Perhaps it's where I live, but for me - it's just the internet. It doesn't have any resemblance to my reality. As someone who's been on the internet since a teen, watched it evolve, etc, it makes me kinda sad. Because I feel forced out. But that's ok.

As online communities, emboldened really by tech companies themselves, try to gain control by silencing dissent via mob behavior or 'canceling', I just find myself leaving. And in doing so make both myself and presumably the community happier for it. Take a walk in the park, or go sit on the beach a while. Make small talk with people walking by. In doing all this, I realize I never meet or see the type people who are so 'in control' and loud and/or threatening online. Most people seem friendly enough in person.

So my questions become - are these people even real? Do they live somewhere I'm just unfamiliar with? Or did the internet give them some loud voice that otherwise doesn't exist in person? Why are these voices the loudest - does controversy really sell this well? Is social media purposefully putting controversial things on the forefront because it increases engagement?

Not actually expecting answers, just rambling really - apologies.

Getting back to your original posting:

First of all, my whole posting was tongue-in-cheek, which everyone else seems to have gotten.

Anyhow, does it makes sense that "A formal declaration of war" has somewhat more legal force than "An Atlantic headline writer declaring them a hostile foreign power" ?

The board of Facebook consists of Americans. They are helping a hostile foreign power ( Facebook).

The author uses a powerful metaphor ("hostile foreign power") and then wimps out on following through with it.

If you really believe that, then a Congressional declaration of war with Facebook is in order. That would mean, among other things, charging all executives and Board members with treason.

Since that word gets thrown around loosely these days, let's see its actual definition (Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution):

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.

Sounds like a hostile foreign power to me. An open-and-shut case; after all, we're at war with them.

OK, maybe that sounds ridiculous to you (or maybe not)? If so, then magazines shouldn't use clickbait headlines like "hostile foreign power."

…Well, yes? Of course? How else do you explain a supposedly "technologically backward" society beating even the Americans in the space race?

I mean, even this very article immediately refutes that narrative.

Returns are pretty close to just holding Bitcoin...

When facebook launched in February of 2004, America had already spent nearly a year in Iraq due to the misinformation that CNN (among many others) widely distributed. Climate change denial, the anti-vax movement, and various conspiracy theories long predate that point. For decades we've been dealing with misinformation campaigns, such as for smoking and the AIDS pandemic. Back before it all went online, newspaper stands filled with tabloids as ridiculous as today's worst clickbait were a common sight. And that was still nothing compared to the state of communication historically.

The idea that companies like facebook could defeat misinformation, nonetheless that they should, is absurd given the failure of every other attempt throughout history to do the same. Those championing the idea either do not understand the problem, or wish to benefit from its inevitable failure.

The fact is the internet has made it easier than ever before for people to communicate with one another, to access legitimate and accurate sources of information, and to challenge those who have long benefited from keeping people uninformed. Yes when people speak and read and get angry, they may sometimes be speaking and reading and getting angry at the wrong things, but the ability to do something wrong is a necessary condition of freedom.

I wonder if anyone really thought this whole 'defunding the police' idea through.