8 ms·

Cynically, I doubt this decision is driven by the principles of free speech. Like a lot of people & organisations, the Conservative Party is only interested in

by altacc 4y ago

Cynically, I doubt this decision is driven by the principles of free speech. Like a lot of people & organisations, the Conservative Party is only interested in protecting the freedom of speech that they approve of. I think it is more likely that this new minister had it explained to them how impossible this was to enforce or take action against, given the difficulty of proving mental harm. Either way, it's the correct decision. Content policies should be based on clear cut laws in addition to a platform's self authored content moderation policy.

0xy 4y ago
Can you point to the part of the bill that doesn't protect speech they don't approve of? I'm aware the UK Labour Party is in favor of censorship of disapproved topics [1], but I couldn't see any in this bill. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/11/labour-to-vote-against-tory-hate-speech-bill https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/11/labour-to-vote...
- mmarq 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - nailer 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - mmarq 4y ago
      Why should the Oxford university let you speak about whatever on their premises? Is it free speech you want or is it compelled speech?
      - nailer 4y ago
        That’s a good question but not a response to my post addressing labelling people that disagree with the mainstream narrative as ‘insane’’.
      - vixen99 4y ago
        In many cases, these are invited speakers so compulsion doesn't come into it. How would you get to speak if you're not invited ? This list makes interesting reading. These are people "banned from speaking at universities in the UK and Ireland, or faced campaigns to silence them, or sack them for their views. https://www.afaf.org.uk/the-banned-list/ https://www.afaf.org.uk/the-banned-list/ Students wishing to hear all sides of a controversial issue connected with any of these banned folk are out of luck even if they organize a private gathering on university premises. Higher moral authorities prevail - we are told. Perhaps the core debate should be with these people.
        yunwal 4y ago
        Compulsion comes into it if you start forcing Oxford to give platforms to speakers that go against the stated values of Oxford.
        altacc 4y ago
        Skimming that list, it seems to be bulked up by many who faced objections and protests but still spoke at the talks they were invited to. Them attending to talk whilst having protests is respecting free speech of everyone. Those whom object should not have their freedom of speech silenced in favour of one other's. People don't like protests when it's against them or something they don't support but protest is speech.
      - onetimeusename 4y ago
        There are many free speech laws and I think the way they are applied to charities like Oxford and ancient institutions is interesting. Compelled speech is dangerous and wrong, yes. I think if you are a trustee of a charity you also should be required to uphold the principles of that charity or form a new one entirely that is more agreeable. But hijacking a charity for a different purpose than it was intended is wrong. If the administrators, trustees, and professors would prefer that Oxford have a political lean and remove any who disagree that could violate the terms of the university's constitution and history. Obviously this didn't start out of nowhere. First of all, the university has regulations on free speech[1] which are quite unrestricted. That does not mean the university enforces them that way. So the law could be said to be forcing the university to be less biased in their judgement of speech. Bringing up Holocaust denial is like invoking Godwin's Law irl. There is no mention of what views the people with grievances actually think. Presently the university has charity status. That restricts their political speech, this could be another debate. They also receive public funding. I suppose if the university administration and professors admitted to having a bias, it could threaten their funding. I don't think compelling speech is correct but I also think it is almost certainly a violation of the charity status and Oxford regulations to underhandedly enforce political views. [1]: https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/life/clubs/clubs/registered-clubs/rules-regulations/freedom-expression https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/life/clubs/clubs/registered-cl...
        mmarq 4y ago
        > I don't think compelling speech is correct but I also think it is almost certainly a violation of the charity status and Oxford regulations to underhandedly enforce political views. The Oxford university is [check notes] a university. What you have in mind is the Speakers Corner, where everybody can go and speak about vaccines, children of celebrities, lizard people and whatever.
        onetimeusename 4y ago
        no? Did I or did I not link to a policy by the university? The council and congregation do not have the right to violate their own constitution and laws by selectively enforcing them and using underhanded hiring tactics. If they wanted to make a private political activist club, they don't have that authority to do so even if it's impossible to enforce this. So the compelled speech is a blunt instrument against the rather delicate issue of free speech grievances at the university (given that the university has its own policy which may not be enforced properly)
    - LordDragonfang 4y ago
      >Pfizer recent admitted they didn’t ever bother testing to see if the vaccine prevented transmission. Claiming they only admitted it "recently" is intentionally misleading. They said it plainly when it was released, because there wasn't any time to test it. That's part of why it was called emergency authorization. Later research gave significant evidence that it did significantly reduce transmission. https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-transmission/fact-check-preventing-transmission-never-required-for-covid-vaccines-initial-approval-pfizer-vax-did-reduce-transmission-of-early-variants-idUSL1N31F20E https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra...
