"Oi bruv, you got a loiscience for dat news?"

A: "Don't walk across the street without looking. You could get hit by a car."

B: "What if I didn't know that?"

A: "You have to learn it. What other choice is there?"

B: "We could change things so that someone couldn't walk in the street without knowing."

A: "How would we do that?"

B: "We could make a law!"

A:

You know the Russians are using fake news to undermine and destabilize the countries and leaders that stand up to them. You can questions it's effectiveness, but you can't deny it's happening. How can you know that and respond with nothing but "ah well, Americans should just be smarter?"

Each of us has a responsibility to think about what we see, read, and hear, to evaluate it critically, and to decide whether to believe it, REGARDLESS of the source. I don't need nor want someone to deny me access to ANY information, even on the basis I might be deceived by it. I'M responsible for that. Besides, there is no false or deceptive expression that can be said in an environment where freedom of speech prevails that cannot by countered or disproven by other expression in that same environment.

The idea that someone needs to control which information we receive so that, gosh, we don't get wrong thoughts, ideas, or impressions is FAR MORE DANGEROUS than any would-be meddling by the Russians. That's what parents do for children, or what totalitarians do for the masses. I'm even a bit leery of the idea that government should tell us certain messages are foreign governments meddling. How could we trust that the claim is true and not in itself a deception on the part of our own government, an attempt to discredit a position by claiming it's the product of a foreign power? Governments around the world frequently issue claims about other countries, often to deflect from their own responsibility. How can we be sure ours doesn't?

And, philosophically, are all things the Russians want you to believe necessarily false simply because the Russians want you to believe them?

Nothing Russians say can be trusted.

I have lots of responses to that. It's just that "the government should start regulating speech" isn't one of them.

Post some of them, then. All I'm seeing is the same "let's do nothing, the market will sort it out eventually" bullshit that's the default position of NaiveLibertarianForge.

I'm sure we'd all feel comfortable allowing 14th Douche or another of his ilk to determine what kinds of freedoms are appropriate for people to have, and to what extent those freedoms can be exercised.

I find it tragic that the current generation neither understands basic Constitutional freedoms & liberties, nor sees those freedoms as pivotal to their lives. Consequently, they feel no desire to defend those freedoms, and often (as demonstrated here) actively attempt to undermine and eliminate them.

The men and women who died to beat back tyranny and fascism in WWII sacrificed their lives in vain if no-nothing traitors like 14th Douche are allowed to impose their worldview on the rest of us. We used to know how to deal with those who practiced sedition.....

By not letting it our inept septigenarian leadership destroy our fundamental freedoms over what is essentially red scare 2.0

You mean be Russian state?

Sorry, this comment is all kinds of dumb.

Manipulation of social media and on demand/streamed news is simply not comparable to things during the last Cold War. The battleground has changed, the methods more insidious and the public not just a propaganda tool for the home nation but foreign actors as well.

The only way to fight back is using similar methods. Sadly this means unacceptable methods used to fight unacceptable actions. But then it’s not as if we’ve even been shy in the West of meddling the the affairs of other nations, including elections.

Oh, no, I'm not denying that foriegn nations use propaganda, I'm just saying that we shouldn't give up our freedom of speech because smug people believe that the plebians are too stupid to be trusted.
Should we go back to a time when only educated land owners were allowed to vote? Do you really want to get onto that vector of discussion?

I fucking hate Russians, from personal experience, worst people on the planet but this:

is so very true.

Sorry, that's unacceptable.

It's also completely unnecessary. Any individual or organization can have an agenda when operating in a free speech environment, and it's the responsibility of a free person to evaluate critically what one hears in such an environment. I don't want anyone removing that responsibility from me. I don't need "protection."

Also, there are a great many things that fall into a gray area between fact and non-fact--opinions, for instance--which would inevitably be caught up in any censorship scheme.

Remember, too, that any censorship scheme put in place will inevitably be controlled at some point by people whose views you despise.

At what point in my comment did I say anything about censorship?

No matter how you dress it up, if you put barriers and filters between free actors exchanging speech, it's censorship.

But, by all means, outline your plan.

Where did I say anything about barriers or filters?

Except that this is exactly what the OP is saying is being proposed in California.

If I've misunderstood you, tell me what you ARE saying.

You're hinting at "unacceptable" measures, so I'm kinda expecting something intrusive.

Nope. I am saying if a foreign actor attacks you on social media with propaganda and misinformation then the only way to fight it is to do the same in return. That is the only option that doesn’t involve censorship.

I have less objection to that. Turnabout is fair play.

Nyet.

So you’re making a sweeping generalisation of Russians in general? Didn’t you ban Dinner for doing that to Ukrainians??

Ukrainians don't invade their neighbors, bomb hospitals and schools, fuck with others elections or poison it's citizens living abroad. Do you think Moskali politicians are performing these acts? Nyet. Not all Russians are bad, but the vast majority of Russians I've met were thoroughly unpleasant.

I’ve met about two or three dozen Russians (Ex-Wife was one and I’ve been to Russia) and not one of them I didn’t like(though one was annoying at times). The men do have a 1950s American view on how women should behave, but not all of them. I’ve also met around the same amount of Ukrainians and I can say the same, but I will say Russians will quickly point out that there is a distinct difference in Russians and Ukrainians, Vise versa. My Ex did seem to harbor prejudice towards Ukrainians and Bellarus people.

The proposal in the OP is bad.

Having said that, the naive idea that fake news aren't a problem is far more dangerous. Yes, lies and propaganda have always existed, but so have infectious diseases; it still makes one hell of a difference whether you are suffering from a cold or your continent is ravaged by the Black Death.

Critical media literacy is a good thing. But how will people learn it in bad schools and surrounded by uncritical fantasy?

And what does critical thinking do when 99% of the voices you hear are false? How do you ever figure out which source to trust?