Sacha Baron Cohen: Facebook Would Have Let Hitler Buy Ads For 'Final Solution'

[appalachiablue]

Source: The Guardian

Nov. 22, 2019, 11:02 EST, Andrew Pulver. In wide-ranging speech, actor accuses tech giants of running the ‘greatest propaganda machine in history.’ Sacha Baron Cohen has denounced tech giants Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google as “the greatest propaganda machine in history” and culpable for a surge in “murderous attacks on religious and ethnic minorities”.

Baron Cohen was speaking on Thursday at Never Is Now, the Anti-Defamation League’s summit on antisemitism and hate in New York, where he was presented with the organisation’s international leadership award. He said that “hate crimes are surging, as are murderous attacks on religious and ethnic minorities” and that “all this hate and violence is being facilitated by a handful of internet companies that amount to the greatest propaganda machine in history”.

He added: “The algorithms these platforms depend on deliberately amplify the type of content that keeps users engaged – stories that appeal to our baser instincts and that trigger outrage and fear. It’s why YouTube recommended videos by the conspiracist Alex Jones billions of times. It’s why fake news outperforms real news, because studies show that lies spread faster than truth … As one headline put it, just think what Goebbels could have done with Facebook.”

“If you pay them, Facebook will run any ‘political’ ad you want, even if it’s a lie,” he said. “And they’ll even help you micro-target those lies to their users for maximum effect. Under this twisted logic, if Facebook were around in the 1930s, it would have allowed Hitler to post 30-second ads on his ‘solution’ to the ‘Jewish problem’.”...

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/nov/22/sacha-baron-cohen-facebook-would-have-sold-final-solution-ads-to-hitler

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Baron Cohen challenged Zuckerberg’s defence of Facebook as a bastion of “free expression”: “I think we could all agree that we should not be giving bigots and paedophiles a free platform to amplify their views and target their victims.”

He also blasted Facebook’s decision not to remove Holocaust deniers, stating: “We have millions of pieces of evidence for the Holocaust – it is an historical fact. And denying it is not some random opinion. Those who deny the Holocaust aim to encourage another one.”

As well, Baron Cohen demanded that internet companies be held responsible for their content. “It’s time to finally call these companies what they really are – the largest publishers in history. And here’s an idea for them: abide by basic standards and practices just like newspapers, magazines and TV news do every day.”

- 'Never Is Now,' the Anti-Defamation League’s/ADL summit on antisemitism and hate in New York, where Sacha Baron Cohen was presented with the organisation’s international leadership award 2019. The actor accused tech giants, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google, of running the "greatest propaganda machine in history."

- "Neil Young Quits Facebook In Response To 'False Information Given To Public": Company’s sponsorship of Federalist Society gala prompts action from singer who says site ‘confuses readers regarding truthfulness’
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/nov/22/neil-young-facebook-account-federalist-society

[Beakybird]

1. Cohen is so cogent. Just genius!

[tblue37]

4. It runs in his family. His uncle is Simon Baron-Cohen, the psychiatrist who devised the

concept of mind-blindness.

[appalachiablue]

16. I've heard of his uncle and and mind blindness. Sacha is certainly

gifted with brains and talent and his speech rocked it out of the park. Comedian John Oliver and he are alumni of Christ's College, University of Cambridge like historian Simon Schama, Darwin, John Milton and many others. I had the good fortune to attend Christ's for a semester, it's a wonderful environment.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ%27s_College,_Cambridge

[empedocles]

8. Great, 'cogent', soundbite

[littlemissmartypants]

14. I like your sig line. nt

[empedocles]

15. Thank you. Have long tried to learn from classical Greeks and Romans.

[Igel]

25. Under Hitler, they'd have had no choice.

Now, running ads for freedom of speech or equal rights for gays, that would have been banned by the Nazis.

Cohen could have easily said that Facebook would have allowed for ads by Lenin calling for collectivization of land ownership and power to the workers. (Of course, under the tsars that speech would have also been banned.)

