Endless Censorship Demands from Brazil | Hacker News Reader

Endless Censorship Demands from Brazil

twitter.com

Mirror: https://twiiit.com/ggreenwald/status/1777392222851240334

That bounces to a random Nitter instance (there are a few still working), to show the subsequent posts and replies.

The next post in the series (it comes from ggreenwald as well) also seems relevant:

    Last year, we received one of the censorship orders sent by Moraes. This was *after*
    the 2022 election and thus after these powers expired.

    You can see: they are done with no notice to those banned, and with a requirement
    that the order be kept secret:

• https://nitter.privacydev.net/pic/orig/media%2FFmaDDYxWYAY9k...

• https://nitter.privacydev.net/pic/orig/media%2FFmaDE0BWAAEBe...

• https://nitter.privacydev.net/pic/orig/media%2FFmaDGF7XkAECc...

• https://nitter.privacydev.net/pic/orig/media%2FFmaDG1VXgAAJ2...

Brazilian law allows content to be removed online for reasons of investigation, hate speech or unbased defamation. And this was always the case. Moreover, recent laws tried to control the amount of fake news trying to manipulate the elections. The Brazilian electoral laws forbid spending in secret for the purpose of buying or making propaganda for electoral campaign and also regulate what is allowed in the elections. Before the new laws, manipulating social media with lots of fake accounts spreading fake news was a loophole that was being explored by the far right. What they are calling "censorship" is just the application of law.

> Before the new laws, manipulating social media with lots of fake accounts spreading fake news was a loophole that was being explored by the far right.

The left also does that. Their goals is to monopolize and not combat fake news.

Yes, and the left already got banned from TV ads when that happened during the election.

In my state, former Governor and candidate Requião (PT, left) said that the current governor (Ratinho Jr, PSD, Right-wing) didn't give give teachers a salary increase.

It was a lie.

He was banned from TV ads for almost two weeks because he lied.

I couldn't find any news regarding this ban. Even if true it looks like an exception rather than the rule.

What makes Ratinho Jr right-wing? PSD is the the "Social Democractic" Party, it's center and aligned to whoever is in power.

Ratinho Jr fully supports Bolsonaro. And it's heavily invested in military schools and even banned some books from schools. Very conservative. The party is indeed center, but he is right-wing. Well, just Brazilian things.

Here the news: https://contraponto.jor.br/campanha-de-requiao-nao-tera-mais...

https://www.bemparana.com.br/publicacao/blogs/politicaemdeba...

That's also censorship. He should not be silenced just because he lied. People should recognize him as a liar and stop trusting what he says instead.

That's not how our laws work...

Yes?

Our laws work by enabling censorship. I recognized that, and said that they should not work that way.

Saying wrong things should just hurt your reputation. As in, you become known for being wrong. It should not lead to the fucking government knocking on your door.

Do we need to rethink the idea of global social media platforms? Maybe even the idea of a global internet. If countries like Brazil or India want to have everything censored then perhaps western companies should simply withdraw their main platform and create some subsidiary application solely for people within each of those countries.

This is a very complicated issue, because enabling some censorship is harmful in itself.

“Countries” do not want censorship. Corrupt bureaucrats in power do.

Essentially corrupt bureaucrats are the countries. They might have to occasionally follow whims of elected representatives, which the populous is forced to vote and select from small pool.

I think putting it that way could lead someone to believe a country’s population agrees with the actions of the managerial elite. But yes, I agree with the essence of the idea, though I think it’s clearer to say they own or run the country.

No, they're not. These judges do not represent me. I did not vote for them at all. Actually not a single person did.

They are. Brazil isn't a democracy. There is a non-elected elite with absolute power. They can indict, investigate, prosecute and condemn anyone at their whim. Elected representatives aren't immune (e.g. Deltan Dallagnol, Sergio Moro). They can nullify and change laws made by elected representatives. They can create new laws out of thin air. They can uncondemn criminals.

I know, and I agree. I just consider it completely illegitimate. If anyone attempted a coup in Brazil, it was the supreme court. Looks like they succeeded too, unlike Bolsonaro and his clumsy flirtations with the topic.

