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Different debate. Those authors were not restricted from publishing their books. The Florida issue is about what kind of material is suitable for children to ac

by jl6 3y ago

Different debate. Those authors were not restricted from publishing their books. The Florida issue is about what kind of material is suitable for children to access.

mindslight 3y ago
It's actually not. You can make the same distinction by saying web commenters aren't restricted from writing whatever posts they want, and the debate is about what kind of material is suitable for centralized websites to facilitate. Really, the larger ideal of free speech is about the desired orthogonality of distribution channels versus content, and general tolerance for things we dislike. We see the results of its diminishing the strongest where the first amendment to the US constitution doesn't legally apply due to these kinds of distinctions.
- jl6 3y ago
  The key element that makes it a different debate is the involvement of children. There is widespread precedent for children to have limited rights and responsibilities, and limiting what media they have access to is entirely commonplace and not done to curtail speech.
  - mindslight 3y ago
    First, Reddit is used by plenty of children (regardless of COPPA). Many have tacit approval of their parents, who don't look too hard at what Reddit contains past the front page. And Reddit most certainly wants to be a place for children (age 13-17). So what children have access to is part of both issues. Second, does this "Florida issue" include provisions for parents of children that want their children to be able to access those books, to opt out of the restrictions in question? If not, then one can't say the topic is entirely limited to the traditional role of parents deciding what is right for their children. Rather it's also about about controlling what other people's children might read. Ultimately, both topics are about filtering distribution channels, based on criteria the distribution channel managers deem appropriate - with free speech concerns hinging on how much those distribution channels end up affecting what gets perceived as the total market.
    - jl6 3y ago
      > Second, does this "Florida issue" include provisions for parents of children that want their children to be able to access those books, to opt out of the restrictions in question? Yes, it does: they are perfectly free to buy or borrow those books themselves. The law is about what’s available in a public school.
      - mindslight 3y ago
        That's not an opt out, but rather routing around. And you can make the same argument about online forums - forum owners' decisions are about what is appropriate for their desired audience, and users are perfectly free to seek out their desired type of comments from other forums. I'm not making an argument about what level of opinionated curation is appropriate or justified. Rather it's just disingenuous to say something is censorship when the other team nominally supports it, but then throw out specific reasons why your team's favored censorship shouldn't actually be considered censorship. There are always legitimate sounding reasons for centralized distributors to police the content of speech, and it's also always censorship.
mcv 3y ago
That's a very disingenuous way of describing that issue. Much of the banned material is entirely suitable for children, just not something the governor and his supporters approve of. Books containing various minorities, characters with parents of the same gender, and various other real-life situations that children are likely to encounter, but that the government would prefer hidden from public view. And I also seem to remember news from a couple of years ago that scientists from state-funded institutions (I think this was also in Florida) weren't allowed to talk about climate change. I think both of these are pretty serious restrictions of free speech.
kaba0 3y ago
“That book talks about sex, it’s bad, but please don’t notice that the Bible is full of rape”

by jl6 3y ago

Different debate. Those authors were not restricted from publishing their books. The Florida issue is about what kind of material is suitable for children to access.

mindslight 3y ago

It's actually not. You can make the same distinction by saying web commenters aren't restricted from writing whatever posts they want, and the debate is about what kind of material is suitable for centralized websites to facilitate. Really, the larger ideal of free speech is about the desired orthogonality of distribution channels versus content, and general tolerance for things we dislike. We see the results of its diminishing the strongest where the first amendment to the US constitution doesn't legally apply due to these kinds of distinctions.

jl6 3y ago
The key element that makes it a different debate is the involvement of children. There is widespread precedent for children to have limited rights and responsibilities, and limiting what media they have access to is entirely commonplace and not done to curtail speech.
- mindslight 3y ago
  First, Reddit is used by plenty of children (regardless of COPPA). Many have tacit approval of their parents, who don't look too hard at what Reddit contains past the front page. And Reddit most certainly wants to be a place for children (age 13-17). So what children have access to is part of both issues. Second, does this "Florida issue" include provisions for parents of children that want their children to be able to access those books, to opt out of the restrictions in question? If not, then one can't say the topic is entirely limited to the traditional role of parents deciding what is right for their children. Rather it's also about about controlling what other people's children might read. Ultimately, both topics are about filtering distribution channels, based on criteria the distribution channel managers deem appropriate - with free speech concerns hinging on how much those distribution channels end up affecting what gets perceived as the total market.
  - jl6 3y ago
    > Second, does this "Florida issue" include provisions for parents of children that want their children to be able to access those books, to opt out of the restrictions in question? Yes, it does: they are perfectly free to buy or borrow those books themselves. The law is about what’s available in a public school.
    - mindslight 3y ago
      That's not an opt out, but rather routing around. And you can make the same argument about online forums - forum owners' decisions are about what is appropriate for their desired audience, and users are perfectly free to seek out their desired type of comments from other forums. I'm not making an argument about what level of opinionated curation is appropriate or justified. Rather it's just disingenuous to say something is censorship when the other team nominally supports it, but then throw out specific reasons why your team's favored censorship shouldn't actually be considered censorship. There are always legitimate sounding reasons for centralized distributors to police the content of speech, and it's also always censorship.

mcv 3y ago

That's a very disingenuous way of describing that issue. Much of the banned material is entirely suitable for children, just not something the governor and his supporters approve of. Books containing various minorities, characters with parents of the same gender, and various other real-life situations that children are likely to encounter, but that the government would prefer hidden from public view. And I also seem to remember news from a couple of years ago that scientists from state-funded institutions (I think this was also in Florida) weren't allowed to talk about climate change. I think both of these are pretty serious restrictions of free speech.

kaba0 3y ago

“That book talks about sex, it’s bad, but please don’t notice that the Bible is full of rape”