Let’s see, how does the line go? “Parler needs to decide if they’re going to be a platform or a publisher, and if they’re going to start censoring speech that they don’t like, they need to be held responsible for—“ haha sorry, it’s too ridiculous to even satirize
They somehow managed to avoid any screencaps of what sorts of things people got banned over. No doubt it entailed reasonable question asking and familial conversation.
Techdirt is fine. Compare today's response to David fucking Duke being kicked off of youtube.
FWIW it's totally fine that people wanna curate the content on their site. I'm not under the impression that any of the lefties are there on good faith; that's a great reason to kick folks off your platform.
Here I am. What they are doing is less harmful than when a larger network does it, due to their smaller market share, but still harmful to the spirit of free speech (even if legal), and more than that, it's hypocritical. Any users of the platform should take this as a cue to ditch it for some alternative.
Perhaps there would be more outrage if Parler was more than a rounding error in terms of user base?
As for your cheap dismissal, let me counter by suggesting you go defend Zoom's banning of Chinese activists, if you have such a dim view of free speech.
Let's correct one thing. I do not have a dim view of free speech, I've been championing it my whole life. I have a dim view of so-called "free speech activists" who clamber to protect right-wing extremists at the exclusion of other important freedoms, and then don't make a peep when lefty rabble-rousers get the same treatment on platforms made by, for and of the far right. Because that demonstrates bad faith, and a lack of commitment to first amendment rights -- hypocricy, as you say.
I disagree with you about harms to the "spirit" of free speech. Ultimately, you and I have right to disagree. We have the right to complain about eachother, we have the right to petition third parties to dissociate from the other, and those third parties have a right to ignore us, listen to us, act or not act based on the information presented. For one example right under our nose, HN users who stick around for a few weeks and make valued contributions have the privilege to downvote and flag eachothers' comments and submissions. All that to say, free speech is not without its just limitations -- first, I cannot be compelled to agree with or disseminate your speech, and second, the freedom of speech does not confer a freedom from social consequences -- if I go into a church and shout blasphemy during a sermon, then I'd rightly get kicked out and they'd probably ask me to never come back. The "spirit" of free speech, in my opinion, is the freedom to expose your opinions to the judgements of others.
Not sure what you're referring to as a "cheap dismissal", feel free to elucidate. Personally, I've been trying to get my employer and friends to stop using Zoom for various reasons. I'm not super informed about the situation with Chinese activists, but I do have a razor. If that was the act of the Zoom execs' personal conscience, more power to them, and hopefully the market will punish them severely. On the other hand, if that was due to pressure by the Chinese government, then I am very much against it.
A lot of the friction that we're seeing today is because technology has enabled monopolies, or near-monopolies. I'd love to see facebook, twitter, google, etc. get broken up. I'd love to see zoom replaced with open protocols wherein apple, microsoft, android corp (a post-google organization), linux devs, etc. all make their own apps but they're as interoperable as a phone call. As it stands, we've got a handful of non-interoperable social platforms and video chat services, where for the most part, a single service is in an overwhelmingly dominant position. The impact of this is a near-monopoly where a single entity's choice to deplatform somebody has an outsized impact. I understand why this makes free-speech purists squirm, but I do not have sympathy for the notion that free speech is the only right worthy of protection. There must be balance.
I love the fact that this thread is empty while the one about deplatforming white supremacists is chock-full of people screaming about free speech. Really makes the whole thing a bit blatant.
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[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 42.6 ms ] threadAh, yes. The the very limits of free speech.
FWIW it's totally fine that people wanna curate the content on their site. I'm not under the impression that any of the lefties are there on good faith; that's a great reason to kick folks off your platform.
Perhaps there would be more outrage if Parler was more than a rounding error in terms of user base?
As for your cheap dismissal, let me counter by suggesting you go defend Zoom's banning of Chinese activists, if you have such a dim view of free speech.
Let's correct one thing. I do not have a dim view of free speech, I've been championing it my whole life. I have a dim view of so-called "free speech activists" who clamber to protect right-wing extremists at the exclusion of other important freedoms, and then don't make a peep when lefty rabble-rousers get the same treatment on platforms made by, for and of the far right. Because that demonstrates bad faith, and a lack of commitment to first amendment rights -- hypocricy, as you say.
I disagree with you about harms to the "spirit" of free speech. Ultimately, you and I have right to disagree. We have the right to complain about eachother, we have the right to petition third parties to dissociate from the other, and those third parties have a right to ignore us, listen to us, act or not act based on the information presented. For one example right under our nose, HN users who stick around for a few weeks and make valued contributions have the privilege to downvote and flag eachothers' comments and submissions. All that to say, free speech is not without its just limitations -- first, I cannot be compelled to agree with or disseminate your speech, and second, the freedom of speech does not confer a freedom from social consequences -- if I go into a church and shout blasphemy during a sermon, then I'd rightly get kicked out and they'd probably ask me to never come back. The "spirit" of free speech, in my opinion, is the freedom to expose your opinions to the judgements of others.
Not sure what you're referring to as a "cheap dismissal", feel free to elucidate. Personally, I've been trying to get my employer and friends to stop using Zoom for various reasons. I'm not super informed about the situation with Chinese activists, but I do have a razor. If that was the act of the Zoom execs' personal conscience, more power to them, and hopefully the market will punish them severely. On the other hand, if that was due to pressure by the Chinese government, then I am very much against it.
A lot of the friction that we're seeing today is because technology has enabled monopolies, or near-monopolies. I'd love to see facebook, twitter, google, etc. get broken up. I'd love to see zoom replaced with open protocols wherein apple, microsoft, android corp (a post-google organization), linux devs, etc. all make their own apps but they're as interoperable as a phone call. As it stands, we've got a handful of non-interoperable social platforms and video chat services, where for the most part, a single service is in an overwhelmingly dominant position. The impact of this is a near-monopoly where a single entity's choice to deplatform somebody has an outsized impact. I understand why this makes free-speech purists squirm, but I do not have sympathy for the notion that free speech is the only right worthy of protection. There must be balance.
This belief is held because all rights flow from free speech. You can't have any other rights without functioning & free discourse.