Or more realistically, the first thing he’ll do is re-platform all those that got de-platformed.
Trump 2024, here we go.
Trump 2024, here we go.
Wouldn't Trump tweets drive a bunch of traffic and therefore ad revenue to the platform? Seems like an obvious move just from a business sense.
They can have at it.
Freedom of speech also means freedom to leave.
It does but you could also not look at his tweets. Shouldn't other people on the platform be able to decide whether they wish to see (or not see) the tweets they wish to?
it's also about public good and legitimate intention to stop attacks on the foundations of our republic and stop the spread of dangerous (imho should. be libelous under law to combat) lies.
complicated and can become paternalistic, deciding what is best for someone. but we do that (or used to, vaccines and mask pushback) all the time on other dangers.
You are able to block the account and then you wouldn't see retweets. If they screenshot something then you could shrug and get on with your day in the knowledge that you'd stopped most of the stuff, or block your friend. I'd give users more tools, like the one Twitter itself has, to rate accounts and shape the kind of tweets one can see.
> it's also about public good and legitimate intention to stop attacks on the foundations of our republic and stop the spread of dangerous (imho should. be libelous under law to combat) lies.
If stopping lies comes at the cost of undermining free speech for everyone, then it would be the thing undermining the republic, far more than a known liar lying.
I rely on Mill for my views on bad men speaking bad things:
> It is also often argued, and still oftener thought, that none but bad men would desire to weaken these salutary beliefs; and there can be nothing wrong, it is thought, in restraining bad men, and prohibiting what only such men would wish to practise. This mode of thinking makes the justification of restraints on discussion not a question of the truth of doctrines, but of their usefulness; and flatters itself by that means to escape the responsibility of claiming to be an infallible judge of opinions. But those who thus satisfy themselves, do not perceive that the assumption of infallibility is merely shifted from one point to another. The usefulness of an opinion is itself matter of opinion: as disputable, as open to discussion, and requiring discussion as much, as the opinion itself. There is the same need of an infallible judge of opinions to decide an opinion to be noxious, as to decide it to be false, unless the opinion condemned has full opportunity of defending itself. And it will not do to say that the heretic may be allowed to maintain the utility or harmlessness of his opinion, though forbidden to maintain its truth. The truth of an opinion is part of its utility. If we would know whether or not it is desirable that a proposition should be believed, is it possible to exclude the consideration of whether or not it is true?
Trump & members of Congress's actions are not "opinion: disputable, open to discussion." Clear facts that actually happened.
The election was free and fair. Fact.
There was minuscule fraud which did not affect outcomes, even on the smallest level. Plus a decent chunk of the worst offenders were Republicans including the COS who actively engaged in this sedition. Fact.
Congress was violently attacked. Fact.
Trump & sworn Government Representatives tried to overturn the election, subvert democracy, and overthrow the Government. Fact.
That can not be supported and is a clear exception to free speech that is grossly & intentionally harmful.
To the below comment, I do believe courts have interpreted and created law which applies to Trump's words and actions, specifically on reasonable restrictions to speech which incites, creates, has immediate danger.
Trump's actions and words fit that and he is culpable for the actions resulting from his words.
On the actual law surrounding the consequences of his speech and attempts to subvert our Government and Democracy
Fourteenth Amendment Section 3 No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
Law specific says incites https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?path=/prelim@title18/par...
Hence, those facts, as you assert, are moot. Additionally, as Mill wrote:
> Strange it is, that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free discussion, but object to their being "pushed to an extreme;" not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case. Strange that they should imagine that they are not assuming infallibility, when they acknowledge that there should be free discussion on all subjects which can possibly be doubtful, but think that some particular principle or doctrine should be forbidden to be questioned because it is so certain, that is, because they are certain that it is certain. To call any proposition certain, while there is any one who would deny its certainty if permitted, but who is not permitted, is to assume that we ourselves, and those who agree with us, are the judges of certainty, and judges without hearing the other side.
Hence, the veracity of those facts is irrelevant.
> That can not be supported and is a clear exception to free speech that is grossly & intentionally harmful.
Here we find a limit - should speech that is knowingly wrong and malicious be allowed? We're back to infallibility. Are you going to prove to me that Trump committed mens rea, or do you think he'd be able to claim he really believes the election was stolen from him? You don't have the ability to read minds.
His actions are clear, direct, immediate threat and dangerous. Speech his says to support that should not be accepted.
Did you skip over the bit where Mill mentions infallibility?
> His actions are clear, direct, immediate threat and dangerous.
Not according to US law.
> Speech his says to support that should not be accepted.
