Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

eshoo.house.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 602 posts

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#71

Post by jolux »

rayiner wrote: post #70
jolux wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I don't really care what inflammatory things people post in their free time. But make no mistake that there will be double standards in how these rules will be applied. This seems like a red herring though? These letters are talking about the statements that news sources make as official outlets, to which you're comparing statements an individual makes (presumably) on her own time. I don't deny that there's a potent…

I absolutely agree there is a distinction in general. However, I don't think that distinction applies to the Twitter posts of a blue-checkmark journalist. The news outlets themselves are heavily involved in Twitter, and Attiah prominently advertises her Washington Post affiliation on her Twitter account. Her affiliation with a prominent media company is why she has a blue checkmark: https://help.twitter.com/en/managi…

> While I agree there is a distinction, I don't think that distinction applies to the Twitter posts of a journalist.

We can disagree on this, but it's absolutely a question of current debate and not something that is settled. Some journalists believe themselves to have freedom on Twitter that they do not have in their columns. Some have been fired for assuming as such. Others have not.

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#72

Post by TrispusAttucks »

hogFeast wrote: post #12
surge wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It pretty much is and is a chilling attempt at limiting speech. Free press, is free press. CNN and MSNBC both spread their share of misinformation. You need to be able to watch multiple news sources with different takes in a free society, to determine whose wrong or whose omitting key facts in an attempt to frame the news.

When you think people disagree with you because they are evil, any action is justfiable (internally).

It's even worse when you think people are evil simply because they disagree with you!

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#73

Post by benjohnson »

katmannthree wrote: post #20
kodah wrote: post #9

It's a letter to AT&T that encourages them to do something about Fox and OANN. I'd say sure, do something about them, but let's also look inward. There was a lot of misinformation abound after the Capitol Riots that was simply there to stir up Democrats and a lot of this information was very racially angled. Though Democrats play up the death of the Capital police officer now, their constituents were absolutely promo…

Would you be able to give specific examples of left-focused misinformation on the capitol riots, that is specific news articles from "trusted partisan" sources (CNN, etc) containing unsupported conspiracy theories?

The "five people died!!" narrative.

Three of them were just people dying because walking around while not in the best of health. One was an unarmed woman shot in the neck by police.

So really.. the rioters can only have rightfully been the cause of one death of someone not involved in the riot or protest.

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#74

Post by omgwtfbyobbq »

rayiner wrote: post #61
omgwtfbyobbq wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so far been in the hands of the courts, and like you said, they don't determine what's free speech based on whether something makes us feel bad. Per bhupy, their specific criteria is whether the speech is "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action". If the misinformation on certain media outlets is considered by the courts to have incited the insurre…

> If the misinformation on certain media outlets is considered by the courts to have incited the insurrection , then it may not be considered free speech. The legal standard for "inciting or producing imminent lawless action" is given by Brandenburg v. Ohio . In that case, which upheld speech openly advocating for violence against specific groups to be protected speech. It overturned an Ohio law that had been directe…

It is, but I'm not certain the courts will interpret it the same way when applied to a large media corporation making many statements over a long period of time.

Like rayiner said, the courts have been protective of media corporation's free speech, but those were cases involving defamation or intentional infliction of emotional distress, not an insurrection with the intent to detain and possibly murder elected officials.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hustler_Magazine_v._Falwell https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#75

Post by omgwtfbyobbq »

rayiner wrote: post #65
omgwtfbyobbq wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are narrowly interpreted as it relates to individuals, but I'm not sure that same interpretation would be applied to media outlets. In terms of liability, as a property owner I have a much lower standards for care, custody, and control of an empty piece of property I have with a no trespassing sign than a corporation has for a sports stadium they run. I'm not certain that the standards for free speech by an indi…

While the Supreme Court has not specifically ruled on incitement in the context of media outlets, it's clear from cases like New York Times v. Sullivan and Hustler Magazine v. Falwell that the Supreme Court is extremely protective of speech by media outlets.