      - nailer 4y ago
        OK, acknowledged. We were lead to believe the vaccine would stop covid transmission and even at the time we knew it had never been tested.
        LordDragonfang 4y ago
        ...Because it was deemed likely based on all previous knowledge about vaccines and transmission, and that turned out to be correct. I don't know what your objection is here. "Pfizer couldn't see the future"? "They should have just let people die while they conducted further tests of something they had every reason to believe would work (and, again, did work)"?
        nailer 4y ago
        Er no the vaccine doesn’t stop transmission. This is mainstream knowledge at this point. My objection and I suspect many others is that governments lying to people about something they have no data on is immoral.
        LordDragonfang 4y ago
        Read the article I just linked to. Scroll down, there's a heading for it. From my other comment in this thread: >The opposite was evidentially proven, multiple times. Vaccines stopped the virus transmitting from infected individuals in many if not most interactions: >https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra... >If you're saying it doesn't 100% eliminate the chance of infection or transmission, no one who knew anything about vaccines ever claimed that. Lying to people on the internet about something you have no sources for is also immoral.
  - pjc50 4y ago
    I wonder how that conflicts with the duty to ban certain other speakers: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/24/terror-bill-requires-universities-to-ban-extremist-speakers https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/24/terror-bill... Which is part of "PREVENT": https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-guidance/revised-prevent-duty-guidance-for-england-and-wales https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-guid...
    - mmarq 4y ago
      Extremists are a kind of mad they don’t like so they are banned. Instead they like vax-people, lizard-people and anti-EU nutcases and so Oxford should give them a platform and maybe even a PhD.
  - gadders 4y ago
    Things that were previously considered "insane" by social media companies: - Hunter Biden's laptop being genuine - The COVID Lab Leak theory
    - PartiallyTyped 4y ago
      > - Hunter Biden's laptop being genuine Which has what exactly? > - The COVID Lab Leak theory Still not proven.
      - gadders 4y ago
        a) Hunter Biden's laptop - we never got to find out as it was all suppressed. There are emails that at first glance look like shady business deals involving his father. b) COVID La Leak - I never said it was proven, just that it couldn't even be discussed.
    - throwayyy479087 4y ago
      ISIS and the Taliban had Twitter accounts after they banned the sitting president of the USA. It's not about truth, it's about control and political power. That's also the reason people are so hysterical about Elon.
    - owisd 4y ago
      You can accept Twitter’s not the best place for debating either of these things without taking a judgment on whether they are true or false.
      - gadders 4y ago
        There are probably a lot of things that Twitter is not the best place for debating, but who gets to control that list and why does it always favour the left?
        owisd 4y ago
        If we accept there are better places for debating then it doesn’t matter what‘s on the list.
  - 0xy 4y ago
    Given lab leak theory was initially censored as "misinformation", and anyone claiming the vaccines did not stop the spread (now proven accurate) were banned from many platforms, I'm not sure this brand of censorship is targeting the correct "insane people". After all, these policies of 'shoot first, ask questions later' are precisely the opposite of science-based approaches. We can't ever forget that these policies led to the censorship of topics that later turned out to credible, or true. The atrocious record of this censorship is the stifling of the scientific process. These policies that you champion not only stifle free speech, they censor credible theories if they happen to not be politically correct. That's just from one perspective, there's also the massive issue of creating what amount to blasphemy laws. Criticism of certain religions has regularly been punished as "hate speech" in the UK and Europe.
