Brazil top court threatens to suspend X within 24 hours
apnews.com
apnews.com
Maybe this way more people will wake up to all the abuses, violations and honestly, crimes, happening in the country, committed by the Brazilian Supreme Court.
But I guess the rules play differently when you are a billionaire, so here we are.
> While certain restrictions on freedom of expression may be motivated by principles of equality and non-discrimination, “direct and public incitement to genocide” and “advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence” are strictly prohibited under international law, and are considered the “severest forms of hate speech”.
Also no one cares what the UN’s “international law” is. They just all support it or ignore it as convenient, because it means nothing.
But that was only to say, responding to who asked me the original question, that it doesn't matter what I think. I'm not a legislator. What matters is what's enforceable.
*I'm deliberately side-stepping religious law because there's no way to reasonably debate it logically. So this is meant to read "all secular law"
> So you think it's a crime to allow people speak things you don't like?
That was the original question which was clearly designed to trap me in an opinion pitfall. I was making sure I was referencing external sources when responding to that, but nobody seemed willing to take what I wrote in context.
Source: https://www.un.org/en/hate-speech/understanding-hate-speech/...
Even if it wasn't, censorship by an individual or a company is not a crime, are you confused by the first amendment which is a restriction on the government?
X or Musk are not the government.
> He asked our reporter James Clayton for specific examples of hateful content.
> When he couldn't pinpoint individual messages, Mr Musk said: "You don't know what you're talking about… you just lied.
That is hilarious, thanks for the article.
And I don't see examples of crimes committed by X or Musk in there?
> Several fringe characters that were banned under the previous management have been reinstated.
> They include Andrew Anglin, founder of the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer website, and Liz Crokin, one of the biggest propagators of the QAnon conspiracy theory.
From that same hilarious article.
Links from the BBC article you appear to have missed: "Antisemitism on Twitter Before and After Elon Musk’s Acquisition"[1] "The Musk Bump: Quantifying the rise in hate speech under Elon Musk"[2]
Additional studies: "Hate Speech Spikes on Twitter After Elon Musk Acquires the Platform" [3] "Auditing Elon Musk’s Impact on Hate Speech and Bots" [4]
1. https://beamdisinfo.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Antisemit...
2. https://counterhate.com/blog/the-musk-bump-quantifying-the-r...
3. https://www.montclair.edu/school-of-communication-and-media/...
Which is fair enough, I think.
To be frank, this censorship and threats of censorship is much scarier than whatever X are doing.
Laws have been broken, and this is the justice system's reaction to that. This is not censorship. Brazil (and most of the world) don't subscribe to the idea that freedom of expression and freedom of press are unbound.
The rest of the world should subscribe to the idea that freedom of expression and freedom of expression are (nearly) unbound. The USA is the only major country which gets this right.
No, it's not.
> The Brazilian people will have to decide whether they want their judiciary to have such excessive control over freedom of expression.
This is a very loaded comment, full of personal opinions. Which is fine, but let's not pretend it's factual truth.
In any case, we have. At least within the limits of our USA-inspired representative democracy. Federal law goes through 3 houses of elected representatives: the National Congress, the Senate and the Union Executive.
The Constitution goes through even more scrutiny.
> The rest of the world should
More personal opinions. Which, again, is fine. But it's not factual truth.
> The USA is the only major country which gets this right
I think this says it all. We have very little common basis for discussion. I would say the USA is the main major country that gets the _most_ things wrong.
I would like to hear you expound on this.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censorship
When any party, either government or private, blocks free expression then that is literally censorship. It might be legally or morally justified in some circumstances, but it is still censorship.
Words mean things. You don't get to redefine words to support your argument.
Article 10 of the Human Rights Act [0] says:
> 2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
[0] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/schedule/1
What's being done in Brazil falls within that definition and, as such, is not censorship.
Although I can't imagine why you would cite a UK law in a discussion about censorship in Brazil. It's sad how the UK has been growing ever more authoritarian and totalitarian, but that's an entirely separate discussion.
For the record, I would like to note that this sort of censorship is utterly unconstitutional here in Brazil too.
Every single time this gets discussed, I cite the literal words from the constitution:
> Any and all censorship of political, ideological and artistic nature is prohibited
These are very simple words that any citizen can understand. There is no room for misinterpretation here. Yet every single time people respond with impressive mental gynmnastics to justify the judge-king's actions. I've had people argue with me by citing laws lower than the constitution, by getting into asinine arguments over the definition of free speech and censorship, by arguing about "isonomy" as if it somehow invalidated the very simple words written above, and also by calling me a moron for presuming to do the judge-king's job as if the contradictions weren't there in plain sight for all to see. The guy you're replying to once called me a sterotypical reactionary WhatsApp uncle right here on HN.
