Germany Is Using AI to Erase Pro-Palestinian Speech (jacobin.com)
from chobeat@lemmy.ml to technology@lemmy.world on 31 May 14:35
https://lemmy.ml/post/30947950

#technology

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FireWire400@lemmy.world on 31 May 15:01 next collapse

Nice. Real fucking nice.

andrewrgross@slrpnk.net on 31 May 16:08 collapse

This headline reads like 2025 news Mad-Libs:

“[Proper noun] is using [Latest fad] to [Verb] [Ideological alignment adjective] [Conceptual noun]”

Try it:

“OpenAI is using Hydroflasks to destroy Catholic exceptionalism”

“Mark Cuban is using cryptocurrency to monetize white supremacist hope”

Good times./s

OrteilGenou@lemmy.world on 31 May 18:19 collapse

Append a “Here’s how” on those suckers and suddenly you’re back in the 2020s

GnuLinuxDude@lemmy.ml on 31 May 18:23 collapse

damn the 2020s felt like decades ago 😥

Alistaire@sopuli.xyz on 31 May 15:54 next collapse

Kind of good, it’s just bots spamming same shit everywhere, and asking for donations who knows for what

[deleted] on 31 May 16:31 next collapse

.

Octagon9561@lemmy.ml on 31 May 19:09 next collapse

Nazi Germany turned itself into Zionazi Germany, how original

idriss@lemm.ee on 01 Jun 06:08 collapse

Germany never misses a chance when it comes to being on the wrong side of history.

Mrkawfee@lemmy.world on 31 May 21:06 next collapse

Fuck Germany.

KumaSudosa@feddit.dk on 01 Jun 06:13 collapse

Just to be clear though, it’s not a state programme. But fuck Germany’s stance on Israel for sure…

Buffalox@lemmy.world on 31 May 21:27 next collapse

I’m pretty sure this article is one big lie,

the school soon faced political pressure from Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor

This sounds like complete bullshit, the Israeli ambassador has zero power over a school, and outside interference would be regarded as intolerable.

and Berlin’s conservative mayor Kai Wegner, who demanded that its leadership “cancel the event

This does not sound right at all, this would be a major attack on freedom of speech, which is protected in Germany not only by German law but also by EU requirement to observe human rights.

The university then did call off the talk, vaguely citing “security concerns.”

There is no way a school would just give in to such obviously illegal pressure. If true this would be a huge scandal in Germany.

Yet many people here seem to swallow the story with zero critical thinking. 🙄

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 31 May 21:59 collapse

You might have missed a lot of news about Germany. They passed a new law that suspends freedom of speech when it’s against Israel. www.dw.com/en/…/a-70715643

There has been plenty of extra-judicial retaliation, i.e. against Francesca Albanese or Oyoun, and we got close to having 4 cases of extra-judicial extradictions without an accusation against pro-Palestine protesters, which a judge eventually blocked.

Buffalox@lemmy.world on 31 May 22:07 next collapse

I admit that is very bad, but I doubt you can’t criticize Israels war crimes and oppression and illegal settlements in Gaza.

IndustryStandard@lemmy.world on 31 May 22:13 next collapse

www.npr.org/…/germany-deportation-protesters

Buffalox@lemmy.world on 31 May 22:27 collapse

“masked individuals” entered a university building and caused "property damage

www.washingtonpost.com/…/eu-israel-gaza-war/

BRUSSELS — A rare rebuke of Israel by Germany this week underscored Europe’s growing willingness to pressure the Netanyahu government over its siege and bombardment of the Gaza Strip, which is testing the tolerance of some of Israel’s staunchest allies.

www.dw.com/en/…/a-72691002

Germany’s tone with Israel is getting harsher

Obviously it’s not illegal to criticize Israel.

IndustryStandard@lemmy.world on 31 May 23:21 collapse

Did these people cause the damages or are you making things up?

IndustryStandard@lemmy.world on 31 May 23:21 next collapse

Hint: it is the second

Buffalox@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 07:16 collapse

I’m quoting from the article.

IndustryStandard@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 07:37 collapse

It impliws these people who did not cause the damages caused them. Media ambiguously implies that Zionists were right as usual by inserting irrelevant quotes.

Alsof “changed tone” like Angry Joe?

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 31 May 22:43 next collapse

Many of my direct friends lost their job for doing it. Look up “exposing Zalando”.

Here in Berlin it’s a regular occurrence that any exhibition, cultural or political event criticizing Israel receives at the very list a threatening call and a visit from the police. Sometimes it escalates into vandalism or violence, sometimes with getting raided by the police, sometimes with defunding if it’s a public thing.