As Chomsky would say, even Stalin and Goebbels were in favour of freedom of speech for speech they agreed with.
The legal system is already adequate to deal with libel. If someone libels you then you can sue in civil court.
But I will not contribute 1 cent/penny/vote in advertising revenue towards a platform that hosts that horsesh!t.
I'm going to try my best to find a more matured and curated (and long lived) kind of horsesh!t that's closer to actual truths than the fresh and regular horsesh!t on twitter.
We should probably stop now. Good luck.
Twitter does put a lot of stuff from people one doesn’t follow in their feed though. I imagine the problem would be a lot less severe if they didn’t push for this kind of “engagement.”
He can run for office. He can win office. But just no more chicken stuff please. It really upsets the community. It’s your chicken store and you can ban anyone you like, especially the weird chicken trash can guy.
That would seem a more accurate depiction. Regardless, Trump has not been stuffing chickens into bins, you're comparing speech to actions other than speech in order to justify that speech being curtailed because you don't like it. Are you okay with the Saudi royal family controlling Twitter too?
Long live HN.
That wasn't the claim, if it was one. This is what I wrote:
> A Saudi prince and his family control access to the square, along with a group of incredibly rich investors. Criticism of them is strictly controlled.
We know that certain critical speech is suppressed on the platform, part of the problem is we don't know how much (hence Musk's wish to increase transparency). That does not, however, mean that all criticism is stopped at source. Do you reject, for example, the existence of shadow bans? If not, do you think they are only used against trolls?
As to citations… I'm not giving a viva. If you want me to clarify things I write, you can ask in a normal way.
What makes you think that his ownership will increase transparency. He has sued whistleblowers, he has sued and insulted and bullied people he disagrees with, he employs gilded-age tactics against workers who want to unionise... Words are cheap (especially when you're virtue signalling about things which don't impact your bottom line), but actions speak louder.
Those aren't related to transparency.
> He has sued whistleblowers,
The logic is that Tesla/Musk are suing whistleblowers to silence them because of embarrassing information. Why would Twitter's algorithms be embarrassing to Musk? Or its moderation policies?
> Words are cheap (especially when you're virtue signalling about things which don't impact your bottom line), but actions speak louder.
Exactly, all the more reason to treat words as a special case and not restrict them.
I think it's more than this. Trump's tweets have had significant real world consequences. Questioning the integrity of the US elections based on no real evidence eventually led to an insurrection at the US Capitol. When someone's speech is actively dangerous, it makes sense to block it, akin to shouting fire in a crowded theater.
I can see a thousand ways that could be misused in the aid of authoritarianism. Try speaking it in a German accent, perhaps with "vhere iz your mister Churchill?", and I'm sure you'll see the problem.
> akin to shouting fire in a crowded theater
That was the example given by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr for the clear and present danger test[1] in Schenk vs United States[2]:
> The ruling established that Congress has more latitude in limiting speech in times of war than in peacetime and set out the clear and present danger test, in which Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. indicated that the most stringent interpretations of the First Amendment would not protect a person who causes public panic by shouting “Fire!” in a theater when no fire exists.
I don't see how that test would apply to Trump, even in wartime.
[1] https://mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/898/clear-and-prese...
[2] https://mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/193/schenck-v-unite...
Did I write that? I find it endlessly fascinating when people think in black and white and come back with some kind of false dilemma because I was able to make an entirely legitimate and obvious criticism.
I've a better question: is there anyone worse to own Twitter than the Saudi royal family?
I think so but there aren't many.
But Trump broke the rules multiple times and then was trying to get around his first ban. Treating Trump differently would be giving him his account back, I don't see any reason that if you try to get around your ban you should get your account back.
There is no reason to believe that he's changed.
"I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means."
which could imply that those banned for non-criminal speech would be reinstated.
Edit: This is not about whether de-/replatforming is the right thing to do. Only about the fact that Musk can have (legitimate or illegitimate) reasons other than his political support of Trump.
So what you're saying is that whatever you or your party claims "threatens democracy" -- justified with some vague and arbitrary standards you just invented and that you judge -- is what threatens democracy. And anything anybody else thinks is wrong.
And by the way questioning election integrity and voicing concerns about that is not "threatening democracy" so that's just not some fundamental truth you've stumbled upon there either, other people can disagree about that. If your democracy is threatened by people voicing their concern about election procedures and results and must silence them to function, then it's not really much of a democracy.
What about people concerned about voter suppression or gerrymandering or whatever? Do we need to silence them too? I'm sure you're going to come up with some other vague handwaving as to why those don't meet your criteria for silencing your political opponents.
