7 ms·

Florida Steps Up to Defend Its Unconstitutional Social Media Law; It's Terrible

37 points by danaris 5y ago

jaz2130 5y ago
“When a private company says take your content elsewhere, no one's First Amendment rights are violated.” I think the concern is moreso regarding massive corporations like Facebook and Twitter working together in lockstep to remove people from their platform that they ideologically disagree with, thus preventing them from reaching their audience. If Twitter wants to curate which people are allowed to post, then they are a publisher and should be regulated as such. That also means that they need to be held responsible for everything on their platform that they don’t remove.
- devwastaken 5y ago
  No such thing as "publisher vs platform". That's political propaganda. https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello...
  - jaz2130 5y ago
    > “That’s political propaganda!” proceeds to link to political propaganda
ipspam 5y ago
Maybe it's a fine article, but I didn't make it past "imagined anti-conservative bias"
- Tehchops 5y ago
  It is imagined. The bias is against hate-speech and restricting the real, actual rights of others from discrimination and bias. If the conservative platform has devolved to dog-whistling or outright hate speech, calling for interstate armed conflict etc... then yea it's gonna seem like an "anti-conservative" bias. Since you didn't make it past that part, I'll save you the trouble. The case so laughably lacks legal merit it's already a joke.
  - logicalmonster 5y ago
    > The bias is against hate-speech What exactly is hate speech? There are some people out there who think stating clear biological reality about a certain topic is the most vile hate speech imaginable, yet others would call that same behavior stating clear scientific fact. Or better yet. Have you ever played the “______ is racist” game? Search literally any noun and “is racist” in a search engine and you’ll find references to virtually every human activity being called racist at some point or another: including gardening, hiking, and milk. If anything can be labeled as hateful when convenient, the conditions for honest discourse online seem to become impossible.
    - danaris 5y ago
      > stating clear biological reality about a certain topic is the most vile hate speech If your "clear biological reality" is denying the existence and experience of transgender people, that's hate speech. If it's claiming that black people are less intelligent, that's hate speech. If it's claiming that Native Americans are naturally lazy, that's hate speech. There have been a lot of "clear biological realities" down the centuries that have been used to justify the continued oppression of minorities and marginalized groups. As long as they're not causing harm to others, every human being deserves the same level of dignity and respect as every other, regardless of what you or anyone else thinks of their identity.
      - logicalmonster 5y ago
        It feels like I'm getting mixed messages about trusting the science. Some science is apparently double-plus-good, and some science is double-plus-ungood. I'm not sure I understand in advance which science is permissible by the Inner Party. To clarify, it seems like you're arguing a strawman (or strawwomyn) argument with your (IMO very bad) points. To pick a less contentious example, I think science can clearly recognize that the average man is a little bit taller than the average woman. Would you agree that this is correct? In and of itself, would making this observation be bigoted? It doesn't seem to me that doing the science and objectively recognizing that this height difference currently exists in nature is bigoted against any group. To me, it would take something akin to a law that treats people with different heights differently in society to turn a scientific observation into some kind of oppression or harm.
devwastaken 5y ago
Clearly unconstitutional, they're going to waste money on going through the federal courts, cry when the big bad feds tell them to follow federal law, and some politicians get a pat on the back from their votebase. Make your own social media that is actually moderated and legal. There's no monopoly on servers, anyone can do it and have been. There's plenty of rack owners that vote red.
LatteLazy 5y ago
Scotus should punish states that pass obviously unconstitutional nonsense. It's vexatious litigation, it shows contempt for the court and the constitution. If Florida can't legislate like a grown up state, put them under direct federal control for a few years. They can go back to being a territory and we'll let Puerto Rico have their reps for a while.
- decremental 5y ago
  This would be a fantastic way to eliminate the unconstitutional gun laws passed in many states.
  - cyanydeez 5y ago
    yeah, itd pretty tiring seeing unregulated militias trying to overthrow the governme t
    - jfengel 5y ago
      Didn't you hear? That part of the Second Amendment doesn't count. The Constitution must be interpreted as originally intended, except for that part.
  - LatteLazy 5y ago
    Fair is fair, if a state is passing obviously unconstitutional laws they should be punished. It doesn't matter whether that's guns, abortion, free speech or some obscure thing about quartering soldiers.

