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I'm curious about how this is happening in America, of all places. As a European, I've always wondered (with a certain hint of jealousy, I might add) at the USA

I'm curious about how this is happening in America, of all places. As a European, I've always wondered (with a certain hint of jealousy, I might add) at the USA's absolute freedom of speech. People like the Westboro Baptist Church would've certainly been blocked from protesting here in the Netherlands. At the same time, it's now companies that are very American, both by origin and by culture, that are (letting themselves be pressured into) censuring speech more than has ever been seen in the modern West. This strikes me as an odd paradox, coming from a country where people get taught from primary school onward to "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it". I wonder where all this is going to lead, especially since these few companies control so much of global information flow. Are Facebook, Google and Twitter, once self-titled champions of free information flow, going to be the forces that end America's freedom of expression (in practice at least)?

iamaelephant 8y ago
What does this have to do with "America"? It's a private company enforcing its own rules on its own platform.
Svip 8y ago
Because it is American companies operating these big social media sites? Believe it or not, companies react to outcries by consumers, and they calculate that it will be better to suspend some users than not to. Had it been European companies operating big social media sites, you'd seen the same thing happen. Companies are companies, and they aim for profit less so principles. And more and more Americans view websites' hosting of controversial content as implicitly condoning that content. Besides, the First Amendment only prevent governments from limiting speech, not companies.
pjc50 8y ago
> companies ... censuring [censoring?] speech more than has ever been seen in the modern West More than the Hays Code or HUAC? And those are just in America; I'm old enough to remember when certain UK elected members of Parliament were legally banned from speaking on television, resulting in the weird "words read by an actor" workaround. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988%E2%80%9394_British_broadcasting_voice_restrictions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988%E2%80%9394_British_broadc...
Jacqued 8y ago
I must say I have not been jealous of the US in this regard. In my opinion the state should be able to silence fascists and neo-nazis and jail them for hate speech. Unlike the US, people in Europe have experienced first hand what happens when you tolerate and enable them. Also I don't think you can call it "absolute freedom of speech" as some speech, like calls for murder of the usual fire in a theatre exemple, are indeed not allowed. The US also has libel laws & copyright laws. To me the main difference with European style freedom of speech seems to be tolerance of extremist political/religious speech.
- nasoieu 8y ago
  (Eastern) Europe has also experienced what happens when communists are in charge, yet communists are not being persecuted in any way, while fascists or nazis are. Something else is going on. Case in point: this comment is being downvoted without any explanation.
  - hanselot 8y ago
    Its fine to say that something else is going on, as long as you don't ask what.
  - teh_klev 8y ago
    > this comment is being downvoted without any explanation https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading."
    - nasoieu 8y ago
      I am not complaining about it, but I think it's relevant to the point: oppression of certain opinions. Otherwise I wouldn't have mentioned it.
- ramblerman 8y ago
  Hate speech is a slippery slope, it's ill defined and you grant an awful lot of power to the people who get to 'define' the term. A critique of islam could be considered 'hate speech'. On the other hand I do agree that calls for violence/murder should indeed be punishable and are also far better defined to be taken up as law.
frou_dh 8y ago
> coming from a country where people get taught from primary school onward to "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it". I've always found that to be a trite self-aggrandising phrase (especially in its "to the death" variant). How many of the people who have repeated that, actually stick by it long term? Gotta be microscopic.
- InitialLastName 8y ago
  Especially given that said phrase was written by a Frenchman and popularized by an Englishwoman.
beberlei 8y ago
But the absolute freedom of speech is just from prosecution of the government (correct me if I am wrong). private parties can always deny you their platform to be used for hatemongering or anything else really.
- eej71 8y ago
  Agreed. I think this is an important distinction that seems to get lost in some of the conversation. There is a fundamental distinction to be had between the government forbidding you from speech versus a private individual or corporation from excluding you from their platform.
- forgottenpass 8y ago
  Freedom of speech is a principle about how to exercise power. The first amendment is scoped to the government because the constitution is scoped to the government.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > The first amendment is scoped to the government because the constitution is scoped to the government. Yes and no. It's true that he Constitution is scoped to government, so if there was a free speech principle that was not it might have been limited in the Constitution. But the free speech principle actually underlying the Constitutional text is also scoped to government in that involves and relies on the freedom of all actors except government to choose what speech to make, endorse, support, relay, or associate themselves with to promote the competition of ideas and the success of good ones and elimination of bad ones, on the concept that the former will be more likely to be relayed and the latter will die out from failure to convince people to participate in spreading them. If platforms of overwhelming reach and intrusiveness actively relay content blindly, it makes it much harder for the winnowing process to work.
ebbv 8y ago
Freedom of speech is about censorship from the government. As much as Silicon Valley companies love to self aggrandize they are not the government and are under no obligation to allow their platforms to be used for furthering hate speech (or anything else.) In fact I firmly believe sites like Reddit, Twitter and Facebook allowing racism and other horrible crap on their sites in the mid 2000s until recently is what helped make it more mainstream. In the web of the 1990s these idiots would have had to go to their own sites that nobody else goes to. Mainstream sites like Slashdot or whatnot didn’t tolerate it. For some reason after the dot com crash the new round of sites afterward have had some kind of delusion that they need to uphold free speech. And it’s nonsense.
sn41 8y ago
Clearchannel, which controlled most FM channels, infamously stopped playing John Lennon's "Imagine" after Sep 11 2001. So this is not new. In the absence of popular govt. media and channels, this does form de facto censorship in the US. The usual explanation I have heard is that free speech is limited to tge govt. not able to arrest you for criticising it. It does not apply to private parties. I think de facto censorship by private monopolies must also be illegal for true freedom of speech.
- teh_klev 8y ago
  > Clearchannel, which controlled most FM channels, infamously stopped playing John Lennon's "Imagine" after Sep 11 2001 This snopes article provides some background about what happened there: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/radio-radio/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/radio-radio/
