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Comment by latexr | Hacker News Reader

> Did the government force YouTube to take down the videos?

Yes, according to the article. That argument is made over and over in it, it’s hard to miss. “Forcing” doesn’t just mean directly requiring the action, it also means the threat of “this is not going to end up well for you if you don’t comply”. Of course, you can argue that Google could and should fight it, but that doesn’t change what the government is doing.

> but a social media site censoring what they don't want to host seems like fair game.

Again, the article makes it really clear they are doing this as the direct result of government actions.

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It doesn't seem that clear in my opinion. There is a lot of smoke there, and I wouldn't be surprised if there was a fire, but I didn't see the article specifically claiming the government directed YouTube to take down the videos.

I saw multiple references there to the government sanctioning groups and that YouTube took down videos based on the sanctions. That very well could be a loophole and a court might deem that a first amendment violation, but it isn't as simple as finding communications where the government directly requested those videos to be taken down.

I’ll say it again:

> “Forcing” doesn’t just mean directly requiring the action, it also means the threat of “this is not going to end up well for you if you don’t comply”.

Which is definitely what the current administration does. If you need an example, look at the recent Jimmy Kimmel case.

And I would expect its up to the legal system to decide which of those examples were the government overstepping.

I could see a court deciding this YouTube situation is a first amendment violation. I don't know of any law or precedent that makes it a clear cut case given what is described in the article.

> If you need an example, look at the recent Jimmy Kimmel case.

Jimmy Kimmel is on the air today, having walked back his nonsense about the political allegiances of the Charlie Kirk killer. If the outcome is the political left in America is even fractionally less likely to incite violence against anyone they don't like the speech of, then that's a great outcome.

> Jimmy Kimmel is on the air today

That it was even off, based on threats made by the government, is the point. Bad things by one party aren’t suddenly OK because a different party beat them.

We don't know that that's all that did it. ABC chose to do it, and probably because what he said was really ignorant and inflammatory to the US political left's violent streak.

I am as against the Republicans doing this stuff even 5% as much as the Democrats did, so I'm glad the Trump administration turns out to have not done anything to get him off the air.

What Jimmy Kimmel said was:

1. The right was making all sorts of claims about the killer before they knew anything about him (this is a true statement).

2. Donald Trump is not acting at all like someone who's in mourning (this is also a true statement).

Neither of those statements is inflammatory or ignorant. They're both objectively true statements that pretty much everyone who follows the news is aware of.

Beyond that, you're ignoring the fact that ABC only "chose" to suspend Jimmy Kimmel's show after they were publicly threatened by Trump's FCC chair.

No such walk back exists btw, especially when he never made a definitive claim to the political allegiance of the killer. The only people doing a walk back here are the show execs allowing Kimmel to return. The groups of people who did make claims about the politics of the killer, i.e. the president and the presidents cabinet did so immediately after his death with no evidence and have shown to be wrong in their initial assertion, which has now been swept under the rug. Pathetic display all around holding a late night comedian to a higher standard than the president tbh, more than "a great outcome".

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