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Broadly agree. Freedom of speech definitely means that people may not want to associate with you any longer. But 'cancel culture' wouldn't be an issue if that
by piaste 5y ago
Broadly agree. Freedom of speech definitely means that people may not want to associate with you any longer.
But 'cancel culture' wouldn't be an issue if that was all - if individual people simply chose to stop associating with the wrong-thinker. Not even if a lot of people did at once.
The problem is that when those people are not individual fellow citizens, but the "Trust & Safety Team" or the "Anti-Evil Team" at $Megacorporation, they don't just stop doing business with you - they can effectively cut you off from most of the rest of the world, whether or not the rest of the world wants it.
Simply put, the problem is that they have too much power. They have the same freedom of association as private citizens, but their ability to punish people is incomparably greater and isn't subject to the same restraint as the government's.
- lesuorac 5y ago> but their ability to punish people is incomparably greater and isn't subject to the same restraint as the government's. If Facebook/Google/Amazon/Cloudflare deny your their services you can still always find a new provider (see Gab). If the government shuts you down, you need to emigrate to start back up. Sure, its a PIA to re-setup a service meant for AWS not on AWS but that's really the core of AWS's offering. Big Tech is not the grocery store, you will live without twitter, you will not live without food. The power a corperation has is governed by the Charter that was (now implicitly) granted by the State they're incorperated in. If you think they have too much power in their Charter complain to that state.
- piaste 5y ago> If you think they have too much power in their Charter complain to that state. Quite. I loudly support breaking up the megacorps and try to avoid depending on them, for what little I can do as a European citizen.