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Mark Zuckerberg should unfriend the crazies before more people get hurt

臉書發起人馬克·祖克柏會將臉書上一些瘋子除名避免更多人受害

Mark Zuckerberg has never been famous for his reading choices. No one knows or cares if the founder of Facebook got around to Moby Dick when he was at Harvard. But in January, Zuckerberg launched an online book club, offering reading recommendations to members every two weeks. Earlier suggestions included such important works as Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature and Sudhir Venkatesh’s Gang Leader for a Day.

馬克·祖克柏從不以他閱讀的選項聞名. 沒人知道, 沒人在乎這位臉書發起人在哈佛時期是否讀過白鯨記. 但一月份時, 祖克柏推出了線上讀書具樂部, 每兩周為會員提供好書推薦清單. 早先的建議包括重要作品如: The Better Angels of Our Nature, 以及黑社會老大的一天

But Zuckerberg dropped something of a small bombshell with his most recent—and most excellent—choice, On Immunity by Eula Biss. It’s a thoughtful exploration of what’s behind the irrational fear and suspicion in the anti-vaccine community, as well as a full-throated call for parents to heed medical wisdom and get their kids vaccinated. “The science is completely clear,” Zuckerberg writes, “vaccinations work and are important for the health of everyone in our community.”

但祖克柏拿掉一些東西, 比方, 最優秀的首選之一- On Immunity. 是敘述反疫苗社區, 不理性恐懼, 不理性懷疑背後, 充滿深思的探索, 並呼籲家長留意智慧醫療，讓他們的孩子接種疫苗。祖克柏說: 預防接種是有效的, 對於社區每一位成員的健康是重要的

So kudos to Zuckerberg for getting the truth out and challenging the lies.

And shame on Zuckerberg for enabling those lies, too.

Social media sites can do an exceedingly good job of keeping people connected and, more important, spreading the word about important social issues. (Think the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge would have raised the $100 million it did for research into Lou Gehrig’s disease if people couldn’t post the videos of themselves being heroically doused?) But it’s long been clear the sites can be used perniciously too.

社群網站能把人們串連在一起保持訊息通暢無阻, 更重要, 讓重要訊息快速流通.但同樣的工具也可是陰謀的串連.

Want to spend some time in the birther swamp, trading conspiracy theories with people who absolutely, positively can tell you the Kenyan hospital in which President Obama was born? You can find them online. Ditto the climate-denying cranks and the 9/11 truthers.

想要花點時間瞭解一下某些人的交易陰謀理論嗎? 他們會堅定告訴你歐巴馬總統出生在肯亞的醫院. 你會在網路上找到這些資料, 同樣情形也有拒絕相信氣候的怪胎, 堅信911是有人在一手操控的真實主義者

But the anti-vaxxers have a particular power. People who buy the nonsense on a birther or truther page can’t do much more than join that loony community and howl nonsense into the online wind. Climate change denial is a little more dangerous because every person who comes to believe that global warming is a massive hoax makes it a tiny, incremental bit harder to enact sensible climate policy.

但反疫苗有種特別得力量. 相信無稽怪談的人們在網路上拼命叫囂著奇怪的理論. 拒絕相信氣候的影響有點危險, 因為當中的每一份子相信全球暖化是個騙局, 一點一滴讓有感的氣候對應政策無法成形

Anti-vaxxers, however, do their work at the grass-roots, retail, one-on-one level. Convince Mother A of the fake dangers of vaccines and you increase the odds that she won’t vaccinate Child B—and perhaps Children C, D or E either. And every unvaccinated child in her brood increases the risk to the neighborhood, the school, the community—the entire herd, as the epidemiologists put it. The multi-state measles outbreak that began in Disneyland, along with the epidemics of mumps and whooping cough in Columbus, Ohio and throughout California, have all been fueled by falling vaccine rates.

而反疫苗是從根反對起, 人與人之間的影響. 說服A母親相信疫苗的假性危險, 你增加她不會讓B小孩接種的機率, 然後C小孩, D小孩, 到E小孩. 每個未接種的小孩增家一個社區, 學校所面臨流行病的危險, 甚至到整個族群,  如流行病理學家所言. 起始於迪士尼樂園的跨州麻疹爆發, 跟隨著在俄亥俄州, 哥倫布市和加州的流行性腮腺炎和百日咳的疫情, 都是因為預防接種率低落所產生的

One thing that would help—something Zuckerberg could do with little more than a flick of the switch, as could Twitter CEO Dick Costolo and the other bosses of other sites—is simply shut the anti-vaxxers down. Really. Pull their pages, block their posts, twist the spigot of misinformation before more people get hurt.