If they silenced Albanese and banned Varoufakis, they can silence anybody.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 13:22 collapse

You can’t critisize the ideology that caused the conflict, you can’t promote boycotting, you can’t acknowledge thr colonized right to armed resistance

EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com on 01 Jun 07:49 next collapse

Israel lost the PR war. Everyone needs to just accept this and just move the fuck on rather than continuing to dig in their heels. Defending genocide and trying to suppress opposition is a really bad look.

barsoap@lemm.ee on 01 Jun 08:10 collapse

They passed a new law that suspends freedom of speech when it’s against Israel

You might have missed in your study of law and the news that what passed is not a law, but merely a resolution. It’s the equivalent of a press release.

extra-judicial extradictions without an accusation against pro-Palestine protesters, which a judge eventually blocked.

So it wasn’t extra-judicial.

I’d be much more inclined to listen to you if you didn’t make such glaring mistakes.

Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 31 May 22:12 next collapse

Well, I for one did nazi that coming…

unskilled5117@feddit.org on 01 Jun 05:52 next collapse

This is a clickbait headline. The headline implies that the German State is using AI to censor. It is not! While there might be a lot to criticize the German State/Goverment for, this is not it.

It is a different actor developing a model, not the state. One can rightly criticize that, but that is definitely protected under scientific freedom.

[…] the Decoding Antisemitism project at the Center for Research on Antisemitism at the Technical University Berlin […]. With the help of a large language computing model, the project aims to create “an [AI] algorithm that will automatically recognize antisemitic statements in web comments . . . so that antisemitic posts can be removed more efficiently and accurately” by online platforms.

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 01 Jun 07:21 next collapse

The word “state” doesn’t appear a single time in reference to Germany in the whole article. Germany, despite their pervasive state-oriented mentality, is not just its state. It’s the society, the people and other institutions.

Also TU is a public university, so it’s still an emanation of the state, state-funded and state-controlled.

PapstJL4U@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 07:30 next collapse

Why do you want to be evem more wrong? Neither the state nor the collective of German people do want the headline implies. It’s a group of people doing it under the <freedom> of science concept. People are to US-triggered and believe every state does day2day politics like Trump.

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 01 Jun 07:41 collapse

I live in Germany and I’m not from the USA. It has nothing to do with the USA. Many Germans do want this genocide to happen and they still defend it. It’s a daily lived experience, it has nothing to do with online discussions, let alone with Americans. Germany doesn’t have the same concept of military-industrial complex like the USA (even though they might have started rebuilding it recently), but universities do research to enable genocide, like many universities around the world.

I’m Italian, and Leonardo does the same with universities in Italy, using young naive researchers to build weapons used in Palestine or by other undemocratic governments throughout the world.

I don’t get what’s so weird to you: universities have alwasy been complicit of horrible stuff.

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jun 08:07 collapse

Then edit the title (yes you can do that here) to reflect that. Mention the TU and point them out in particular

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jun 08:05 next collapse

Mentioning a country by the name implies it’s the government doing it.
Else you need to name the individual/organization that does it.

How would you feel if I said “[Insert OP’s first name] murders childrens and fucks their bodies” while being in your hometown?
Same energy.

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 01 Jun 08:54 collapse

The outcome is responsibility of the whole environment. This project didn’t come out of nowhere.

It’s not just who’s doing but who allowed it. If somebody murdered children in my hometown I would hold social services and mental health services responsible for that.

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jun 09:27 collapse

In that case it should (IMO) be “A government backed project at the TU is using AI to erase/eliminate/minimize Pro-Palestinian Speech”.

Now this is obviously not as catchy but you get my drift. Accuracy vs Inflammatory/opinion/sentiment steering.

And especially on Lemmy I dislike outside influence on my opinion and wish for a neutral stance.

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 01 Jun 09:51 collapse

Your opinions are all influenced by the outside. The distinction is just between influences you ignore/accept and influences you reject. We are not born with opinions.

Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jun 15:56 collapse

You are completely missing the point.
Obviously opinions are influenced by your environment.
The difference is if you tell me about a thing that happened and I can form my own opinion on the topic or if you want me to feel a certain way about a thing that happened and thus steering my sentiment.

One is neutral. The second is obviously not.

chobeat@lemmy.ml on 01 Jun 16:02 collapse

that’s not how information and journalism works, but ok bro, keep believing in “objectivity” lol

unskilled5117@feddit.org on 01 Jun 12:03 next collapse

Oh come on, just accept that the wording of the headline is wrong and misleading.

If a Country is named in the headline like this, it is always implied to be the state/government. No other interpretation makes sense, the society is surely not using ai to censor.

