I know this is difficult when people are saying things you believe to be untrue, but thus far nobody has come up with an alternative that doesn't result in censorship or end up having an unrealistically high moderation cost.
Let me put it this way. Nothing is stopping hateful people from creating their own video hosting platform and hosting their drivel. Hence, free speech. But nothing in the entirety of free speech, whether the legal notions or the philosophical notions, requires platforms to give that speech a place to live. The whole "marketplace of ideas" concept fundamentally works by having the community at large reject hateful speech.
Free speech does not mean each instance of speech needs to be weighed and evaluated equally by the community.
From a far more practical perspective, allowing this sort of thing onto your platform spells death for any content-platform startup. Seeing this sort of thing is going to immediately (a) drive sensible content consumers -- your actual users -- away from the platform, and (b) draw other hate speech creators to you like flies to shit. If that's what the platform wants to do, then nothing in the world is stopping them, but they will never gain mainstream success.
Cloudflare and domain registrar bans, payment processor bans and deplatforming, etc. would beg to differ.
You don't even need to use the Internet, paint it on a sign and walk around the street with it on a pole.
You're not having your free speech impeded by any of this, because refusing to carry someone elses speech isn't censorship, it's just that when you say things that are repulsive to people they won't want to help promote it.
If you want free speech go to your door, walk outside, start taking. You got your free speech. Everything else is a bonus.
This argument is reductio ad absurdum, except executed against an argument you support. De-platforming online is in opposition to free speech, and the fact you can walk out your front door with a sign does not mitigate the loss of equal power behind your speech that others enjoy by using Internet services. You standing on the street with a sign is in no way equivalent in character or reach to writing what your sign says on Twitter. So here we are, the Internet is a thing, it exists, and so do digital platforms. Free and open access to web platforms is a core philosophical requirement to ensure freedom of speech, and de-platforming people damages that.
It's okay to be opposed to freedom of speech, it's okay to be opposed to the open web, but don't act as if you are not while advocating de-platforming as being an acceptable behavior.
Maybe the answer is obvious to you, but it is not to me: why should these things be equivalent? Why should you be entitled to twitter's channel for your views that twitter does not want to host?
If Twitter is making the decision on its own -- that is, it's not coerced by the state, and if you are still capable of getting your information online by some other means, then Twitter is making its own free speech decision to curate its own website like you would your own site or your own store. Free and accessible doesn't and shouldn't mean that you get to hold the platform for ransom with your content. That is, Twitter shouldn't be chained to indefinitely dedicating hosting specifically for any one kind of unpopular content.
Your definition for the "open web" sounds to me like, honestly, very severe state control of private enterprise. You, a member of the open web, not being permitted to choose what content belongs on your own website just defeats the purpose of any kind of experiment of free expression online. A government telling you that you must always carry this or that particular view is totally antithetical to the First Amendment that establishes the Freedom of Speech.
Getting kicked out of the bowling club for sharing highly offensive statements has not prevented you from sharing those statements. Losing your job over them has not prevented you from sharing those statements. Being banned from twitter has not prevented you from sharing those statements. I really do mean to be absolute about this -- your freedom of speech would not have been impeded _at all_, no matter how many hosts or bans or jobs you go through.
If you're reduced to screaming your opinions from a street corner in order to have anyone hear them, and you're still being ignored by people, well you've still got 100% of your freedom of speech -- it's just that the speech isn't resonating and the government isn't some despotic, Orwellian regime that would force audiences to listen to those views.
If you're saying that you're not physically prevented from saying whatever you'd like, but with that being the limit, it seems like just about any infringement becomes acceptable.
> Being put to death by the government has not prevented you from sharing those statements.
All speech has consequences. You, the free speech enthusiast, not being prepared to pay those consequences is not cause for a government bailout or arrests of website hosts.
Ah, you are making the same claim (and thus mistake) as another commenter in another thread I responded to. Freedom of speech is not just a law, it is also a social more. It's basis is first in philosophy, and then in law stemming from that. Just because the government has not violated your First Amendment civil rights, does not mean your freedom of speech has not been violated in some other way.
Losing my friends over calling them assholes definitely dissuades me from doing so in the future. This impedes my freedom of speech.
See how nonsensical that is? Just because something makes you less likely to speak your mind doesn't mean it's impeding your freedoms. You have the freedoms to call your friends assholes. They have the freedom not to associate with you anymore (this is called freedom of association, and is part of freedom of speech). That freedom of association is the same freedom your employer is exercising when you make a racist joke and then fire you. You had the freedom to make the joke, they had the freedom not to associate with you after you did. No ones freedoms were limited.
Are you implying that black people choose to be black like someone saying racist, firable things at work chooses to say those things?
If the freedom of association is inviolable, why can't I put up a sign outside my store saying "NO BLACKS"?
If it's about someone making statements at work, would you accept if a business owner said that they'll fire you if you're Jewish, but let you work there as long as they don't know about it?
