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With the recent news of X being banned in Brazil, it seems we're entering a new stage of the ongoing battle between major, multinational corporations and governments.
A common talking point on the left is that Musk is making a hissy fit out of Brazil, but has been happy in the past to censor for 'outgroup' countries like Turkey, China, et cetera. While I haven't looked into the truth of these claims, I think it's interesting to take them at face value, and ask why that's a problem exactly?
We have clear evidence that Facebook, Insta, Twitter, etc all heavily and not even secretly censored anti-right wing information (and even just true information) during the Covid pandemic especially, but also around other, more political topics.
So in this case, I suppose the question comes down to - if most people on the left think that censoring information during covid and around the 2020 election was fair game, why is it not fair game when someone on the 'other side' does it back to them?
Now personally I think that the censorship around covid was far more egregious, but again I'm hoping to pose a general question about freedom of speech, especially for these incredibly powerful media tech companies. Are we entering an era where elections are mostly decided based on corporate censorship? Are governments going to just cede power to the technarchs gently, or will there be more and more lawfare against them?
I don't think e.g. Brazil can really pressure someone like Musk much, but the battle between him and the EU, as well as the left side of the U.S. government, is certainly worth keeping an eye on.
A few disparate thoughts.
I suspect that the arrest of the Telegram guy in France was a trial balloon/shot across the bow to show that Western Countries can use a, for lack of a better term, "Chinese-Style" authority to physically detain extremely wealthy oligarchs and celebrities to try to reign in their open resistance to government edicts. Compare the "Russian-style" authority where they just chuck you out a window or crash your plane.
My model of how centralized governments think holds that NO such government will tolerate a serious power base outside of its own control, which includes any 'platform' or organization that, if activated, could attempt to seize political control of said government from the current holders (organizing to vote for particular candidates counts too!). The instant such an alternative power base seems to arise, the existing government will seek to either seize it, destroy it, or disrupt it.
They will do so with even more urgency in times of war or serious unrest, and we're sliding into such times.
It was all fun and games when tech companies were helping produce more wealth and providing said government with neat tools to e.g. surveil the public and detect crimes, or analyze economic data, or better weapons to fight their enemies. But the balance of power in the relationship is becoming untenable... from the government's point of view.
I believe the U.S. and European governments strongly feel like the tech industry represents such a power base, or at least that they provide the platforms that dissidents and political opponents can use to organize their supporters into effective movements that can then undermine existing power bases. And said governments can pay lip service to classical liberal ideals while plotting to disrupt those opponents and bring those platforms to heel all the same. End of the day this will mean threatening the people in charge of and operating those platforms with serious consequences. Which is hard to do if those people are extremely wealthy and generally popular, and your country has laws that inhibit the government from arresting citizens and taking their stuff on a whim.
The one thing I know for certain is that they will NOT simply stand by and allow power to accrue outside their hands until it actually destabilizes their authority.
Finally, I have literally never felt quite this much shivering terror at the realization that the group who believes in something like unrestricted free speech even and ESPECIALLY against the efforts of government to 'protect' us... is a tiny school of fish in a sea of indifference, patrolled by many censorious sharks.
I was aware that globally the concept or ideal of free speech was vastly a minority preference, but I didn't have much concern about what a Cameroonian or Indonesian thought was okay to say or not say. But even in the West, even in the United States itself it feels like I've got maybe 20% of the population that would honestly vote for a provision protecting free speech if one didn't already exist.
The left was never in favor of it but now they've gained enough institutional control to silence enemies on various platforms, the liberals have abandoned it in the name of stopping or getting Trump, the moderates just want to grill, and the conservatives/MAGA are generally shaky allies on this particular point.
With all the tools for censorship that are now turnkey ready to implement across the board, starts to feel like it is just a question of whom will be in charge when the governments of the world lock down speech entirely.
Why are you surprised? It seems obvious to me that "unrestricted free speech should be legal" is no different from "you can't defend yourself from my swing until and unless it connects".
What were your beliefs about freedom of speech and the importance of government power to crush dissent in 2007?
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I would characterize it more as "It should be legal for any given person to speak to any given willing audience without interference." Trebly so on the internet, where generally an audience seeks out a speaker and the speech doesn't interfere with anyone who hasn't actively sought it out.
The right to free speech has as a necessary corollary the right to hear. As in, a speaker and a listener/the audience both have an interest in the right to free speech, and both are 'infringed' when a speaker is censored.
That's less the case when someone starts throwing punches, there is no consent, implied or otherwise, to receive a punch, vs. the consent to hear a given speaker. Unless it is in an agreed upon boxing match, of course.
I'm sure you could find a listener who's interested in hearing the nuclear codes, or, as another user put it more saliently, the coordinates of a military unit at the frontline that you're entrusted with. The listener's right and interest to hear things is not exactly under question.
