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> Phone companies and ISPs facilitate communication between people, but that doesn't necessitate they take political stances on what communication to allow Tak

> Phone companies and ISPs facilitate communication between people, but that doesn't necessitate they take political stances on what communication to allow Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. It just so happens that, I believe in those cases, it's also a legally mandated stance; but, if it weren't a legally mandated stance, it would absolutely be a political stance, whatever they ended up saying. Where a private company decides to limit free speech (or not limit free speech) is, 100%, a political stance when the laws have not been written that make that decision for them. Even if we maintain a law around protecting companies that just host other people's content vs curating and publishing content, it could be seen as a political decision whether a given website and company choose to be on the publisher vs public content stance. I'm forgetting the word for publisher vs ... whatever it is where they take no responsibility for what people post on the site; but I hope my point is clear.

novok 6y ago
In these debates, people seem to pretend that if facebook or others don't stay politically neutral as possible premptively, that pissed off politicians will not do it for them, badly, in hundreds of countries. It's why social media companies have the kid gloves with politically powerful people. A segment of social media company staff also don't like that reality and want their social to censor the political parties / discussions they don't like and thus they toe the line and give unsatisfying non-answers at all hands and to the media.
ponker 6y ago
This is why the cloud flare CEO has lobbied for regulation that takes these decisions off his hands.
mehrdadn 6y ago
> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. Then in your model of the world, how would one not take a political stance? If everyone takes a political stance in your model by definition no matter what their intents or actions are then it's a rather useless definition.
- eli 6y ago
  Indeed! We all take political stances every day and it is certainly not possible to run an apolitical social network. The word is probably not very useful. But being able to reflect on “sensitive” issues is extremely useful and, I would argue, necessary.
  - throwawaysea 6y ago
    And yet any random person on the street can easily flag something as being political or not political. I don’t accept that everything is automatically political. That is just an unrealistic argument that doesn’t match the reality of how the word is used.
    - NoodleIncident 6y ago
      You're correct. Almost everyone can efficiently categorize things they disagree with as "politics", while categorizing things they agree with as "common sense".
      - throwawaysea 6y ago
        Again this is hyperbole and is not how people think. The politicization of everything and denying that some ideas are apolitical are tied. The latter is a false justification for the former.
- shard 6y ago
  It's like Rush says in Free Will, "If you choose not to decide, You still have made a choice".
  - mehrdadn 6y ago
    Taking that logic at face value, it would mean "if you choose not to take a political stance, then you still have made a choice". Okay, so you've chosen not to make a decision. Yet I don't see how having made the choice implies you've still made a decision ("you have still taken a political stance"). If anything it seems like you just argued against the point?
stale2002 6y ago
> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. It just so happens that, I believe in those cases, it's also a legally mandated stance; but, if it weren't a legally mandated stance, it would absolutely be a political stance, whatever they ended up saying. Not really, no. That is not usually what people mean, when they say "take a political stance". We can extend this to other examples. Do you think that a grocery store should ban people from their stores, if the individual is wearing a pro Trump, or pro Biden Tshirt? I think it would be pretty silly to condemn a grocery store, for refusing to ban people from their stores, if they were wearing a "Vote for Biden/Trump" shirt. Most people would find it absolutely and completely ridiculous to ban people from stores for doing that.
- adamsea 6y ago
  [EDIT: actually what’s probably quite relevant is all the stories about high schools sending young women home because they don’t approve of their outfits even if said outfit doesn’t violate a dress code.] Imagine someone walks into a grocery store naked. Or wearing a t-shirt with a explicit image of a man and a woman having sex. Or two men having sex. Or a t-shirt which says / shows something extremely inflammatory yet not illegal. I could imagine various stores making various decisions in all of these cases, all of which would be the folks working in that store expressing their beliefs! Humans are inherently social and thus inherently political (politics in the sense of politics as the negotiation and management of a community). Or imagine someone walks into a grocery store and doesn’t wear a mask! Lol :):/:(.
  - stale2002 6y ago
    > Or wearing a t-shirt Or wearing a "vote for Trump/Biden" t shirt. In that situation basically everyone would agree that it would be ridiculous to say that the grocery store should ban people for wearing that t-shirt. I think that most people would not call refusing to ban someone for wearing this t-shirt as a "political" decision. Most people would agree that it is not political to refuse to ban someone for wearing a "vote for Trump/Biden" shirt. If you do call that political, to refuse to ban someone for that, basically everyone would disagree with you.
IncRnd 6y ago
Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. That's simply not true. One can verify the truth or falsehood of your statement by applying the knife of logic. Draw your statement to its logical conclusion in order to determine if it results in absurdity. Let's do that. A person who has had their brain surgically removed will (quite probably) never mention politics or attempt to control other's communications about politics. According to your statement, that person's actions are political. Sorry, but that's absurd.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  Your conflation of passive inaction with an active choice to refrain from certain action is absurd.
  - IncRnd 6y ago
    1. People who live in the Congo may consciously choose not to become involved in Candian politics. It is absurd to think that is political. 2. You wrote: Your conflation of passive inaction with an active choice to refrain from certain action is absurd. That is only meaningful as a circular definitio0n. Choosing not to act differs from an inability to act. Why? How would you define the difference between the action of not acting and the action of not acting, because of not making a choice to act?
    - dragonwriter 6y ago
      > How would you define the difference between the action of not acting and the action of not acting, because of not making a choice to act? I wouldn't, because not making a choice to act in a particular way is very different from making a choice to avoid as policy acting in that way, or, as was at issue upthread, “Taking a stance to not” act in a particular way. Taking a stance is (for this subject matter, at least) political. Inaction on its own is not.
triceratops 6y ago
I see this a misconception a lot online so I have to point out something important. The "publisher" vs "platform" is only about liability. Publishers are liable for everything posted on their websites. Platforms are not - as long as they make good faith efforts to take down or prevent posting of illegal content. Both are allowed to engage in moderation, curation or "censorship". Engaging in such does not make a website a publisher.