  - dingaling 8y ago
    So songs weren't banned, they were deemed inappropriate to play. Another example of Snopes proudly declaring FALSE when PARTIALLY TRUE would be more appropriate. Ah the modern Web, where even the 'fact-checkers' play the spin game.
    - Max_Mustermann 8y ago
      "Radio personnel were still free to make their own programming decisions, and the list was merely intended as helpful advisory information." How does that make a "ban" partially true?
zavi 8y ago
Most users are outside of the US for these companies.
kylesellas 8y ago
I'm all for freedom of speech even if that speech includes ideas I vehemently disagree with (even hate speech). However, when speech incites physical violence and can be viewed as a legitimate threat, then it needs to be shut down. Parents of children who were lost during Sandy Hook received physical threats and death threats because of Jones' comments. That's the line where free speech should be censored.
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  so then those people should be banned. A public individual cannot be held responsible for the actions of their followers unless they called for those actions to be taken.
  - berbec 8y ago
    So for example "tweeted a link to a video calling for supporters to get their “battle rifles” ready against media"?
    - beaconstudios 8y ago
      I'd have to see the video myself - I'll probably look it up later in order to have an informed opinion. Because it could be meant in many ways, and my suspicion is that it was intended in a metaphorical way rather than literally calling for his followers to shoot up some offices.
      - mcphage 8y ago
        > Because it could be meant in many ways, and my suspicion is that it was intended in a metaphorical way rather than literally calling for his followers to shoot up some offices Welcome to the world of "plausible deniability". Deliberately speaking in a way that lets you defend yourself "oh I was only meaning metaphorically!" or "I was just joking!", where you intend a subset of your listeners to understand that you are speaking literally, is a common tactic. It's somewhat akin to the Motte and Bailey defense: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-words-words-words/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-word...
ern 8y ago
This seems to be a common misconception outside of the United States. The First Amendment applies to the government, not to private entities.
ddebernardy 8y ago
Freedom of expression isn't at stake here. Your right to free speech - even the "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it" kind - doesn't entitle you to get broadcast or listened to. https://xkcd.com/1357/ https://xkcd.com/1357/
- legostormtroopr 8y ago
  Sure, within a few days he was banned from Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and LinkedIn - which covers almost all Internet traffic. It was just 4 companies that banned him, not the government. He can just go to the alternate versions of those platforms...
  - kthejoker2 8y ago
    How is this germane? He's also not on all the major television networks, radio networks, or newspapers. Why are you deeming the Internet special? Alex Jones made his name originally driving around Austin with a sound truck. You're not guaranteed an audience, full stop.
joeblau 8y ago
Freedom of speech does not apply to privately controlled products from private companies. Any one of these companies could create any arbitrary rule to regulate their platform and it's not a violation of free speech. The thought is that they operate in a capitalist system where they are optimizing for profits which means they need the most amount of customers so they are trying to accommodate everyone. The same way all of these companies actively block spam on their platforms to improve user experiences. This is probably a result of analytics in inside Twitter where they realize that it's costing them subscribers and revenue.
boomlinde 8y ago
> I'm curious about how this is happening in America, of all places. Freedom of speech doesn't mean that any private entity has to facilitate it. In the US it means that the government can't instate laws that limit free speech, for what may be a broader definition of what is considered legitimate expressions thereof than you'd find in a typical European country applying the same principles. > This strikes me as an odd paradox, coming from a country where people get taught from primary school onward to "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it". Let's say that you throw a party. You invite friends and acquaintances to use your property. After a few hours, everyone is drunk and someone you don't really know well starts shouting racial slurs. You feel uncomfortable about it. Your guests feel uncomfortable about it. Would you fight for his right to use your property as a platform for his ramblings? He's ruining the party and your own reputation as a host is at stake. Your moral standards are being questioned. You would not be limiting his right to say anything by throwing him out. If nothing else he can go home and shout at a mirror. That's the kind of situation you have with Facebook/Twitter/Google. They invite people to use their property, on their terms. If they don't like you, they'll kick you out. Even if they don't care, they might kick you out to save face. It's not paradoxical; it's very much in line with American culture: everyone should have the right to choose how to represent themselves and how to use their property. Get off my land! Trespassers will be shot! > I wonder where all this is going to lead, especially since these few companies control so much of global information flow. Here I think you pinpoint the problem exactly. This problem doesn't only concern censorship but how these companies treat and disseminate information overall. If public debate is largely controlled by private, poorly unregulated organizations, democracy takes a hit. Maybe tighter regulation of entities that deal with so much communication is called for. I think GDPR is a step in the right direction. Destroy the economic incentives to facilitate so much communication.
- creaghpatr 8y ago
  It will be interesting when he gets banned from AirBnB, Uber, Lyft, etc in solidarity. We already know AirBnB will discriminate against you if you harbor hate speech views even if they weren’t expressed on their platform.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> As a European, I've always wondered (with a certain hint of jealousy, I might add) at the USA's absolute freedom of speech. The USA does not have absolute freedom of speech, it recognizes free speech as a fundamental right which means speech restrictions are evaluated under the “strict scrutiny” test. > At the same time, it's now companies that are very American, both by origin and by culture, that are (letting themselves be pressured into) censuring speech more than has ever been seen in the modern West. First, this is factually inaccurate: private parties throughout the West have controlled what speech they will choose to repeat, convey, relay, and associate themselves with under standards much more restrictive than those being applied by the controversial platforms today, which are controversial precisely because of how much extreme speech they choose to relay on their platform. But, second, there is no paradox between the US’s strong notion of free speech and US private entities being selective about speech they will participate in: the strong free speech protection in the US has always included protecting the right of private actors to choose what speech they will participate in, not merely as a legal principle but as an essential theoretical underpinning of the right.
threatofrain 8y ago
The refusal to promote the voices of others is as much a part of free speech. Facebook is not the town square just because people used it that way.