    - LordDragonfang 4y ago
      >claiming the vaccines did not stop the spread (now proven accurate) The opposite was evidentially proven, multiple times. Vaccines stopped the virus transmitting from infected individuals in many if not most interactions: https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-transmission/fact-check-preventing-transmission-never-required-for-covid-vaccines-initial-approval-pfizer-vax-did-reduce-transmission-of-early-variants-idUSL1N31F20E#:~:text=VACCINE%20DID%20REDUCE%20TRANSMISSION https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra... If you're saying it doesn't 100% eliminate the chance of infection or transmission, no one who knew anything about vaccines ever claimed that. (As for the lab leak hypothesis, there's still only circumstantial evidence, not enough to conclusively priviledge it above the zoonotic hypothesis. There was even less evidence at the time, and anyone discussing it was only serving to distract from the conversation to blame China, a country that was already doing more than any other country to stop the spread (arguably too much)).
      - DiggyJohnson 4y ago
        Are you saying that you're comfortable banning conversation of important, unresolved issues? I'm not sure I see your point, and > There was even less evidence at the time, and anyone discussing it was only serving to distract from the conversation to blame China is both a very strong assumption about the motivations of those you disagree with, and a very political opinion of yours that many might not agree with. If anything, this comment of yours seems to contain an example of the exact thing being criticized: limiting certain domains of speech (including certain positions within some domain) for the reason that you don't think it's right, or dangerous, or it doesn't agree with your politics or int'l relations, or w/e.
  - hayd 4y ago
    It isn't that just anyone can demand a platform. This is usually if a debate club/similar invites someone to speak, and then some other body/higher authority steps in who disapproves of the speaker. Ten+ years ago this happened with Nick Griffin at Durham Union Society. NUS bused in people from other universities to protest/stop the debate, successfully. A few weeks later he appeared on BBC Question Time and was utterly demolished, leading to the BNP being utterly wiped out in the election shortly afterwards. Sunlight is the best medicine. (See also Ye on Timcast yesterday.)
    - Spivak 4y ago
      This has to be a culture difference because that kind of thing would never happen in the US which is why I think people over here have become disillusioned that sunlight works. In fact Cheeto in Chief seemed to have actually proven the opposite, sunlight only served to make the insane people realize they weren't alone and embolden politicians to campaign on that nonsense because it fires up the nutjobs and moderates are stuck voting for them anyway. It's become a game of saying the most unhinged vile shit to keep your name in the news cycle. It genuinely doesn't seem a lot of them even buy into it based on what they do once elected. Like it's the funniest thing to watch. campaign: "I'm gonna launch myself into orbit and destroy the Jewish space lazers with my freedom fists" elected: "Yeah I think we should increase the budget allocation to the department of transportation next fiscal year in anticipation of the harsh winter we're about to have."
      - pmyteh 4y ago
        It didn't happen here, either in my view. Yes, Griffin got rinsed - but the reason his vote collapsed was not that a small number of people watching Question Time suddenly realised that he wasn't any good. Rather, the rise of UKIP took away the non-fascist right wing protest vote part of his coalition, which was always a lot bigger than the National Front-esque true believers. We're not even on our first go around this University "free speech" game. A previous Conservative government put anti-no-platform clauses into the Education (No. 2) Act 1986[0] during the previous 'politically correct' moral panic. The practical effect is to require universities themselves to make sure that there are facilities for speakers etc. that their students union refuses to host for political or moral reasons. These duties are still in force. [0]: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/61/section/43 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/61/section/43
- Mindwipe 4y ago
  > Can you point to the part of the bill that doesn't protect speech they don't approve of? Pornography is speech - and the age verification provisions effectively mean any non-mass scale platform in the UK will have to remove all adult content because the costs of age verifying every visitor are insane. What does the bill protect in there?
  - AdrianB1 4y ago
    I think there is a widely accepted view that children have limited rights, that may include free speech - porn included. They have no right to vote in all countries, no right to drink in most, no right to own guns (looking at USA mainly), so a limit on free speech does not look like a new approach to children's rights.
    - jkercher 4y ago
      I think he is getting at this part "non-mass scale platform." He's implying it only protects the big players that can afford the change.
      - mrguyorama 4y ago
        Do you think everything in this world should be doable as a mom and pop business? I don't. For example, I wouldn't want a moon-lighter handling my medical records, or my money accounts and credit cards. We have many examples where limiting who can work in certain spaces has become reasonable.
      - jacobr1 4y ago
        While this is generally true for any regulation ... for small businesses we do have one approach to address the problem of regulatory compliance: outsourcing to specialized firms. For example small sites can just use an identity provider (maybe something like AuthO presuming they add an age-verification module) which can be easily integrated.