In the eve of the 2022 elections I witnessed this judge censor a documentary a priori. Without even watching it, before it was even released, he judged it was "fake news" and ordered its censorship. This is the sort of thing that used to happen in last century's military dictatorship. There is no justification for this whatsoever.
If a brazilian is harmed by someone's speech, they get to answer. They get to be made whole by legal means. They don't get to straight up censor the other guy or in any way prevent them from speaking. I see this all the time, even in politics. Some guy insults another, gets sued and is made to pay damages or whatever. That's all there is to it. The original insult is not censored. This is fine.
With these judges it's different. Some magazine ran some damning article on them back in 2019 and they granted themselves virtually limitless power to investigate, prosecute, judge and punish "fake news" of all kinds, with themselves as the victims. They determine what's fake of course. Their powers just kept expanding until they essentially usurped all power in this country. It got to the point the judge started proposing changes to laws directly to our representatives. The changes were rejected but he just rammed the "fake news" nonsense down our throats anyway via his "resolutions".
This is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship of the judiciary. Unelected judge-kings with lifetime mandates whose pens directly make the people with guns do their bidding. It's kind of ridiculous to even discuss "laws" at this point. These guys could write whatever they want on a piece of paper and it becomes law.
Twitter blocked 122 accounts in India at the government’s request https://restofworld.org/2023/twitter-blocked-access-punjab-a...
Elon Musk caved to government pressure to censor tweets ahead of the Turkish election. https://www.businessinsider.com/free-speech-censorship-elon-...
The greater point to my comment is that they have a track record of siding with the Mohdi's, Bolsonaro's, Erdoğan's et al when it comes to blocking accounts and otherwise standing on principal as "free speech absolutists" when they like the disinfomation being spread.
That's just the new face of X-Twitter.
Do you have any factual observations to add about censorship by Twitter 2.0?
The law's about power, not rationality.
I think one could expect a bit of self-reflection to not have states shut down online spaces. And that is true for those that I do not personally like as well.
Unless Musk's principle is really that one needs to bow down to right-wing attempts to censor speech, and a left-wing attempt to censor speech must be resisted at all costs.
(Either way, Musk's adherence to the principle of standing up for free speech universally is very poor, and I truly marvel at anyone who believes him to be a defender of free speech.)
The Brazilian court ordered global removal, rather than just to have the content hidden within its jurisdiction.
For years there were arguments that a private platform could censor what they like. I guess some people are just ignoring the repercussions.
You’re using this false equivalence to attack Musk and Twitter as unprincipled when they’re actually being principled.
Disobeying that court order means breaking the local law of the land. It is completely fair to ask the question why Twitter seems willing to argue that the courts in one country are wrong and the courts in another country are right, when both courts perhaps seem to violate their own constitution. What is their fundamental principle to choose when they declare a court empowered to interpret its own constitution is doing it wrong?
(I'll note that part of Mike Masnick's excellent speedrunning content moderation is a step noticing that it's not actually a good idea to abide by all countries' local laws, because many countries have local laws that people would get upset at you for abiding by.)
In Brazil’s case - when the order to perform censorship is secret, and when the people arguing against censorship are not allowed to have legal representation without implied threats of arrest, how can the public even know of or debate the legality of these orders? It creates an opening for abuse of power, which is exactly what is happening here in my opinion.
By the way, each of the other countries you are referencing is a different situation with different nuances. For example, regarding the liability of lawyers representing defendants. Or whether the orders are done and secret. Or what their constitution says. It’s been a while since I dived into this but my recollection was that Twitter correctly complied in other cases (legally not morally) and is correct to take a stand here.
In Brazil’s case, it is important to note that there has been no new legislation that granted these powers to this single Supreme Court justice who is unilaterally issuing secret orders for censorship. Orders are not issued by the judicial bench as a whole. Some of the other justices have spoken in support of the approach, but it is possible that they are themselves acting out of fear because of how things have gone. For his part, De Moraes claims his power comes from a different court (to simplify, Brazil has two different top level courts with different powers) but it is suspect because courts cannot make laws and because he served in that court previously.
Ultimately though, censorship is bad. Free speech is good. And even if it was legal I think the use of such power is highly unethical and not compatible with democracies. For that alone, I feel Twitter / X is on the right side of this issue, independent of legalities or what the situation is in other countries.
- people under investigation or jailed can’t access this secret investigation, even their lawyers can’t, so they don't know why they're being arrested for.
- STF is starting other investigations without being provoke, which is illegal under our constitution.
