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Political censorship is unconstitutional in Brazil. These judges are after Bolsonaro and his supporters for the political speech they engaged in. Blatant politi

Political censorship is unconstitutional in Brazil. These judges are after Bolsonaro and his supporters for the political speech they engaged in. Blatant political censorship. The constitution literally contains the words: > Any and all censorship of political and artistic nature is prohibited It's really not that hard to understand. Any citizen can understand this. It's just that it doesn't matter what the law says. Because there's no court above them, the law becomes whatever they say it is.

bryant 2y ago
There's an argument to be made that lying to the public is not political speech. Relevant analysis: https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/framing-disinformation-through-legislation-evidence-from-policy-proposals-in-brazil/ https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/framing-disinf...
- bpodgursky 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - dang 2y ago
    Can you please stick to the site guidelines? You broke them here (and in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41457274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41457274 as well). If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
- ImJamal 2y ago
  I didn't read your link, but if political speech has to be honest then I'm sure all of the politicians in Brazil are going to have their speech censored, right?
  - matheusmoreira 2y ago
    Of course. Brazilian politicians, even the literal brazilian government's official accounts, used to get fact checked on X on a pretty much daily basis. I have videos of our current president straight up admitting to a journalist that he invents numbers on the spot. These are the "authorities" who would presume to condemn you for posting "fake news". In the 2022 elections, I witnessed these judge-kings censor people for associating Lula with the Venezuelan dictator. Then I had to watch him literally roll out the red carpet for that very same dictator only months into his mandate. More recently I watched as he supported the dictator's "election".
defrost 2y ago
Which parágrafos or incisos of the Constituição da República Federativa do Brasil > literally contains the words: cited in English? Isn't political debate in Brazil sharply divided by selective absolute Constitionalism in any case? Why leap to the defence of bad faith falsehoods spread by bad losers of a democratic election? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Brazil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Brazil
- rdlw 2y ago
  Article 220, Paragraph 2 of the official English version says that verbatim
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  Brazil is a Portuguese-speaking country. Obviously, the brazilian constitution is not written in English. I took the liberty of translating the passage so that people from this community would understand it. You don't have to believe my translation. Here's a completely independent source I found by searching the web: https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Brazil_2017 https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Brazil_2017 I will cite and copy the relevant parts from it. TITLE II. FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND GUARANTEES CHAPTER I. INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE RIGHTS AND DUTIES Article 5 Everyone is equal before the law, with no distinction whatsoever, guaranteeing to Brazilians and foreigners residing in the Country the inviolability of the rights to life, liberty, equality, security and property, on the following terms: Term IX. expression of intellectual, artistic, scientific, and communication activity is free, independent of any censorship or license; CHAPTER V. SOCIAL COMMUNICATION Article 220 The expression of thoughts, creation, speech and information, through whatever form, process or vehicle, shall not be subject to any restrictions, observing the provisions of this Constitution. Paragraph 1. No law shall contain any provision that may constitute an impediment to full freedom of the press, in any medium of social communication, observing the provisions of art. 5°, IV, V, X, XIII and XIV. Paragraph 2. Any and all censorship of a political, ideological and artistic nature is forbidden. The terms referenced by the above paragraph: Term IV. manifestation of thought is free, but anonymity is forbidden; Term V. the right of reply is assured, in proportion to the offense, as well as compensation for pecuniary or moral damages or damages to reputation; Term X. personal intimacy, private life, honor and reputation are inviolable, guaranteeing the right to compensation for pecuniary or moral damages resulting from the violation thereof; Term XIII. exercise of any job, trade or profession is free, observing the professional qualifications that the law establishes; Term XIV. access to information is assured to everyone, protecting the confidentiality of sources when necessary for professional activity; It's really not that hard to read and understand these words. Surely you'll agree that there is not a single case here that says these judges get to censor anyone for any reason at all. If a brazilian is harmed by speech, he gets to answer and to be made whole by compensation, financial or otherwise. He does not get to censor the other guy. I simply cannot find in this entire text a single exception that would allow censorship. Debating these points here on HN, I've had people cite lesser laws than the constitution, I've had people get into incredibly pedantic arguments over how it's ackshually not really censorship when you delete the political opposition's social media, I've had people appeal to authority, I've had people call me a moron. I've never, not once, had them point out to me where in the fuck it says, in the above text, that these judges can do what they're doing. > Isn't political debate in Brazil sharply divided by selective absolute Constitionalism in any case? The whole point of my comments is that everything in this country is like that. Even the supreme court judges, whose literal job is to interpret and apply the constitution, are like that. They "selectively and creatively interpret" the constitution. This country has no laws. Only the whims of these judges. > Why leap to the defence of bad faith falsehoods spread by bad losers of a democratic election? I "leap" to the defense of so called "falsehoods" because I see several things wrong with your loaded question. This country is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship of the judiciary. Calling what we had an "election" is an insult to elections, it was more like a circus. I do not believe for a second that there was fraud in the US elections, but here the "bad losers" had plenty of reasons to doubt the results, among them the blatant political censorship perpetrated by the very same judges involved in this case. I was going to elaborate on the above points but ultimately decided against it due to how fruitless it usually is. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if I saw HNers defending the communist Venezuelan dictator's "reelection" and calling the opposition he murdered and exiled "bad losers".
littlestymaar 2y ago
> Blatant political censorship. Shutting down businesses (not speeches, they aren't keeping pro-lula Twitter accounts up while censoring conservative ones) for refusing to comply with the law isn't censorship. Censoring books in public library is censorship though, and Musk supported De Santis anyway.
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  > keeping pro-lula Twitter accounts up while censoring conservative ones Funny. Among the accounts targeted by this judge, not a single one is pro-Lula. Really curious, indeed. Are these guys saints? Are they literally never wrong on the internet? Not too long ago, one of Lula's ministers "disseminated" some serious "misinformation". She literally said about a hundred million brazilians are starving to death right now. Where's the judge's fact checking? I wonder. I mean, Lula himself has admitted to journalists that he just makes up statistics on the spot. You'd think he'd be this judge's worst enemy, given how gung-ho he is about "misinformation"... Oh shit, is that the judge attending a barbecue with Lula and his allies? Whew, lad. What do you know?
  - littlestymaar 2y ago
    You're conflating two different things: - broad Twitter ban (which is the topic of TFA), which itself results from Twitter refusal to cooperate with Brazilian justice. - prosecutions related to the attempted coup in Brasilia, which includes activities on Twitter (and obviously there isn't a single pro-lula in the list of people involved, like there's no Bidden supporters among the people charged for Jan 6th, and it's not a conspiracy against republicans …). Big corporations aren't exempted from laws and they cannot unilaterally decide not to comply with Court's order, whatever you think about the order in the first place. And the reason why Musk doesn't comply with Brazilian justice isn't free speech, as he's eager to comply with authoritarian regimes all around the world, he's just doing that for political motives. Reminder: you'll get censored on Twitter if you type the word “cisgender" and Musk supported Ron De Santis censoring books in libraries, and also canceled Tesla orders from people after they criticized him personally: Musk doesn't give a shit about freedom of speech, he just claim he does hopping enough idiots will buy it against all evidence.