[Coventina]

2. He's exactly right. n/t

[tblue37]

3. K&R for visibility. nt

[Docreed2003]

5. K&R

[Moe Joe MoFo]

6. I'm not even a fan of SBG, but AMEN

Fuck Zuck!

[Pachamama]

7. The scary thing is: He is right. And Zuckerberg & Sandberg would have been the good Kapo's

Sacha Baron Cohen is calling out the truth and I hope people are listening.

I have quit Facebook and refuse to participate in anything so toxic and destructive to our democracy.

[bucolic_frolic]

9. Exactly. Imagination trumps reality, emotion exceeds logic

That's what Fake News, Trump, Facebook, YouTube are all about.

It's why the Impeachment case, which would send any criminal to jail for decades in a conventional courtroom, is a roll of the dice in the Senate. Republicans are creating an imaginary, conspiratorial case against the Rule of Law folks, the defenders of Democracy

[IronLionZion]

10. Nazis did buy ads in US publications

and worked with several US businesses and politicians to influence policy. They would have liked the US to stay out of the war.

Nazis also spread a lot of fake news and propaganda.

[The Mouth]

13. Including a member of the Bush crime family

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar

[Hekate]

11. Kudos

[2naSalit]

12. K&R!!!

[erronis]

17. Rare that I will listen to a 20 minute monologue but this was mesmerizing. Thx!

[appalachiablue]

18. Same, what a blistering, righteous rant!

[Johnny2X2X]

19. Zuckerberg is evil

He’s everything wrong with our world. Greed and power is all he cares about and he deserves to rot in hell.

[gordianot]

20. I would like to see news sourced as State Sponsored News.

State sponsored news such as Fox and RT is the real culprit.

[The Wizard]

21. brilliant (NT)

[BootinUp]

22. Couldn't agree more. Hate and fear are

Out of control.

[Initech]

23. Well he's definitely not wrong!

[Skittles]

24. he is ABSOLUTELY CORRECT

yes INDEED

[BeyondGeography]

26. Hate, lies and conspiracies

Humans aren’t built to withstand overexposure to the programmed sewer that is social media. Government must act. But first government must be strong and we live in an age of weakened government. Until we produce our own Reagan who turns “government is the problem” into “government is the solution,” we will be at the mercy of the private sector and outcomes such as unrestrained social media.

[mr_lebowski]

27. There's something of a chicken and egg problem with the thrust of the argument against 'algorithms'

I'm not saying I don't agree with many points being made, but these algorithms aren't really working in the nefarious way some are imagining ...

They end up working the way that they do BECAUSE we have these base instincts and fears as humans ... not the other way around.

Just sayin'.

[LiberalLovinLug]

28. Kick and f'n Rec

Unfortunately if there was any country in history that would be the most susceptible to these algorithms being used to spew out fake news its the US. What most around the world, including Canadians like me, admire in Americans is that can-do attitude, which comes with a high sense of self reliance and self policing. And with that a free and open attitude towards "freedom of expression". But add to that a growing bias against the official MSM news. (Created in part by the MSM news itself with their overt pandering to both sides and never going out on a limb to call out liars. IMO the reason the MSM news is so mistrusted in poll numbers is because they have disappointed both the right and the left) and people are primed to accept "facts" they want to hear. And to go back to the places where those compatible stories are dished out to them relentlessly. Kind of why I go to DU every day, if I'm honest.

And its fine in that regard. I actually have embraced having a YouTube account for instance. If I like ballet, pro Democratic politics, and hot food reactions for instance, I will get suggestions when new pertinent videos are posted. I appreciate getting the TYT videos right away.

But I think the FaceBook ad policy is very different. Its one thing to have your own interests facilitated and focused for you, its another thing to be subjected to unmoderated bullshit meant to fool gullible fools that only hear the lies, and then go out and vote based on those fake ads. And with the potential of harming the very democracy that Facebook used the freedoms for to get where they are. Zuckerberg is the new Benedict Arnold.

[Raster]

29. Farcebook* and Zuckerfuck* are not our friends...

...and certainly not good corporate citizens.