If Twitter actually wanted to promote civic responsibility, they would ban Donald Trump for repeated ToS violations and try to encourage him to be a little more thoughtful about his proclamations to the world.
Censoring the speech of the President is probably not something that they want to get engaged with.
He's a special case. So I would argue that some of the terms should not apply to him.
For instance, he has the right to make violent threats in certain circumstances compared to normal citizens.
Whether I personally agree with his threats or tact is not important.
Now when he does something that he does not have the legal right to, I'll let the courts handle that one.
No one has the 'right' to make violent threats on twitter. It is a private service with a ToS.
There are no principled reasons to treat the president as a special case here. The practical reason is simply that it is often and free advertising for them and the terms of service dictate what they can do when breached; not what they must do.
I never claimed this. My argument hinges on the fact that he has the right, in certain circumstances, to make violent threats as opposed to normal citizens.
The TOS is written for normal citizens because it is indeed illegal for normal citizens to do so. And I therefore agree with you that the TOS technically does not allow any violent threats on twitter.
I do not think it is unreasonable to allow the President to communicate his threats on Twitter, a modern means of communication. I think it's actually a good thing to allow, for this and all future presidents.
Again, letter of the TOS vs. spirit of the TOS.
For instance -- I have the right to say 'Nazis should be punched in the face' in most circumstances. It would violate Twitter TOS to tweet that however and they'd be well within their right to take that message down or ban the account.
The 'spirit' of the TOS is civility in most part, not legality. Donald Trumps twitter account isn't civil.
And if you disagree about that, or about the spirit of the TOS so be it -- that is why things like terms of service are held to the more objective letter, and not the highly subjective spirit.
> POTUS has _authority_ to enact those threats in certain cases whereas one typically doesn't.
The first quote deals with the threat. The second deals with "enacting the threats."
So if you claim that he has no right to make a threat, then how can he enact something that he has no right to say?
Regardless, I'm only speaking on his legal right to make threats. And yes, he does have a legal right to make violent threats.
And no, Twitter's TOS does not prohibit uncivil language with a broad brush. But I agree with you that it is not purely based in law, but civility certainly is based in moral law.
> that is why things like terms of service are held to the more objective letter, and not the highly subjective spirit.
You mean as in the case that we're discussing?
No, I'm claiming he has no more legal right to make threats than any other person. There is a large difference there. Largely speaking a persons right to make threats is protected under the first amendment.
There are very narrow instances where verbal or written threats become assault (or terrorism, or attempts to incite a riot, etc); and since one of the criteria there is ability to carry out threat, someone in a position of power has somewhat more liability here, not less.
Which is all besides the point -- twitter isn't a government entity; your first amendment protections don't apply to their ban hammer. Their rules and regulations are more restrictive in all cases than what is allowed by law.
> You mean as in the case that we're discussing?
I mean, yes? My point is that a) Trump is in technical violation of the TOS and b) The TOS constrains the behaviors of the users, not Twitter so they have no real obligation to enforce it.
> that is why things like terms of service are held to the more objective letter, and not the highly subjective spirit.
I replied.
> You mean as in the case that we're discussing?
Clearly your objection is that the TOS is not held in this case at all.
Which could indicate that they're failing to act or they are interpreting their TOS subjectively per his special role.
> No, I'm claiming he has no more legal right to make threats than any other person.
This is not about freedom of speech. This is about his position, that threats are sometimes part of negotiation and he can legally threaten (as an example).
Large classes of other people cannot, for instance, negotiate on behalf of the U.S.
We're not arguing about the same thing here.
There underlying logic of the demands made no sense at all, but it didn't matter. Believing Trump had violated the Twitter ToS and should be banned was simply something you did if you weren't an evil Nazi Trump supporter.
Then they shouldn't get engaged in censoring anyone's speech on their platform (unless, of course, the free market value of the President’s special treatment on Twitter is reported and treated in law as either a corporate gift by Twitter to Donald J. Trump or an in-kind campaign donation to his re-election campaign, or a campaign expenditure coordinated with the candidate. Of course, any of these has significant legal consequences.)
We have laws governing gifts of anything of value to political office holders and candidates for a reason.