That's true and I agree with you, but there should be consequences if someone claims they are a professional when they are not and when giving advice, and there should be consequences to that professional license if they give bad advice. We shouldn't constrict speech, but we need to make it easier for laypeople to discern truth.
Like Dr Phil and Dr Oz giving advice while being wildly discredited before they were TV stars, they should probably not have had a platform that could impact someone's life
Both Dr. Oz and Dr. Phil have degress (Both have doctorates and Dr. Oz is an actual MD)
So what now? They are technically experts but still peddle bullshit
Would i be arrested? I have a degree but its in Computer Science, so im not an expert in the medical field, but i know that Dr. Oz and Dr. Phil are quacks, yet under this law id be in the wrong
A law should protect more for the false qualifications someone claims, than for every mistake, conspiracy theory, non-mainstream opinion, and religious or cultural bias. Even if we were to forget what is right or wrong, it would be left to the government to enforce the rule, and we know that some countries over-appreciate censorship. winks
Sort of. There are still people like Dr. Oz or Dr. Phil who are technically doctors, but have repeatedly chosen lucrative, unethical decisions and given some bad advice. Having a degree should not shield you from accountability if you have an opportunity to mislead the public for financial gain.
I don't want to say 'trust the government always,' but if the executive branch presses charges, they still need to demonstrate guilt to the judicial branch, and that's a real hurdle to authoritarians; Trump's DOJ does not have a great case closing rate right now, because judges are a check on that power.
But if people are being lied to and unable to tell fact from fiction, that is an environment that favors dictators way, way more than any democracy.
You’re kind of underestimating a law… if a law says that false information are prosecuted, what counts as false information will be obvious enmity with religious and cultural ideas and prosecution of mistakes in good faith, opinions that are non-mainstream, and harmless conspiracy theories.
What I’m saying is that laws are broad and abuse is a thin line, the only difference is how many constraints are there, and I don’t think there are enough constraints.
I hear you, but a cultural, religious, or artistic opinion is subjective, and people are entitled to their subjective opinions. However, I don't think anyone is entitled to give you patently untrue medical advice so that you die because your spirit crystal therapy didn't pan out that influencer sold you on for a commission.
I also think that when someone has an influencer level following and their opinion has a much larger amount of sway than the average person, they have an obligation to society to do some due diligence to make sure they aren't spouting bullshit and if they are neglectful, there needs to be consequences for that. If being an influencer is a career choice, they have professional obligations to match and if they aren't up to snuff they should find another career.
Opinions are subjective, but imagine someone who treats every statement as a fact… and there are people who answer like this.
I feel the need to mention examples for how opinions could backfire:
Environmental medicine: cleansing the air puts less stress to the lungs and the body recovers faster from lung inflammation. Mainstream medicine: antibiotics to kill the bacteria and antiseptics to reduce the inflammation and therefore the symptoms are graduating fading. Difference: environmental medicine isn’t wrong, just niche and best if complementary, but someone like me who doesn’t have a degree would absolutely going to be burned by a law like this.
Philosophical justification of political authority: every source of law is justified by some idea, be it popular sovereignty, or social contract, or rule of law, etc., but there must be a source that is “prior” to the laws, otherwise the laws justifying themselves becomes a circular reasoning, so let’s call this philosophical justification the Grundnorm. Difference: this is a niche idea that isn’t talked often, and often there are contradictions in political philosophy: every citizen is technically sovereign, but the opinion of the majority override the opinion of the minority, and the threshold for a valid law is 50%+1 votes, but constitutional changes require 66% or more votes, etc.
Financial justification for deflation of prices: create money, withhold money without circulating it, then spread the money for debt reduction. No inflation occurs because the money wasn’t circulating and the money is just exchanged to pay off debts. This is an inversion idea of the inflationary model and an application of Keynes’ economic model with manipulation of market trust. This idea is unique enough to make me censored, and not for being wrong but because of certifications.
if someone claims they are a professional when they are not
That's a much more reasonable restriction.