bryant 2y ago

There's an argument to be made that lying to the public is not political speech. Relevant analysis: https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/framing-disinformation-through-legislation-evidence-from-policy-proposals-in-brazil/ https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/framing-disinf...

bpodgursky 2y ago
[flagged]
- dang 2y ago
  Can you please stick to the site guidelines? You broke them here (and in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41457274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41457274 as well). If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
ImJamal 2y ago
I didn't read your link, but if political speech has to be honest then I'm sure all of the politicians in Brazil are going to have their speech censored, right?
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  Of course. Brazilian politicians, even the literal brazilian government's official accounts, used to get fact checked on X on a pretty much daily basis. I have videos of our current president straight up admitting to a journalist that he invents numbers on the spot. These are the "authorities" who would presume to condemn you for posting "fake news". In the 2022 elections, I witnessed these judge-kings censor people for associating Lula with the Venezuelan dictator. Then I had to watch him literally roll out the red carpet for that very same dictator only months into his mandate. More recently I watched as he supported the dictator's "election".

defrost 2y ago

Which parágrafos or incisos of the Constituição da República Federativa do Brasil > literally contains the words: cited in English? Isn't political debate in Brazil sharply divided by selective absolute Constitionalism in any case? Why leap to the defence of bad faith falsehoods spread by bad losers of a democratic election? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Brazil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Brazil