- they send one person to prison because he was running from justice on USA, but this person lawyer prove that he never leave the country. Even the USA authorities say he didn’t entered the country.
- they censored a magazine that published a report of corruption inside de court.
- they censored some journal about people calling to end the secret investigation.
- they are trying people who should be tried in the first instance (the US equivalent of local courts), not in the supreme court.
- all orders sent to X (twitter) are secret, including the reason why this person or tweet must be down. which is, of course, illegal under our "marco legal da internet", a law approved years ago that was suppose to regulate internet.
The list can go on.
As far as I know this is disputed and not black-and-white, there's been a back and forth between PGR, AGU and the court on the legality of the Supreme Court on investigating activities that directly affect members of the court (including technical employees employed by the court themselves). I'm not so into Brazilian politics since I left more than 10 years ago but got some context from chatting with some law practicing friends.
> - STF is starting other investigations without being provoke
I don't understand what this means.
> - they send one person to prison because he was running from justice on USA, but this person lawyer prove that he never leave the country. Even the USA authorities say he didn’t entered the country.
What person? Would like to research more about this case.
> - they censored a magazine that published a report of corruption inside de court.
Is this about the "O Antagonista" and "Crusoé" debacle from 2019?
Edit: just checked about the case in 2019 and if that is what you refer to, the request to take down the article was due to the article lying about Odebrecht mentioning Dias Toffoli and reporting that his deposition was reported to the PGR and Lava Jato task force while both denied receiving any material about it. It sounds like a pretty clear case of defamation/libel.
> - they censored some journal about people calling to end the secret investigation.
What newspaper was censored in this case? Also keen to check it out if given more information.
Hard to say because, you know, it's a secret thing. More info here: https://www.jusbrasil.com.br/noticias/inquerito-do-stf-incon...
> I don't understand what this means
The judiciary cannot act ex officio. It must be prompted by the public prosecutor or another party, such as defense attorneys.
> What person? Would like to research more about this case.
Filipe G Martins.
> Is this about the "O Antagonista" and "Crusoé" debacle from 2019?
Yes.
> Edit: just checked about the case in 2019 and if that is what you refer to, the request to take down the article was due to the article lying about Odebrecht mentioning Dias Toffoli.
Toffoli name was into Odebrecht spreadsheet.
> Reporting that his deposition was reported to the PGR and Lava Jato task force while both denied receiving any material about it. It sounds like a pretty clear case of defamation/libel.
Funny. Evidence collected from Lava Jato is illegal. But Telegram messages collected by a hacker and whose authenticity was not confirmed, were normally used to free corrupt individuals from jail.
Furthermore, who provoked the Supreme Court to censor this article? Or was it something ex officio? If the Supreme Court was provoked, why didn't they choose another rapporteur for the case? Allowing the case to be judged by the supposed "victim" violates some basic precepts of law.
> What newspaper was censored in this case? Also keen to check it out if given more information.
https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/colunas/painel/2024/08/moraes-...
https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-noticias/2024/0...
From what I gather they used Article 43 from the court proceedings, that's the debatable part but they can act under that, no?
>> Reporting that his deposition was reported to the PGR and Lava Jato task force while both denied receiving any material about it. It sounds like a pretty clear case of defamation/libel.
> Funny. Evidence collected from Lava Jato is illegal. But Telegram messages collected by a hacker and whose authenticity was not confirmed, were normally used to free corrupt individuals from jail.
Nothing of what I said was evidence collected from Lava Jato, you are creating a strawman here.
What I said was: the reporting from "O Antagonista"/"Crusoé" mentioned that there was material being handed over by Odebrecht's lawyers to the Lava Jato task force and to the PGR about Toffoli, while both (the task force and PGR) denied there was ever anything handed over to them by Odebrecht naming "friend of a friend" as Toffoli. And that's libel.
> Filipe G Martins.
Yeah, reading about his imprisonment seems like the Moraes is using a similar heavy-handed illegal approach used by Moro/Delagnol during Lava Jato. He shouldn't have been arrested given the cause (the travel) didn't happen, even though he was part of the coup planning I can't ever condone this overstepping of the court, pretty stupid from Moraes part.
Kind of. The article 43 from the court proceedings, is clear when it says that it limits the power of investigation to the court's premises. The internet does not seem to me to be a court's premises.
> And that's libel.
I'm not sure. And it's hard to analise it since the evidence has either been destroyed or is under seal.
> pretty stupid from Moraes part
one more thing about Moraes that looks like power abuse: https://www.estadao.com.br/politica/blog-do-fausto-macedo/de...
