Taking the knee

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Should football continue to take the knee?

  • Yes

  • No


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I suppose once you start bringing in te technology to stop racial abuse, the question I would ask is why stop just at racial abuse?

Comments such as spastic, mong, ****, etc are also offensive, should Comm get banned next time he asks @BobbyD about his 'chinky' - I've even been told on this forum to go kill myself. Hence the problem being, there are many forms of offensive language aside from racism. If restrictions were brought in, the site owner might eventually have to bin a lot of content in GC. We seem to look at this from a tunnel vision of racism, but social media monitoring would surely have to go beyond that, if people demand measures are brought in. What we might deem as non offensive, the powers that be, may decide otherwise, so at what point does it encroach on freedom of speech. That's not saying racism shouldn't be stamped out, it's just I can't see it stopping at just that, once the cyber police are allowed to monitor our interactions.
 
I suppose once you start bringing in te technology to stop racial abuse, the question I would ask is why stop just at racial abuse?

Comments such as spastic, mong, ****, etc are also offensive, should Comm get banned next time he asks @BobbyD about his 'chinky' - I've even been told on this forum to go kill myself. Hence the problem being, there are many forms of offensive language aside from racism. If restrictions were brought in, the site owner might eventually have to bin a lot of content in GC. We seem to look at this from a tunnel vision of racism, but social media monitoring would surely have to go beyond that, if people demand measures are brought in. What we might deem as non offensive, the powers that be, may decide otherwise, so at what point does it encroach on freedom of speech. That's not saying racism shouldn't be stamped out, it's just I can't see it stopping at just that, once the cyber police are allowed to monitor our interactions.

Good point.

There are though some fairly well defined parameters of hate speech as defined in law.

So I would just apply that measure, otherwise as you say, you’d open a can of worms about what is considered to be ‘offensive’
 
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Good point.

There are though some fairly well defined parameters of hate speech as defined in law.

So I would just apply that measure, otherwise as you say, you’d open a can of worms about what is considered to be ‘offensive’

Tongue in cheek, it's a bit like everyone screaming for VAR...we get VAR, now everyone's moaning about the dickheads running it. <laugh>

One rule will always lead to another.
 
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Good point.

There are though some fairly well defined parameters of hate speech as defined in law.

So I would just apply that measure, otherwise as you say, you’d open a can of worms about what is considered to be ‘offensive’

I’m proud you’ve turned your back on your white supremacist past <3
 
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Tongue in cheek, it's a bit like everyone screaming for VAR...we get VAR, now everyone's moaning about the dickheads running it. <laugh>

One rule will always lead to another.

VAR should be added to the hate speech list.

Any mention of it should be a mandatory 3 year custodial sentence
 
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VAR should be added to the hate speech list.

Any mention of it should be a mandatory 3 year custodial sentence

Calling someone a fat scottish ****er is defined as racist, but my club manager use to get called it all the time. <laugh>
 
I suppose once you start bringing in te technology to stop racial abuse, the question I would ask is why stop just at racial abuse?

Comments such as spastic, mong, ****, etc are also offensive, should Comm get banned next time he asks @BobbyD about his 'chinky' - I've even been told on this forum to go kill myself. Hence the problem being, there are many forms of offensive language aside from racism. If restrictions were brought in, the site owner might eventually have to bin a lot of content in GC. We seem to look at this from a tunnel vision of racism, but social media monitoring would surely have to go beyond that, if people demand measures are brought in. What we might deem as non offensive, the powers that be, may decide otherwise, so at what point does it encroach on freedom of speech. That's not saying racism shouldn't be stamped out, it's just I can't see it stopping at just that, once the cyber police are allowed to monitor our interactions.

The problem with the huge platforms managing the issue of all kinds of abuse is that it has to be done via algorithm & AI simply due to the numbers involved. The issue with algorithms is that they don’t do nuance.

Dealing with racial or any other form of direct abuse should be relatively easy for them to manage. The issue at the minute is that they’re way too slow to react to reports and it’s also far too easy to create new accounts without any form of verification. As you said earlier they could solve that easily, they’re just choosing not to.

The freedom of speech angle is far more difficult, but I suppose ultimately it comes down to the difference between demonstrable fact and misguided ‘beliefs’. For example, holocaust deniers, should someone who posts on social media that they deny the holocaust happened, have those views censured? My view would be yes, as they’re denying reality and so spreading misinformation. Others would argue that to silence them would be a denial of free speech. Pick the bones out of that one.....my view is that when it comes to freedom of speech that’s a societal issue, and we shouldn’t expect SM platforms to make those calls, unless they choose to, which of course is their complete prerogative.
 
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@Libby should be banned from creating polls, I can't see who voted.

Ha, normally something I moan about but have done purposely, as thought it might bring better numbers with an emotive subject.
 
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Racism is conditioned into people and it can’t just be switched off, especially by kneeling down. This is a generational thing imo. Certain cultures are way behind others, so I’d expect places in Eastern Europe to be well behind forward thinking countries.

The U.K. won’t evolve the right way either, our woke ******s seem to have gone too far the other way, with radicals looking for racism where it doesn’t exist, digging up graves and stuff, meanwhile the actual racists are hiding in plain sight, keeping shtum until they’re in a comfortable environment.

What the celebs are doing is maybe accelerating the process of eradicating it, but I doubt it’s going away anytime soon, especially since it’s primarily focussed on black folk. From where I’m sat the minorities taking the most heat in this country are Asian/Arab.