  - retox 4y ago
    >Pornography is speech How did we get to this point? I assure you the idea that porn is speech is not an idea that the even liberal Brits would agree with.

by altacc 4y ago

0xy 4y ago

Can you point to the part of the bill that doesn't protect speech they don't approve of? I'm aware the UK Labour Party is in favor of censorship of disapproved topics [1], but I couldn't see any in this bill. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/11/labour-to-vote-against-tory-hate-speech-bill https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/11/labour-to-vote...

mmarq 4y ago
[flagged]
- nailer 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - mmarq 4y ago
    Why should the Oxford university let you speak about whatever on their premises? Is it free speech you want or is it compelled speech?
    - nailer 4y ago
      That’s a good question but not a response to my post addressing labelling people that disagree with the mainstream narrative as ‘insane’’.
    - vixen99 4y ago
      In many cases, these are invited speakers so compulsion doesn't come into it. How would you get to speak if you're not invited ? This list makes interesting reading. These are people "banned from speaking at universities in the UK and Ireland, or faced campaigns to silence them, or sack them for their views. https://www.afaf.org.uk/the-banned-list/ https://www.afaf.org.uk/the-banned-list/ Students wishing to hear all sides of a controversial issue connected with any of these banned folk are out of luck even if they organize a private gathering on university premises. Higher moral authorities prevail - we are told. Perhaps the core debate should be with these people.
      - yunwal 4y ago
        Compulsion comes into it if you start forcing Oxford to give platforms to speakers that go against the stated values of Oxford.
      - altacc 4y ago
        Skimming that list, it seems to be bulked up by many who faced objections and protests but still spoke at the talks they were invited to. Them attending to talk whilst having protests is respecting free speech of everyone. Those whom object should not have their freedom of speech silenced in favour of one other's. People don't like protests when it's against them or something they don't support but protest is speech.
    - onetimeusename 4y ago
      There are many free speech laws and I think the way they are applied to charities like Oxford and ancient institutions is interesting. Compelled speech is dangerous and wrong, yes. I think if you are a trustee of a charity you also should be required to uphold the principles of that charity or form a new one entirely that is more agreeable. But hijacking a charity for a different purpose than it was intended is wrong. If the administrators, trustees, and professors would prefer that Oxford have a political lean and remove any who disagree that could violate the terms of the university's constitution and history. Obviously this didn't start out of nowhere. First of all, the university has regulations on free speech[1] which are quite unrestricted. That does not mean the university enforces them that way. So the law could be said to be forcing the university to be less biased in their judgement of speech. Bringing up Holocaust denial is like invoking Godwin's Law irl. There is no mention of what views the people with grievances actually think. Presently the university has charity status. That restricts their political speech, this could be another debate. They also receive public funding. I suppose if the university administration and professors admitted to having a bias, it could threaten their funding. I don't think compelling speech is correct but I also think it is almost certainly a violation of the charity status and Oxford regulations to underhandedly enforce political views. [1]: https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/life/clubs/clubs/registered-clubs/rules-regulations/freedom-expression https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/life/clubs/clubs/registered-cl...
      - mmarq 4y ago
        > I don't think compelling speech is correct but I also think it is almost certainly a violation of the charity status and Oxford regulations to underhandedly enforce political views. The Oxford university is [check notes] a university. What you have in mind is the Speakers Corner, where everybody can go and speak about vaccines, children of celebrities, lizard people and whatever.
        onetimeusename 4y ago
        no? Did I or did I not link to a policy by the university? The council and congregation do not have the right to violate their own constitution and laws by selectively enforcing them and using underhanded hiring tactics. If they wanted to make a private political activist club, they don't have that authority to do so even if it's impossible to enforce this. So the compelled speech is a blunt instrument against the rather delicate issue of free speech grievances at the university (given that the university has its own policy which may not be enforced properly)
  - LordDragonfang 4y ago
    >Pfizer recent admitted they didn’t ever bother testing to see if the vaccine prevented transmission. Claiming they only admitted it "recently" is intentionally misleading. They said it plainly when it was released, because there wasn't any time to test it. That's part of why it was called emergency authorization. Later research gave significant evidence that it did significantly reduce transmission. https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-transmission/fact-check-preventing-transmission-never-required-for-covid-vaccines-initial-approval-pfizer-vax-did-reduce-transmission-of-early-variants-idUSL1N31F20E https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra...
