Making lists of disfavored or ill-behaved people seems to be popular these days. Let's check some out!

SJWList.com

Location: SJWList.com

Stated Ethos: "You were added to the list because you publicly called for someone to be fired, disinvited, shunned, no-platformed, or otherwise punished or silenced for refusing to submit to the SJW Narrative. The particular incident is linked to your name in the list. Tortious interference is not a joke."1

Actual Ethos: Jumbled, as you would expect from a wiki inspired by a nerve-stapled easily excitable white nationalist. Some entries offer proof that the named person actually called for some sort of firing or disinviting. Others don't. Take, for instance, the entry for artist and author Alison Bechdel:

Now, I don't feel silenced or no-platformed or shunned if someone tells me that a movie I like is sexist, even if I disagree with them. I suppose if you were emotionally and socially stunted then someone criticizing Apollo 13 could be silencing. YMMV.

Is it defamatory? Unlikely. As I frequently discuss here, only statements that can reasonably be interpreted as provable facts can be defamatory; insults and opinions cannot unless they imply false provable facts. To the extent the statements on SJWList don't have supporting links, they seem mostly emotive rather than factual. To the extent entries have links, they are characterizing the information in those links and therefore disclosing the factual basis for their opinions. Moreover, the entire enterprise is probably subsumed by the batshit-crazy rule.

Is it creepy? Meh. To me it's too effortful and impotently angry to be really creepy. I think it tries to be intimidating, and I could see how people could find it creepy if it directs hordes of incel cheetofingers to froth at someone.

Am I mad I'm not on it? YES. Dammit.

Social Autopsy

Location: [not giving them traffic over the lingering suspicion it's a scam or a troll job]

Stated ethos: "We are about to break the internet. Literally." "Users submit a screenshot of a person’s hate-fueled social media post, which is then used to create a profile that includes their full name, place of employment, city of residence and schools."

Actual ethos: "lol i made a kickstarter :)" "Please allow me to explain the law to you based on this quote from Wikipedia."

Is it defamatory? Too early to say. It's not defamatory to quote someone. It's not defamatory to characterize something that someone said (unless, I suppose, you deliberately took it out of context in a way to change its meaning). It could be defamatory if the site managers negligently attributed to someone a statement they didn't actually make. They may look to a "we only allow user submissions" approach so that they can take advantage of Section 230, but that contradicts their claims that they will verify information. Also, it's possible that gathering and exposing data about minors will violate some state and federal laws; I'm still researching that.

Is it creepy? Hell yes. First, it's creepy because it increases my anxiety about how, in the modern world, it is almost impossible to distinguish trolls from stupid people from evil people. (Edited to add: I previously cited a tweet here but it came from a troll posing as them, not from them.) Second, it's creepy because it's aimed at children, and seems to be Clickhole satire brought to life. I accept the first premise (bullies suck) and part of the second premise (bullies are morally responsible for their bullying) and even some of the third premise (it is appropriate for bullying to have consequences) but I can't agree with a platform that seems either intended to, or reckless about, empowering more bullying than it punishes or deters, even leaving other moral issues about minors aside. Also, the project's advocates offer garbled and contradictory plans and explanations suggesting that they are either great performance artists or unusually dim-witted.

Am I mad that I'm not on it? No.

ggAutoblocker

Location: https://blog.randi.io/good-game-auto-blocker/

Stated ethos: You don't have to listen to Gamergaters on Twitter if you don't want to; use this app.

Actual ethos: You don't have to listen to people who follow certain Twitter accounts we associate with Gamergate as a rough cut of who is a Gamergater; use this app.

Is it defamatory? No, as I've said before. They're pretty up front that this blocks people because they follow other people. Most third-party characterizations of people on the list are self-evidently opinion and hyperbole. "Everyone on that list is a sexist/racist/harasser" is almost certainly protected opinion rather than a statement of provable fact, particularly in the contexts in which it is uttered. Moreover, the group is probably too large and diffuse to attribute generalizations about it to any one person. Group Libel is rarely a thing.

Is it creepy? Not to my taste. It's not a list of people by real name, and as far as I can tell no effort has been made to connect the Twitter handles to real humans. Popehat doesn't use it — each Popehat block is artisanal. I generally would not cede my decision-making over whom to block on Twitter to an algorithm based on who follows a set of users, especially when I don't control the set. Sometimes I follow trolls for information and amusement, and I assume the same is true of others. But then, the sort of abuse Popehat gets on Twitter is limited in scope, and generally suitable for hand-banning. We don't get a thousand eggs a week yelling at us. I can see how this sort of tool could be useful to people who do. It's an extremely rough cut, but I don't think it pretends to be anything else. I think many users adopt it as an expressive act: "I reject thee, Gamergate!" That may be silly but then so is lots of expressive conduct. Caveat: if some employer started making hiring or firing decisions based on whether someone is on the list, that would be ignorant, arbitrary, and thoroughly creepy, and would mark it as a company I wouldn't do business with. But then it would be the company that's the problem, not the list. Consider this: if your local police department starts arresting people based on what psychics tell them, the problem isn't the psychics. The problem is the irrational police.

Am I mad that I'm not on it? Yes. Pretty sure I could get on it by following @Nero, but eh. Doesn't seem worth the effort.

The Block Bot

Location: http://www.theblockbot.com/

Stated ethos: You don't have to listen to abusive people on Twitter. "The Block Bot was created specifically for the atheist feminist community and currently includes a strong contingent of transgender social justice activists and intersectional feminists."

Actual ethos: You don't have to listen to people on Twitter if they have been identified as abusive by a group of other Twitter users, sometimes based on sensible criteria and sometimes based upon ideological purity, junior-high-school ingroup squabbling, humorlessness, inability to comprehend satire, binge-drinking, and possibly performance art.

Is it defamatory? Again, No. It pretty explicitly bills itself as a list curated based upon idiosyncratic criteria. "It should go without saying that blockers, as with any other human beings, make assessments based on their own perspectives and world-view and any commentary they make is their own." So, though being on the Block Bot list means somebody has classified you as a Level 1, 2 or 3 baddie, and those levels have unflattering descriptions, it's clear in context that inclusion is subjective-opinion based, and that it's largely an expressive enterprise. For instance, consider the description of Level III: "This may include, but is not limited to, accounts that appear to frequently engage in microagressions, parrot tired talking points, show a sense of entitlement to have a conversation, exhibit a lack respect for the lived experience of others, etc." Once upon a time you could look at what Tweets got someone put on the list, but as far as I can tell that function is no longer available. I was not particularly impressed with what I saw in that regard.

Is it creepy? Eh. In the sense that human interaction is creepy, I suppose. At its best, it identifies and blocks people who are actually dicks on Twitter. At its worst, it makes semi-transparent the judgmental, irrational, and catty nature of human interaction. Honestly. Say that John Doe thinks "I want to give over the decision about whom to block on Twitter to a group of people who say "intersectional" non-ironically." How much are you missing by not being able to interact with John Doe? Now, I have the same caveat as above. To the extent anyone tried to weaponize this by tying handles on the list to real names, I'd start to find it creepy. To the extent that any employer started making hiring or firing decisions based on it, I'd find the employer creepy, ridiculous, and unworthy of my business.

Am I mad that I'm not on it? Definitively. At the risk of being narcissistic I suspect they didn't put me on the list just to spite me. Well trolled.

Look: making lists and following lists and acting based on lists is expressive conduct, both speech and free association. That doesn't make it right; speech and association decisions can be good or evil or neutral. But when people treat this sort of thing as inherently censorious, they're forgetting that the people writing and using the lists have expressive rights too.

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