So now you see why pro-free-speech people don't like these kind of restrictions, because they can and are abused.
The asymmetry of the disinformation war markedly benefits the fascists. There is no need to bow down to them "because free speech."
I agree but the analogy is still a bad fit. A better one would be a phone company back in the days of of AT&T's monopoly. If they kicked you off of their service then you'd lose access, in practical terms, to all those people. This was considered enough of a problem in the past that you weren't allowed to lose your phone service for the content of your speech, on or off of the phone.
I think the analogy extends quite well when we consider the lengths other concerns have gone to in crushing competition, the Parler debacle being the most obvious.
The part of the analogy that holds, in my opinion, is the part where a monopoly concern can kick people off for the content of their speech. It wasn't right with telephone and it doesn't seem right with this but they are being treated differently. I'd say that's because speech is powerful so the logic goes that it must be curtailed, if you're against certain views.
I'm someone who's confident that truth will win the day given a fair hearing, hence, I want freedom of speech.
I think this is a 19th/20th century idea that generally held because of, and not in spite of, the natural barriers to mass communication. Those barriers were the "fair hearing" (an author needed to spend weeks/months/years on their work. They probably spent several years before that studying their topic, or journalism, or whatever. It needed to pass through editors, maybe peer review, etc. It had to compete with others working just as hard, etc.)
For the first time in human history it is easier to broadcast disinformation, lies, and propaganda than it is to broadcast accurate information. This form of truly unrestricted access to mass communications has nearly put a stake in the heart of western democracy in less than 20 years. I am not at all confident truth will win the day.
> I think this is a 19th/20th century idea that generally held because of, and not in spite of, the natural barriers to mass communication
I've heard this take a lot and I'm not sure I agree. The invention of the printing press by Gutenberg offered the same relative change in communication reach. Previously, only wealthy entities (nobles, ecclesiastical authorities, etc) could have the money to create actual written books to disseminate ideas. Literate non-wealthy people could only hope to make a sign and hope for the best. The monopoly on distributing ideas lay with the wealthy and the state.
> For the first time in human history it is easier to broadcast disinformation, lies, and propaganda than it is to broadcast accurate information.
The printing press led to centuries of chaos in the form of the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther used the printing press to print several copies of his "99 Theses" and plastered them on the walls of churches, widely disseminating his ideas. Now, after a renaissance, an enlightenment, and an Industrial Revolution in the West, we have built the cultural norms in place to deal with the negatives of Print. We have social norms separating tabloids from newspapers. We understand that different newspapers have different biases.
Governments have tried to restrict what can and cannot be printed. Many Enlightenment-era empires (Empire of Russia, Austro-Hungarian empire, etc) restricted what can be printed by whom. The Soviets famously only allowed government-approved publications until Glasnost under Gorbachev. In the end, despite the dangers we've found in unfettered public speech, the benefits have proved more salient.
I think it's a lack of norms. A lot of folks don't know how to treat the Web. They see a hot-take/dunk on Twitter and because they agree with the aesthetics of a person's post and some of their other content, they think of the poster as "correct" and retweet/share their content. That's how online tribes form. I'm confident that in a few generations, we'll all "know" much better how to navigate the online world. Until then, much like the aftermath of the printing press, there will be instability.
When you share something on Twitter, there is literally a script (executed by Twitter) that shares that same thing with all your followers. That's essentially the primary mechanism of Twitter, and I would argue that it's fundamentally very different than you choosing to call everyone to know to tell them something (at least for people with more than, say, Dunbar's number of followers). Because of the fact that it's automated, essentially instant, and essentially unbounded in its reach, it is mechanically much more similar to robocalling than to calling your friends to tell them something.
> I would argue that it's fundamentally very different than you choosing to call everyone to know
Okay, one is a broadcast to subscribers and the other is single calls to subscribers. The end result is the same, again, the difference is in implementation and convenience.
Anything that is afforded to the public (for whatever price) is a public square, any ban or deprivation from it amounts to censorship and exclusion. This is unremarkable on the micro scale (e.g. a golf club or a coffeshop) because alternatives are plenty and easy to find, but when a huge corporation with effectively monopolistic control of a huge slice of some market does it it's worrying. And it should worry you even if you happen to like the effects of one particular incident, because the same machinery that allows such incidents to happen is bound to impact you someday.
Completely unmoderated free speech is beneficial to them because regular people that can't even tell what's real or fake aren't ever going to organize to the point where the privileged positions of the elite are challenged.