    - nailer 4y ago
      OK, acknowledged. We were lead to believe the vaccine would stop covid transmission and even at the time we knew it had never been tested.
      - LordDragonfang 4y ago
        ...Because it was deemed likely based on all previous knowledge about vaccines and transmission, and that turned out to be correct. I don't know what your objection is here. "Pfizer couldn't see the future"? "They should have just let people die while they conducted further tests of something they had every reason to believe would work (and, again, did work)"?
        nailer 4y ago
        Er no the vaccine doesn’t stop transmission. This is mainstream knowledge at this point. My objection and I suspect many others is that governments lying to people about something they have no data on is immoral.
        LordDragonfang 4y ago
        Read the article I just linked to. Scroll down, there's a heading for it. From my other comment in this thread: >The opposite was evidentially proven, multiple times. Vaccines stopped the virus transmitting from infected individuals in many if not most interactions: >https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra... >If you're saying it doesn't 100% eliminate the chance of infection or transmission, no one who knew anything about vaccines ever claimed that. Lying to people on the internet about something you have no sources for is also immoral.
- pjc50 4y ago
  I wonder how that conflicts with the duty to ban certain other speakers: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/24/terror-bill-requires-universities-to-ban-extremist-speakers https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/24/terror-bill... Which is part of "PREVENT": https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-guidance/revised-prevent-duty-guidance-for-england-and-wales https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-guid...
  - mmarq 4y ago
    Extremists are a kind of mad they don’t like so they are banned. Instead they like vax-people, lizard-people and anti-EU nutcases and so Oxford should give them a platform and maybe even a PhD.
- gadders 4y ago
  Things that were previously considered "insane" by social media companies: - Hunter Biden's laptop being genuine - The COVID Lab Leak theory
  - PartiallyTyped 4y ago
    > - Hunter Biden's laptop being genuine Which has what exactly? > - The COVID Lab Leak theory Still not proven.
    - gadders 4y ago
      a) Hunter Biden's laptop - we never got to find out as it was all suppressed. There are emails that at first glance look like shady business deals involving his father. b) COVID La Leak - I never said it was proven, just that it couldn't even be discussed.
  - throwayyy479087 4y ago
    ISIS and the Taliban had Twitter accounts after they banned the sitting president of the USA. It's not about truth, it's about control and political power. That's also the reason people are so hysterical about Elon.
  - owisd 4y ago
    You can accept Twitter’s not the best place for debating either of these things without taking a judgment on whether they are true or false.
    - gadders 4y ago
      There are probably a lot of things that Twitter is not the best place for debating, but who gets to control that list and why does it always favour the left?
      - owisd 4y ago
        If we accept there are better places for debating then it doesn’t matter what‘s on the list.
- 0xy 4y ago
  Given lab leak theory was initially censored as "misinformation", and anyone claiming the vaccines did not stop the spread (now proven accurate) were banned from many platforms, I'm not sure this brand of censorship is targeting the correct "insane people". After all, these policies of 'shoot first, ask questions later' are precisely the opposite of science-based approaches. We can't ever forget that these policies led to the censorship of topics that later turned out to credible, or true. The atrocious record of this censorship is the stifling of the scientific process. These policies that you champion not only stifle free speech, they censor credible theories if they happen to not be politically correct. That's just from one perspective, there's also the massive issue of creating what amount to blasphemy laws. Criticism of certain religions has regularly been punished as "hate speech" in the UK and Europe.
  - LordDragonfang 4y ago
    >claiming the vaccines did not stop the spread (now proven accurate) The opposite was evidentially proven, multiple times. Vaccines stopped the virus transmitting from infected individuals in many if not most interactions: https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-transmission/fact-check-preventing-transmission-never-required-for-covid-vaccines-initial-approval-pfizer-vax-did-reduce-transmission-of-early-variants-idUSL1N31F20E#:~:text=VACCINE%20DID%20REDUCE%20TRANSMISSION https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-pfizer-vaccine-tra... If you're saying it doesn't 100% eliminate the chance of infection or transmission, no one who knew anything about vaccines ever claimed that. (As for the lab leak hypothesis, there's still only circumstantial evidence, not enough to conclusively priviledge it above the zoonotic hypothesis. There was even less evidence at the time, and anyone discussing it was only serving to distract from the conversation to blame China, a country that was already doing more than any other country to stop the spread (arguably too much)).