What's under question is why any society would want to have free season on coordinating violence/malfeasance. Classify all communication as "speech" and thus "free", and you get bizarre anarchy where no opsec can be enforced and no threat can be reacted to until it is made true on. Make exceptions, and you get to argue over the extent of the exceptions.
I approach you in a dark alley from behind and tell you to empty your pockets with my hand half a second away from retrieving my open carry gun and shooting at you. That should be legal, shouldn't it? All I did was speak to you. If you felt threatened, that's entirely on you. And besides, don't you have the right to hear what I have to say?
I mean, I still support contractual rights to restrict the spread of information, such as nondisclosure agreements and even certain forms of copyrigght.
The constant tension between the "INFORMATION WANTS TO BE FREE!" philosophy and "Some information can cause harm" is everpresent.
Ahh, this takes me back to arguing this stuff on 4chan and reddit back in the day.
What is your specific intent in uttering these words? Is it to give me some useful information that I desire to hear or that I requested to hear? If not, then surely I am entitled to take that into account when I judge how to respond to your speech.
"It should be legal for you to utter those words" and "it should also be legal for me to shoot you on the spot if you utter those words" are not in fact in tension.
In this case, the restriction on speech is more practical than anything. You wouldn't utter those words for fear of being shot. No third party needs to 'interfere.'
You would probably welcome an opportunity to hand over your valuables without a fight, rather than get shot/stabbed wordlessly and have no choice in the matter.
I'm sure you're very badass, but I do believe the advantage is on the robber's side here. I specified that the gun is holstered because I expected a gotcha about brandishing, but really, brandishing is a fake crime as well.
More generally, I do support shooting people who called you a slur on Twitter. Perhaps if more progressives did that, people wouldn't give them such information that they didn't desire to hear.
Ironically you've presented a scenario that I can claim expertise in, since one of my jobs is in fact self defense instructor. This precise scenario is one I have thought about and trained on literal hundreds of times.
The calculation I have to make is based on whether I think your gun is real, whether it is loaded, whether you have the wherewithal to pull the trigger, and, ultimately, if I'm faster than you. Which I probably am because, as stated above, I train for this.
And in the vast majority of hypothetical cases I would... hand over my stuff without a protest and let you go on your way. Simply the easiest resolution once you've pressed the matter. But you have acted in such a way that I will consider ALL options on the table. And my calculation will adjust based on whether I have loved ones with me and whether I have reason to believe you would kill anyway.
Simply put, YOU have to make a calculation too, and if your calculation has already included the possibility of being shot yourself and you STILL take this action, I can't speak well of your judgment.
And once YOU have made a statement that shows you are willing to kill me (or someone else) to obtain mere possessions, by my perfectly, coldly rational logic you have forfeited any argument for why you shouldn't be killed in return, so the only question is whether I think that is necessary to protect myself.
Similarly, if you claim that you want to suppress the speech of others, I would HAPPILY support restricting your speech because you can't really complain about being treated the way you already agreed its fair to treat others.
Symmetry is nice, like that.
It sure would. But you've already stated that its on twitter, so the means to do so would certainly not be present unless you go to the effort of locating and hunting that person down, which seems like a LOT OF FUCKING EFFORT when you could just walk away from the screen. Or you could just use twitter's own tools to mute the words you don't want to hear/read and block the people you don't want to interact with.
So there's a certain level of implied consent if you consider a particular set of words offensive enough to kill over... and yet you don't avail yourself of readily available tools that will prevent you from seeing those words at all if you don't wish.
I now recall that we've disagreed before on the meaning of the word "fairness". Yet again, you seem to have your own definition for "symmetry" as well.
It is not "symmetrical" to kill in the process of robbery and to kill in self-defense. The latter is a more "fair" act, even in a situation that is not evenly matched. I doubt even your training would provide you with the means to quickly and accurately evaluate any attacker in order to make your self-defense perfectly, rationally "symmetrical" (the classic home invasion scenario - few on this forum would say they'd hold themselves back from shooting the invader, even if he's not obviously armed and threatening). This does not matter in a sane legal code because as one who has not initiated the aggression, you are in the right.
Am I correct to assume that if I want to suppress others expressing a certain set of ideas A, you would support restricting my speech entirely? That's hardly symmetrical, and not very fair either. What would be symmetrical and fair is to support restricting my speech around the set of ideas A. You'll find that many people readily agree to such proposals. In my view, that supports my interpretation of fairness. People tend to agree to fair counterproposals and reject unfair ones.
I don't think this can be done before encountering the random person who'd say the words to me. Similarly, you can't shoot a robber before they appear and try to rob you. Instead, you rely on implicit intimidation to deter robbers. Instead of putting the onus on every possible robbery victim to "block" them, many would-be robbers decide not to rob in the first place.
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Because the west is still marketing itself as supporting free speech, and claiming it's different from / better than the autocrats in other parts of the world.
Though I suppose I agree that by now one shouldn't be surprised.
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