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The Twitter Files, Part Six

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Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#171

Post by BEEdwards »

kodyo wrote: post #61
kevinh wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who's the fascist in this situation?

The corporation and the state partnering to censor speech.

...did we read the same thing?

This is sinister music played over a video of someone doing the dishes.

"Between January 2020 and November 2022, there were over 150 emails between the FBI and former Twitter Trust and Safety chief Yoel Roth."

150 emails in 2 years is a partnership?

All the provided examples are actual misinformation and low effort nonsense and at no point was twitter forced to do anything.

This is literally nothing.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#172

Post by simpleblend »

Apocryphon wrote: post #135
simpleblend wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that it's not the job of the FBI to police 1A speech, especially about an election, right?

What is your definition of policing? If those FBI agents had been individual citizens who found misinformation and hit the report button, little different would have occurred. They got to cut the line, perhaps, but I doubt it would be much ahead of organizations like Microsoft, Stanford University, or the Archdiocese of Boston, to name some random bigwig organizations who could potentially complain to Twitter about s…

I have a really hard time believing Twitter would have reacted in similar way if an individual or company initiated the same takedowns

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#173

Post by b0sk »

progrus wrote: post #15

Quoted post unavailable.

oh right.. The guy who famously published this https://theprint.in/opinion/majority-indians-have-natural-im... before Delta variant ripped through India and killed millions.

SARS-Cov-2 is not novel anymore. Most of the population has immunity some form or other. The disease is almost an afterthought. That doesn't mean that this guy was correct all along, especially when the world was rushing to vaccinate.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#174

Post by kadoban »

jacquesm wrote: post #116
jcranmer wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as you are given the option to decline a request (a real option, not a Hobson's choice), it doesn't cross the line into state action. The distinction in legal jurisprudence is pretty damn clear here, there needs to be some element of coercion by the government; if the government has the same power as private actors (e.g., to flag things), then that doesn't meet the bar.

The FBI would upon such a refusal then most likely go by a court to see if they could get a judge to sign off on an order and those you refuse at your peril.

So the harm to Twitter in refusing the original request is zero, right? There's no "stick" if the downside of refusing is just them asking a different way that you may have to actually listen to.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#175

Post by pigtailgirl »

chomp wrote: post #145
moralestapia wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once per week for three years is not constant to you? Weird.

We had a couple Us dedicated to the feds in our datacenter for their wiretap box, in addition to weekly emails. We had like 1/16 twitter’s revenue. That’s what I’d consider constant!

-- yes - used to work for a small isp - multiple law enforcement contacts per day - the twitter scale seems tiny --

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#176

Post by jacquesm »

shkkmo wrote: post #163
jacquesm wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Because 'legal' and 'damaging to society' are different bars and both the FBI and Twitter probably felt that cooperating on that front was better than to let things get out of hand. The alternative may well have been a dead VP, or worse, so be happy that these channels exist(ed). With that whole department axed we are now in much more dangerous territory. That said I'm pretty sure that Elon Musk knows which side…

The FBI should absolutely not be trying to manage or control activity that isn't illegal, especially when that activity is speech. When the FBI does, we end up with horrible stuff like COINTELPRO.

> When the FBI does, we end up with horrible stuff like COINTELPRO.

You could. But that's not what happened here, judging by the evidence on display.

All I see is what I expected to see: law enforcement engaging in a careful manner with a company that is dealing with an extremely large flow of communications. And if some of those communications are of a society destabilizing nature it is well within the mandate of the FBI to stick their noses in and make requests. You then have the option to refuse those requests, in which case you may either end up in court, they could forget about the whole thing or you are served with a piece of paper signed off by a judge.

What is illegal and what isn't is ultimately for a judge to decide but not every two-bit issue needs to go by a judge if all parties agree that the world is better off with moderating it out of existence.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#177

Post by kodyo »

mikeyouse wrote: post #157
kodyo wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't have to submit high quality reports because they were working with ideological soulmates.

You do realize for this to be true - the FBI, one of the most conservative organizations in this history of the country, one that’s never been led by a democrat - would have to be secretly as liberal as Twitter’s trust and safety team? Do you understand why people might not find that plausible?

The FBI serves the state, and itself. If they need to make friends with a leftist to get something done, why would that stop them? I personally find it hard to believe that Crossfire Hurricane was run by a conservative cabal in the FBI, but maybe you're right. Whoever were doing it were elitist reprobates.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#178

Post by Apocryphon »

simpleblend wrote: post #172
Apocryphon wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your definition of policing? If those FBI agents had been individual citizens who found misinformation and hit the report button, little different would have occurred. They got to cut the line, perhaps, but I doubt it would be much ahead of organizations like Microsoft, Stanford University, or the Archdiocese of Boston, to name some random bigwig organizations who could potentially complain to Twitter about s…

I have a really hard time believing Twitter would have reacted in similar way if an individual or company initiated the same takedowns

You bet your ass they would if those individuals were celebrity influencers. Or if those companies were advertisers.

Twitter needs such entities to survive. Displeasing then is more existentially threatening than running afoul of the FBI.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#179

Post by joshuaheard »

sleepybrett wrote: post #101
joshuaheard wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's corruption. It's a violation of the First Amendment. It's a dangerous collusion between state and media. We should all be concerned.

It's literally none of those things. The FBI contacted trust and safety and said 'Hey we have concerns about these tweets'. Twitter decided to take them down in some cases. Who is corrupted here? Twitter for taking reports and then deciding how to react to them? The FBI for finding misinformation that might lead to crazies creating mass casualty events? The FBI at no time FORCED twitter to do anything. So it's not vi…

The corruption is that the requests were ideologically based. In other words, they only requested conservative tweets to be removed.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#180

Post by BEEdwards »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #10
camjohnson26 wrote: post #3

This is the height of hypocrisy. Everything the "twitter files" have disclosed so far is in line with what most people expected was happening, but Musk's censorship of the platform has been far more egregious than anything that came before. This isn't to defend the actions that Twitter took, which were arguably partisan in some cases, but it's difficult to make the case that Twitter wasn't making a best effort to cur…

I'll try to find an article explaining the concept, but for right-wing authoritarians, the hypocrisy is the point. In group vs out group. https://level.medium.com/its-always-about-power-f9fca4321e0c

The Authoritarians by Bob Altemeyer

https://theauthoritarians.org/

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