    - DiggyJohnson 4y ago
      Are you saying that you're comfortable banning conversation of important, unresolved issues? I'm not sure I see your point, and > There was even less evidence at the time, and anyone discussing it was only serving to distract from the conversation to blame China is both a very strong assumption about the motivations of those you disagree with, and a very political opinion of yours that many might not agree with. If anything, this comment of yours seems to contain an example of the exact thing being criticized: limiting certain domains of speech (including certain positions within some domain) for the reason that you don't think it's right, or dangerous, or it doesn't agree with your politics or int'l relations, or w/e.
- hayd 4y ago
  It isn't that just anyone can demand a platform. This is usually if a debate club/similar invites someone to speak, and then some other body/higher authority steps in who disapproves of the speaker. Ten+ years ago this happened with Nick Griffin at Durham Union Society. NUS bused in people from other universities to protest/stop the debate, successfully. A few weeks later he appeared on BBC Question Time and was utterly demolished, leading to the BNP being utterly wiped out in the election shortly afterwards. Sunlight is the best medicine. (See also Ye on Timcast yesterday.)
  - Spivak 4y ago
    This has to be a culture difference because that kind of thing would never happen in the US which is why I think people over here have become disillusioned that sunlight works. In fact Cheeto in Chief seemed to have actually proven the opposite, sunlight only served to make the insane people realize they weren't alone and embolden politicians to campaign on that nonsense because it fires up the nutjobs and moderates are stuck voting for them anyway. It's become a game of saying the most unhinged vile shit to keep your name in the news cycle. It genuinely doesn't seem a lot of them even buy into it based on what they do once elected. Like it's the funniest thing to watch. campaign: "I'm gonna launch myself into orbit and destroy the Jewish space lazers with my freedom fists" elected: "Yeah I think we should increase the budget allocation to the department of transportation next fiscal year in anticipation of the harsh winter we're about to have."
    - pmyteh 4y ago
      It didn't happen here, either in my view. Yes, Griffin got rinsed - but the reason his vote collapsed was not that a small number of people watching Question Time suddenly realised that he wasn't any good. Rather, the rise of UKIP took away the non-fascist right wing protest vote part of his coalition, which was always a lot bigger than the National Front-esque true believers. We're not even on our first go around this University "free speech" game. A previous Conservative government put anti-no-platform clauses into the Education (No. 2) Act 1986[0] during the previous 'politically correct' moral panic. The practical effect is to require universities themselves to make sure that there are facilities for speakers etc. that their students union refuses to host for political or moral reasons. These duties are still in force. [0]: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/61/section/43 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/61/section/43
Mindwipe 4y ago
> Can you point to the part of the bill that doesn't protect speech they don't approve of? Pornography is speech - and the age verification provisions effectively mean any non-mass scale platform in the UK will have to remove all adult content because the costs of age verifying every visitor are insane. What does the bill protect in there?
- AdrianB1 4y ago
  I think there is a widely accepted view that children have limited rights, that may include free speech - porn included. They have no right to vote in all countries, no right to drink in most, no right to own guns (looking at USA mainly), so a limit on free speech does not look like a new approach to children's rights.
  - jkercher 4y ago
    I think he is getting at this part "non-mass scale platform." He's implying it only protects the big players that can afford the change.
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      Do you think everything in this world should be doable as a mom and pop business? I don't. For example, I wouldn't want a moon-lighter handling my medical records, or my money accounts and credit cards. We have many examples where limiting who can work in certain spaces has become reasonable.
    - jacobr1 4y ago
      While this is generally true for any regulation ... for small businesses we do have one approach to address the problem of regulatory compliance: outsourcing to specialized firms. For example small sites can just use an identity provider (maybe something like AuthO presuming they add an age-verification module) which can be easily integrated.
- retox 4y ago
  >Pornography is speech How did we get to this point? I assure you the idea that porn is speech is not an idea that the even liberal Brits would agree with.