing
One of those things is accurately reporting the 5 W's of a story -- "Who" being the salient W here
The other is publishing as much damaging information on a person as you possibly can, including things like address, phone number, social security number, etc.
It is meant to encourage hostile, bullying action towards an individual (and in some cases has led to suicides), and in many cases is accompanied by, "Here's X person's information, now go make their life a living hell"
Whereas reporting is meant to inform the public
Unless you feel like the media can't report on anything bad anyone ever does because they might be embarrassed, you should be able to recognize the major differences between these actions, the intent behind them, and the methods that go into their implementation
It isn't like CNN went all CSI on Reddit, the guy's profile was practically three or four clicks away from his real identity
The expectation of privacy on the Internet is far beyond the scope of this thread but the takeaway here is if you want to be anonymous, it's not exactly good OPSEC practices to attach your Facebook profile to your Reddit username
tl;dr: Never post anything on the Internet you would be uncomfortable saying openly to real people
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CNN outing him or not isn't the issue. Their statement declaring his repentance acceptable and so they won't publish so long as he's good is an entirely different thing and not grounded in journalistic ethics at all.
It's probably unethical to threaten him but CNN has a legitimate "we were stupid and explained why we aren't IDing him in a bad way" defense.
Why?
What is in any way activist about it?
The ethical dilemma CNN faced when they learned his identity was - what good comes from telling the world who this horrible guy is? Does it make it a better story? Does it add anything to the context of his comments? Does it help convey the facts better?
And the answer to all the above is no.
Journalism isn't black and white. You wield immense power when you report on anything. When you tell the world something, entire lives, families and communities change. You can bring down governments.
So when you are faced with something like this, you have to decide. In my journalism ethics class we did an exercise debating about suicide. Do you report on a suicide? If it's a lone adult? What if it's the son of someone famous? What if it caused an even bigger accident somehow? You have to balance informing people what's going on in the world with just being a decent human being and not putting people like family members, who did nothing wrong, through pain and suffering for no reason.
How does having a name change anything about this story?
Yeah I think it's important to remember here that news organizations and journalists frequently do make agreements to not reveal names. Which can potentially provide ground for legal action if broken, and would certainly cause a pr disaster. What they did here is simply choose to not publish relevantish information for good reasons.
"reserve the right" just means "hey we didn't agree to shit"
CNN is well within their rights to publish his name regardless of whether he has offered up a mea culpa or not
I read that line as them being gracious and giving him the benefit of the doubt, but if he pops up elsewhere advocating violence towards the media there will be no reason for them to keep his name out of the story anymore
I think the fact that this guy was inciting violence against CNN is getting forgotten in the hubbub here
If somebody threatened me with physical violence I would probably out them immediately, so as far as I'm concerned CNN went above and beyond here
Especially if those factors really did make the actual human beings writing the story and making the decision feel more sympathetic to not publishing the guy's name?
How is the poster's real name relevant to the public? Would that actually improve the story or is it just encouraging people to harass them? A name can often be enough to get an address, phone number, etc.
The story surely should be focused on the president's actions, no? He is the newsworthy individual here
This is all moot because they didn't post his name in the piece
This is some really absurd logic. They clarified that they agreed to not publish his name now based off his pleas but reserve the right to do so if it becomes relevant in any way. Which it might, because he's an adult who behaved as a hateful little shit-stain in such a way that it pleased the President.
It's. It's just not a threat. It's bad writing at the absolute worst. Why make discrediting CNN any easier? The right-wing is doing an admirable job, and CNN is no slouch at embarrassing themselves either, but not because of this, and less so recently than in the (fairly recent) past.
What is the logic that would drive CNN to do this? They extort random trolls now? They get him to wash all their news vans for free forever?
Sorry but when the POTUS uses something anti-1st Amendment you made you are suddenly thrust into the national spotlight
If that thought scares you maybe don't be so publicly anti-1st Amendment?
This is the price we pay for having a free press and a free exchange of ideas
Free speech does not mean freedom from consequences of speech
Also, the private citizen thing is the biggest deal. Almost all racist assholes get exposed by trying to get bigger, run for office or live a public life and this stuff comes up. This guy literally did none of that.
Journalism is facing some really weird challenges.
Unlike, say, a politician making veiled threats to stop legal proceedings against him and his friends.
