Blockbots and Blacklists

“Are you, or have you ever been, a supporter of Gamergate, NotYourShield, Sad Puppies, Rabid Puppies, Men’s Rights Activists, Ron Paul, Donald Trump, White Supremacists, etc, etc etc?”

Blacklists have come a long way since the bygone days of McCarthy.

With the power of modern database and data processing systems, a list of targets can be drawn up in a matter of minutes, regardless of the criteria used to populate that list.  And with the Internet, that same list can be in place, worldwide, in hours.

Two fairly recent examples are Randi Harper’s Good Game Auto-Blocker and Vox Day’s SJWList.

Filtering Out Gamergate:  GG Autoblock

The Culture War in a Nutshell

The differences between the GG Autoblock and SJWList are like night and day.

Since the program is built on guilt by association, anyone can land on the GG Autoblock list without even realizing it, just by following the wrong person.  Anti-Gamergate SJWs are perfectly willing to ban ten thousand people from their Twitter feeds to ensure a mere handful are silenced.

If you are a person who wants to hear the viewpoints of both sides and are willing to run the risk of being offended by the words you read, then you also run the risk of being added to the Autoblock simply for trying to listen.

SJWList, by comparison, is specific and detailed.  The criteria are very clear and well defined.  No one listed there should be surprised at their inclusion or confused as to the reason because it attempts to clearly and accurately document past statements and actions.

In other words, like most political correctness/social justice issues, the key difference between the two systems lies in “who you are” versus “what you do.”

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