Yes and Bolsonaro flirtations are theatrical. He and his sons are always the firsts to dose water on the fire when things get close to reaching a critical mass. They sabotaged the opening of a parliamentary investigation of the supreme court (CPI da Lava-Toga).

e.g. https://youtu.be/jivOclOWSVY?si=TRiw6yBaTYRh94n9&t=84

To foreigners: you don't understand how powerful the Brazilian supreme court is and how flawed our short-lived constitution is. Due to "foro privilegiado" they are the ones who judge politicians for their crimes and ensure that only the few who fell out of favor get condemned. As pretty much every politician is involved in some sort of wrongdoing, the supreme court pretty much owns everybody. Bolsonaro is no exception and his anti-democratic show is the only thing providing a simulacrum of legitimacy to the authoritarian acts of the supreme court.

> He and his sons are always the firsts to dose water on the fire when things get close to reaching a critical mass.

That's why I no longer have any respect for him at all. He's a coward with no balls, no convictions and no vision. It's hilarious to me how he's being treated like some ruthless dictator. If only he had been one. He's being treated like Hitler anyway, might as well have tried it just to see what happens. Too cowardly to even do that.

For my money, I think the way this works out is that the idea of global social media conglomerates also falls apart. I think instead of subsidiaries of mostly US companies, governments will prefer to have the social media platform and its officers entirely subject to their jurisdiction with no option of leaving, or have it directly operated by the state, or not have it at all.

> Do we need to rethink the idea of global social media platforms? Maybe even the idea of a global internet.

Yes.

> If countries like Brazil or India want to have everything censored

They aren't even the worst. The biggest advocates of censorship on american social media is europe, canada, israel, etc.

> create some subsidiary application solely for people within each of those countries

Or maybe brazil or india should outright ban these platforms and create their own? These countries have their own national tv stations, newspapers, etc? Why don't they have their own twitter, facebook, etc?

If media essentially controls who you vote for, shouldn't india, brazil and every democracy control their own media? Seems to me that a foreign nation controlling so much of your social media is a direct threat to your democracy.

Besides, if we continue on this path of global social media, we would have to censor everything everyone finds offensive. It would be the tyranny of the offended. The worst kind of tyranny.

> They aren't even the worst. The biggest advocates of censorship on american social media is europe, canada, israel, etc.

any sources on this ? and for most things you are mentioning in your post ?

You're replying to a throwaway troll account. You won't get any sources.

Because most state controlled/sponsored media are filled with incompetency, hugely impopular and prone to follow the official narrative.

The idea of fragmenting the Internet into country level information silos controlled by each state is authoritarian and stupid.

It is a good thing to be able to talk to anyone regardless of border, to be able to express yourself freely, to have open access information.

I could see setup where there is local wholly independent companies that simply buy IP from some original company, maybe federate allowed content. These would then live on their own domains and be fully controlled by states they are in.

The US has pressured the rest of the world to censor anything it considers to be copyright infringement and enforce its draconian domestic copyright laws.

2 hours, no reason given, order of confidentiality? Straight up abuse of power.

>Given 2 hours to suspend an account or face massive fines.

>Being given demands to suspend sitting members of parliament and major journalists, and moreover we could not tell them that this was at the behest of the Alexandre Moraes [the judge they are discussing] and we had to pretend it was due to our rules of service. That was the final straw and we said no.

Glad to see that the world is finally starting to notice Brazil has become a judicial dictatorship.

Is there a trustworthy actor on either side here?

Not really. Brazilian courts were always highly political - its members are appointed by presidents, after all. The situation has become more volatile recently, due to the polarised politics.

Courts should be a tad more neutral than they are being right now. The people being investigated, and the journalist reporting it, are well known bad faith misinformation spreaders. But it is not up to a judge to find a reason to stop them. They need to be investigated and prosecuted, not banned from a couple of non Brazilian platforms.