iamaelephant 8y ago

What does this have to do with "America"? It's a private company enforcing its own rules on its own platform.

Svip 8y ago

Because it is American companies operating these big social media sites? Believe it or not, companies react to outcries by consumers, and they calculate that it will be better to suspend some users than not to. Had it been European companies operating big social media sites, you'd seen the same thing happen. Companies are companies, and they aim for profit less so principles. And more and more Americans view websites' hosting of controversial content as implicitly condoning that content. Besides, the First Amendment only prevent governments from limiting speech, not companies.

pjc50 8y ago

> companies ... censuring [censoring?] speech more than has ever been seen in the modern West More than the Hays Code or HUAC? And those are just in America; I'm old enough to remember when certain UK elected members of Parliament were legally banned from speaking on television, resulting in the weird "words read by an actor" workaround. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988%E2%80%9394_British_broadcasting_voice_restrictions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988%E2%80%9394_British_broadc...

Jacqued 8y ago

I must say I have not been jealous of the US in this regard. In my opinion the state should be able to silence fascists and neo-nazis and jail them for hate speech. Unlike the US, people in Europe have experienced first hand what happens when you tolerate and enable them. Also I don't think you can call it "absolute freedom of speech" as some speech, like calls for murder of the usual fire in a theatre exemple, are indeed not allowed. The US also has libel laws & copyright laws. To me the main difference with European style freedom of speech seems to be tolerance of extremist political/religious speech.

nasoieu 8y ago
(Eastern) Europe has also experienced what happens when communists are in charge, yet communists are not being persecuted in any way, while fascists or nazis are. Something else is going on. Case in point: this comment is being downvoted without any explanation.
- hanselot 8y ago
  Its fine to say that something else is going on, as long as you don't ask what.
- teh_klev 8y ago
  > this comment is being downvoted without any explanation https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading."
  - nasoieu 8y ago
    I am not complaining about it, but I think it's relevant to the point: oppression of certain opinions. Otherwise I wouldn't have mentioned it.
ramblerman 8y ago
Hate speech is a slippery slope, it's ill defined and you grant an awful lot of power to the people who get to 'define' the term. A critique of islam could be considered 'hate speech'. On the other hand I do agree that calls for violence/murder should indeed be punishable and are also far better defined to be taken up as law.

frou_dh 8y ago

> coming from a country where people get taught from primary school onward to "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it". I've always found that to be a trite self-aggrandising phrase (especially in its "to the death" variant). How many of the people who have repeated that, actually stick by it long term? Gotta be microscopic.

