Technology

Most of this entire report is patently ridiculous. They asked people who follow HRW’s social media to please send them instances of censorship on social media, get about 1,500 random examples from a self-selecting population, then publish a big expose about it.

There’s no intensive comparative analysis (statistical or otherwise) to other topics discussed, other viewpoints discussed, or at other times in the past. They allege, for example, that some people didn’t have an option to request a review of the takedown- is that standard policy? Does it happen in other cases? Is it a bug? They don’t seem to want to look into it further, they just allude to some sense of nebulous wrongdoing then move on to the next assertion. Rinse and repeat.

The one part of the report actually grounded in reality (and a discussion that should be had) is how to handle content that runs afoul of standards against positive portrayal of terrorist organizations with political wings like the PFLP and Hamas. It’s an interesting challenge on where to draw the line on what to allow- but cherry picking a couple thousand taken down posts doesn’t make that discussion any more productive in any way.