Trump starting Truth Social and Musk buying Twitter are literally the same thing to me. They're both tying to prevent any kind of unison or popular movements that could de-throne them from their positions as the ruling elite. They both also want to ensure their status as the loudest voice in the room can't be taken away because they use that to convince the average person they "deserve" to rule the world.
That's a deeply depressing take.
specifically Trump's access to the platform is de facto supporting or implicitly allowing Trump's right to lie, attack our Republic, spread violence. (if don't agree crosses into violent words, at least should agree definition something like: suggestively, dog whistle, saying it without saying)
I don't believe anyone can make a good faith argument that his rhetoric did not incite violence. During the campaign, during BLM protests, and most important Jan 6
But not convicted! Something you Trump obsessed seem to always leave out. So yeah, means nothing more than Clinton's impeachment.
BLM? The summer of love? Surely you jest!
And January 6 - sure you want to keep beating that drum? There is far more documented evidence of people on the FBI payroll inciting violence in the days leading up to January 6th than anyone in the Trump campaign, let alone of his followers. Indeed there is plenty of video of such wackos as Alex Jones and other right wing extremists telling people NOT to enter the capital. More video of capital police standing by or ushering people inside. I was watching it live on various live streams on January 6th because it smelled too good to be true. People being ushered inside by the capital police - that's one hell of an "insurrection". People walking between velvet ropes, not lighting shit on fire, spraying things with paint, knocking statues down. People walking inside of a public building and taking selfies. ZOMG! How will the republic survive?!?
How many convictions have they gotten - after more than a year - of these "insurrectionists"? Zero. A few plea deals that are now unraveling. But sure, keep bang that "insurrectionist" drum.
seriously? Where is this documented evidence that more FBI employees were violent leading up to Jan 6. More than hundreds and hundreds storming the Capitol?
You haven't seen the huge amount of footage of battering police, pepper spraying police, throwing spears at police, brutally beating a cop on the ground who now has long term head trauma, the death of police, ransacking, throwing over, messing with proprty.
crazy. flag.
The future causes me intense anxiety especially 2024 ;(
though i do work in politics so perhaps I think about it too much.
I have no idea how we can continue when such a large % of the country believes increasingly insane things
Nah, they all determined he did it. Republican Senators like Lamar Alexander were all quoted saying that both times, they just went on to say they didn't care or they think he learned his lessons.
> How many convictions have they gotten - after more than a year - of these "insurrectionists"? Zero. A few plea deals that are now unraveling. But sure, keep bang that "insurrectionist" drum.
Over 150 by my count. The Oath Keeper who was Roger Stone's bodyguard that day pled guilty to actual sedition!
It hasn't rolled up to Alex Jones and further up but it will, since he was intentionally leading people around to the east side for an attack on Pence by claiming Trump would "give a second speech" there.
https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1503855795951312898
If you wanted to actually follow this, which is kind of a waste of time but might be educational(?):
https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/04/04/the-evidence-needed-fo...
A republic isnt' based on "good faith arguments". There are 80 million people who will disagree with your "good faith argument".
This is why courts exist. A political impeachment is not an impartial legal system. What are you even talking about?
Your position of deciding for the public what the truth is is the biggest threat to the republic - not a single orange man.
He was not convicted. That's the same as being tried and found not guilty in a court of law.
> Trump's right to lie, attack our Republic, spread violence.
I'd be happy with a right to lie, because it implicitly protects the rights of all others to speak truth.
Would "attack our Republic" include via speech? Then I support a right to "attack" a republic, any republic.
How does one "spread violence" that one is not engaged in?
Intent can not be separated either.
What do you mean you support the right to attack a republic? You want to attack our government?
We have a means to make change in our country/government. It's called Democracy, activism, and yes through protected (non violence causing) speech.
Directly trying to literally overthrow a free and fair election & government by the chief executive and Members who are sworn to uphold the law and constitution is explicitly sedition and their 'speech' that caused and incited this should not be and is not protected. Trump's lies directly caused this and his actions were (and still are) a threat to the very foundation of law that protects our speech.
He WAS involved in violence and is 100% responsible for instigating it on multiple occasions. He directed his supporters to act multiple times during first election on through most important Jan 6 obviously.
Congress was attacked. People with guns and weapons broke into the Capital. I do NOT support the rick to literally attack our Republic/country it's crazy that people support this. There was permanent injury and death to multiple people. It was violence. Many explicitly intended to kill members of Congress.
Citation needed - and be specific with how he, personally, was "involved in violence".