Even if we consider that not to be the case, just for the sake of the argument, you still can not say “a few people at this project” = “Germany (Society)”. I heavily caution you to not go down the generalization route of “a select group” = “german society”. You ought to think about what that assertion would mean in the context of hamas and palastinians.

Also TU is a public university, so it’s still an emanation of the state, state-funded and state-controlled.

While universities get funding from the state, they are mostly free to research what they choose. On the projects website is also no sign of direct funding by the state. You are free to criticize the research, but what you are implying is that the state should censor the direction of research because you don‘t like it, which is quite ironic.

iAvicenna@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 12:46 collapse

I thought it was the state from the headline too. maybe because of German’s state past behaviour on the topic and high likelihood of it doing such a thing sort of naturally completed the narrative in my head

CosmoNova@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 07:33 next collapse

Depriving the internet of an opportunity for good old German bashing. How sinister of you. /s

[deleted] on 01 Jun 13:12 next collapse

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Obelix@feddit.org on 01 Jun 16:55 collapse

Yeah, let’s insult other users based on their instance. That is really helpful, will bring peace to the middle east and make the fediverse the dominant social media network in the world.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 17:10 collapse

You are in an instance prohibiting talking qbout boycott the only options we have to help even 0.1% the palestinians. Your instance prohibit educating people about the cancer called zionism the source of the problem

I don’t see you guys in posts about israel crimes but appear like a genie when zionism is compared to nazim despite both having the same rhetoric just different population they target

You don’t see to be bothered whem people get insulted for being in .ml instance

Obelix@feddit.org on 01 Jun 17:23 collapse

You really should read the original announcement of the feddit.org mods, because what you are saying is absolutely not what the rules there are.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 17:39 collapse

Apparently calling for a one state solution where Israeli and palestinian live peacefully is prohibited

hendrik@palaver.p3x.de on 01 Jun 21:39 next collapse

I believe that's what some people who don't like the instance claim. I'm pretty sure I read that, too. But I really can't find it in the rules written by themselves. You can not however say the state of Israel needs to be dissolved in the process, I think that's banned. I'm not a mod there but I'd say as you prased it, it should be fine.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 21:50 collapse

Israel made it impossible for a two state solution to happen with all the illegal settlements. What’s wrong with dissolving Israel and create a one state solution where both can has the same rights?

hendrik@palaver.p3x.de on 01 Jun 22:47 collapse

This discussion is about some peculiarities in German law concerning hate speech. And about how it might be considered hate speech if someone were to call for the termination of the country. And how we deal with that here on Lemmy. It's complicated though and you need to read the law and not take my summary. This has nothing to do with whether one or two states or other ideas might be better or worse, or with what's right and what is wrong.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 22:58 collapse

The law doesn’t apply on normal people or an lemmy instance managed by German admins. It target only organizations or project receiving funding from German government.

The Bundestag reaffirms its decision to ensure that no organizations or projects that spread antisemitism, question Israel’s right to exist, call for a boycott of Israel or actively support the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement receive financial support."

www.dw.com/en/…/a-70715643

Obelix@feddit.org on 02 Jun 03:57 collapse

You can read the post here: feddit.org/post/12529640

There is nothing there containing a one state solution and also german law totally doesn’t prohibit calling for it.

And BTW: You have a autocorrect error in your post: “leave” vs “live” can lead to people misunderstanding your point.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 02 Jun 04:14 collapse

The comment in that link that was removed called for a one state solution and was removes

SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world on 01 Jun 22:49 next collapse

So an israli think tank is using US tax dollars funding a project at a Berlin University that identifies antisemitism with no accountability?

Yeah that’s all above board.

SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world on 02 Jun 04:46 collapse

jacobin.com is not a reliable source

[deleted] on 01 Jun 06:21 next collapse

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vga@sopuli.xyz on 01 Jun 06:21 next collapse

There’s a huge amount of pro-palestine propaganda in the internet right now. And looking at reactions, it’s working.

As a recent example: “14,000 babies could die in Gaza in next 48 hours if aid isn’t let in – UN”

One would think that the actual warcrimes Israel is committing should be enough to report on honestly, but somehow no. We have spruce things up a bit. If I was conspirationally inclined, I’d say that Israel themselves are adding these lies into the mix so they can always point out that this and that was a lie.

rumimevlevi@lemmings.world on 01 Jun 13:30 collapse

You said in a previous comment that at lease israel has a reason to start the war which is not true colonizers has no right to “self defense”

Yareckt@lemmynsfw.com on 01 Jun 13:08 collapse

Following the headlines logic: Germany is angry at this post right now for overgeneralising in a topic where there are a lot of fake news and and propaganda spreading actors. Germany will now go and make itself tea.