If they cannot manage unmoderated posting without hurting a lot of people, why should they be allowed to run a business based on unmoderated posting?
Would you say it is a catch-22 for a factory if a government ordered them to stop production or stop polluting nearby waterways with their toxic runoff? Perhaps for the factory, but the nearby communities would say it's a clear-cut case.
Your telecom also uses tax money to fund its infrastructure deployments, and it is regulated as more than an ordinary private company.
This is nonsense. They are trying to moderate content and they're being told that it's not permitted. It's qualitatively akin to requiring the New York Times to publish all letters to the editor. Or more specific to the posted article, require that the NYT write a personalized response for each letter that they don't publish and give the letter's author an opportunity to edit it for content.