Ideologically it troubles me that political opponents are censored in USA (Trump) even though I vehemently disagree with every thing he has to say and I understand it’s damaging to the society through incitement of violence.
[EDIT} this is getting downvoted, but him magically being removed from Twitter and Parler being shut down didn't just happen in a vacuum. We are in full censorship mode as a country. It is sad to see.
Other part of me thinks “Twitter is so much better without Trump”. I’m with you all.
There may have been another event that occurred right about the same time which had more impact on Twitter's decision to boot him from the platform.
There are few things that can dampen First Amendment protections (to say nothing of Section 230 protections). Incitement to violence or insurrection is one of them (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imminent_lawless_action), and on January 6th, Twitter and FB made the judgement call that it was too likely that's what the President was doing. Perhaps if one turns one's head and squints, one could consider it government censorship because the CEOs of those companies didn't want any risk at all they'd be hauled into a Congressional oversight (or a court) over the use of their platforms in aiding and abetting an insurrection, but it's a strange type of government censorship that censors the President, isn't it? It's not entirely out of the realm of possibility in the US, given that Congress and the Courts are independent branches; perhaps one could make a claim that Congress can apply indirect pressure to shape what a President may say.
(There is, perhaps, more to be said on the topic in terms of why he's still banned from those sites).
Did you not read the article? Its whole point is the new authoritarians are a lot more flexible than the old ones. They are about reducing the spread of dissenting thought, rather than eradicating it altogether. As the article says:
"Friction is about making it harder and less convenient to access unapproved material."
Banning Trump from Twitter doesn't make it impossible to access what he says, but it does make it harder. You are less likely to read what he says, unless you specifically go looking for it. Twitter's censorship of Trump means a lot fewer people will know what he says, which is its goal.
Oh noes. Anyone who wants to know what Trump is saying has to experience the momentary and minor inconvenience of discovering a URL on the open internet. Once then bookmarking it or something. The horror.
This is a net positive, insurrectionists should not be given a platform.
At the end of the day, free speech doesn't mean that a platform like twitter has to let you on to their platform, but should you want to create or host your own alternative to Twitter? Well you can, so you're not restricted in your free speech.
Perhaps in law, but certainly not spirit. I understand the dilemma. Twitter doesn't want the KKK on their site, but they've gone way too far. It's nothing more than a thinly veiled self-serving propaganda machine anymore, as is all the other large social media sites. The original dream of internet freedom is dead.
You can spread all the harmful lies you like as long as your victims are diffuse and lack the standing for a lawsuit.
We have plenty of forms of censorship available through the courts - people can be punished for perjury, filing a false report, defamation, false advertising, fraud, uttering threats, etc. But in all those cases, you only face punishment if you target somebody with the standing and means to retain a lawyer, or you target the machinery of justice itself.
What happens when you target something like "climate change"? Or vaccines? Or the history of the 2020 election? Nothing. Nobody has standing to sue so the act is not punished.
So why is Hulk Hogan more worthy of protection from harmful speech than Climate Change?
And letting falsehoods go uncorrected plainly hasn't worked. The "Marketplace of Ideas" has done jack squat about Q or climate change denial or antivaxxers or whatever, and now we're facing real catastrophic impact of those problems. Significant thought-leaders in these communities can be caught over and over again in easily-verifiable lies and supporting extremist and hateful content... and face no consequences in terms of losing support through the normal mechanisms of the platform.
You can see what happens to platforms without substantive moderation or censorship - they're gradually consumed by obsessed extremists who simply exhaust all the normal people until they leave.
So, with the total failure of a government policy to tackle the problem, is it any wonder that people are looking to the owners of the platforms to tackle the issue? They have the means, and can be influenced through threats of boycotts.
Until reality itself can sue for defamation, we have to come up with a decent alternative. The stakes are high and the impact is real.
and which institutions? the elected federal government? the appointed federal government? the intelligence agencies?
who is the authority on truth, and what gives them that authority?
I question whether they should want to be such an authority, or whether they are competent to be such an authority, but they have the power (both technically and, currently, legally) to be the authority... on their own platform.
If celebrities can sue the Daily Mail for lying about them and win, why doesn't climate change or covid infectiousness get the same protection, considering the stakes are so much higher?
It makes sense for US companies to ban people trying to overthrow the US.
though in this case I'd argue it was a combination of both, there were folks involved in the insurrection attempt on the 6th that brought weapons: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/jul/13/donald-tru...