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> Texas has never been shy, and always been consistent, about its interest: The objective is to correct the mix of viewpoints that major platforms present. But

> Texas has never been shy, and always been consistent, about its interest: The objective is to correct the mix of viewpoints that major platforms present. But a State may not interfere with private actors’ speech to advance its own vision of ideological balance. States (and their citizens) are of course right to want an expressive realm in which the public has access to a wide range of views. But the way the First Amendment achieves that goal is by preventing the government from “tilt[ing] public debate in a preferred direction,not by licensing the government to stop private actors from speaking as they wish and preferring some views over others. A State cannot prohibit speech to rebalance the speech market. That unadorned interest is not “unrelated to the suppression of free expression.” And Texas may not pursue it consistent with the First Amendment. This is about as open and shut as it gets on the Supreme Court, and it's crazy that it even went that high.

notyourwork 2y ago
I found that text to be crystal clear. Some language from the courts I have trouble fully comprehending.
skissane 2y ago
I think Texas is at a disadvantage because they were very open about the political motivation for passing the law. But I’m wondering: suppose they pass a new law permitting state residents to challenge in court “arbitrary and capricious” content moderation decisions. And to publicly justify it, they find some examples of state residents who claim to be victims of such decisions (I’m sure they could), but for posting things that aren’t obviously political. For example, we live on the other side of the planet, but I’m thinking of the time my wife was suspended from Facebook for joking that her cousin’s baby was “so cute she had to kidnap her”-her cousin read that as just a figure of speech not a violent threat against a child, Facebook disagreed. So, a law to permit judicial review of content moderation decisions could be sold as something apolitical, and a law with such an apolitical framing might be more likely to be upheld by the Supreme Court. But once it has been accepted with that apolitical framing, then there is the potential for the judiciary to apply it in more explicitly political cases; and the precedent of applying it in apolitical cases may make courts more likely to accept it as constitutional if its application is later extended to more political cases too.
- rtkwe 2y ago
  That seems like you've have to get past Section 230 still and this kind of work pushing state authority down to the individual as a kind of work around like they did with the abortion bounty laws before Roe was struck down is an insidious cancer if it's allowed to continue.
rtkwe 2y ago
It should be but the current SC has an ideological bent that pushed them away from that simple solution to this can kicking maneuver. It would be far simpler to stick to the First Amendment where the government can only control what a person/company does, and just as importantly doesn't say, in specific circumstances.

notyourwork 2y ago

I found that text to be crystal clear. Some language from the courts I have trouble fully comprehending.

skissane 2y ago

I think Texas is at a disadvantage because they were very open about the political motivation for passing the law. But I’m wondering: suppose they pass a new law permitting state residents to challenge in court “arbitrary and capricious” content moderation decisions. And to publicly justify it, they find some examples of state residents who claim to be victims of such decisions (I’m sure they could), but for posting things that aren’t obviously political. For example, we live on the other side of the planet, but I’m thinking of the time my wife was suspended from Facebook for joking that her cousin’s baby was “so cute she had to kidnap her”-her cousin read that as just a figure of speech not a violent threat against a child, Facebook disagreed. So, a law to permit judicial review of content moderation decisions could be sold as something apolitical, and a law with such an apolitical framing might be more likely to be upheld by the Supreme Court. But once it has been accepted with that apolitical framing, then there is the potential for the judiciary to apply it in more explicitly political cases; and the precedent of applying it in apolitical cases may make courts more likely to accept it as constitutional if its application is later extended to more political cases too.

rtkwe 2y ago
That seems like you've have to get past Section 230 still and this kind of work pushing state authority down to the individual as a kind of work around like they did with the abortion bounty laws before Roe was struck down is an insidious cancer if it's allowed to continue.

rtkwe 2y ago

It should be but the current SC has an ideological bent that pushed them away from that simple solution to this can kicking maneuver. It would be far simpler to stick to the First Amendment where the government can only control what a person/company does, and just as importantly doesn't say, in specific circumstances.