5 ms·

Not to be Debbie downer but there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment over the years away from protecting speech, even hateful speech to active

by mc32 3y ago

Not to be Debbie downer but there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment over the years away from protecting speech, even hateful speech to actively espousing and advocating for censorship. It’s clear that principles can shift over time and Wired is toeing the line.

barbazoo 3y ago
It's a problem across the spectrum. "Don't say gay" and the whole book banning business across the US come to mind. Is there legislation anywhere implementing "left wing censorship"?
- mc32 3y ago
  That was about introducing sex ed to third graders. Have third graders put down their toy cars, dolls and blocks yet? And then you have a Cal governor suinf a school dist demanding they teach the curriculum he believes is correct. So you have an example of two governors, one on each side, tellig districts what to teach But, the thing is, liberals _used_ _to_ espouse free speech as long as it was legal and defended it to the death, so to speak. Conservatives, well, they were conservative and were more on the "decency" argument but today that is reversed and the liberals are tending more autocratic than the conservatives.
  - katbyte 3y ago
    That may have been the intent (which I seriously doubt) but in practice it means teachers cannot even mention their same sex partners or even that gay/trans people exist because that could be considered “sex ex” by a parent who doesn’t want their children to know gay people exist (and for the record it is not sex ed) Hence the use of the phrase “don’t say gay”
    - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
      I would government employees to not talk about sex, their partners, their bedrooms, and all manner of topics to 5-9 year old kids.
      - mrguyorama 3y ago
        That bill would penalize the teacher if their gay significant other brought their forgotten lunch to school, the kids asked "who was that", and the teacher attempted any answer. It has nothing to do with sex. Republicans in florida have quite clearly criminalized same sex couples doing normal things.
        SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
        That's a very specific hypothetical. How based in reality is it?
      - katbyte 3y ago
        So you don’t want female teachers to mention their husbands? Or their partner is male? Or that marriage even exists? Because that would be the equivalent.
        SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
        YES. I don't any teachers to mention anything that isn't part of my child's direct education. How is this so difficult to understand? Go talk to an adult. The children are not the teachers friends. Leave them alone. I don't care who their partner is, neither does my child. No one cares. Maybe we should ask why government employees aren't keeping stronger boundries when around children? Also... Seriously? You aren't fooling anyone with these absolutely convoluted hypotheticals. No one is going to jail for saying "that's my <whatever>". It's an weak case when you need to reach outside of reality.
        katbyte 3y ago
        you do realize what you are saying right? and how dumb of suggestion it is or were your teachers growing up robot automatons who were not people? and you do realize that marriage and relationships ARE part of education? history english etc. at what age do kids learn about what a husbands or wife is and what is marriage? because that is the same age they should learn about same sex relationships. > I don't care who their partner is, neither does my child lots of people do. lots of parents want their kids to not be exposed to the fact same sex couples exist, hence the don't say gay bill. and afterwards schools pulling all library books because the mere mention of a same sex couple in one is enough for them to be sued under the bill. you are correct no one will go to jail. but school districts can be sued, which means they will not hire gay teachers because of the simple risk one parent gets upset and racks up a legal bill for them THAT is why its so bad, how is that so difficult to understand for you?
  - barbazoo 3y ago
    I think that's (grade 3 -> 9yo) an ok age to start talking about sexuality. Lots of age appropriate topics there. Not sure why this is such a big deal.
    - Gareth321 3y ago
      I agree, but there are too many reports of teachers teaching some pretty extreme gender ideology to young kids. Things like "you can be any gender you feel like." Most people don't agree with that, and in fact there is no scientific evidence for the existence of gender at all. Sex ed is fine, but I don't think school is a place for ideological indoctrination. States are addressing this in many ham-fisted ways.
      - barbazoo 3y ago
        > too many reports of teachers teaching some pretty extreme gender ideology to young kids Interesting, what's a good source on that?
  - XorNot 3y ago
    Do you know what the content of sex ed when taught to younger classes is, and why the curriculum was adopted? Because, the core of it was to ensure that said 3rd graders knew two things: 1. What the correct anatomical names for their genitals - parts of their bodies - are, and 2. What is appropriate and inappropriate touching. Now, the reason you want to teach these things to children, really as young as possible, is because it turns out there's been quite a lot of child abuse cases where the defense case has rested on the fact that the victims don't actually know the anatomical names of body parts. And as a result when you go to prosecute, you can't conclusively prove from their testimony what was taking place, which it turns out has a habit of not convincing juries. A child who only will sort of gesture to the lower part of their body, because they don't know to volunteer the correct name of the body