InitialLastName 8y ago
Especially given that said phrase was written by a Frenchman and popularized by an Englishwoman.

beberlei 8y ago

But the absolute freedom of speech is just from prosecution of the government (correct me if I am wrong). private parties can always deny you their platform to be used for hatemongering or anything else really.

eej71 8y ago
Agreed. I think this is an important distinction that seems to get lost in some of the conversation. There is a fundamental distinction to be had between the government forbidding you from speech versus a private individual or corporation from excluding you from their platform.
forgottenpass 8y ago
Freedom of speech is a principle about how to exercise power. The first amendment is scoped to the government because the constitution is scoped to the government.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > The first amendment is scoped to the government because the constitution is scoped to the government. Yes and no. It's true that he Constitution is scoped to government, so if there was a free speech principle that was not it might have been limited in the Constitution. But the free speech principle actually underlying the Constitutional text is also scoped to government in that involves and relies on the freedom of all actors except government to choose what speech to make, endorse, support, relay, or associate themselves with to promote the competition of ideas and the success of good ones and elimination of bad ones, on the concept that the former will be more likely to be relayed and the latter will die out from failure to convince people to participate in spreading them. If platforms of overwhelming reach and intrusiveness actively relay content blindly, it makes it much harder for the winnowing process to work.

ebbv 8y ago

Freedom of speech is about censorship from the government. As much as Silicon Valley companies love to self aggrandize they are not the government and are under no obligation to allow their platforms to be used for furthering hate speech (or anything else.) In fact I firmly believe sites like Reddit, Twitter and Facebook allowing racism and other horrible crap on their sites in the mid 2000s until recently is what helped make it more mainstream. In the web of the 1990s these idiots would have had to go to their own sites that nobody else goes to. Mainstream sites like Slashdot or whatnot didn’t tolerate it. For some reason after the dot com crash the new round of sites afterward have had some kind of delusion that they need to uphold free speech. And it’s nonsense.

sn41 8y ago

Clearchannel, which controlled most FM channels, infamously stopped playing John Lennon's "Imagine" after Sep 11 2001. So this is not new. In the absence of popular govt. media and channels, this does form de facto censorship in the US. The usual explanation I have heard is that free speech is limited to tge govt. not able to arrest you for criticising it. It does not apply to private parties. I think de facto censorship by private monopolies must also be illegal for true freedom of speech.

teh_klev 8y ago
> Clearchannel, which controlled most FM channels, infamously stopped playing John Lennon's "Imagine" after Sep 11 2001 This snopes article provides some background about what happened there: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/radio-radio/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/radio-radio/
- dingaling 8y ago
  So songs weren't banned, they were deemed inappropriate to play. Another example of Snopes proudly declaring FALSE when PARTIALLY TRUE would be more appropriate. Ah the modern Web, where even the 'fact-checkers' play the spin game.
  - Max_Mustermann 8y ago
    "Radio personnel were still free to make their own programming decisions, and the list was merely intended as helpful advisory information." How does that make a "ban" partially true?

zavi 8y ago

Most users are outside of the US for these companies.

kylesellas 8y ago

I'm all for freedom of speech even if that speech includes ideas I vehemently disagree with (even hate speech). However, when speech incites physical violence and can be viewed as a legitimate threat, then it needs to be shut down. Parents of children who were lost during Sandy Hook received physical threats and death threats because of Jones' comments. That's the line where free speech should be censored.

beaconstudios 8y ago
so then those people should be banned. A public individual cannot be held responsible for the actions of their followers unless they called for those actions to be taken.
- berbec 8y ago
  So for example "tweeted a link to a video calling for supporters to get their “battle rifles” ready against media"?
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    I'd have to see the video myself - I'll probably look it up later in order to have an informed opinion. Because it could be meant in many ways, and my suspicion is that it was intended in a metaphorical way rather than literally calling for his followers to shoot up some offices.
    - mcphage 8y ago
      > Because it could be meant in many ways, and my suspicion is that it was intended in a metaphorical way rather than literally calling for his followers to shoot up some offices Welcome to the world of "plausible deniability". Deliberately speaking in a way that lets you defend yourself "oh I was only meaning metaphorically!" or "I was just joking!", where you intend a subset of your listeners to understand that you are speaking literally, is a common tactic. It's somewhat akin to the Motte and Bailey defense: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-words-words-words/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/07/social-justice-and-word...