So it's a little ridiculous to see outrage and claims that this was DEFINITELY a threat from certain circles. I can see how it could be perceived as a threat because there's a huge power imbalance between the two, but CNN deserves the benefit of the doubt since they do not have even the glimmer of a pattern of doing this.
When the President tweets your content, your publicly accessible reddit profile isn't exactly a private thing.
But it's not!
That isn't what happened!
And if it did happen, there would be nothing wrong with that!
I think everyone agrees that it is stupid for CNN to blackmail an internet troll. Most people in this thread seem to agree that's not CNN's actual intent. Unfortunately they worded it in such a way as to make it seem like that to anyone who is inclined to dislike CNN, which is a lot of people. It's not a good look for CNN, regardless of how dumb it actually is. They needed to word that differently to avoid allowing everyone with a grudge to immediately grab it and run the wrong way.
True, but they're a television network.
They're not just going to say his name without putting up his Facebook photo.
I was making a leap to prove a point, but I don't think it's that big of a leap.
"we don't publish names" is also a moral stance. Journalists make ethical decisions all the time. The decision whether or not to publish a name is one of the most frequent ethical questions a journalist encounters.
I put my CNN hate up against anyone on the forum. I consistently say they're more dangerous than Fox, after all. :P
But this story is ridiculous.
Ridiculous or not, it's an easy target for the right. An easy thing to call out and say to people "CNN is trying to blackmail this person because they disagree with CNN." People without the time or inclination to learn the nuance just see this statement CNN put out that comes off as pretty hostile. That's not good. Reddit is awash with this story right now for one, and there's a lot of people saying "not a trump supporter, but this isn't cool CNN" or the equivalent.
Which again gives the President a little more weight when he throws around "fake news" and talks about the tactics of the media.
I am very tired of the left hemming and hawing over how people who are already predisposed to a position are going to dislike how something is phrased
Our side (the side that thinks we should have a free press in this country) has to be absolutely perfect and concerned over how trolls and bigots will interpret our phrasing and, meanwhile, they can openly celebrate a video of the media getting bodyslammed
I am fucking unapologetic about my desire for a free press, and if CNN is making the choice to refrain from publishing this guy's name unless he continues being a shitburger, then that's their prerogative as a member of said press
And I'm pretty much done hand-wringing over how those guys that are inclined to prefer having only national propaganda outlets feel about how CNN constructs sentences explaining the reasoning for their choices about how to exercise their First Amendment rights
But in general joshofalltrades, I agree. I think maybe they should have just published the name instead of this weird statement.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
If the President starts tweeting out far-left shitposts, I am totally not comfortable with NEWS organizations combing through their history and then using said history to doxx them so that they become a target for the alt-right.
Remember Joe the Plumber? Nobody had a problem publishing that guy's real name and shit. Now, in that case, Joe seized upon his fifteen minutes of fame and sank his teeth in, and maybe NaziMemester420 doesn't want to do that. Lots of times when private citizens get the Eye of Sauron of the political press on them, they don't want to do that. Happens all the time.
But somehow, because it's The Internet, it's different? Baloney.
So then we all agree it's for the best that CNN didn't release his name?
Hooray?
What they have to gain is a deterrent for future internet trolls to involve them in such memes. By making it clear that they have the means and the willingness to track down someone who makes such a post, and hold the possibility of an info leak over their heads, it potentially scares others away from doing the same.
What CNN's article says, quite explicitly, is that they could have released his information but they didn't because he apologized. If I'm an internet troll I read that as an unspoken warning that next time they might not be so generous. If the author of that article truly didn't intend it to be taken that way then it was incompetently written, and I don't know why it hasn't been updated by now.
This whole thing is about CNN not even naming the guy, let alone doxxing him.
The inference some are making that the reason they did NOT do that is to coerce the guy into apologizing and behave differently is ludicrous to me.
It's a few steps along the path of global Illuminati media conspiracy.
That's my read on it.
CNN went in expecting a guy who was going to tell them off, be vile and go MAGA all over them.
Instead they got a guy who it sounds like wants nothing to do with this and is terrified.
Then they had to decide how to handle that.
I also fully expect that they're staying in touch with him and hoping he keeps talking about what kind of stuff gets shared and the culture there. My parents don't even know what reddit is. The value of an in depth piece on how it all works and what happens and organized attacks on journalists with an exclusive interview from the guy the president retweeted is a pretty big get.
It will have more people screaming coercion but those screaming made up their minds already.