part, again, it turns out, leads to a court system which fails to apply justice properly, and also increases the general risk of abusers being able to operate because they convince their victims that everything that's happening is "okay". Oh, and as it turns out, it's also very hard to teach children how to identify this sort of thing without touching on the idea of their being multiple sexualities, because of course to teach something like appropriate and inappropriate touching you are quite likely (a) having to service questions from children who'll ask why it's not inappropriate for mommy and daddy, or (b) have to ask what about daddy and daddy or mommy and mommy and (c) who might struggle with the notion if it's not correctly identified that the inappropriate thing will apply regardless of gender, and yet can also be appropriate for adults regardless of gender. There's a reason no one targeting primary school level physical education classes wants to say anything more then "sex ed" because, if they had to actually cover the content of what they were opposing, they'd rather look they were basically defending child predators. Which, though not directly, they are.
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      Oh, and you can't base this on "well parents should be in charge of what their kids learn" because a significant amount of the time, the abusers ARE the parents.
  - sudosysgen 3y ago
    I've gone through sex ed in third grade. All I learnt was what the name of the body parts are, that I shouldn't let other people touch them in inappropriate ways, and that boys and girls have different things going on there. I don't see why it isn't appropriate and why a 9 year old shouldn't know this.
    - bombolo 3y ago
      Because rich conservatives don't want the poor class to have a decent education… too dangerous. Sex education is just part of the trend.
      - hellojesus 3y ago
        [dead]
    - xorcist 3y ago
      Why is this discussion always so nationalistic? It can seem miraculous that other countries can even function. How hasn't countries with working sex ed collapsed long ago, given all the severely dysfunctional things people attribute to it?
  - kelnos 3y ago
    > ... demanding they teach the curriculum he believes is correct. I mean, there's objective truth here; "he believes is correct" is a distortion of the facts. LGBTQ people actually do exist. Suing a school district and opposing the legislation of a state that's trying to erase classes of people from existence seems like a reasonable thing to do. The Temecula school district in question decided they wanted to remove gay-rights activist Harvey Milk from the state-approved curriculum. Are we going to be willfully naive (or just flat-out bigoted) and suggest that they wanted to do that for any reason other than not wanting their kids to know homosexuality exists? In the case of Florida, if teachers are allowed to discuss heterosexual relationships (even just simply talking about "mom and dad") in the classroom (which of course they are), legally requiring that they pretend homosexual relationships don't exist seems a bit absurd, no? I'm not buying any of this as liberals trying to restrict free speech. If anything, it's the opposite: what if teachers wanted to teach the material the Temecula school board decided they wanted removed? What if teachers in Florida don't want to be afraid that they just might say something about a homosexual relationship and get fired?
  - HDThoreaun 3y ago
    Don't say gay is now law for high schoolers in Florida too. The "third graders" rhetoric was always a falsehood, the law was designed to be used for all ages of students.
- tetrep 3y ago
  I wouldn't be surprised if there was some sort of legislated PC terminology for government workers somewhere (but, ironically, what first comes to mind is the banning of "Latinx" by Sanders). What about NYC protecting fat workers from being fired? Body-positivity and similar things tend to be "left" in the US.
  - barbazoo 3y ago
    > banning of "Latinx" by Sanders Was there legislation? If not, how was it "banned"?
    - monocasa 3y ago
      https://apnews.com/article/sarah-huckabee-sanders-politics-united-states-government-arkansas-hispanics-4f23386e609acd8206d2396719c17cab https://apnews.com/article/sarah-huckabee-sanders-politics-u...
      - barbazoo 3y ago
        Oh I totally misunderstood and looked for a different "Sanders", thanks for sharing.
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    >I wouldn't be surprised No, this is absurd. You don't get to imagine injustices by "the left" just because you don't like them. Right now the right is actively censoring teachers as private individuals. Where is this happening from left wing politicians?
- junofan 3y ago
  I’ll just say I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I have heard about misinformation. That term is suddenly pretty much ubiquitous. Mitigations are now everywhere. I can’t watch a video of Elon Musk explaining how new Tesla cars will start up by recognizing specific patterns in the driver’s testicles without a big warning telling me that the video is AI-generated. Funnily enough, the absolute best content tends to be the stuff with fact checker warnings.
- autoexec 3y ago
  Sylvia Garcia is a Democratic senator from Texas and she sponsored the EARN IT Act two of the times they tried to shove it down our throats. That would have forced sites to backdoor any encryption.
  - matthewdgreen 3y ago
    There has always been a (small) bipartisan coalition in favor of law enforcement-sponsored anti-encryption legislation, unfortunately. Senator Lindsey Graham has been a vocal sponsor of several bills recently, but he had no problem finding Democrats to co-sponsor them. We have not seen these bills go completely mainstream and get the full partisan treatment. https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/press/rep/releases/graham-cotton-blackburn-introduce-balanced-solution-to-bolster-national-security-end-use-of-warrant-proof-encryption-that-shields-criminal-activity# https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/press/rep/releases/graham-c...