They are, in civil cases involving defamation and parody. I don't think a case involving any of the media outlets who are spreading misinformation about the election that could be related to federal crimes would be based on either of those.

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#77

Post by omgwtfbyobbq »

bhupy wrote: post #67
omgwtfbyobbq wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do, for individuals, in specific situations. Like I stated in my comment above, I'm not certain those would apply in this case.

The New York Times vs Sullivan precedent pretty specifically addressed that issue: organizations (like the NYT) are protected by the First Amendment. Also, just taking a step back, the Constitution makes no mention of a difference between individuals and groups. If you and I were to group together to advocate for something, our rights to advocate for that thing don't magically disappear. In fact, by this logic, we do…

The New York Times vs Sullivan precedent does, in terms of defamation. That may not apply in other situations, specifically in federal crimes.

The Constitution may not differentiate between individuals and other entities, but the courts have differentiated between them. They may not in this case, but I wouldn't assume they would either.

They also differentiate based on other facts, which may differentiate any future cases. We definitely have freedom of the press, as it relates to defamation, and parody, but the precedent established in those cases may not apply to a case involving criminal acts.

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#78

Post by edbob »

jolux wrote: post #69
edbob wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, this isn't any more helpful than responding "citation needed" to someone asserting that man-made causes will accelerate climate change. The inevitability of the abuse of political power is not something that has to be debated over and over again in every thread.

>The inevitability of the abuse of political power is not something that has to be debated over and over again in every thread. I don't contest this, what I contest is the idea that there is comparable misinformation on both sides. rayiner has since updated his post with some examples that he thinks constitute misinformation by news sources themselves, but before the only example given was the tweets from the Washing…

I responded about the future because the quote you disagreed said "there will be", and I think the general tone of discussion here is around the potential future for abuse. We've seen notable comments by Democratic voters who are legitimately afraid of what their party will become. In this context, I'm not sure if current comparisons of misinformation are very relevant.

Having explained my thinking, I'll make sure to respectfully engage with yours. I do see the point about both sides not being equal in misinformation. But I think that a lot of the apparent difference comes from bias. There are several liberal narratives that are as baseless as anything in QAnon, and others that are partially factually accurate but framed in very misleading ways. But as these are accepted and promulgated in mainstream media, they are not considered fringe misinformation. I think there may still be greater fault on the "right" in misinformation, but it's not nearly as large as it appears to people in a liberal bubble, and, moreover, that disparity can shift overnight. I don't really want to derail this into a debate about those political narratives, so I probably have to leave it at that.

Re: Letters from House members to cable providers [pdf]

#79

Post by bhupy »

omgwtfbyobbq wrote: post #77
bhupy wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The New York Times vs Sullivan precedent pretty specifically addressed that issue: organizations (like the NYT) are protected by the First Amendment. Also, just taking a step back, the Constitution makes no mention of a difference between individuals and groups. If you and I were to group together to advocate for something, our rights to advocate for that thing don't magically disappear. In fact, by this logic, we do…

The New York Times vs Sullivan precedent does, in terms of defamation. That may not apply in other situations, specifically in federal crimes. The Constitution may not differentiate between individuals and other entities, but the courts have differentiated between them. They may not in this case, but I wouldn't assume they would either. They also differentiate based on other facts, which may differentiate any future…

> The Constitution may not differentiate between individuals and other entities, but the courts have differentiated between them.

When? To my knowledge, there are no major landmark decisions which hold that an association of individuals may be treated differently from individuals; especially as it relates to the First Amendment. We even have a precedent in Citizens United v FEC which reinforces the consistency between individuals and organizations under First Amendment jurisprudence.

> We definitely have freedom of the press, as it relates to defamation, and parody, but the precedent established in those cases may not apply to a case involving criminal acts.

The established cases also include criminal acts, as was the case when the Ku Klux Klan advocated for (criminal) violence. The courts have held that even advocating for illegal acts at some time in the future is protected (Hess).

Post reply on HN