We're watching some pretty bad stuff unfold this week. Twitter suspended Trump, Facebook/Insta bans users and content all of the time, Apple suspended Parlor. This needs to end really quick or things are going to get much worse. Free speech or what free speech Americans thought they had is coming to an end.
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Yeah I actually don't really like their move to censor Trump permanently. Give him a 12hr ban or 10 day ban or something, but the people at Twitter and Facebook definitely don't like Trump or a lot of the right - and this was their chance to find a reason to ban him.
Twitter claimed part of the reason for the ban was to avoid inciting violence through the Tweets, which was a clever way to portray that their ban served an important purpose. But, really they just want Trump off of their platform.
Overall, Trump did completely fuck up Wednesday and I do think that these companies have some ground to do what they did. But, we saw a lot of the left and politicians comment over the 'peaceful protests' (even Kamala saying they 'should protest') when things were raging in the past year, and not a single person was banned when the left raged and burned down and looted cities. It seems like a double standard and I just don't like seeing free speech trampled upon. I don't follow Trump's tweets or much like the content, but he should at least have the ability to participate in the platform.
Sarcasm, am I right?
Agree with the precedent it sets and that it comes across as politically-driven given the tenor of the ban. One point to think about here is should there be different levels of severity in terms of bans dependent on influence? It's worth thinking about since clearly Trump's influence is widespread and him inciting violence could have a large influence on society but the same argument could definitely be made for those who incited violence and chaos during the riots which ruined businesses this past summer
I am convinced not a single conservative knows what “free speech” is anymore. The first amendment protects you from government restrictions/punishment of free speech; this is a private company matter. This is a hell of a thorny issue and I’m not sure how I feel about it. Very inconsistent use of the permanent ban (I saw Iran’s ayotollah still has Twitter access and that heinous genocide tweet from the Chinese government this week)
Sure wish our President wouldn’t incite riots and destabilize democracy on Twitter though.
Hawley knows exactly what it is but he and others cry about it to rile up their illiterate followers
Your phone and electrical utility providers may well be private companies, but their executives aren't legally permitted to cut off your service because they don't like your politics.
Some of these tech companies have become such entrenched parts of modern communications infrastructure that there's a good argument for treating them like traditional utilities are treated. Especially since the companies coordinate with each other to suppress competition. ("Build your own Twitter" is not so easy when Google and Apple just delete your app from their app stores, which they're doing to Parler as we speak.)
Not sure where I fall on this issue but I will say that there is a big difference between phone, electrical and other utility providers and social media sites. You need to be able to use your phone and have electricity, then you pay for that service, the basis of commerce. However, social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are free (from a monetary standpoint anyway, you're definitely still paying by giving up your privacy and allowing them access to your data) but the fact that people believe they should be entitled to use these platforms without restriction is a bit ridiculous. Think about it like someone who owns a restaurant, they "reserve the right to refuse service to anyone". Granted I will say there is definitely some hypocrisy regarding who they do and do not block but at the end of the day we are not entitled to the use of these platforms in any way.
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Lol we hear this every time something like this happens from the left - I can’t believe I have to explain this to another adult, but the concept of free speech exists outside strict legal meaning. It’s an ideal that promotes discourse, something people believe has social value.
You’re not dunking on anyone with your “ACTUALLY it’s only for the government” line. We know. People still value this idea beyond the government.
Petey coming in hot!!!
Can't wait until woke muh private enterprise Big Pharma starts denying wrongthinkers their chemo drugs. "Don't like it? Build your own biotech company, bigot!"
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it's possible that genocide isn't massive enough to alter underlying population growth trends
it's possible the data are bad
it's possible that the atrocities we're being told about are exaggerated
what is not possible, is that you can infer something like what you are claiming from a chart such as this
historically genocides aren't proven until after the fact when mass graves are found, so I think it's too early to say anything for certain (unless there's something like video evidence I've not seen)
Perhaps you shouldn't belittle people when you have a high schooler's understanding of "free speech"?
So, Twitter is a private company and can ban people as they see fit. Having said that, I honestly don’t think anyone should be banned, unless their speech falls outside what’s considered protected. Trump, while you may not like him or what he says, did not directly incite any violence and shouldn’t be permanently banned off of social media.
Dude, you might want to rethink that one. If he was not in legal peril before this incident, this puts him serious legal trouble. I would not be surprised if he hops a flight and leaves the country.
When a US POTUS puts his own legislative branch directly in harms way, it is time for him to be shut down and sent home.
I’m not so sure, he may be in legal trouble for other reasons, his phone call with the Georgia attorney comes to mind. However, I don’t think he should be banned for his tweets. Don’t you think things like this set a precedent? I hate censorship, it’s an awful to silence someone because you don’t agree with them.
Trump has probably violated Twitters terms and agreement more than any human on this planet and could have been banned a long time ago.
Do we really want to go here? What about the CCP openly bragging about concentration camps. This is no the hill you want to die on bud.