rdlw 2y ago
Article 220, Paragraph 2 of the official English version says that verbatim
matheusmoreira 2y ago
Brazil is a Portuguese-speaking country. Obviously, the brazilian constitution is not written in English. I took the liberty of translating the passage so that people from this community would understand it. You don't have to believe my translation. Here's a completely independent source I found by searching the web: https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Brazil_2017 https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Brazil_2017 I will cite and copy the relevant parts from it. TITLE II. FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND GUARANTEES CHAPTER I. INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE RIGHTS AND DUTIES Article 5 Everyone is equal before the law, with no distinction whatsoever, guaranteeing to Brazilians and foreigners residing in the Country the inviolability of the rights to life, liberty, equality, security and property, on the following terms: Term IX. expression of intellectual, artistic, scientific, and communication activity is free, independent of any censorship or license; CHAPTER V. SOCIAL COMMUNICATION Article 220 The expression of thoughts, creation, speech and information, through whatever form, process or vehicle, shall not be subject to any restrictions, observing the provisions of this Constitution. Paragraph 1. No law shall contain any provision that may constitute an impediment to full freedom of the press, in any medium of social communication, observing the provisions of art. 5°, IV, V, X, XIII and XIV. Paragraph 2. Any and all censorship of a political, ideological and artistic nature is forbidden. The terms referenced by the above paragraph: Term IV. manifestation of thought is free, but anonymity is forbidden; Term V. the right of reply is assured, in proportion to the offense, as well as compensation for pecuniary or moral damages or damages to reputation; Term X. personal intimacy, private life, honor and reputation are inviolable, guaranteeing the right to compensation for pecuniary or moral damages resulting from the violation thereof; Term XIII. exercise of any job, trade or profession is free, observing the professional qualifications that the law establishes; Term XIV. access to information is assured to everyone, protecting the confidentiality of sources when necessary for professional activity; It's really not that hard to read and understand these words. Surely you'll agree that there is not a single case here that says these judges get to censor anyone for any reason at all. If a brazilian is harmed by speech, he gets to answer and to be made whole by compensation, financial or otherwise. He does not get to censor the other guy. I simply cannot find in this entire text a single exception that would allow censorship. Debating these points here on HN, I've had people cite lesser laws than the constitution, I've had people get into incredibly pedantic arguments over how it's ackshually not really censorship when you delete the political opposition's social media, I've had people appeal to authority, I've had people call me a moron. I've never, not once, had them point out to me where in the fuck it says, in the above text, that these judges can do what they're doing. > Isn't political debate in Brazil sharply divided by selective absolute Constitionalism in any case? The whole point of my comments is that everything in this country is like that. Even the supreme court judges, whose literal job is to interpret and apply the constitution, are like that. They "selectively and creatively interpret" the constitution. This country has no laws. Only the whims of these judges. > Why leap to the defence of bad faith falsehoods spread by bad losers of a democratic election? I "leap" to the defense of so called "falsehoods" because I see several things wrong with your loaded question. This country is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship of the judiciary. Calling what we had an "election" is an insult to elections, it was more like a circus. I do not believe for a second that there was fraud in the US elections, but here the "bad losers" had plenty of reasons to doubt the results, among them the blatant political censorship perpetrated by the very same judges involved in this case. I was going to elaborate on the above points but ultimately decided against it due to how fruitless it usually is. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if I saw HNers defending the communist Venezuelan dictator's "reelection" and calling the opposition he murdered and exiled "bad losers".

littlestymaar 2y ago

> Blatant political censorship. Shutting down businesses (not speeches, they aren't keeping pro-lula Twitter accounts up while censoring conservative ones) for refusing to comply with the law isn't censorship. Censoring books in public library is censorship though, and Musk supported De Santis anyway.

matheusmoreira 2y ago
> keeping pro-lula Twitter accounts up while censoring conservative ones Funny. Among the accounts targeted by this judge, not a single one is pro-Lula. Really curious, indeed. Are these guys saints? Are they literally never wrong on the internet? Not too long ago, one of Lula's ministers "disseminated" some serious "misinformation". She literally said about a hundred million brazilians are starving to death right now. Where's the judge's fact checking? I wonder. I mean, Lula himself has admitted to journalists that he just makes up statistics on the spot. You'd think he'd be this judge's worst enemy, given how gung-ho he is about "misinformation"... Oh shit, is that the judge attending a barbecue with Lula and his allies? Whew, lad. What do you know?
- littlestymaar 2y ago
  You're conflating two different things: - broad Twitter ban (which is the topic of TFA), which itself results from Twitter refusal to cooperate with Brazilian justice. - prosecutions related to the attempted coup in Brasilia, which includes activities on Twitter (and obviously there isn't a single pro-lula in the list of people involved, like there's no Bidden supporters among the people charged for Jan 6th, and it's not a conspiracy against republicans …). Big corporations aren't exempted from laws and they cannot unilaterally decide not to comply with Court's order, whatever you think about the order in the first place. And the reason why Musk doesn't comply with Brazilian justice isn't free speech, as he's eager to comply with authoritarian regimes all around the world, he's just doing that for political motives. Reminder: you'll get censored on Twitter if you type the word “cisgender" and Musk supported Ron De Santis censoring books in libraries, and also canceled Tesla orders from people after they criticized him personally: Musk doesn't give a shit about freedom of speech, he just claim he does hopping enough idiots will buy it against all evidence.