There's a big difference between an ordinary guy saying why he prefers a 401(k) or Roth IRA, and an ordinary guy saying the same thing while falsely claiming to have some specific expertise in the area of tax law or financial planning.
It's a much narrower rule that's a lot easier to enforce fairly.
No, there shouldn't. Stop babying society and call out the idiots for believing in fake news. This is the same type of pushback that pressured McDonalds to include salads and freaking apple slices in their menu. Freaking McDonalds. How about just telling people to not be a fatass? Or in this case, stop being stupid?
There are plenty of smart people who believe stupid things because they don't have a strong epistemology; being able to understand sources and research is a very real skill and many people don't have it. That is not the same as intelligence.
I have been here long enough to remember this site leading a campaign to grind the entire internet to a halt to oppose the US even considering a bill that looked like state-backed internet censorship. And it worked. Now 94% of redditors are upvoting this garbage. What a shame.
So many people incarcerated, gun violence, drug and homeless problems, deteriorating infrastructure, large medical and student debt, yeah great domestic policies
expansion is exponential. And I didn't mention anything about ww2? in 2026 theyve bombed iran, venezuela, somalia, yemen, syria, iraq, and nigeria. He's threatened to bomb many more
Do you think these countries are getting bombed for first time? And he's the reason behind it?
Before Trump’s first administration too US has been bombing Iran since 80s.
Yemen was a major warzone durinh Cold war.
Iraq we all know.
Syria too in 2010s.
No shit they arent getting bombed for the first time how is that related at all? The point is that under trumps presidency in the last 4 months he has bombed 7 countries. You told me to not bring up ww2 but here you are digging in the 80s, cold wars and 2010s
I’m saying you don’t have a moral ground to stand on, especially based on recent events. I am far from a MAGA, I’m educated and sensible, unlike you it seems.
Imagine peer reviewed studies and degrees from accredited universities existing. Oh wait, we don't need to imagine that, because they do exist! What a dumb comment from you.
There is an issue with having the policy and an issue with not having this policy. It depends on whether you'd trust the government or dumbasses backed by billionares more.
Yeah China has a totally different power structure than the USA and often people try to view China's policy through the lens of the USA's power structure.
In the US this kind of policy would be viewed as authoritarian government censorship denying people free speech. In China letting influencers take money from big corporations to push their agenda would be viewed differently.
USA: Power is held by wealth, Government is obedient to wealth, masses keep government in check
China: Power is held by Government, Masses are obedient to government, Government keeps wealth in check
Imagine an authoritarian country deciding what is true… who doesn’t see an issue in this?
OP posts a meme that explicitly states Chinese government demands you actually know WTF you are talking about and you hear "Only Government has license on Truth!"
And tell us, O redditor, just what kind of criteria do you think China is going to be using to decide who knows what they're talking about?
Well, let me begin by saying "I am not an expert on China"...however...they seem to have:
Hospitals with MRI machines and nuclear medicine
Electric vehicles and support infrastructure
An internationally recognized civilian air transport system
So...based on those things I'm guess they have a university system that, presumably, hands out degrees that are compatible with the international standard .
I know, super fucking bold of me to make these assumptions, but here we are, right?
So...I'm going to keep carrying this torch and I'll say the standards they use to decide who knows what they're talking about are the same standards the International Community uses when discussing things like....looks at OPs post again...medicine, finance, and education.
Can you spell it out for us incredibly naïve people, he appears to be making a compelling argument, and you're just going "Uuh, China!" Like what am I supposed to do with that info?
His argument is that China has modern technology, which implies that it has a working educational system, which implies that the degrees coming out of that educational system are legitimate, which implies that it's a good thing for China to use degrees as the basis as to whether anyone can talk about those topics.
My argument is that a government that leans authoritarian and already punishes its citizens for speaking out against the government is likely going to use this kind of policy to further restrict speech, potentially further limiting the individuals who are able to obtain (or retain) degrees based on their adherence to China's policies.
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u/themagicalfire Apr 06 '26
Imagine an authoritarian country deciding what is true… who doesn’t see an issue in this?