What about people who self-harm @NickMargerrison? For the majority a video of someone cutting isn't a trigger, but for vulnerable people?
— SINGULARITY UTOPIA (@2045singularity) September 23, 2013
Consider the issue of self-harming (cutting). Videos of someone self-harming will have no impact upon people not likely to self-harm, but regarding the people who are inclined to self-harm, self-harming videos can be a trigger, a reinforcing mechanism similar to an alcoholic being surrounded by alcohol. A recovering alcoholic needs to avoid bars because bars or parties could trigger a relapse. A recovering heroin addict needs to acquire a new set of friends. People who cut themselves need to avoid being reminded of cutting. Anorexics need to avoid pro-anorexia sites. Religion is a form of intellectual self-harm, religion stunts intellectualism, thus the burqa or hijab can be a trigger for religious self-harm, harm to intellectual capacity.
There are lots of vulnerable people in the world who are unable to think independently. Yes people should be capable of independent thought thus the blame should always reside with the individual but the fact is many humans are week-willed, shallow, empty, waiting for their minds be totally shaped by external factors.
Taking the censorious initiative could be a problematic slippery slope. The replacement of independent thought with external censorship-control means you make people less self-reliant thus more censorship is needed, which could likely be a vicious circle of excessive control. The problem with a dictatorship is who the dictator is. The problem is regarding deciding what to ban or suppress. Should religion be suppressed, or burqas, or crucifixes, or sexually provocative women in the media, or short skirts, or alcohol, or LSD, or videos of people cutting themselves? I think sexually provocative women in "Lads Mags" is more akin to women's liberation than sexism because there is an openness, openness is empowering. In the 1960s women began wearing miniskirts but many commentators opposed the trend, they strongly criticised the trend by stating it was turning women into sex-objects or targets for rape. It seems women being openly free regarding their sexuality is about freedom, which is evident by the fact an Islamic state would never allow "Lads Mags" to be sold in supermarkets.
I think selective censorship (dictatorship) could help civilization because too many humans have become too incapable of independent thought. It is perhaps ironic to consider how guiding people to think in a certain way could make them more intelligent, more capable of independent thought, but it is not really contradictory if you consider how children do need to be taught about the world, or how someone with severe mental illness can benefit from the guidance of psychologist who channels their thinking along healthy pathways. Perhaps the problem with the world is that we have never had the correct type of dictator.
I think the solution could be to ban all aspects of religion from education, medicine, and the media. We also need to legalise all drugs but access to all drugs including alcohol and nicotine should be restricted to shops only open between the hours or midnight and two am, furthermore all advertising of drugs should be banned. Newspapers should be banned from reporting on violence, they should instead publish articles about thinking, they should publish thoughtful articles where people think about the way civilization should be. Wage inequality and the hoarding of vast wealth should also be banned.
Perhaps no dictatorship will work, maybe my dictatorship would be equally bad compared to the current Obama-Putin-Merkel-Cameron dictatorship. This is the problem with dictating, there is always someone who has a different idea regarding what rules should be enforced.