The removal of the Dissenter extention

Translation: our overlods at google, opensociety, et al would like us to start banning addons that support your freedom and liberty like dissenter, or anything else that doesn’t align with a narrow political view (aka wrongthink). So please bear with us while we continue to offer you lips service about freedom and openness while at the same time restricting it. But, we promise we’ll do it slowly and over a protracted time window so you don’t notice.

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Not you, not my browser and not google. Tech companies need to focus on making good tech, not trying to be the arbiters of social justice. Your job is make a good browser. Full stop.

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Translation: question 7, box 1.

Yet mozilla just banned an addon that was made specifically for sharing views from anyone and everyone. dissenter… This is all pretense. Mozilla sold out to their overlords google and opensociety.org They don’t care about any of this, they give you lip service while removing your freedom in so many ways.

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Its going to be interesting to see what your original comment was that a person would flag it. My original post was flagged and hidden as well but it appears to be restored.

If its as you describe, a definition of free speech, then getting flagged is a perfect example of the problem that Dissenter was designed to combat.

Ideological censorship is real, and short of gross and untruthful misrepresentations, I have yet to see any reasoned coherent explanation for removal of the Dissenter addon.

I doubt its possible to give a ‘real’ reason for the removal, its all going to be doublespeak and unearned virtue signalling.

Free speech is fundamental to freedom, its the main tool to protect everyone against dictatorships tyranny and of course the boogeyman of recent years FASCISM

This professor of linguistics says it much better though:

I did a quick search of mozilla.org and found zero references to ‘free speech’, I wonder if there used to be a statement on the same and if it was removed?

https://www.google.com/search?&q=site%3Awww.mozilla.org+"free+speech"

Anyways the point of this post was to ask to see your original.

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You wont always agree with free speech, this is the point. Mainstream Media control a narrow narrative that they want you to see. It often chooses not to cover stories or output highly misleading content.

Surely you are not saying free speech is bad? It’s the first amendment for a reason. Free speech includes speech you don’t like.

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Yes, its goal is free speech. There is no such thing as hate speech, its a meaningless term designed to allow a tiny group to spoon feed you news and control the narrative; is that what you want? To be a drone who is told what to think?

People need to toughen up, don’t like what Dissenter says (it’s the most civilized comment thread I’ve ever seen btw) then don’t install the extension. What’s the problem?

Would you shut down all speech that offends anyone? Who should decide this stuff?

Even this thread will probably be closed. You’re begging to be a drone, wake up.

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After more than 10 years using Firefox, even in the worst days i keep Firefox because “A non-profit with one mission: defend the free and open web” but with this censorship, i em going to brave now.

really disappointing, i really regret helping in the code, simple thing years ago but now i regret every single help i lend to Mozilla.

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It has been a week since I started this topic in the hopes of making Mozilla aware of the seriousness of their mistake.
In this time I have contacted Mozilla through their input form https://qsurvey.mozilla.com/s3/FirefoxInput/ several times requesting at least a reply on this matter,
Today I will make the same request for a final time again in this thread.
Mozilla, Please respond.

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This is deeply troubling. I cannot belive that the web browser of the free and open internet removed a app that allowed freedom of speech. How often have people said, “If you don’t like what is out there make your own”. Now they did and everyone just banned it. There is also NO option to keep developer plugins auto loading and up to date. Not only is this a massive inconvenience it shows us Mozilla’s true colors. I cannot believe they have not even issued a statement on this.

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I finally got around to reading the reply Mozilla made to Gab and its worse than I expected, no information whatsoever, its just an unsubstantiated claim of breach of acceptable use which falls exactly into what my first post pointed out (Notwithstanding of course that Dissenter appears to be inline with the First Amendment and deletes/censors the most extreme language to that standard).

The ENTIRE BROWSER ITSELF can be used for any purpose whatsoever including the most terrible things imaginable.

So fundamentally if the claim of a standard of USE, is that a plugin may not ever be used for something ‘bad™’, then to not be completely ridiculous and obviously hypocritical, Mozilla must apply that standard of use to the browser itself.

Therefore they must shut down Firefox now.

Its so hard to imagine the mental gymnastics required to think this is a good idea.

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I never ever before heard about that thought. Nice and good organization.

I am confused. There is an April 23, 2019 archive of this page at the WayBack Machine, however, I cannot create an additional updated record right now at https://archive.org/web/ inputting Save Page Now: “The removal of the Dissenter extention

The saved page that appears shows:

Oops! That page doesn’t exist or is private.

which seems incredibly suspicious

I assume you get the same issue saving other threads on these boards?

Pages containing scripts to pop out of frames or otherwise reload may not work on the Wayback Machine. I recently was trying to screenshot one that reloaded continuously, testing my skills at clicking the Stop button at just the right moment. (Perhaps I should have disabled JavaScript? Hmm…)

Yeah, I tested another topic, and same issue.

I’m in the process of switching to waterfox (firefox that allows not-so-active plugins like Youtube Video Blocker, Youtube Video Downloader, etc). currently not working with waterfox. Hopefully more knowledgeable people step up to the plate like they did with linux.

'sounds like what they did to their CEO for supporting the notion that marriage is a relationship commitment between a male and female partner [who do not part except in death…heh]

Mozilla joins the censorious gestapo. Dissenter was deleted from my machine without warning or any choice on my part - just plain evil. SJWs destroy every organization they can infiltrate. Mozilla will be irrelevant in 10 years. Just the motivation I needed to move over to Brave.

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people are talking here about free speech. I’ve just visited Dissenter for the first time and scan-read recent articles and comments.

It’s without doubt a strongly right wing orientated platform, at least in terms of the content. Comments range from the ok/mild to intolerant to rabid/aggressive.

I don’t see discourse or balanced debate.

There seem to be plenty of pro-references to Christianity, Trump, Republicanism, etc.

Also, a lot of anti-left, anti-“communist”, anti democrat leanings too.

People could argue that it’s an agnostic vehicle. That’s probably true.

However, if it’s going just to become a repository and a speakers corner (reference for an open air public speech opportunity in London) for right wing material, that’s the identity it will hold and the orientation it will travel in.

More importantly, when it’s completely unmoderated (I presume this is the case), you only need people to start peddling attacks on race and culture, to incite further hatred. I’d like to think Mozilla is making it more difficult to access Dissenter because they are NOT interested in facilitating bigotry and ignorance.

I would say i read some interesting dissenter comments about a youtube video about the john birch society, so it’s not exclusively bad.

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It is moderated.

https://dissenter.com/help/faq

From above:

"Where a user’s speech is legal under U.S. law, it is allowed on our site. Our rules protect the expression of any viewpoint that is protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. They do not protect speech that is or would be illegal or actionable in the United States. Copyright infringement, illegal pornography, malicious defamation, spam, and true threats are not protected by US law and may be moderated or result in a ban. Borderline cases are reviewed by an independent attorney to ensure we are adhering to our First Amendment-based moderation principles. Moderated posts will transparently let users know that they have been removed for violating our Community Guidelines.

Dissenter is a comment publishing platform, so it’s impossible to use the platform to cause physical harm to another person. If a user uses the platform for an illegal purpose, for example publishing a credible threat of violence, and we are made aware of it, we will take action and cooperate with law enforcement if necessary. Where a user publishes content constituting a civil wrong, such as copyright infringement or defamation, we may be served with a takedown notice or court order which would compel us to remove the content. We treat our users like adults and give them a lot of latitude. It is up to our users to not abuse that latitude and to stay within the confines of the law."

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