  - barbazoo 3y ago
    I see, thank you. I wouldn't say this counts as censorship the sense we're talking about though right?
    - autoexec 3y ago
      I wouldn't put it in the same category as book burning, but if the law had passed it would certainly have resulted in censorship. > Although the content the EARN IT Act seeks to regulate is abhorrent and the government’s interest in stopping the creation and distribution of that content is compelling, the First Amendment still requires that the law be narrowly tailored to address those weighty concerns. Yet, given the bill’s broad scope, it will inevitably force online platforms to censor the constitutionally protected speech of their users. (https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-constitution https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-c...) The Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act of 2020 (EARN IT Act) amends an existing federal law to force online platforms into changing how they moderate content online by scanning and censoring more of their users’ communications. (https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/the-earn-it-act-is-a-disaster-for-online-speech-and-privacy-especially-for-the-lgbtq-and-sex-worker-communities https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/the-earn-it-act-is-a-d...) If it’s hard for a provider to tell what’s unlawful, but it’ll face legal liability if it gets it wrong, then the obvious incentive is for the provider to avoid the danger zone and censor lots of lawful content along with the unlawful content, just in case. This is exactly why Section 230 immunity is so important, because without it, platforms would constantly censor a lot of legal speech by their American users – maybe your speech – as a byproduct of trying to censor illegal speech, for fear that if they didn’t cast a wide net, some illegal speech would slip through and they’d get sued for it. (https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/03/earn-it-act-unconstitutional-first-first-amendment https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/03/earn-it-act-uncon...)
- didntcheck 3y ago
  There's no need for legislation when you have the right businesses and institutes on your side https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/government-sachs-lind https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/government-...
komali2 3y ago
The only time I hear this is when people refer to it. I've yet to find examples of it myself, bearing in mind that companies choosing what can and can't be said on their platforms doesn't constitute censorship (unless we're willing to admit that platforms have a monopoly on public communication).
- mc32 3y ago
  When you have Federal embeds counselling companies on content, that's essentially censorship. I don't know what else you'd call it. That's banana republic level technique and tactics. This is something a Francisco Franco might have done. No, no, we don't have censors, we're just making sure only the truth of the moment is published. And of course, blackhole all the contradictions.
  - komali2 3y ago
    > only the truth of the moment is published What other truths are you struggling to publish? What contradictions do you have that you're unable to display anywhere? > Federal embeds counselling companies on content What's this? I haven't heard about it.
- kelnos 3y ago
  It absolutely is censorship. Whether or not that censorship is illegal depends on who is doing the censorship. But the act of suppressing speech is censorship, no matter who does it.
  - komali2 3y ago
    I don't understand - you're not allowed to submit blog posts to my blog, am I censoring you?
flangola7 3y ago
It's not so much a shift as the US coming into alignment with the rest of the world. Harmful expressions like hate speech and inciting violence have more or less always been recognized as things you don't put up with in a civilized democratic society, just as you don't put up with physical violence to resolve disputes or allowing vehicles to drive any which way on motorway. The essence of freedom of speech has always been the ability of the common or marginalized folk to discuss and criticize those with power and privilege - the state, the landed, the majority. Attacking marginalized minorities is not the purpose of it and is a categorically different type of action - the marginalized don't have power over others to begin with. Frustratingly the US is actually rather poor about expression freedom in a number of other ways (ways which ironically almost never come up when Americans talk about speech freedoms), and ranks below many other western nations.
- 4bpp 3y ago
  > The essence of freedom of speech has always been the ability of the common or marginalized folk to discuss and criticize those with power and privilege - the state, the landed, the majority. Attacking marginalized minorities is not the purpose of it and is a categorically different type of action - the marginalized don't have power over others to begin with. If you make this the principle according to which you allow or censor speech, the predictable outcome is that would-be speakers will seek to establish that they are common and marginalized (or speaking for those who are) and their opponents have power and privilege (or work on behalf of those who are), as in a classical bravery debate (https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/05/18/against-bravery-debates/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/05/18/against-bravery-debate...). In general, the powerful and privileged tend to be the ones who win these contests.
wredue 3y ago