ern 8y ago

This seems to be a common misconception outside of the United States. The First Amendment applies to the government, not to private entities.

ddebernardy 8y ago

Freedom of expression isn't at stake here. Your right to free speech - even the "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it" kind - doesn't entitle you to get broadcast or listened to. https://xkcd.com/1357/ https://xkcd.com/1357/

legostormtroopr 8y ago
Sure, within a few days he was banned from Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and LinkedIn - which covers almost all Internet traffic. It was just 4 companies that banned him, not the government. He can just go to the alternate versions of those platforms...
- kthejoker2 8y ago
  How is this germane? He's also not on all the major television networks, radio networks, or newspapers. Why are you deeming the Internet special? Alex Jones made his name originally driving around Austin with a sound truck. You're not guaranteed an audience, full stop.

joeblau 8y ago

Freedom of speech does not apply to privately controlled products from private companies. Any one of these companies could create any arbitrary rule to regulate their platform and it's not a violation of free speech. The thought is that they operate in a capitalist system where they are optimizing for profits which means they need the most amount of customers so they are trying to accommodate everyone. The same way all of these companies actively block spam on their platforms to improve user experiences. This is probably a result of analytics in inside Twitter where they realize that it's costing them subscribers and revenue.

boomlinde 8y ago

> I'm curious about how this is happening in America, of all places. Freedom of speech doesn't mean that any private entity has to facilitate it. In the US it means that the government can't instate laws that limit free speech, for what may be a broader definition of what is considered legitimate expressions thereof than you'd find in a typical European country applying the same principles. > This strikes me as an odd paradox, coming from a country where people get taught from primary school onward to "disagree with what you say but fight for your right to say it". Let's say that you throw a party. You invite friends and acquaintances to use your property. After a few hours, everyone is drunk and someone you don't really know well starts shouting racial slurs. You feel uncomfortable about it. Your guests feel uncomfortable about it. Would you fight for his right to use your property as a platform for his ramblings? He's ruining the party and your own reputation as a host is at stake. Your moral standards are being questioned. You would not be limiting his right to say anything by throwing him out. If nothing else he can go home and shout at a mirror. That's the kind of situation you have with Facebook/Twitter/Google. They invite people to use their property, on their terms. If they don't like you, they'll kick you out. Even if they don't care, they might kick you out to save face. It's not paradoxical; it's very much in line with American culture: everyone should have the right to choose how to represent themselves and how to use their property. Get off my land! Trespassers will be shot! > I wonder where all this is going to lead, especially since these few companies control so much of global information flow. Here I think you pinpoint the problem exactly. This problem doesn't only concern censorship but how these companies treat and disseminate information overall. If public debate is largely controlled by private, poorly unregulated organizations, democracy takes a hit. Maybe tighter regulation of entities that deal with so much communication is called for. I think GDPR is a step in the right direction. Destroy the economic incentives to facilitate so much communication.

creaghpatr 8y ago
It will be interesting when he gets banned from AirBnB, Uber, Lyft, etc in solidarity. We already know AirBnB will discriminate against you if you harbor hate speech views even if they weren’t expressed on their platform.

dragonwriter 8y ago

> As a European, I've always wondered (with a certain hint of jealousy, I might add) at the USA's absolute freedom of speech. The USA does not have absolute freedom of speech, it recognizes free speech as a fundamental right which means speech restrictions are evaluated under the “strict scrutiny” test. > At the same time, it's now companies that are very American, both by origin and by culture, that are (letting themselves be pressured into) censuring speech more than has ever been seen in the modern West. First, this is factually inaccurate: private parties throughout the West have controlled what speech they will choose to repeat, convey, relay, and associate themselves with under standards much more restrictive than those being applied by the controversial platforms today, which are controversial precisely because of how much extreme speech they choose to relay on their platform. But, second, there is no paradox between the US’s strong notion of free speech and US private entities being selective about speech they will participate in: the strong free speech protection in the US has always included protecting the right of private actors to choose what speech they will participate in, not merely as a legal principle but as an essential theoretical underpinning of the right.

threatofrain 8y ago

The refusal to promote the voices of others is as much a part of free speech. Facebook is not the town square just because people used it that way.