Recently the press published message leaks indicating wrong conduct from Moraes or at least from his minions. In one of the messages they even cogitated — joking? — hiring someone to kidnap those they couldn't get extradited. But what summarizes all is Tagliaferro's, the chief of the supreme court investigative team (yep), answer to a journalist when asked if he was responsible for the leaks. That he, knowing Moraes, "would never have the courage" to do so.
https://www.poder360.com.br/poder-justica/ex-assessor-de-mor...
The criminals confessed their crimes due to the sentence reduction incentives of the 'rewarded collaboration' law. One of the most important requirements to get the sentence reduction is "you cannot lie, if you do, you lose everything".
All of it, now, undone.
Yes, they are very corrupt. They are untouchable, and use the given power to their own benefit. The law is deliberately written very subjective so they can interpret and judge as it is convenient to them. They even use their power across their jurisdiction, which has been bringing debate in society lately.
Politics is an exchange of favours in that environment. To have an idea of how it is, I recommend you to watch "Elite Squad II" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1555149/
However, in this specific case, it's been pretty clear that the Brazilian court orders send to X/Twitter. Specifically, some that order the censoring of specific individuals are illegal. (Some of these orders appear to violate other Brazilian laws)
This is a hard one to really judge. Just a mess overall.
They form the highest court of law in Brazil for constitutional issues and its rulings cannot be appealed.
The NYT wrote previously how Alexandre de Moraes is a threat to democracy in Brazil: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/22/world/americas/brazil-ale...
In case anyone wants context:
I assume you can cite the exact laws which refute every single one of the points raised in the comments I cited?
We're not even gonna get into the censorship stuff this time around. We'll limit our focus to the very specific irregularities of the supreme court which are well outlined in the aforementioned comments. You don't even have to refute both comments, the first one is enough:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39966382
Take the sentences starting with a dash and cite the laws which refute those claims, one by one. Cite the laws that say these judges can do everything that was outlined in that comment. Link me to the law that supposedly allows supreme court judges to investigate, prosecute, judge, sentence and punish others for crimes against themselves. Take your time. I will be checking my threads for replies.
If you refute those points, I will change my world view accordingly, and I will never cite those comments ever again. I will even thank you for making me smarter than I was yesterday.
If you can't, then at least have enough decency to stop commenting this "brazilian laws allow..." nonsense like clockwork. Simply because brazilian law clearly does not allow judges to do what these judges are doing. Also, at this point brazilian law is irrelevant anyway since whatever these judges decide is the real law. I mean, our representatives rejected the proposed "fake news" law, and the judges proceeded as if the law was in effect anyway.
Yes, the law is apparently abusable enough that it allows the supreme court to deem whatever it wants illegal and censor what they disagree with. Does that mean it makes sense?
These people are in for a rude awakening in a few years.
Arguing that angle is fruitless. My fellow brazilians seem to think the law is some kind of holy tome which holds the ultimate truth of the universe. Maybe it's because we never had racial segregation laws like in the USA. There was no Martin Luther King Jr. to introduce the concept of civil disobedience to them.
Hilariously, things are so screwed up that arguing this morals angle is not even necessary. The existing laws already do a fine job at not allowing what these judges are doing. The whole problem is they're the highest court in the country and they're just doing whatever they want with not a single person able to stop them. "Selectively applying and creatively interpreting" the very simple words written in the constitution.
And every single time people respond with impressive mental gynmnastics to justify the judge-king's actions. I've had people argue with me by citing laws lower than the constitution. By getting into asinine arguments over the definition of free speech and censorship. By arguing over "isonomy". By calling me a moron for presuming to do the judge-king's job as if the contradictions weren't there in plain sight for all to see.
> These people are in for a rude awakening in a few years.
I hope I'm here to see it.
No, really. At this point it's a desperate hope. My own parents, who lived through the military dictatorship, asked me to stop saying this stuff online. They are afraid I'll be arrested.
I'd say especially since Bolsonaro was elected, not last election...
Last i read X suspended operations in Brazil. What changed ?
We will no longer be allowed to read what Biden, Kamala, the European leaders, the hundreds of thousands of institutions around the world and 350 million fellow earthlings have to say.
All this by way of the sudden and unappealable decision of a single judge this night.
The law says that you need legal representation to be able to do business in Brazil. To sign contracts and pay taxes. Twitter no longer does business (i.e. doesn't sell ads) in Brazil. Twitter fired everyone and left Brazil a few weeks ago.
Twitter is now like Hacker News. A billion-dollar American company (Y) that hosts user-created content, free to be used by anyone on the global Internet.
Hacker News/Y does not need legal representation in Brazil.
That is not what is being discussed. That's just people on the internet saying that.