Twitter Sues Texas AG over content moderation citing 1st Amendment Rights | Hacker News Reader

Twitter Sues Texas AG over content moderation citing 1st Amendment Rights

politico.com

1 pointldbooth9 comments

Twitter suing somebody over the First Amendment rights. This is rich. I believe that Twitter is one of the most egregious violators of the First Amendment themselves.

It sounds like you have no idea what the First Amendment is, then. Here it is, since you obviously haven't read it:

> "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

It protects most types of speech from being suppressed or compelled by the government.

It protects Twitter from being forced to publish things they don't want to publish.

It says absolutely nothing about Twitter being obligated to moderate content in a particular way.

Twitter and Facebook are monopolies in their respective niches. They are quasi-government entities at this point. They should be subject to a 1A-like rule as well.

Twitter does not—and cannot—violate first amendment rights, since it is not the US government.

There is a certain point whereafter I end up doubting the normative value that most ascribe to coming out of the 1st Amendment; that being the concept that if the government can't do it, we probably shouldn't be doing it to each other willy nilly under the guise of private enterprise either, as aftera certain point, the lines between enterprise and government blur together as to become nigh-inseperable.

You can say that you disagree with Twitter's moderation choices if you want. That has nothing to do with this lawsuit. The lawsuit is saying that the Texas government is abusing its power to pressure Twitter to publish, distribute, and tacitly endorse things that Twitter has chosen not to. That's exactly what the First Amendment is intending to stop.

> the concept that if the government can't do it, we probably shouldn't be doing it to each other

The government's behavior is more restricted because it has a monopoly on many types of power (law creation and enforcement, for example). The purpose of the First Amendment is to stop the government from abusing its monopoly powers to oppress people. Otherwise, we couldn't trust the government with those powers in the first place.

Private corporations like Twitter don't have the power to broadly suppress speech in the first place. They can't, for example, censor the New York Times or Joe Rogan's podcast. They can only decide what they publish.

> The government's behavior is more restricted because it has a monopoly on many types of power (law creation and enforcement, for example)

You mention monopolies, yet don't point out that Twitter essentially has a monopoly in its niche. This to me sounds like it should be regulated to include aspects of 1A.

"Twitter has a monopoly in its niche" is totally indefensible with any evidence.

They're much, much smaller than Facebook and Instagram, for starters. They're not even the biggest social network!

And then if you include all the other ways to publish an announcement (press releases, interviews with journalists, your own blog, etc.) there are dozens or hundreds of other important channels.

God... That's an unfortunate auto correct.

s/end up/stop

Should read "stop doubting the normative value"

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