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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".
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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