There has not been a liberal push away from encryption. In fact, it is the fascist right that want to remove privacy, has passed laws (like PATRIOT) to do so, and the supporters simply say “if you don’t want to be spied on, then what are you hiding” The right wing are the ones actively pushing this along with “if you think privacy is a right, then you are a predator. Won’t someone think of the children?!”
- kelnos 3y ago
  Pretty sure Democratic Congresspeople have co-sponsored the EARN IT Act. Both sides are complicit in this garbage.
  - mcpackieh 3y ago
    wredue said > "There has not been a liberal push away from encryption." Pointing out Democratic congresspeople who push away from encryption does not contradict wredue's claim. Liberal is not a party affiliation, when Democratic congresspeople push away from liberal principles they are being illiberal. Liberal doesn't mean "whatever it is that Democratic politicians support". And yes, I know this is confusing to Americans who received their political education from AM talk radio or cable television, who's understanding of the term amounts to "whatever it is that Democratic politicians say." When a Democratic politician calls for violent lyrics in rap music to be banned (as some did in the 90s), that is illiberal. When a Republican says that abortion should be legal, that is liberal. Even though liberal values are generally associated more with one party than the other, that doesn't mean liberalism is nothing more than party affiliation.
r00fus 3y ago
Al Gore as VP championed the Clipper Chip which proposed backdoor encryption keys to all encryption used (back when encryption was considered weaponry and regulated). It’s not that far of a shift (at least from the 90s Clinton admin). https://archive.epic.org/crypto/clipper/ https://archive.epic.org/crypto/clipper/
wolverine876 3y ago
How does that relate to the article? It seems like a completely different subject to me, but maybe I'm misunderstanding you. > there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment over the years away from protecting speech, even hateful speech to actively espousing and advocating for censorship The shift is to protecting the rights of people oppressed by hate speech, in the balance between its speakers and victims. It's based on the idea that the politically vulnerable have their rights - including their free speech - abridged by hate speech. It says hate speech censors the politically vulnerable, so at some points, we must censor one or the other. It's tricky, but portraying it as 'anti-free-speech' is like portraying 'pro-life' advocates as 'anti-personal-rights'. If we're honest then it's not that simple, whatever one's perspective.
- supazek 3y ago
  Can you define hate speech? Or “politically vulnerable”? I’m not dogging you but this sounds like an argument that someone who would like to ban E2E encryption would make. No one has a right to not be offended and we have already clearly defined where words become terroristic threats. Although the law is the least of my concerns as I get downvoted for having an opinion not totally in lock step with the social-liberal worldview.
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    I could take a stab at defining it but both are already defined in law (if we take 'politically vulnerable' as 'protected classes', for example) and I'd be adding to the infinite Internet crap pile if I didn't do some research first. Plenty of other dangerous speech is illegal, such as forms of incitement. It's not about feeling offended - a common way to belittle a serious, challenging issue. I'm not sure how E2EE is implicated: If the speech isn't heard by the politically vulnerable, it's much less likely to be oppressive; if someone texts me hate speech over Signal, the encyrption doesn't matter. If it's a plan of violence, that's of course a different and existing issue. > I get downvoted for having an opinion not totally in lock step with the social-liberal worldview. The victim routine degrades the credibility of your comment. It looks like someone just following standard right-wing rhetoric. Also, you don't offer convincing evidence.
deleted 3y ago
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Klonoar 3y ago
It's not advocating censorship to call for platforms (& co) to combat hate speech. Can you link to anything that actually backs up that claim of yours?
- didntcheck 3y ago
  It objectively is calling for censorship, irrespective of whether one considers it justified censorship
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    The idea that a private platform choosing not to amplify something they don't agree with, something that is clearly spelled out as their right in the first amendment, is "censorship" is absurd. If the local newspaper chooses not to run the classified ad you sent them, that's not censorship. If a big newspaper chooses not to publish the letter to the editor you sent them, that's not censorship. If FEDEX chooses not to ship the package you bring in, that's not censorship. A business choosing not to do business with you, even in very specific and obtuse ways is not censorship. A private entity has no legal, ethical, or moral obligation to signal boost or publish anything they do not want to.
- Gareth321 3y ago
  It clearly is censorship. Maybe you're conflating censorship with the First Amendment? The Constitution only protects certain kinds of speech. Only that of citizens with respect to government, and only Americans. When people speak about censorship, they are referring to all kinds of censorship by people all over the world, including private companies censoring individuals.
  - Klonoar 3y ago
    So just to be clear: you consider it censorship when the rest of the world tells you "you cannot harass x group by utilizing this set of harmful language"?
    - 3y ago
mcpackieh 3y ago
> Not to be Debbie downer but there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment More accurate to say the establishment shifted away from liberalism.