I hate this argument, oh well they do it too so...
finaceabc isn't wrong but that's not to say there aren't plenty of other people/organizations like CCP that are in the same boat.
All I know is the hypocrisy on the left is real. BLM can riot and burn down cities and that's OK. I'm by no means justifying what happened at the Capitol so let me be loud and clear, I don't support the RIOTS at the Capitol this week and they deserve to be punished by law to the fullest extent possible. The Pro-Trump protests were "mostly peaceful" just like the BLM riots were "mostly peaceful". I'd actually argue that to some extent the BLM riots were much worse, burning down innocent people's livelihood, burning police stations, etc.
The power of Big Tech is out of hand and I really hope they face a reckoning for this shit. Suspending Trump temporarily, maybe even through the end of his term? Fine whatever, his rhetoric contributed to the Capitol Riots. Removing Parlor and permanently banning Trump? What a joke. They'll probably regret this one day, I hope.
Yup. I can’t stand Trump (or Big Tech) but their censorship efforts are a very slippery slope.
These social media companies run powerful platforms that control the flow of information to millions, maybe billions, of people. The moment a competitor arrives to provide a "free-er" platform, they are immediately populated by the worst, most "radical" people who were banned from the mainstream platforms, while the less radical users don't move immediately. The competitor is, as a result, branded as a "right-wing, neo-Nazi, conspiracy theorist" website which then further discourages normal users from ever joining, so the mainstream platforms maintain their dominance and network effects. Now we see companies like Google and Apple banning Parler which limits these "free-er" platforms even more. Facebook, Twitter, Google etc. are basically free to censor without facing significant competition at this point. What we're seeing is that the more controversial, politically incorrect voices (the very voices freedom of speech is meant to protect) are censored, while the controversial progressive voices are allowed to reach millions.
You can argue that these companies are trying to shut down language that incites violence and riots, but how do we know they are policing without any bias or agenda in mind? Trump says things about the election and his supporters riot in his name? It must be his fault, ban Trump. BLM supporters burn down entire cities while politicians call it "the summer of love"? That fine, no problem. It's a totally unfair application of their standards.
In theory, we have do have freedom of speech in this country, but in practice it's pretty much gone for conservatives. We can't talk on these platforms without getting banned and we can't talk in real life out of fear of getting cancelled or fired. And now the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES has lost his line of communication with millions of Americans.
Shits going to get worse and worse until America crumbles or a real revolution happens (which it never will). The power of large corporations is out of control, and they all act in unison. The president of the United States currently has no real way to get a message out to his viewers. Banned from all social media. News channels won't air his speeches if they don't feel like it. This includes Fox btw, they're all in on the game together. Trump supporters online communities being banned (parlor, Reddit, discord, everything else). There's nobody who has both the power and the willingness to end this. The democrats (and much of the GOP, it's a uniparty) benefit from it, so why change anything? Why honestly report BLM vs the Capitol riot when you can just push a fake narrative and have 70% of the country believe you?
First, it was small-time content creators. Then it was Alex Jones. Anyone who said Alex Jones was just a test at the time was made fun of. Now it's the President of the U.S. Next it's anyone in govt who supported Trump. Then it's anything anti-government. Then you get arrested for wrongthink.
Others seem to have made a decent argument for why it's bullshit that the companies have the power to do this, both due to their monopolistic and same-think nature as well as aspects of section 230 when they act as publishers, but I don't think America is truly aware of just how terrible a precedent this is setting. What the fuck is hate speech? Whatever the government decides is anti-government, or what twitter decides is anti-twitter?
Richard we know it's you, stop hiding.
Yet Facebook can have its MAJOR role in the Arab Spring and no one bats an eye?
Underrated reply. We’ll see how the other side can explain this one.
I still can’t even believe that this is an actual conversation topic in this country.
In no other developed nation would educated and politically informed citizens be writing paragraphs after paragraph about their leader and a fucking app. Could you even imagine one of Boris Johnson’s many children or Angela Merkel’s step-children tweeting about how people should sign up at JOHNSONJR.COM to get updates on how to sign up for a Twitter clone? My fucking god. We are living in a circus, led by the biggest clown of all.
This is not just about a little app anymore. These are the most powerful companies in the world that control what information gets to hundreds of millions of people. Them picking which voices to censor is legal but completely against the spirit of free speech in this country. Like I said before, free speech does exist in principle, but if we can't speak to millions without being banned while the progressive voices can stay, does it really exist in practice?
Boris Johnson's country has a population less than California, turn your brain on dude and stop hiding behind a damn anon account.
That isn’t the point. There is no other major leader on the world stage who spends all day tweeting and watching commentary about himself on TV. There is no other leader who would ignore calls from the neighboring state’s governor offering over their National Guard while beaming at the mayhem on his screen. No other leader would say shit on Twitter to get banned in the first place. He was not leading at any point, he was goading his mentally ill army of failures who are disillusioned with life into wreaking havoc on his behalf.