I don't think there is an obvious answer here. We're in the realm of philosophy. My response to the grandparent was less about my own advocacy for freedom of speech (although that is clearly my position/bias) and more about their statements being disingenuous.
What my own personal opinion is as to the answer to your questions is pretty simple though. Twitter, like other social media "publishers", enjoys special legal status under the law via [0]Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act. As such, they themselves do not have freedom of speech, they must not interfere with the content of the creators who use their platform. Interfering with that content (in theory) loses them that special legal status and opens them up to liability for the content they do choose to retain/host. So our legislation is pretty clear on the matter, Twitter does not have the right to censor you simply because they're a private business while also maintaining liability immunity as a common carrier.
> If Twitter is making the decision on its own -- that is, it's not coerced by the state, and if you are still capable of getting your information online by some other means, then Twitter is making its own free speech decision to curate its own website like you would your own site or your own store.
See above. "Publishing platforms" don't have free speech rights as long as they choose to operate as common carriers to maintain liability immunity, which Twitter does. That's setting aside the separate argumentation point which is that corporations are not people and corporate personhood is a sham, and therefore corporations themselves do not fundamentally have freedom of speech.
> Your definition for the "open web" sounds to me like, honestly, very severe state control of private enterprise.
Please elaborate. I can't imagine how you would come to that conclusion from what I wrote.
> A government telling you
"You." Civil Rights are individual rights, not collective rights. Compelled speech is obviously not philosophically aligned with freedom of speech. But it seems you are using a collective "you", strongly implying the impositions that come from corporate personhood as a legal concept to be more tangible than they are even in current law.
> Getting kicked out of the bowling club for sharing highly offensive statements has not prevented you from sharing those statements. Losing your job over them has not prevented you from sharing those statements. Being banned from twitter has not prevented you from sharing those statements. I really do mean to be absolute about this -- your freedom of speech not impeded _at all_. If you're reduced to screaming your opinions from a street corner in order to have anyone hear them, and you're still being ignored by people, well you've still got 100% of your freedom of speech -- it's just that the speech isn't resonating and the government isn't some despotic regime out of 1984 that would force audiences to listen to those views.
I'm less absolutist here. Your argument has merit, and yet it misses the point. The bowling club kicking you out is not the same thing as being banned from Twitter. The bowling club is not a publishing platform which exclusively exists for broadcasting speech to people who choose to follow you. Twitter is. People who are highly offended by your statements on Twitter have many modes of recourse in order to not be accosted by your statements such as not following you, blocking you, or otherwise using available technical means to ignore you. The bowling club, however has no such filtering mechanism, nor is it's sole purpose for existence to provide a platform for individuals to broadly publish their speech, it exists for people to bowl and your highly offensive speech reasonably detracts from its purpose for existence.
Platforms are different from other forms of private entities, and they are treated differently under the law as such. Trying to conflate the two is not reasonable, nor is it reasonable to take an absolutist position based in a conflation. Also, it's just plain wrong to say that "your freedom of speech not impededed _at all_." if you've been banned from a broadcasting platform. That's an obvious impediment, which shouldn't need further explanation.
There's a line between removing content and creating/editing content, especially when it's attributed to someone else. When you, publisher, start modifying others' content, it's reasonable that you become liable for the result. If you choose not to publish certain authors, for any reason goes against your acceptable use policies, I don't see an issue. It's off-topic comments on a forum. Political comments on a cooking blog. Etc. You have pretty wide latitude to define what is acceptable on your publishing platform, and that definition shouldn't have to be fixed throughout time.
> "Publishing platforms" don't have free speech rights as long as they choose to operate as common carriers
Twitter is not a common carrier. Social media is not a public utility. They are publishers.
Anyhow, you still need a bank account to get paid. If you can only work jobs that pay you in cash and don't need any access to bank accounts or the Internet themselves, that rules out 99% of businesses that could employ you.
Should you start your own DDoS protection service too?
That's about as 'mainstream' as you can get in the fediverse.
so i have to make my own bookstore just to sell that book? I'd say that's pretty close to censorship. Even tho the constitution doesn't stop private censorship (only gov't censorship), it isn't a good outcome imo.
I, a terrible author, am not entitled to your bookstore's audience.
In the market of video providers, none of them are interested in hosting a particular viewpoint, then the creators of the video either have to put up with that or go make their own.
Either way: still not censorship.
To spell it out, your reasoning assumes that the prevailing consensus in any society is good.
Removing it from the bookstore prevents those who wants the book from getting it. Having it in the bookstore doesn't force those who don't want it from reading it!
Instead, you can choose to not support that bookstore owner by shopping somewhere else and rewarding the bookstore owner that -does- carry it. Bookstore owners are not the government, they're free to do all sorts of things and you're free to be a patron or not.
it is ridiculous when there's physical constraints, but for digital goods, such as youtube, there's almost no physical constraints.
