4 ms·
Who knew that the right wing would be the one trying to limit free speech of private companies??
by hn2017 6y ago
Who knew that the right wing would be the one trying to limit free speech of private companies??
- ed25519FUUU 6y agoHow does this limit the free speech of private companies? Does a company have free speech?
- newacct583 6y ago> How does this limit the free speech of private companies? Does a company have free speech? Yes! And very broadly so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC (Which, as much as it pains me as a hippie liberal to admit it, is probably the best decision in context. Enshrining even things like corporate election finance as "speech" makes is VERY clear that government regulation of actual opinion on behalf of private entities is verboten. At the time none of us saw Trump coming, but if the price for protecting a twitter correction is a bunch of Comcast-funded PACs? Yeah, I'll pay that.)
- newacct583 6y agoYeah, that's the truly horrifying thing here. As others are pointing out, the EO itself is just theater, precisely because the actual first amendment of these companies and their employees protect them from the government (or have so far, anyway). To wit: Twitter has the same right to tell you the president is lying that the president does to speak via tweet in the first place. The thing that strikes me is that the political tribe that crows about this stuff constantly, when faced with an actual attempt by the executive branch to control the speech of private entities... is absent. Where is the HN libertarian debate squad now? Fucking crickets is all I hear. I despair for society.