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Comment by boublepop | Hacker News Reader

People saying parler has a right to exist should be asked if they feel aws, Apple and google should also be forced to host an ISI chat forum. Or if they only support terrorists seeking to overthrow the democratically elected government when it suits their personal politics.

Either they support de platforming terrorists, or they have to afford these companies the same level of selectivity they are themselves displaying. In either case you have to allow these hosting providers to say “no way, we aren’t touching this”.

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People don't like these enormous platforms having the power to unilaterally make these decisions on a dime, accountable to no one but shareholders. At a certain point these platforms get so big and integral to modern life they need to be regulated.

I can't count the number of times Twitter and Facebook have been used for hatching/plotting terror attacks. No one banned these social media giants for failure to police their own sites. Was Facebook banned after the NZ Mosque shooter live streamed entire shooting spree? Was Twitter banned after it allowed ISIS to operate on its site with impunity for 2 years by posting propaganda and beheading videos? These are just few examples of plenty of examples of violence propagated on these sites. Yet they are given a free pass. Parler on the other hand had to face the consequences.

There are personal threats, hate-y speech, and all sorts of borderline calls to violence on Twitter, as well. It's baffling to me how supportive people are of censorship (given that it'll affect THEM at some point eventually), but even more baffling how facile the rationalizations are. We're being cognitively selective when we say that Parler 'caused' or facilitated violence, and Twitter never has!

Exactly! We were told that we are going to experience fascism for 4 years. In all of these 4 years the press was given so much freedom to say whatever it wants and publish whatever it wants on a sitting US President. I don't think Putin or Xi would have been kind to the press if they were ever treated the way Trump was treated. The journalists along with the media organisations would have disappeared overnight!

Yet here we are. In a purely fascist Censorship overdrive. And everyone is cheering it! The attack on US Capitol pales in comparison to what has happened now. This is far more damaging to USA than some bunch of idiotic insurrectionists who thought they'll be able to take over the US Capitol.

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