Noone is saying the bookstore must promote or give prominence to all books equally. But preventing the books from existing by virtue of their platform size is wrong.
There's a difference between your home, which is a privately owned private space, and a mall, which is a privately owned public space. Youtube is more like a mall or a newspaper conglomerate than your house. For it to have a bias when censoring content can be objectionable in the same way that a big media conglomerate with a bias can be objectionable.
So if I ask you to leave my house because I don't want to listen to you any more, am I violating the global ethical principle of free speech?
The second paragraph of my response is more relevant here. Your house is not open to the general public except for me, it does not contain political discourse from billions of people, it's not owned by a company with a market cap close to a trillion dollars, and it has a plethora of viable alternatives.
If I was a political candidate and you asked me to leave your debate venue, I don't know whether you'd be right, but it would certainly be more controversial than if you asked me to leave your house.
Flip it around: Imagine you have a tattoo. You're publishing the one tattoo therefore "free speech" means you have to publish all the tattoos? Should you be obliged to allow a big "Kick whites out of America" tattoo next to whatever tattoo you have chosen to wear?
Leaving a piece of speech alone and simply doing nothing to it doesn't count as promoting it. That's exactly what section 230 in the USC means.
It’s fucking textbook definition of censorship.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censorship
Are you conflating “government censorship” with censorship?
Those who agree with the norms of 2020 also think many of the norms of past times were awful. Homosexuality was considered beyond decency not long ago. Race mixing, premarital sex as well. The list can be made very long.
So what are the chances that mainstream decency right now has found the perfect set of correct values, that never needs to be challenged?
That's not what is happening here. That's not what the issue is. Hate speech doesn't boil down to "things I don't believe to be true."
Typing "Jews" into these platforms and getting hate speech back isn't an issue of "oh dear, here are some untruths." It's hate and designed to create more hate. Which is why many platforms and many countries have a special category for it.
You can disagree with that philosophically, fine. But you might try not being so flippant about it. Especially when the example here, anti-Semitism, is associated with the death of millions of people's loved ones.
Since we're on the subject, anti-Semitism is one of those accusations that is used liberally to attack anyone that organizations like the ADL don't like. For example, if you compare the treatment of Palestinians by the Israelis to apartheid, if you criticize Judaism in a way that resembles what Catholics are subjected to on a regular basis, or some tendency in Jewish culture, then suddenly you're an anti-Semite. Anti-Semitism is a hatred of Jewish ethnicity, a hatred of a person who is Jewish because of his ethnicity. It is not a critical stance toward questions of culture, religion, or politics. But the legitimate definition of the term has been expanded by political hucksters into what Norman Finkelstein (whose parents are survivors) calls the Holocaust industry, where a grave crime is exploited to silence criticism and bully people into silence on matters that have nothing to do with anti-Semitism. So we have a textbook example of how "hate speech" is deployed to silence political opposition and stifle debate. There are, of course, other examples.
Mind you, I do not include things like libel and calls for violence in hate speech. Those kinds of things are already legislated and penalized as they should be. Too many things, like pornography, have been falsely defended by appealing to "free speech". What I'm talking about is the use of this insidious term by powerful groups to silence those they don't like, and then pretending like that's not what's happening. It is that simple.
One core value that a platform could have is common decency, which is not the same as censorship, but it is given up even easier than what your argument calls free speech.
How do you suggest making a platform which allows good content while disallowing bad? Also, how do you expect to be able to define these things? Remember: every person you pay to moderate has to be able to discern good from bad in as little time as possible. Even less time than that.
I have no idea how to apply this to a content hosting paradigm though. Not without spending a couple million dollars on bots who inevitably make mistakes.
Since somebody downvoted without providing references to their refutes here's an actual case about freedom of speech online which is the main one by the looks of it in regards to suppressing speech online:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reno_v._American_Civil_Liberti...
The burden of defamation is on the person not the website if anything, however, if someone posts anonymously who do you sue? The best a platform can do is delete their account. I've successfully had defamatory / false content about myself deleted from a platform in the past.
If someone wants to argue that YouTube should be declared a public utility that is required to host everyone’s content no matter what, that’s totally understandable and they should make that argument instead. Otherwise they’re just asking for the government to mandate that YouTube, etc. are safe spaces where everything is permitted and no one is allowed to judge other people for what they say, including the company paying for the servers. Which is so totally counter to what those very same people seem to think about everything else that I’m surprised the hypocrisy and inconsistency doesn’t create a singularity or something. But here we are, in 2020, and AM-talk-radio types are demanding the government mandate safe spaces for them on privately owned platforms where they are shielded from consequences.
I suspect you'll find out that whatever free speech rights your local jurisdiction grants you don't allow you to stay in the bar.
What you are doing when you allow racism or xenophobia on your site is helping them promote it. There's a difference, and the fact that you have chosen to stand with those people doesn't put you in the free speech group, it puts you in the "I am a racist" group.