Your comment makes sound points that equally apply to the current US Supreme Court.

the difference is that no SCOTUS member is opening inquiries in processes where they are the prosecutor, victim, and judge at the same time. Fun fact: Brazil's Supreme Court can legally do that _if a crime occurs in the Court's dependencies_... well, they ruled that as the Court has Internet, and people are hurting their honor there... then it is as if the crime occurred inside the Court

Will this anti-censorship stance extend to every government that routinely demands Twitter hide content they find inconvenient, or just the governments that Elon Musk doesn't want to cooperate with?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/05/twitter-accuse...

He will, of course, let it go if the government is right wing.

Is this the part where — in order to avoid being downloaded or flagged — everyone continues to pretend that Musk really is a "free speech absolutist", instead of acknowledging a clear and distinct pattern of what he enforces, and against whom?

Well ... go on, don't keep it to yourself.

>don't keep it to yourself

It's not exactly a secret. See, for example, censorship in Turkey and India. In general, he's overwhelmingly approved censorship requests from authoritarian governments. So much for "free speech absolutism".

In general, Musk himself regularly shouts his biases at the top of his lungs, and has applied selective enforcement of Twitter's own TOS. His selectivity can be easily aligned with his biases.

He'll censor anything on behalf of Saudi Arabia or India, but complains loudly when it's Brazil.

Why the double standard? He wants a pliable, aligned government in Brazil so he's using his megaphone to try to achieve that.

Oh dear, is your web browser broken? It should be trivial to search for detailed critiques, with terms like "Musk free speech hypocrisy", ex:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/15/elon-m...

https://www.techdirt.com/2024/01/16/free-speech-experts-real...

He does it to individuals and says as such in interviews. You have free speech, but not free reach.

Twitter will limit the number of eyeballs that see your content if Twitter doesn't like what you have to say.

Does this make what is happening in Brazil less wrong?

Brazil is under a judiciary kind of government regime, having that Alexandre Moreas as their supreme leader.

They're hostile to high tech companies and entrepreneurs, but ok with the organized crime.

Musk challenges Brazil's order to block certain X accounts

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39962568

Also related:

>Brazil threatens to regulate social media after clash with Elon Musk

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39963060

>Brazil judge opens inquiry into Musk for obstruction involving X

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39965454

>Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39967203

Government also threatened to "review" its contracts with Starlink. You'd think they have cellphone towers covering the entire amazon.

@dang it looks like some political group are clicking on the flag button. Without moderation it's probably for the best, political divisiveness doesn't belong here, but I fail to see how this story is divisive except perhaps the fact it's related to a judge appointed by a president. Consider unflagging it and delete/warn/ban overly political divisive comments.

>I fail to see how this story is divisive

Because many would say that Greenwald is not an honest broker, and neither is Musk.

Well, it is already unflagged. I don't follow your logic here though, the owner of Twitter isn't an adequate source of judicial orders received by twitter? What's wrong with Greenwald? Are you implying they collided to report something that did not happen? Why would that make sense? If that was the case, that itself would be news, not something to just flag and ignore.

Your question was WRT why some people would find the article politically divisive.

>Because many would say that Greenwald is not an honest broker, and neither is Musk.

Honestly, you could say the same thing about the New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, DW, etc or, hell, even Brazil's Supreme Court who will say “everything is working just fine”, despite the increasing censorship happening in the country that they have been taking part. Everyone has some narrative and bias. The problem is to think this bias is only there when I'm listening to someone who I disagree with. And when I'm reading the Times, I'm listening to some sort of "unfiltered truth".

Sure, Musk might have other interests with this other than defending freedom of speech in Brazil. But the same can be said about Moraes, the Brazilian judge censoring journalists who criticize him left and right, going as far as trying to extradite them (and failing on that btw), blocking their profiles on social media, sure as hell isn't interested in "defend the rule of law" or whatever his official excuse is.

>The problem is to think this bias is only there when I'm listening to someone who I disagree with

I'd argue the bigger problem is rampant "what-aboutism" that infects virtually every discussion these days. What does the NYT or WaPo have to do with Musk, Brazil, or this situation? The subject is Musk. Why broaden the discussion this way to "even out" things for him?