by mc32 3y ago

barbazoo 3y ago

It's a problem across the spectrum. "Don't say gay" and the whole book banning business across the US come to mind. Is there legislation anywhere implementing "left wing censorship"?

mc32 3y ago
That was about introducing sex ed to third graders. Have third graders put down their toy cars, dolls and blocks yet? And then you have a Cal governor suinf a school dist demanding they teach the curriculum he believes is correct. So you have an example of two governors, one on each side, tellig districts what to teach But, the thing is, liberals _used_ _to_ espouse free speech as long as it was legal and defended it to the death, so to speak. Conservatives, well, they were conservative and were more on the "decency" argument but today that is reversed and the liberals are tending more autocratic than the conservatives.
- katbyte 3y ago
  That may have been the intent (which I seriously doubt) but in practice it means teachers cannot even mention their same sex partners or even that gay/trans people exist because that could be considered “sex ex” by a parent who doesn’t want their children to know gay people exist (and for the record it is not sex ed) Hence the use of the phrase “don’t say gay”
  - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
    I would government employees to not talk about sex, their partners, their bedrooms, and all manner of topics to 5-9 year old kids.
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      That bill would penalize the teacher if their gay significant other brought their forgotten lunch to school, the kids asked "who was that", and the teacher attempted any answer. It has nothing to do with sex. Republicans in florida have quite clearly criminalized same sex couples doing normal things.
      - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
        That's a very specific hypothetical. How based in reality is it?
    - katbyte 3y ago
      So you don’t want female teachers to mention their husbands? Or their partner is male? Or that marriage even exists? Because that would be the equivalent.
      - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
        YES. I don't any teachers to mention anything that isn't part of my child's direct education. How is this so difficult to understand? Go talk to an adult. The children are not the teachers friends. Leave them alone. I don't care who their partner is, neither does my child. No one cares. Maybe we should ask why government employees aren't keeping stronger boundries when around children? Also... Seriously? You aren't fooling anyone with these absolutely convoluted hypotheticals. No one is going to jail for saying "that's my <whatever>". It's an weak case when you need to reach outside of reality.
        katbyte 3y ago
        you do realize what you are saying right? and how dumb of suggestion it is or were your teachers growing up robot automatons who were not people? and you do realize that marriage and relationships ARE part of education? history english etc. at what age do kids learn about what a husbands or wife is and what is marriage? because that is the same age they should learn about same sex relationships. > I don't care who their partner is, neither does my child lots of people do. lots of parents want their kids to not be exposed to the fact same sex couples exist, hence the don't say gay bill. and afterwards schools pulling all library books because the mere mention of a same sex couple in one is enough for them to be sued under the bill. you are correct no one will go to jail. but school districts can be sued, which means they will not hire gay teachers because of the simple risk one parent gets upset and racks up a legal bill for them THAT is why its so bad, how is that so difficult to understand for you?
- barbazoo 3y ago
  I think that's (grade 3 -> 9yo) an ok age to start talking about sexuality. Lots of age appropriate topics there. Not sure why this is such a big deal.
  - Gareth321 3y ago
    I agree, but there are too many reports of teachers teaching some pretty extreme gender ideology to young kids. Things like "you can be any gender you feel like." Most people don't agree with that, and in fact there is no scientific evidence for the existence of gender at all. Sex ed is fine, but I don't think school is a place for ideological indoctrination. States are addressing this in many ham-fisted ways.
    - barbazoo 3y ago
      > too many reports of teachers teaching some pretty extreme gender ideology to young kids Interesting, what's a good source on that?
- XorNot 3y ago
  Do you know what the content of sex ed when taught to younger classes is, and why the curriculum was adopted? Because, the core of it was to ensure that said 3rd graders knew two things: 1. What the correct anatomical names for their genitals - parts of their bodies - are, and 2. What is appropriate and inappropriate touching. Now, the reason you want to teach these things to children, really as young as possible, is because it turns out there's been quite a lot of child abuse cases where the defense case has rested on the fact that the victims don't actually know the anatomical names of body parts. And as a result when you go to prosecute, you can't conclusively prove from their testimony what was taking place, which it turns out has a habit of not convincing juries. A child who only will sort of gesture to the lower part of their body, because they don't know to volunteer the correct name of the body part, again, it turns out, leads to a court system which fails to apply justice properly, and also increases the general risk of abusers being able to operate because they convince their victims that everything that's happening is "okay". Oh, and as it turns out, it's also very hard to teach children how to identify this sort of thing without touching on the idea of their being multiple sexualities, because of course to teach something like appropriate and inappropriate touching you are quite likely (a) having to service questions from children who'll ask why it's not inappropriate for mommy and daddy, or (b) have to ask what about daddy and daddy or mommy and mommy and (c) who might struggle with the notion if it's not correctly identified that the inappropriate thing will apply regardless of gender, and yet can also be appropriate for adults regardless of gender. There's a reason no one targeting primary school level physical education classes wants to say anything more then "sex ed" because, if they had to actually cover the content of what they were opposing, they'd rather look they were basically defending child predators. Which, though not directly, they are.
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    Oh, and you can't base this on "well parents should be in charge of what their kids learn" because a significant amount of the time, the abusers ARE the parents.
- sudosysgen 3y ago