Beyond his words, there are huge amounts of convicts who told the police they acted bc Trump's words or even used Trump's words as an argument in court to attempt to show they weren't directly responsible/as culpable. Trump might not punch protestors in the face himself, but his words cause acts of violence.
--
Also given the topic twitter lays out specific examples on their platform.
https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2020/suspensio...
--
The clearing of lafayette square Trump said 'bust some heads' and reports of some blatant attempts to order the military to intervene inappropriately the entire summer.
Trump saying "Seriously. Just knock the hell out of them. I promise you, I will pay for the legal fees. I promise. There won’t be so much of them because the courts agree with us,"
“when the looting starts, the shooting starts.”
“I’d like to punch him in the face.” to a protester.
A funny gem: Wanted spikes on his wall that would 'pierce flesh' 'shoot migrants' build an 'alligator moat'.
Like, you can't make that up in a movie it would be too outlandish. Dr evil type contraption that can be easily overcome lol
BLM "“That will never happen with me. I don’t know if I’ll do the fighting myself or if other people will. But that was a disgrace. … I felt badly for him, but it showed that he’s weak.”"
Thugs pissing on and beating homeless people: “I think that would be a shame. I will say, the people that are following me are very passionate. They love this country. They want this country to be great again. But they are very passionate. I will say that,”
infamous "very fine people" (charlottesville)
Lots of reports of his wanting to use the military during the summer with clear tone and political intent. some reports of nebulous rants about doing the same after he lost to try and hold onto power.
"we’d like to get them out a lot faster, and when you see these towns and when you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon, you just see them thrown in, rough, I said, please don’t be too nice. Like when you guys put somebody in the car and you’re protecting their head, you know, the way you put their hand over, like, don’t hit their head and they’ve just killed somebody. Don’t hit their head. I said, you can take the hand away, okay?"
Gianforte body slam: “Any guy who can do a body-slam ... he’s my guy.” (wish we would have won that race Kathleen is great candidate...)
Lots of campaign rally examples.
“See, the first group, I was nice. ‘Oh, take your time.’ The second group, I was pretty nice. The third group, I’ll be a little more violent. And the fourth group, I’ll say get the hell out of here!”
“You see, in the good old days, law enforcement acted a lot quicker than this. A lot quicker. In the good old days, they’d rip him out of that seat so fast — but today, everybody’s politically correct,”
Another video of Trump saying “Get him the hell out of here! Get him out of here! Throw him out!” to a BLM protestor while a member of the crowd physically beats protester
Attack has a broad meaning and use, perhaps my hint as to the sense I was using was strong enough. I've seen it defined as violence and as words. I support words, not violence, if someone wishes to criticise any government then I would support their right to do that, even though that government's supporters would frame it as an attack.
> He WAS involved in violence
I didn't realise that. Did he use his bare hands or a weapon? How many people did attack? (not the words sense)
This is just like saying that Putin is not involved in war in Ukraine. He obviously is, and we have a name for this kind of involvement and it is called a "war criminal”. He didn't have to pull any gun triggers.
Additionally, the claim is that Trump enacted violence. Putin has not enacted violence, he's ordered it. Of course Putin is involved, and he's legally involved, and even though he's not enacting violence he is on the hook for that violence (or should be). I don't know anyone who wants free speech, even proper absolutists, who would make this case (that ordering military action is covered by free speech). Do you know of one?
Now, please tell me which violence Trump was either actually involved in by actually committing violence or by ordering violence, and by "ordering" I mean making an official, legally backed order in the course of his duties as president and commander in chief, because I'd really like to know or even better, knock these silly claims on the head.
I won't hold my breath waiting.
No. I think they've been frequent, intense subjects of government scrutiny, including antitrust litigation.
He may not be a supporter, but certainly has similar methods. Using mobs of useful idiots to flaunt the law is a bad thing.
Musk overtly uses his companies to retaliate against people who criticize him; he's not at all radically free speech in the sense of believing the owner of a company should not fully utilize the company to promote views that serve their interests and suppress others.
I still would be surprised if we saw Musk abusing his powers to make user-generated things disappear from Twitter.
Except the description of Musk as pro-radical-free-speech and the benefits supposed to result therefrom rely entirely on the definition (otherwise problematic, sure) that free speech means exactly that, and specifically that private actors will not use their own freedom to materially retaliate against you for your unwelcome speech.
Sure, you can maybe defend Musk being for “free speech” in exactly the sense that people claiming that Musk being for it will change Twitter say isn't “free speech”, and is the problem with the current approach at Twitter. But that...defeats the argument for Musk being a beneficial change.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/16/business/elon-musk-politi...