novok 6y ago

In these debates, people seem to pretend that if facebook or others don't stay politically neutral as possible premptively, that pissed off politicians will not do it for them, badly, in hundreds of countries. It's why social media companies have the kid gloves with politically powerful people. A segment of social media company staff also don't like that reality and want their social to censor the political parties / discussions they don't like and thus they toe the line and give unsatisfying non-answers at all hands and to the media.

ponker 6y ago

This is why the cloud flare CEO has lobbied for regulation that takes these decisions off his hands.

mehrdadn 6y ago

> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. Then in your model of the world, how would one not take a political stance? If everyone takes a political stance in your model by definition no matter what their intents or actions are then it's a rather useless definition.

eli 6y ago
Indeed! We all take political stances every day and it is certainly not possible to run an apolitical social network. The word is probably not very useful. But being able to reflect on “sensitive” issues is extremely useful and, I would argue, necessary.
- throwawaysea 6y ago
  And yet any random person on the street can easily flag something as being political or not political. I don’t accept that everything is automatically political. That is just an unrealistic argument that doesn’t match the reality of how the word is used.
  - NoodleIncident 6y ago
    You're correct. Almost everyone can efficiently categorize things they disagree with as "politics", while categorizing things they agree with as "common sense".
    - throwawaysea 6y ago
      Again this is hyperbole and is not how people think. The politicization of everything and denying that some ideas are apolitical are tied. The latter is a false justification for the former.
shard 6y ago
It's like Rush says in Free Will, "If you choose not to decide, You still have made a choice".
- mehrdadn 6y ago
  Taking that logic at face value, it would mean "if you choose not to take a political stance, then you still have made a choice". Okay, so you've chosen not to make a decision. Yet I don't see how having made the choice implies you've still made a decision ("you have still taken a political stance"). If anything it seems like you just argued against the point?

stale2002 6y ago

> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. It just so happens that, I believe in those cases, it's also a legally mandated stance; but, if it weren't a legally mandated stance, it would absolutely be a political stance, whatever they ended up saying. Not really, no. That is not usually what people mean, when they say "take a political stance". We can extend this to other examples. Do you think that a grocery store should ban people from their stores, if the individual is wearing a pro Trump, or pro Biden Tshirt? I think it would be pretty silly to condemn a grocery store, for refusing to ban people from their stores, if they were wearing a "Vote for Biden/Trump" shirt. Most people would find it absolutely and completely ridiculous to ban people from stores for doing that.

adamsea 6y ago
[EDIT: actually what’s probably quite relevant is all the stories about high schools sending young women home because they don’t approve of their outfits even if said outfit doesn’t violate a dress code.] Imagine someone walks into a grocery store naked. Or wearing a t-shirt with a explicit image of a man and a woman having sex. Or two men having sex. Or a t-shirt which says / shows something extremely inflammatory yet not illegal. I could imagine various stores making various decisions in all of these cases, all of which would be the folks working in that store expressing their beliefs! Humans are inherently social and thus inherently political (politics in the sense of politics as the negotiation and management of a community). Or imagine someone walks into a grocery store and doesn’t wear a mask! Lol :):/:(.
- stale2002 6y ago
  > Or wearing a t-shirt Or wearing a "vote for Trump/Biden" t shirt. In that situation basically everyone would agree that it would be ridiculous to say that the grocery store should ban people for wearing that t-shirt. I think that most people would not call refusing to ban someone for wearing this t-shirt as a "political" decision. Most people would agree that it is not political to refuse to ban someone for wearing a "vote for Trump/Biden" shirt. If you do call that political, to refuse to ban someone for that, basically everyone would disagree with you.

IncRnd 6y ago

Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. That's simply not true. One can verify the truth or falsehood of your statement by applying the knife of logic. Draw your statement to its logical conclusion in order to determine if it results in absurdity. Let's do that. A person who has had their brain surgically removed will (quite probably) never mention politics or attempt to control other's communications about politics. According to your statement, that person's actions are political. Sorry, but that's absurd.

dragonwriter 6y ago
Your conflation of passive inaction with an active choice to refrain from certain action is absurd.
- IncRnd 6y ago
  1. People who live in the Congo may consciously choose not to become involved in Candian politics. It is absurd to think that is political. 2. You wrote: Your conflation of passive inaction with an active choice to refrain from certain action is absurd. That is only meaningful as a circular definitio0n. Choosing not to act differs from an inability to act. Why? How would you define the difference between the action of not acting and the action of not acting, because of not making a choice to act?
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > How would you define the difference between the action of not acting and the action of not acting, because of not making a choice to act? I wouldn't, because not making a choice to act in a particular way is very different from making a choice to avoid as policy acting in that way, or, as was at issue upthread, “Taking a stance to not” act in a particular way. Taking a stance is (for this subject matter, at least) political. Inaction on its own is not.

triceratops 6y ago

I see this a misconception a lot online so I have to point out something important. The "publisher" vs "platform" is only about liability. Publishers are liable for everything posted on their websites. Platforms are not - as long as they make good faith efforts to take down or prevent posting of illegal content. Both are allowed to engage in moderation, curation or "censorship". Engaging in such does not make a website a publisher.