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ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

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Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The safest business decision would be to remain neutral, respond to law enforcement requests if presented with one, and otherwise do the job you're paid to do. Have you considered that it might not be about money? What if the decision-makers and operators of Hurricane Electric just have certain people they just want to censor, and use their position to do it at the expense of money. Money is just a means to the end…

If they choose not to host a platform that they don't like, isn't that free speech? Ironically, appealing to authority to enforce an internet service provider to provide speech they don't want to transmit seems like an imposition on a private entity operating freely.

> Ironically, appealing to authority to enforce an internet service provider to provide speech they don't want to transmit seems like an imposition on a private entity operating freely.

Look up "net neutrality" and "common carrier".

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah, sheesh. KF is a website that gleefully reposts terrorist murder videos treated with the same legal penalties as CSAM in other countries, and during the reign of ISIS and the Taliban I don't recall people sitting around defending the need for that particular free speech. Do you genuinely not see a problem with the New Zealand police ordering websites to remove content they dislike and hand over user informatio…

There is not a country in the world that does not believe some forms of speech are worth censoring. In most of the world, CSAM is treated similarly because they don't believe people should spread depraved images of other humans being harmed. US Federal law treats animal abuse imagery in this way: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/48

It is irrelevant whether what other countries believe. Attempting to equate this with child porn (yes, call it what it is rather than the euphemism-du-jour CSAM) does not make your argument stronger, and indeed will just lead most people to distance themselves from you. They aren't providing material aid to terrorists, nor did they engage in those acts themselves. They're reporting on it (and in some cases reveling in it)....... but that is not illegal, nor should it be.

People really should stop trying to be the mutaween of the internet. It's getting tiresome.

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#364

>To put it even more simply: When a person uses a room in a house to engage in illegal or just terrible activity, we don’t call on the electric company to cut off the light and heat to the entire house, or the post office to stop delivering mail. LA actually did this during covid to shut off water for homes being accused of holding parties during covid. https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/06/us/los-angeles-shuts-off-powe...…

> some people have decided the ends justify the means essentially

...and it's long past time they were told in no uncertain terms that the proletariat has had enough of this bourgeoisie nonsense. Laws exists for a reason. No one should be subject to the whims of bourgeoisie overlords. Just because some imbecile believes they have a great idea and thinks it should be forced upon others does not make it so. This is such an important point that there are entire religions built around it.

I didn't think I'd live to see it, but I'm proud, delighted, and amused to see that people are finally starting to wake up to the notion that maybe the rule of law is a good idea and should apply to everybody.

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#365

Glad to see this. Hurricane Electric has behaved in such an incredibly unprofessional manner regarding this entire ordeal. It began here: https://twitter.com/IncogNetLLC/status/1685359845505957888 We filed a complaint with the Washington state AG over their actions. HE's response was more or less technically obtuse garbage and, "You're not our direct customer" (paraphrasing, of course). So what they did, was take it…

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Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#366
post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, the ACLU have lost their way. https://web.archive.org/web/20210608004853/https://www.nytim... > the organization finds itself riven with internal tensions over whether it has stepped away from a founding principle — unwavering devotion to the First Amendment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union... > Beginning in 2017, some individuals claimed the ACLU was reducing its support of unpop…

Meanwhile in the rest of the world, we don’t even have free speech. If only America could export their constitution like they do their weapons

> in the rest of the world, we don’t even have free speech.

It exists to varying degrees in various places. It's not absolute in the US, as much as people like to pretend it is - incitement to violence, the old "yelling fire in a crowded theatre" canard, criminal conspiracy, defamation etc etc. There is a line drawn, it's a fuzzy one that people pretend does not exist, but it's there just as it is in other nations.

For more information on how freedom of speech is codified in Europe, for instance, see - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_by_country#E...

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#367
post #220

I would encourage those interested to read up on the individual behind the ISP harassment campaign and what might actually be motivating them to do it. That it's being done to protect trans people is highly disingenuous.

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Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#368
post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even a literal Nazi should have access to utilities. Though I would say cloudflare isn't quite up to that level. Edit: Seeing this downvoted is disappointing. Access to utilities needs to be treated as a right . Only the courts should be able to take it away.

I have a hard time with this. The constitution doesn't say you have a right to water, electricity, internet service, sewer service, etc. Meanwhile the conservatives in the US are saying that corporations have a right to choose who they serve based upon their religious beliefs. See the SCOTUS Masterpiece Cakeshop ruling on whether they must serve a gay couple. I'm pretty sure I could argue that Nazism is against someo…

>Meanwhile the conservatives in the US are saying that corporations have a right to choose who they serve based upon their religious beliefs. See the SCOTUS Masterpiece Cakeshop ruling on whether they must serve a gay couple.

Unfortunately you are misinformed. The baker was quite willing to serve a gay couple. The Supreme Court never said the baker can not serve gays if he doesn't want to.

What the Supreme Court said is a baker cannot be forced to engage in an activity (gay wedding) that he disagrees with even if it is as remote as a baking the cake. The baker made it clear if they wanted a plain cake he would have sold it to them.

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#369

Glad to see this. Hurricane Electric has behaved in such an incredibly unprofessional manner regarding this entire ordeal. It began here: https://twitter.com/IncogNetLLC/status/1685359845505957888 We filed a complaint with the Washington state AG over their actions. HE's response was more or less technically obtuse garbage and, "You're not our direct customer" (paraphrasing, of course). So what they did, was take it…

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I don't think attacking and maligning someone else while ignoring the substance of their comment is what HN should promote in their comments.

Re: ISPs should not police online speech no matter how awful it is

#370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an extremely charitable description of what KiwiFarms is. What's your list of things to block that are higher up the list?

- Corporations that obtain your data and then sell it or abuse it even if said abuse is permitted in some fine print. - Countries that commit crimes against humanity but those should be fully physically blockaded rather than just blocking their internet. - ISP's and ISP resellers that aid and abet watering holes, phishing sites, scams, etc... and probably also entire countries that refuse to lift a finger to stop sca…

Blocking a country due to scam call centers is kind of horrifying collective punishment.

The argument in the article is suggesting that blocking something so bad they will not defend it nor do they even want to look like they are defending it should not be done because of the slippery slope, meanwhile you've leapt straight to partitioning the internet cutting off billions of people.

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