37 points by danaris 5y ago

“When a private company says take your content elsewhere, no one's First Amendment rights are violated.” I think the concern is moreso regarding massive corporations like Facebook and Twitter working together in lockstep to remove people from their platform that they ideologically disagree with, thus preventing them from reaching their audience. If Twitter wants to curate which people are allowed to post, then they are a publisher and should be regulated as such. That also means that they need to be held responsible for everything on their platform that they don’t remove.

devwastaken 5y ago
No such thing as "publisher vs platform". That's political propaganda. https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello...
- jaz2130 5y ago
  > “That’s political propaganda!” proceeds to link to political propaganda

ipspam 5y ago

Maybe it's a fine article, but I didn't make it past "imagined anti-conservative bias"

Tehchops 5y ago
It is imagined. The bias is against hate-speech and restricting the real, actual rights of others from discrimination and bias. If the conservative platform has devolved to dog-whistling or outright hate speech, calling for interstate armed conflict etc... then yea it's gonna seem like an "anti-conservative" bias. Since you didn't make it past that part, I'll save you the trouble. The case so laughably lacks legal merit it's already a joke.
- logicalmonster 5y ago
  > The bias is against hate-speech What exactly is hate speech? There are some people out there who think stating clear biological reality about a certain topic is the most vile hate speech imaginable, yet others would call that same behavior stating clear scientific fact. Or better yet. Have you ever played the “______ is racist” game? Search literally any noun and “is racist” in a search engine and you’ll find references to virtually every human activity being called racist at some point or another: including gardening, hiking, and milk. If anything can be labeled as hateful when convenient, the conditions for honest discourse online seem to become impossible.
  - danaris 5y ago
    > stating clear biological reality about a certain topic is the most vile hate speech If your "clear biological reality" is denying the existence and experience of transgender people, that's hate speech. If it's claiming that black people are less intelligent, that's hate speech. If it's claiming that Native Americans are naturally lazy, that's hate speech. There have been a lot of "clear biological realities" down the centuries that have been used to justify the continued oppression of minorities and marginalized groups. As long as they're not causing harm to others, every human being deserves the same level of dignity and respect as every other, regardless of what you or anyone else thinks of their identity.
    - logicalmonster 5y ago
      It feels like I'm getting mixed messages about trusting the science. Some science is apparently double-plus-good, and some science is double-plus-ungood. I'm not sure I understand in advance which science is permissible by the Inner Party. To clarify, it seems like you're arguing a strawman (or strawwomyn) argument with your (IMO very bad) points. To pick a less contentious example, I think science can clearly recognize that the average man is a little bit taller than the average woman. Would you agree that this is correct? In and of itself, would making this observation be bigoted? It doesn't seem to me that doing the science and objectively recognizing that this height difference currently exists in nature is bigoted against any group. To me, it would take something akin to a law that treats people with different heights differently in society to turn a scientific observation into some kind of oppression or harm.

devwastaken 5y ago

Clearly unconstitutional, they're going to waste money on going through the federal courts, cry when the big bad feds tell them to follow federal law, and some politicians get a pat on the back from their votebase. Make your own social media that is actually moderated and legal. There's no monopoly on servers, anyone can do it and have been. There's plenty of rack owners that vote red.

LatteLazy 5y ago

Scotus should punish states that pass obviously unconstitutional nonsense. It's vexatious litigation, it shows contempt for the court and the constitution. If Florida can't legislate like a grown up state, put them under direct federal control for a few years. They can go back to being a territory and we'll let Puerto Rico have their reps for a while.

decremental 5y ago
This would be a fantastic way to eliminate the unconstitutional gun laws passed in many states.
- cyanydeez 5y ago
  yeah, itd pretty tiring seeing unregulated militias trying to overthrow the governme t
  - jfengel 5y ago
    Didn't you hear? That part of the Second Amendment doesn't count. The Constitution must be interpreted as originally intended, except for that part.
- LatteLazy 5y ago
  Fair is fair, if a state is passing obviously unconstitutional laws they should be punished. It doesn't matter whether that's guns, abortion, free speech or some obscure thing about quartering soldiers.