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> Visa/Mastercard should have the right to refuse service. Given their market dominance, they should absolutely not have any right to refuse service. At that l

by jjav 1y ago

> Visa/Mastercard should have the right to refuse service. Given their market dominance, they should absolutely not have any right to refuse service. At that level of scale, they need to be treated like common carriers, who must handle all communications/transactions.

FirmwareBurner 1y ago
THIS. Why is this PoV even controversial? Especially given that the videogames in question weren't even illegal. Hell, I don't even like those games, but it's about the precedent of corporate overreach: if it's all legal, Visa/MasterCard shouldn't be able to decide for me what games I'm allowed to buy, no matter how weird they may be. It's not their job to judge the legal kinks I'm up to in the privacy of my own home. If the gov doesn't clamp down hard on them, I can only assume the gov is in on this grift of having corporations acting as unofficial censors and freedom of speech moderators for the state under the loophole of "the state didn't mess with your constitutional rights to freedom of expression, but what you did broke the ToS of the payment processors, so now they're free to de-bank you and take away your ability to buy and sell things. Tsk tsk, shouldn't have sent those memes making fun of JD Vance and Trump I guess".
- coldpie 1y ago
  > THIS. Why is this PoV even controversial? Because it is stating that the government should control private behavior, which bumps into free speech and freedom of association issues. That gets pretty controversial. There are other solutions to the stated problem: > Given their market dominance, they should absolutely not have any right to refuse service. The fix is to address the precondition in that statement: their market dominance. If a single entity is so powerful that it can control entire markets, then the problem is not what it does with that power, but that it has that power in the first place. The solution to this problem is enforcing our existing anti-trust laws, not passing new laws to compel private behavior. We should not have only one or two entities that control this entire market. That's a sign of a broken market, and that's what must be addressed.
  - Goronmon 1y ago
    That gets pretty controversial. Is this issue always controversial? Is it controversial that companies aren't allowed to refuse service based on gender or race (in the US at least)?
    - coldpie 1y ago
      > Is it controversial that companies aren't allowed to refuse service based on gender or race (in the US at least)? Those are legal categories known as "protected classes," and yeah, it was and is pretty controversial[1]. I think you'd have a hard time getting purchasers of porn games declared a protected class. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 ; further reading, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_group
      - Goronmon 1y ago
        Actually, it's not really controversial anymore [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964
  - danaris 1y ago
    The companies in question are monopolies. If you can't get your payments processed by Visa and Mastercard, you are effectively debanked. We collectively agreed long ago that monopolies do not get to enjoy the same freedoms that other companies do.
    - coldpie 1y ago
      > We collectively agreed long ago that monopolies do not get to enjoy the same freedoms that other companies do. I think that's generally only the case for natural monopolies, such as power infrastructure, where breaking them up isn't really a feasible solution (ie we don't want 20 different power lines running to each house). I don't think payment processing meets that standard, we could easily break them up and re-introduce competition into the market.

by jjav 1y ago

FirmwareBurner 1y ago

THIS. Why is this PoV even controversial? Especially given that the videogames in question weren't even illegal. Hell, I don't even like those games, but it's about the precedent of corporate overreach: if it's all legal, Visa/MasterCard shouldn't be able to decide for me what games I'm allowed to buy, no matter how weird they may be. It's not their job to judge the legal kinks I'm up to in the privacy of my own home. If the gov doesn't clamp down hard on them, I can only assume the gov is in on this grift of having corporations acting as unofficial censors and freedom of speech moderators for the state under the loophole of "the state didn't mess with your constitutional rights to freedom of expression, but what you did broke the ToS of the payment processors, so now they're free to de-bank you and take away your ability to buy and sell things. Tsk tsk, shouldn't have sent those memes making fun of JD Vance and Trump I guess".

coldpie 1y ago
> THIS. Why is this PoV even controversial? Because it is stating that the government should control private behavior, which bumps into free speech and freedom of association issues. That gets pretty controversial. There are other solutions to the stated problem: > Given their market dominance, they should absolutely not have any right to refuse service. The fix is to address the precondition in that statement: their market dominance. If a single entity is so powerful that it can control entire markets, then the problem is not what it does with that power, but that it has that power in the first place. The solution to this problem is enforcing our existing anti-trust laws, not passing new laws to compel private behavior. We should not have only one or two entities that control this entire market. That's a sign of a broken market, and that's what must be addressed.
- Goronmon 1y ago
  That gets pretty controversial. Is this issue always controversial? Is it controversial that companies aren't allowed to refuse service based on gender or race (in the US at least)?
  - coldpie 1y ago
    > Is it controversial that companies aren't allowed to refuse service based on gender or race (in the US at least)? Those are legal categories known as "protected classes," and yeah, it was and is pretty controversial[1]. I think you'd have a hard time getting purchasers of porn games declared a protected class. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 ; further reading, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_group https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_group
    - Goronmon 1y ago
      Actually, it's not really controversial anymore [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964
- danaris 1y ago
  The companies in question are monopolies. If you can't get your payments processed by Visa and Mastercard, you are effectively debanked. We collectively agreed long ago that monopolies do not get to enjoy the same freedoms that other companies do.
  - coldpie 1y ago
    > We collectively agreed long ago that monopolies do not get to enjoy the same freedoms that other companies do. I think that's generally only the case for natural monopolies, such as power infrastructure, where breaking them up isn't really a feasible solution (ie we don't want 20 different power lines running to each house). I don't think payment processing meets that standard, we could easily break them up and re-introduce competition into the market.