Minotaur

I think that if you went to a psychologist they could diagnose you with a legitimate preoccupation with this kind of thing

You think they get it from gay people having Facebook on their phone

You think that gay people will be lynched because they have Facebook downloaded on their phone.

And you think that will happen to gay people because they use tiktok

What exactly do you think the anti gay hate groups are going to do?

It’s actually crazy how low the percentage of people under like… forty is now that actually gets their news direct from a news site. Seriously, i don’t know a single person from like 20-35 who actually just goes on the NPR or C-SPAN app or whatever.

It kind of sucks. So much news is just reading the headline and seeing a photo now. And I just feel like there’s something bad about being able to see a comment section on Twitter or Reddit or even Lemmy now on every news event. Makes for a lot more group think rather than just reading the news and going “huh”

Are things like that happening though? With the insurance?

I mean if the police want to come to my door and shoot me in the head or find a reason to brand me as a felon any day they can basically already do that. That goes for about anyone. It doesn’t really seem to matter if any data brokering company also happens to tag me as maybe being gay or having a 90% chance of supporting Palestine over Israel or similar

I dunno. I just feel like a lot of the argument are contingent on envisioning some imminent future wherein every Western country turns into a completely fascist police state with like concentration camps - but also they can only get their information on local demographics based off of data sold by social media companies? And foreign ones at that? And even in this situation you’re not really doing anything about it but just trying to lie low and hope no one discovers you’re an atheist or whatever until you die of old age?

It kind of reminds me of Pascals Wager. You know that one? Where it goes “ooo you have to believe in god because what if you don’t and the Christian god is real… you go to hell!?”. Like. Yeah, sure. I guess that could happen. But most people will shrug their shoulders at it, not really convinced. It requires a lot of assumptions

I’m going to be honest, I’m kind of of this mindset.

I haven’t yet had a decent argument made to me regarding why I should personally care if TikTok or whatever has like… my age gender and what types of books I read and what apps I have on my phone.

Welcome to the scientific process man: you’ve managed to deduce an obvious correlation. People also understood that living in fetid conditions led to disease for centuries before figuring out how they’re actually related (with several deeply incorrect theories along the way).

This is a way to measure that correlation and use that data for future analysis. The researchers doing this work are investigating things at a much more finite level than “duh-doy being poor is bad!!”

This is one of those posts that could never go on modern-Reddit without a bunch of dudes who peaked in high school saying it’s “bullshit”

This is a very cool fusion of decades of research and technology. There are definitely concerns to be had over its use in the private sector and the general loss of privacy over time as technology develops - but if nothing else it’s really fascinating from an academic and public health approach.