3 ms·

First, this comparison is inapt. We forbid people from discriminating against who can buy housing because a person’s race is something that is part of their ide

First, this comparison is inapt. We forbid people from discriminating against who can buy housing because a person’s race is something that is part of their identity, they are born with, that they didn’t choose, and has no bearing whatsoever on whether they can afford or deserve to own property. Restrictions in social media, on the other hand, pertain to voluntary behavior that the subject is 100% in control of and should be responsible for. Second, you can't easily separate the property-rights issue from the free-speech issue; they are naturally intertwined. In this case, that property (equipment, software, etc.) is being used specifically to broadcast speech, and we don't force people to repeat the speech of others (using mechanical devices or otherwise). Finally, fairness as a platform concept was once a thing imposed by the FCC up till the 1980s (due to the scarcity of broadcast channels) and is now dead. We've replaced that with the possibility of infinite numbers of outlets. There's nothing stopping someone from building an anything-goes Twitter. And in fact, people have tried, as recently as two years ago (remember Parler?), but they end up dying from their own radioactive contamination.

ThrowawayR2 5y ago
I've seen the first argument made before and IMO it's not a workable refutation because it ignores those protected classes for characteristics one is not born with intrinsically, namely religion/creed, which can change, e.g. people leaving cults, conversions between faiths, and those who become agnostic/atheist, and gender identity, given proponents of that concept believe it to be fluid (as best I understand it). Unless you are denying those classes should be protected classes, then there is significant precedent for protecting changeable aspects of one's identity. Regarding the second point, actually we do (or did; the Trump administration rolled it back and the Biden administration is trying to re-instate it) "force people to repeat the speech of others"; one of the points of the FCC's net neutrality definition was "No blocking: This includes a right to send and receive lawful traffic, prohibits the blocking of lawful content, apps, services and the connection of non-harmful devices to the network" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_the_United_States#FCC_Open_Internet_Order_(2010) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_the_United_S...) and even deplorable speech is still lawful. Regarding the third point, lots of online services died before the dominant incumbents of today came to power, e.g. AltaVista, Lycos, etc. Various conservative media outlets, like Fox News, are still around and thriving; you can bet they are watching and learning from these failures. Whose to say that one of them doesn't dislodge the incumbents and it becomes your viewpoint that needs protection? Public opinion is fickle. (As an aside, sorry if my original post was confusing; I need to get better at writing.)

ThrowawayR2 5y ago

I've seen the first argument made before and IMO it's not a workable refutation because it ignores those protected classes for characteristics one is not born with intrinsically, namely religion/creed, which can change, e.g. people leaving cults, conversions between faiths, and those who become agnostic/atheist, and gender identity, given proponents of that concept believe it to be fluid (as best I understand it). Unless you are denying those classes should be protected classes, then there is significant precedent for protecting changeable aspects of one's identity. Regarding the second point, actually we do (or did; the Trump administration rolled it back and the Biden administration is trying to re-instate it) "force people to repeat the speech of others"; one of the points of the FCC's net neutrality definition was "No blocking: This includes a right to send and receive lawful traffic, prohibits the blocking of lawful content, apps, services and the connection of non-harmful devices to the network" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_the_United_States#FCC_Open_Internet_Order_(2010) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_the_United_S...) and even deplorable speech is still lawful. Regarding the third point, lots of online services died before the dominant incumbents of today came to power, e.g. AltaVista, Lycos, etc. Various conservative media outlets, like Fox News, are still around and thriving; you can bet they are watching and learning from these failures. Whose to say that one of them doesn't dislodge the incumbents and it becomes your viewpoint that needs protection? Public opinion is fickle. (As an aside, sorry if my original post was confusing; I need to get better at writing.)