6 ms·

> allowing hate, racist, homophobic, and transphobic language to run rampant Are the people with these views not also entitled to free speech and equal rights

• llamaimperative 2y ago
  Sure they are, but you omitted half of that sentence.
• jofzar 2y ago
  Honestly,no.
  • alt227 2y ago
    So do you feel that people who disagree with what you think is right should be silenced and not allowed to express themselves?
    • jppittma 2y ago
      I hate how the word "disagree" is used to strip all nuance out of political conversation. If I said it was my political opinion that the gestapo should show up to your door, and drag you, your wife, and children to a death camp - we don't just have a "disagreement." Would you tolerate a discussion around somebody who said they personally wanted to do something like that to you? There's a line somewhere around political opinions that involve using the state to inflict violence on another that I believe should be inexpressible in public, and I think it's fine for non-state actors to ensure that's the case.
      • alt227 2y ago
        > If I said it was my political opinion that the gestapo should show up to your door, and drag you, your wife, and children to a death camp - we don't just have a "disagreement." Yes we do, we disagree on that statement. > Would you tolerate a discussion around somebody who said they personally wanted to do something like that to you? Yes of course, why wouldnt I? Trying to understand that opinion and maybe bring us closer to agreeing on the underlying issues would be my first aim, not just to cry foul on free speech and expect them to be locked up just for saying something I dont like. That is barbaric. You can say anything you want, acting on it is what turns that into illegal activity.
        • jppittma 2y ago
          > Yes of course, why wouldnt I? Trying to understand that opinion and maybe bring us closer to agreeing on the underlying issues would be my first aim, I think the promotion of liberalism and the lack of critical thinking has created a society of fanatics. For the vast majority of disagreements, it's good to try and understand other perspectives and to work towards compromise. What compromise should the German jews have offered the Nazis? What insights could they have gained from understanding the Nazi perspective? > You can say anything you want, acting on it is what turns that into illegal activity. Everything Hilter/Stalin did was legal. When families were gassed and thrown into ovens, that was legal. In fact, it was illegal to impede them. That started as somebody's political opinion, they were able to foment support for it, and it happened. And finally, I understand what the law is in the US. The US basically allows any speech that doesn't threaten the government's monopoly on violence. I'm saying the Europeans are right to criminalize some political ideas. There's been no slippery slope in German because they don't let you wear swastikas.
    • aredox 2y ago
      "I am ready to pay 1000000 USD to anyone who tortures and/or kills you or anyone in your family in the most gruesome way." Isn't that free speech?
      • alt227 2y ago
        Yep it totally is and you are fine to say that about me or anyone else. If someone takes you up on that offer and you pay them, that crosses from free speech into illegal activity and you will be put in jail. But you are totally fine to talk about if you want.
        • aredox 2y ago
          And if someone takes me up on that offer and I don't pay? "Woops, just joking" but you're dead. Also, you never were in that situation, otherwise you would know there's no way to be fine while people are plotting to maim you. Or if you are, your family sure won't be.
          • alt227 2y ago
            Not really sure what you are talking about here. If someone takes you up on that offer then they are breaking the law and committing an offense, regardless of what you said or did or didnt pay them. If I tell you to go jump off a cliff and you do it, am I liable for murder? I think you need to back off a little bit and stop trying to invent situations that you think fit your idea of what I think about implications of murder. I think its fine to say what you want, thats it. You can agree or disagree with me to your hearts content, but do it amicably :)
• lawn 2y ago
  Free speech doesn't allow you to say anything at all you know? Calling for the eradication of people with certain sexual preferences or skin color for example.
  • alt227 2y ago
    Free speech doesnt have asterisks. If certain people say things that are undesireable to other certain people, they have to power to ignore them.
    • lawn 2y ago
      Free speech is a legal construction and it does in fact come with exceptions. Child pornography, slander, and death threats are other examples of exceptions.
      • throwaway93140 2y ago
        [flagged]
        • scarab92 2y ago
          Pornography is properly regarded as a form of speech
        • intended 2y ago
          Free speech is protected by cases over porn where the government lost - its one of the strongest tests of speech. Porn is 100% speech.
          • throwaway93140 2y ago
            The concept of free speech predates the US constitution or even its government.
      • _heimdall 2y ago
        Anyone who has considered child porn speech is smoking something. We have agreed the act of taking pictures or videos of children in those situations to be illegal, it isn't about the meaning or speech a person may apply to that final product. Slander and death threats are harder to define. You have to show an active plot to commit the crime, not just a statement. At that point the plot, the action you took, is the crime rather than your words.
