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Comment by jmcdiesel | Hacker News Reader

They have a constitutional right to say whatever they want without punishment by the government. Thats where that right ends.

The constitution has no power in the private sector, its an agreement from the government. If a dns provider doesn't want to take money from a hate group and support them by providing them with visibility, why should they be forced to? Its a private company. Now, if the US government was a domain registrar, the constitution may apply, but even then hate speech is a gray area and is easily worked around.

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>The constitution has no power in the private sector, its an agreement from the government.

So going the libertarian route and shrinking government would remove protections. That doesn't seem quite right, because it was still the government that allowed the private sector to take over a duty of the government.

What duty? You think that domain registration is by default a duty of the government? The government has no real say over the internet - and the little it has should be removed. Thats like saying space travel or planetary colonization should be reliant on the approval of a government... its not their place to be in charge...

Or saying the mail system should be.

There isn't an approved list of what the government handles. Much of politics is disagreements in this. But it is still a point worth discussing, and saying that it cannot be the government's duty because it currently isn't a valid reason to stop discussion of it.

"That doesn't seem quite right, because it was still the government that allowed the private sector to take over a duty of the government."

You aren't talking about discussing it, you're already calling it a duty of the government that the government allowed to be taken over. The discussion is fine, just dont start it from a stance already...

Good point. A bit late to go back and edit it.

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