Not sure why you had to throw in a “lib cuck”. Grow up. An adult can respect that people can have differing politics, but Trump isn’t about politics, he’s about himself. Pence and McConnell never want to speak to him again and the smarter Republicans like Cotton are at least now distancing themselves. I can understand why certain Republicans hold their beliefs but I will never understand a Trump apologist, especially after the other day
A guy in his mid 30s throwing around “lib cuck” ... nice
I remember when China was ok with "Private Companies" censoring people...... oh wait that didn't end up working out so hot.
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You guys realise the incitement of violence is not considered free speech?? You cannot deny that Trump and his disinformation of a rigged election which he couldn’t prove in court btw losing all 60/60 lawsuits has brainwashed his base led to the deaths we saw yesterday including a state policeman who was just doing his job.
Twitter has warned him many, many times and all it took was a terrorist attack on the Capitol for them to frankly do something they should have done a long time ago.
Incitement of violence is not free speech
Trump saying the election was rigged is irresponsible but not inciting violence. Was CNN calling riots "peaceful protests" and a mayor calling a takeover of an entire city block the "summer of love" an incitement of violence? Separate stupid rhetoric from actual crimes.
He said he would walk down to Capitol Hill with those rioters but he never did, what a coward and clown.
When you add his initial video in response to the incident, you get a mosaic supporting the violent overthrow of the US government. I can assure you that this will be used in a court of law against him. The POTUS's initial video was disgusting. He basically supported a bunch of nazis or confederates trying to violently overthrow the US government.
I see a lot of people defending Twitter's actions because private company and all. Should your bank be able to freeze your account if they disagree with your political opinions? Should Section 230 protect these private businesses if they seem so willing to censor content? Should Google be able to close your Gmail account, locking you out of all your other accounts, if you post something they disagree with? There's some bad implications to treating these near monopolies with the same logic as a bakery. The common argument is that conservatives should make their own platform, but we saw Google and Apple remove Parler from their app stores. Anti-trust regulation exists for a reason, but this month probably marks a shift to where Dems become the most pro-corporation, pro-monopoly party in the US. We're about to see Patriot Act 2, and the left wing is ecstatic. This certainly won't reduce polarization.
Big tech companies need to be broken down asap. This goes beyond Trump, no private organization should have so much power when it comes to feeding information to people.
A way more pressing issue here is that the entire concept of twitter is literally retarded. The fact that it exists means we deserve neither free speech nor democracy.
People have completely forgotten the fact that Twitter was on the decline before Trump started his 2016 campaign. Just look at their stock price prior to 2016.
Trump Made Twitter Great!
The censoring of right wingers will lead Twitter to becoming the next Tumblr. Nothing but SJW echo chamber non-sense.
Oh wait there's more. A lot of far-left Liberals are supporting this censorship but they will be next to be censored. The Far-left Bernie Sanders Liberals believe in splitting Big Tech and taxing the rich, and this will lead to them being censored. The only Liberals that will be left on Twitter will be the mainstream, Hollywood, Corporate Liberals. So yeah... The WSO Liberals will definitely be fine.
Also, nice to see the CCP freely posting about concentration camps, slave labor and forced sterilization.
Might as well turn Twitter into Chinese Communist Party News Central.
You are an Australian college student in accounting who can’t even keep up with your own lies on the internet.
Little shit heads like you who failed at everything are the exact target of QAnon conspiracy theories. You’re not conservative, you’re retarded. Go fuck around on an accounting forum or Parler with your bullshit, my god
Failed at everything?
Nah mate. I was born poor from a family who lost everything to Communism.
I grew up in one of the worst crime ridden suburbs in Australia, went to an elite university and now work in Restructuring.
How about you?
Born rich with every network set up for you to succeed.
Yet you strive to be different, so you pretend to be a liberal in finance to seem edgy and score HR points. However, now everybody is a Liberal in finance.
You love minorities and the poor but live in a gated community/high rise apartment far from them.
I grew up in the hood and you grew up in the country club playing golf.
As a non-american who is striving to one day live in the US, I would like to end up in a US that resembles that of the vision of the founding fathers not that of the CCP.
Chinese State Media (propaganda) and Chinese politicians still have their Twitter accounts ;)
https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2020/suspension.html
Lmao pathetic
Wow. So Trump saying he will not be attending the Inauguration and calling his supporters Patriots who will not be disrespected is a call to violence. Great logic.
The president of the United States incited a riot in which the Capitol was sacked, a Federal Police Officer was murdered and 4 of his supporters died. He was banned because he’s a danger to our country. Those companies, Facebook, Twitter, and whoever else may also be concerned about their on legal liability if more people are killed in additional riots and they had taken no action.
I agree with you but you are debating people without an ability to use reason. Once you are part of a cult, it is very difficult to get out. Just like you are not going to be able to reason with someone who is ultra religious.
Totally agree with you.
If you think that people who disagree with you are “trapped in a cult” you need to check your ego.
Imagine the US now lecturing anyone about freedoms. It's officially as free as North Korea.
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