  I've gone through sex ed in third grade. All I learnt was what the name of the body parts are, that I shouldn't let other people touch them in inappropriate ways, and that boys and girls have different things going on there. I don't see why it isn't appropriate and why a 9 year old shouldn't know this.
  - bombolo 3y ago
    Because rich conservatives don't want the poor class to have a decent education… too dangerous. Sex education is just part of the trend.
    - hellojesus 3y ago
      [dead]
  - xorcist 3y ago
    Why is this discussion always so nationalistic? It can seem miraculous that other countries can even function. How hasn't countries with working sex ed collapsed long ago, given all the severely dysfunctional things people attribute to it?
- kelnos 3y ago
  > ... demanding they teach the curriculum he believes is correct. I mean, there's objective truth here; "he believes is correct" is a distortion of the facts. LGBTQ people actually do exist. Suing a school district and opposing the legislation of a state that's trying to erase classes of people from existence seems like a reasonable thing to do. The Temecula school district in question decided they wanted to remove gay-rights activist Harvey Milk from the state-approved curriculum. Are we going to be willfully naive (or just flat-out bigoted) and suggest that they wanted to do that for any reason other than not wanting their kids to know homosexuality exists? In the case of Florida, if teachers are allowed to discuss heterosexual relationships (even just simply talking about "mom and dad") in the classroom (which of course they are), legally requiring that they pretend homosexual relationships don't exist seems a bit absurd, no? I'm not buying any of this as liberals trying to restrict free speech. If anything, it's the opposite: what if teachers wanted to teach the material the Temecula school board decided they wanted removed? What if teachers in Florida don't want to be afraid that they just might say something about a homosexual relationship and get fired?
- HDThoreaun 3y ago
  Don't say gay is now law for high schoolers in Florida too. The "third graders" rhetoric was always a falsehood, the law was designed to be used for all ages of students.
tetrep 3y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if there was some sort of legislated PC terminology for government workers somewhere (but, ironically, what first comes to mind is the banning of "Latinx" by Sanders). What about NYC protecting fat workers from being fired? Body-positivity and similar things tend to be "left" in the US.
- barbazoo 3y ago
  > banning of "Latinx" by Sanders Was there legislation? If not, how was it "banned"?
  - monocasa 3y ago
    https://apnews.com/article/sarah-huckabee-sanders-politics-united-states-government-arkansas-hispanics-4f23386e609acd8206d2396719c17cab https://apnews.com/article/sarah-huckabee-sanders-politics-u...
    - barbazoo 3y ago
      Oh I totally misunderstood and looked for a different "Sanders", thanks for sharing.
- mrguyorama 3y ago
  >I wouldn't be surprised No, this is absurd. You don't get to imagine injustices by "the left" just because you don't like them. Right now the right is actively censoring teachers as private individuals. Where is this happening from left wing politicians?
junofan 3y ago
I’ll just say I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I have heard about misinformation. That term is suddenly pretty much ubiquitous. Mitigations are now everywhere. I can’t watch a video of Elon Musk explaining how new Tesla cars will start up by recognizing specific patterns in the driver’s testicles without a big warning telling me that the video is AI-generated. Funnily enough, the absolute best content tends to be the stuff with fact checker warnings.
autoexec 3y ago
Sylvia Garcia is a Democratic senator from Texas and she sponsored the EARN IT Act two of the times they tried to shove it down our throats. That would have forced sites to backdoor any encryption.
- matthewdgreen 3y ago
  There has always been a (small) bipartisan coalition in favor of law enforcement-sponsored anti-encryption legislation, unfortunately. Senator Lindsey Graham has been a vocal sponsor of several bills recently, but he had no problem finding Democrats to co-sponsor them. We have not seen these bills go completely mainstream and get the full partisan treatment. https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/press/rep/releases/graham-cotton-blackburn-introduce-balanced-solution-to-bolster-national-security-end-use-of-warrant-proof-encryption-that-shields-criminal-activity# https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/press/rep/releases/graham-c...
- barbazoo 3y ago
  I see, thank you. I wouldn't say this counts as censorship the sense we're talking about though right?
  - autoexec 3y ago
    I wouldn't put it in the same category as book burning, but if the law had passed it would certainly have resulted in censorship. > Although the content the EARN IT Act seeks to regulate is abhorrent and the government’s interest in stopping the creation and distribution of that content is compelling, the First Amendment still requires that the law be narrowly tailored to address those weighty concerns. Yet, given the bill’s broad scope, it will inevitably force online platforms to censor the constitutionally protected speech of their users. (https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-constitution https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-c...) The Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act of 2020 (EARN IT Act) amends an existing federal law to force online platforms into changing how they moderate content online by scanning and censoring more of their users’ communications. (https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/the-earn-it-act-is-a-disaster-for-online-speech-and-privacy-especially-for-the-lgbtq-and-sex-worker-communities https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/the-earn-it-act-is-a-d...) If it’s hard for a provider to tell what’s unlawful, but it’ll face legal liability if it gets it wrong, then the obvious incentive is for the provider to avoid the danger zone and censor lots of lawful content along with the unlawful content, just in case. This is exactly why Section 230 immunity is so important, because without it, platforms would constantly censor a lot of legal speech by their American users – maybe your speech – as a byproduct of trying to censor illegal speech, for fear that if they didn’t cast a wide net, some illegal speech would slip through and they’d get sued for it. (https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/03/earn-it-act-unconstitutional-first-first-amendment https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/03/earn-it-act-uncon...)
didntcheck 3y ago
There's no need for legislation when you have the right businesses and institutes on your side https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/government-sachs-lind https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/government-...

