Let's have a talk about social media platform censorship. Tiktok and YouTube members who self censor common words like death or rape in legitimate conversations about the topics are learning to temper their language or face consequences. Unimportant consequences.

It may seem small by comparison, but if you condition it at a low level, each step beyond is easy to swallow. Spread it out over an entire population, and you see huge results.

[–] pfaca@lemm.ee 25 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

You just described Newspeak (Nineteen Eighty-Four novel):

Newspeak, which is a controlled language of simplified grammar and limited vocabulary designed to limit a person's ability for critical thinking. The Newspeak language thus limits the person's ability to articulate and communicate abstract concepts, such as personal identity, self-expression, and free will,[1][2] which are thoughtcrimes, acts of personal independence that contradict the ideological orthodoxy of Ingsoc collectivism.[3][4]

Source

[–] Saledovil@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 month ago (2 children)

It's a lot more banal, though. Youtube has to sell advertising, and advertisers don't want to be next to discussions of rape or suicide. These restrictions are enforced algorithmically, hence the self-censorship. And in any case, it doesn't achieve the objective of newspeak, as those concepts are still being discussed.

[–] pfaca@lemm.ee 7 points 1 month ago

And in any case, it doesn't achieve the objective of newspeak, as those concepts are still being discussed.

Yet.

But I get what you are saying. I just find the similarities, although banal, kind of funny. In a scary kind of way.

[–] DogWater@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago

I don't think it's right to divorce the censorship from the result just because the justification is different.

What I mean is that even though that conditioning is taking place for a banal reason it's still true that it's conditioning and will affect the acceptance of moves like this debate fact checking decision that are serious and do have consequences. So therefore it still matters and is still dangerous.

[–] Orbituary@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

I did pick up what Orwell was putting down. It's definitely helped shaped my view of the world.

[–] amio@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Newspeak was an intentional in-universe conlang designed and handed down by Ingsoc based on "how you speak affects how you think" (which is a hypothesis that has... some kind of name). This is a bunch of people trivially avoiding automated filtering like it's been done since the first puritan implemented the first world filter.

One of the main differences is that self-censoring seggs and raep and ahh-es or whatever still leaves it plenty obvious what you mean, it just outs you as a Tiktok user. Conceptually word filters are a blacklist whereas Newspeak was intended to be a whitelist with the restrictiveness that entails.

[–] seaweedsheep@literature.cafe 2 points 1 month ago

The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis or linguistic relativity, just in case that was bothering you.

[–] jaybone@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Is this why I see totally unnecessary self censorship for words like “r*cism”? Even here on Lemmy. I assume some of this originated on Twitter, where people abuse the reporting system as a form of retaliation.

[–] Orbituary@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

Yes. It's so absurd.