• _heimdall 2y ago
  This is the tricky line, isn't it? Regardless of whether someone is entitled to free speech, is a private company bound to the constitutional protection? My understanding has always been that its specifically the government that can't censor me, a private company or citizen can. The NY Times isn't required to write an article I submit to them for example, that's no different than Twitter deciding not to keep a post a write.
  • mro_name 2y ago
    exactly. Once we stop treating TwiX like a public good but rather like the private website of a a gaming cheater with a lot of guests, things would be more obvious, wouldn't it?
  • alt227 2y ago
    Thanks for the thoughtful reply on an incediary topic. I agree with your viewpoint I think, but Im sure as always there are some edge cases which make this definition difficult.
  • barrell 2y ago
    Tricky? Not really. Difficult? Yes.
    • _heimdall 2y ago
      Sure, that's fine. Tricky wasn't a great fit there, I meant tricky to define or agree upon. Difficult works better there.
  • guappa 2y ago
    > My understanding has always been that its specifically the government that can't censor me, a private company or citizen can. Then you have no free speech. I can just refuse you internet access, or not sell ink and paper to you… So my take is that no, it should not be allowed to private companies to censor arbitrarily. And of course an "algorithm" that sorts stuff in any other way than chronologically is censorship. The feed should just show chronological ordered stuff of followed accounts. No more and no less.
• Majromax 2y ago
  > Are the people with these views not also entitled to free speech and equal rights to express themselves the same as everybody else? Free speech and equal rights in a legal sense, meaning staying out of jail? Sure, with caveats about threats and abuse. Free to use a private platform? No, nobody's entitled to the support of someone else's private platform. Equal rights are about protection from the state, not from others' opinions. Platforms themselves also have speech-based rights. Even if one portrays itself as a neutral 'town square,' it puts its own rights to work as soon as it implements an algorithmic feed, implicitly deciding what content to promote or hide. You are entitled to your opinion: good, bad, or irrelevant. You are entitled to your words. You are not entitled to an audience.
  • alt227 2y ago
    > You are entitled to your opinion: good, bad, or irrelevant. You are entitled to your words. You are not entitled to an audience. Brilliant statement, I fully agree. The issue is who chooses to give them an audience. IMO it is up to the audience not to listen, but it seems to be the opinion of a lot of people here that gatekeepers (companies) should have the power to decide that and 'protect' their audience from it. That IMO is anti free speech, as the 'protect' part of the term is abiguous/subjective and depends on the beliefs/opinions of the gatekeepers.
    • intended 2y ago
      If a firm decides to be pro or anti free speech. That is their choice. If their choices were unpopular, people would flock to alternatives. They don't. Which puts a hole into the underlying theory. If people do not naturally gravitate towards alternative ideas, and network effects keep people in one place, then these networks should be made government owned. Firms have a right to their property, and the choices of how they maximize revenue on it. I mean, should the head of a media firm be threatened by the Government or President, and forced to comply with their preferred style of gatekeeping?
      • alt227 2y ago
        > If their choices were unpopular, people would flock to alternatives. They don't. What you are saying is actively happening right now. Certain people dont like that another certain group of people have been allowed back onto Twitter, and so they are going in droves to Mastodon/Bluesky/Threads/TruthSocial etc. Twitter has received an 87% drop in revenue since reinstating previously blocked accounts. Id say people are flocking to alternatives. This is creating an extremely fragmented society, all creating their own bubble of what they want to see. History has shown that where this happens it increases aggression and intense reaction, where people are not used to seeing things they disagree with and so when they do they react more violently. > Firms have a right to their property, and the choices of how they maximize revenue on it. Of course they do, but what this generally turns into in the modern age is 'The left doesnt like what the right have to say, block them plz". Then this turns into a political argument, when in fact one group of people just dont want to hear what a different group of people have to say because 'it offends them'. > I mean, should the head of a media firm be threatened by the Government or President, and forced to comply with their preferred style of gatekeeping? We have rules and laws to prevent this as it is recognised as being a threat.
• intended 2y ago
  No, this is paradox of Tolerance 101. Even in his dissenting opinion in Abrams vs the United States, Holmes valued not free speech, but the market place of ideas - the competition of ideas that underlies the search for truth. Slavishly sticking to free speech, and destroying the market of ideas - creating a monopilist propaganda force, with a symbiotic political party is NOT free speech. Today we have far more information than any of the founders had anticipated. Monopolies of ideas, far more content than fact, the race to the bottom due to advertising - a source of stress in every pocket? Yeah, your network is going to have a very specific signal to noise ratio. Your market place of ideas is going to be selling junk food, because its cheap and easy to make. The idea of counter speech works, if counter speech is heard in the first place. If your message never gets to the other side, or the other party is completely enraged and unable to think past their fears - you have no market place of ideas.