komali2 3y ago

The only time I hear this is when people refer to it. I've yet to find examples of it myself, bearing in mind that companies choosing what can and can't be said on their platforms doesn't constitute censorship (unless we're willing to admit that platforms have a monopoly on public communication).

mc32 3y ago
When you have Federal embeds counselling companies on content, that's essentially censorship. I don't know what else you'd call it. That's banana republic level technique and tactics. This is something a Francisco Franco might have done. No, no, we don't have censors, we're just making sure only the truth of the moment is published. And of course, blackhole all the contradictions.
- komali2 3y ago
  > only the truth of the moment is published What other truths are you struggling to publish? What contradictions do you have that you're unable to display anywhere? > Federal embeds counselling companies on content What's this? I haven't heard about it.
kelnos 3y ago
It absolutely is censorship. Whether or not that censorship is illegal depends on who is doing the censorship. But the act of suppressing speech is censorship, no matter who does it.
- komali2 3y ago
  I don't understand - you're not allowed to submit blog posts to my blog, am I censoring you?

flangola7 3y ago

It's not so much a shift as the US coming into alignment with the rest of the world. Harmful expressions like hate speech and inciting violence have more or less always been recognized as things you don't put up with in a civilized democratic society, just as you don't put up with physical violence to resolve disputes or allowing vehicles to drive any which way on motorway. The essence of freedom of speech has always been the ability of the common or marginalized folk to discuss and criticize those with power and privilege - the state, the landed, the majority. Attacking marginalized minorities is not the purpose of it and is a categorically different type of action - the marginalized don't have power over others to begin with. Frustratingly the US is actually rather poor about expression freedom in a number of other ways (ways which ironically almost never come up when Americans talk about speech freedoms), and ranks below many other western nations.

4bpp 3y ago
> The essence of freedom of speech has always been the ability of the common or marginalized folk to discuss and criticize those with power and privilege - the state, the landed, the majority. Attacking marginalized minorities is not the purpose of it and is a categorically different type of action - the marginalized don't have power over others to begin with. If you make this the principle according to which you allow or censor speech, the predictable outcome is that would-be speakers will seek to establish that they are common and marginalized (or speaking for those who are) and their opponents have power and privilege (or work on behalf of those who are), as in a classical bravery debate (https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/05/18/against-bravery-debates/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/05/18/against-bravery-debate...). In general, the powerful and privileged tend to be the ones who win these contests.

wredue 3y ago

There has not been a liberal push away from encryption. In fact, it is the fascist right that want to remove privacy, has passed laws (like PATRIOT) to do so, and the supporters simply say “if you don’t want to be spied on, then what are you hiding” The right wing are the ones actively pushing this along with “if you think privacy is a right, then you are a predator. Won’t someone think of the children?!”

