Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal • Hacker News Board

Re: Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal

#121

Post by rhn_mk1 » Fri, Jan 15, 2021, 8:23 AM UTC

bobthechef wrote: post #116

praptak wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hypocrisy to paint themselves as protectors of free speech.

Not really. What constitutes free speech is always qualified, so that's a fantastical argument. In this case, Poland has blasphemy laws (and btw, even Strasbourg allows for these under the margin of appreciation). In principle, this move shifts decisions from private global corporate power brokers to national representative government. Facebook and Twitter are private, but they've become so powerful and influential t…

Posturing as protectors of free speech is quoted in the article though:

> “[...]” wrote the prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, on Facebook earlier this week, [...]. “There can be no consent to censorship.”

This is consistent only if censorship does not include removing illegal speech, which I don't think is a very widespread definition.

Re: Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal

#122

Post by tremon » Fri, Jan 15, 2021, 11:23 AM UTC

bobthechef wrote: post #117

praptak wrote: post #60

If you wonder what exactly they want to protect, [1] is the recent ruling of a Polish court. As of Jan 12th, publicly saying that "gay people are perverts" is fine as far as Polish law is concerned. [0] Background in English: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/polish-activis... [1]The ruling (Polish only): https://oko.press/kaja-godek-wygrala-w-sadzie-zboczency/

Ad hominem much? And yes, why shouldn't someone have the right to say that? Under natural law theory, same sex attraction is gravely disordered, and indulging that attraction by engaging in an active gay lifestyle is perverse and self-destructive. That some people want to silence traditional views is revealing. Instead of counterargument, you see totalitarian attempts to silence people, in this case Catholics, though…

Under natural law theory, same sex attraction is gravely disordered, and indulging that attraction by engaging in an active gay lifestyle is perverse and self-destructive.

You're claiming a natural law that doesn't exist. Even lions on the African savannah have been documented to engage in same-sex sexual acts. Worse, you're using that imagined "law" to disparage a whole class of people that do not fit your imagined world order. Even worse, you're then claiming that you should have the right to disparage these other people, and that not being allowed to spread your intolerance is somehow equal to you not tolerating these other people. And to top it off, in order to justify your position, you're claiming a universal concept (love), giving it your own spin, and claiming that any other interpretation than yours is invalid.

So let me give you a counterexample: the Ancient Greeks had four main words for love: eros, philia, storge, agape. The latter one has been narrowed by Thomas Aquinas into the definition you just gave, but even in the language of the Bible, that does not preclude the other instances of love.

So please, get off your high horse and stop imposing your narrow worldview on the rest of us.

Re: Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal

#123

Post by praptak » Fri, Jan 15, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

bobthechef wrote: post #116

praptak wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hypocrisy to paint themselves as protectors of free speech.

Not really. What constitutes free speech is always qualified, so that's a fantastical argument. In this case, Poland has blasphemy laws (and btw, even Strasbourg allows for these under the margin of appreciation). In principle, this move shifts decisions from private global corporate power brokers to national representative government. Facebook and Twitter are private, but they've become so powerful and influential t…

It's still hypocritical to peddle this bill as "protecting freedom of speech" when it is in fact about "who defines what speech deserves freedom".

Unsurprisingly the "who" above is the proponents of the bill and, as the OP notes, they don't exactly have a track record of protecting free speech which makes it even more hypocritical.

Re: Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal

#124

Post by jopsen » Sun, Jan 17, 2021, 8:54 AM UTC

pelliphant wrote: post #45

jopsen wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they can ban those platforms from the country completely. Can they do that without leaving the EU?

It would go against eu-law, but they can still do it, it haven't stopped them before....

Yeah, my point is that if you start messing with free of speech, I think other EU countries will have a lot less patience.

So far, they've mostly been messing around with environmental rulings, etc. not so much fundamental freedoms.

Re: Poland plans to make censoring of social media accounts illegal

#125

Post by BlackFly » Sun, Jan 17, 2021, 10:08 AM UTC

stephenr wrote: post #108

BlackFly wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've missed the point. The biggest chilling factor to speech in the USA is that your employer will fire you because a mob decides you said something wrong. This cannot happen in the country I live. That I could make my employment grievances public and this would give reason to my employer to terminate me with cause is irrelevant to the fact that my employer cannot fire me for wrongspeak on facebook. Edit: of course…

That's an indication that the US needs to fix their laws about wrongful termination. It's unrelated to "censorship". Of note, the current president and the party that nominated him, many of whom are complaining about this current situation, is in favour of "at will" hiring, whereby a person can be fired without reason.

I agree they need to fix their laws, but this is censorship.

Punishing people for their speech with the intention of suppressing other people from speaking is censorship and the people that do it are would-be censors. That is what the statement of chilling effect means. Instead of harassing librarians until the librarians burn books, the censors nowadays harass employers until they fire the speakers.