In any case, I was responding to the OP who asked why this article would be considered divisive. My answer is that some (including myself) don't deem Musk/Greenwald to be honest brokers. Musk and his allies have a distinct pattern of supporting certain narratives and rejecting others, while claiming to be champions of free speech and freedom.

The interlocutor doesn't matter. You shouldn't trust anyone as a general rule and you don't need to trust Musk or Gleenwald as they are not the only ones talking about this.

> The subject is Musk.

You tried to make it so but the subject is authoritarianism in Brazil.

>The interlocutor doesn't matter

Of course it matters. And, there is roughly a 0% chance that anyone who is at least semi-cogent, including you, operates in the real world with the belief that it doesn't. That would be highly inadvisable, unless one enjoys being a persistent rube.

>You tried to make it so

The story is about Musk's and Greenwald's takes on authoritariansim in Brazil. The OP asked how it could be considered divisive. One obvious answer is that people are considering the source(s) and their histories. Whatever your personal feelings, two things are true:

1. People absolutely do consider the source

2. Musk and Greenwald are controversial figures with specific motives and ideologies that frequently cause rancor

I realize your argument was that the story is divisive and I might've made an unnecessary rebuttal. Yes, the interlocutor can make a story divisive though it doesn't change the truthiness (or falseness) of the subject.

Where Musk and Greenwald are often divisive they are not the only voices calling out the supreme court authoritarianism in Brazil. The acts and postures of the ministers are enough evidence.

> censoring journalists who criticize him left and right, going as far as trying to extradite them (and failing on that btw)

Are you talking about that asshat from "Terça Livre"?

That guy should be in jail for spreading misinformation.

Nailed it.

It's a single-line tweet with no information, no background, no anything. I learned nothing from clicking this link beyond a vague accusation which may or may not have merit to it and where there may or may not be more to the story.

So yeah, I flagged it.

My submission referring to Shellenberger's comments on the actions of this judge a few hours ago was also flagged and killed quickly, I referred to it in a comment above [1]. He was a bit more elaborate than Greenwald in explaining the background - which does not seem 'vague' at all - which clearly posts a picture of regulatory abuse related to information distribution, something which clearly intersects with the interest sphere of many HN users and certainly many Brazilian HN users. It was quite common to see criticism of Bolsonaro [2] survive and thrive here but criticism of Lula da Silva hitherto does not fare as well which does point at a political dimension at play.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39974902

[2] https://hn.algolia.com/?q=bolsonaro

Censorship is a tool. One can wield it appropriately, or grossely misuse it.

Tired of Musk fanboi’s conflicting hate speech and disinformation with freedom. Tired of North Americans and Europeans that have zero context about nuances of Brazilian recent history and struggles, thinking their shallow opinions and misconceptions should be accepted as facts. Really tired of tech bros that think everything that is against their ability to troll is censorship.

Tired of countries who think they get to impose their standards on American social media companies (because they cannot make their own) throwing tantrums that they will act in line with American values. You think you have a right to regulate what someone can and cannot say - America does not. Block twitter and make your own then.

> Tired of countries who think they get to impose their standards on American social media companies

Being an American social media do not exempts you from following the law in the countries where you operate. They do not carry with them to that countries the jurisdiction of American laws.

Oh I'm sure the americans will quickly get sick of this unelected brazilian judge, a literal nobody from some barbaric communist country, thinking he can whimsically censor and fine their corporations. In fact I'm counting on it. I hope this guy pisses the americans off so much they actually apply sanctions to my own country.

Not the first time he does it either. Last year Google engaged in a little campaign against their proposed "fake news" law, they just added a little link to their home page. These judges censored Google: take it down or face totally arbitrary fines of about 200kUSD per hour.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-05-02/brazil-ju...

https://archive.is/EdoqQ

They essentially threatened to steal from the american economy an average software developer's yearly salary every hour if their demands were not met. Their unconstitutional demands, by the way. Brazilian constitution says censorship is illegal. And these are the guys whose literal job is to apply that constitution.

Think about it. Google could have hired one person from here for every hour of "disobedience". Doesn't that piss you off? I hope it does. I hope it gets someone to write something to their representatives.

You're free to dislike Musk and to not use Twitter.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com