kelnos 3y ago
Pretty sure Democratic Congresspeople have co-sponsored the EARN IT Act. Both sides are complicit in this garbage.
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  wredue said > "There has not been a liberal push away from encryption." Pointing out Democratic congresspeople who push away from encryption does not contradict wredue's claim. Liberal is not a party affiliation, when Democratic congresspeople push away from liberal principles they are being illiberal. Liberal doesn't mean "whatever it is that Democratic politicians support". And yes, I know this is confusing to Americans who received their political education from AM talk radio or cable television, who's understanding of the term amounts to "whatever it is that Democratic politicians say." When a Democratic politician calls for violent lyrics in rap music to be banned (as some did in the 90s), that is illiberal. When a Republican says that abortion should be legal, that is liberal. Even though liberal values are generally associated more with one party than the other, that doesn't mean liberalism is nothing more than party affiliation.

r00fus 3y ago

Al Gore as VP championed the Clipper Chip which proposed backdoor encryption keys to all encryption used (back when encryption was considered weaponry and regulated). It’s not that far of a shift (at least from the 90s Clinton admin). https://archive.epic.org/crypto/clipper/ https://archive.epic.org/crypto/clipper/

wolverine876 3y ago

How does that relate to the article? It seems like a completely different subject to me, but maybe I'm misunderstanding you. > there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment over the years away from protecting speech, even hateful speech to actively espousing and advocating for censorship The shift is to protecting the rights of people oppressed by hate speech, in the balance between its speakers and victims. It's based on the idea that the politically vulnerable have their rights - including their free speech - abridged by hate speech. It says hate speech censors the politically vulnerable, so at some points, we must censor one or the other. It's tricky, but portraying it as 'anti-free-speech' is like portraying 'pro-life' advocates as 'anti-personal-rights'. If we're honest then it's not that simple, whatever one's perspective.

supazek 3y ago
Can you define hate speech? Or “politically vulnerable”? I’m not dogging you but this sounds like an argument that someone who would like to ban E2E encryption would make. No one has a right to not be offended and we have already clearly defined where words become terroristic threats. Although the law is the least of my concerns as I get downvoted for having an opinion not totally in lock step with the social-liberal worldview.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  I could take a stab at defining it but both are already defined in law (if we take 'politically vulnerable' as 'protected classes', for example) and I'd be adding to the infinite Internet crap pile if I didn't do some research first. Plenty of other dangerous speech is illegal, such as forms of incitement. It's not about feeling offended - a common way to belittle a serious, challenging issue. I'm not sure how E2EE is implicated: If the speech isn't heard by the politically vulnerable, it's much less likely to be oppressive; if someone texts me hate speech over Signal, the encyrption doesn't matter. If it's a plan of violence, that's of course a different and existing issue. > I get downvoted for having an opinion not totally in lock step with the social-liberal worldview. The victim routine degrades the credibility of your comment. It looks like someone just following standard right-wing rhetoric. Also, you don't offer convincing evidence.

deleted 3y ago

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Klonoar 3y ago

It's not advocating censorship to call for platforms (& co) to combat hate speech. Can you link to anything that actually backs up that claim of yours?

didntcheck 3y ago
It objectively is calling for censorship, irrespective of whether one considers it justified censorship
- mrguyorama 3y ago
  The idea that a private platform choosing not to amplify something they don't agree with, something that is clearly spelled out as their right in the first amendment, is "censorship" is absurd. If the local newspaper chooses not to run the classified ad you sent them, that's not censorship. If a big newspaper chooses not to publish the letter to the editor you sent them, that's not censorship. If FEDEX chooses not to ship the package you bring in, that's not censorship. A business choosing not to do business with you, even in very specific and obtuse ways is not censorship. A private entity has no legal, ethical, or moral obligation to signal boost or publish anything they do not want to.
Gareth321 3y ago
It clearly is censorship. Maybe you're conflating censorship with the First Amendment? The Constitution only protects certain kinds of speech. Only that of citizens with respect to government, and only Americans. When people speak about censorship, they are referring to all kinds of censorship by people all over the world, including private companies censoring individuals.
- Klonoar 3y ago
  So just to be clear: you consider it censorship when the rest of the world tells you "you cannot harass x group by utilizing this set of harmful language"?
  - 3y ago

mcpackieh 3y ago

> Not to be Debbie downer but there’s been a cultural shift in the liberal establishment More accurate to say the establishment shifted away from liberalism.