有件事可幫助, 一些祖克柏可做的事, 比輕觸開關多一點的事, 就像推特老闆與其他地方老闆所做的, 只要將"反疫苗"關閉. 真的, 抽掉頁面, 關掉貼文, 在更多人受害之前把不對的訊息關掉

The very idea of muzzling any information—even misinformation—will surely send libertarians to their fainting couches. Similarly, people who believe they understand the Constitution but actually don’t will immediately invoke the First Amendment. But of course they’re misguided. Is Facebook a government agency? No, it’s not. Is Zuckerberg a government official? No, he’s not. Then this is not a First Amendment issue. Read your Constitution.

關掉訊息這樣的想法, 即使是錯誤報導, 肯定會讓自由主義派的人在沙發昏倒. 同樣, 相信自己瞭解憲法的人, 沒有馬上動用這已觸犯第一條修正案. 當然他們被誤導了. 臉書是政府機關嗎? 不是, 它不是. 祖克柏是政府官員嗎? 不是, 他不是. 那麼這不關第一修正法的問題. 請讀一下你的憲法

It’s not as if the folks at Facebook aren’t clear about the kinds of things they will and won’t allow on the site, providing a brief listing and a detailed description of what are considered no-go areas. “You may not credibly threaten others, or organize acts of real-world violence,” is one rule, so nobody would get away with posting instructions for, say, how to build a pressure cooker bomb. There is nothing in the regulations that specifically prohibits trafficking in bogus medical information, but the first section of the policy statement begins, “Safety is Facebook’s top priority,” and then goes on to say “We remove content and may escalate to law enforcement when we perceive a genuine risk of physical harm, or a direct threat to public safety.” (Emphasis added.)

這 不是好像臉友不清楚這類的事, 哪些可寫, 哪些不可寫, 提供個清單與詳細描述哪些地方是禁區, 是不可以的. "你無法威脅他人, 形成一個組織化的暴力形式", 是其中一條遊戲規則, 沒有人可躲過貼文的規則. 比方, 如何製造一個有壓力的廚房炸彈. 在臉書條款並未詳細禁止流通謠言式的醫療訊息, 但政策第一段有寫, "安全是臉書的首要原則", 因此, "我們會移去一些危險內容, 當這些內容, 觸及到法律, 疑似會造成實體傷害, 或直接對大眾安全造成威脅"

It’s worth wondering if Facebook would consider a page arguing that HIV does not cause AIDS and that therefore condoms are not necessary a threat to public safety. What about one that told teens that bogus research shows it’s OK to drive drunk if you’ve had no more than, say, three beers? If the site managers didn’t block these pages and a multi-car crack-up or a cluster of HIV infections occurred as a result, would they wish they they’d made a different decision? It’s hard to know. (As of publication time, Facebook had not responded to TIME’s request for a comment on, or further statement about, its policies.)

值得探討 臉書是否可考慮開個專頁, 提供臉友公開辯駁愛滋帶原不會造成愛滋, 因此保險套不是公共危險的威脅? 還有, 像有些假的研究說, 只要不喝超過三罐啤酒不算酒駕? 如果網站管理員不封鎖這些頁面, 造成多輛車撞成一團, 一堆人愛滋感染的結果, 他們會希望當初他們做不同的決定嗎? 很難說. (這篇文章發表時, 臉書並未回應TIME請求他們做些評論, 或對於他們的政策能進一步說明)

Facebook is equal parts town square, medium of communication and commercial bazaar—complete with ads. And it does all of those jobs well. What the site shouldn’t be is a vector for lies—especially lies that can harm children. Free speech is not in play here. This should be an easy call.

臉書是個市廣場中心, 溝通的媒介, 以及商業中心, 有完整廣告訊息. 它的功能都非常完善. 它不該成為謊言的集散地, 特別會傷害小孩的. 這裏不玩言論自由