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Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

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Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#3
> "Judge Alexandre de Moraes, speaks during the inauguration of the Center for Combating Disinformation and Defense of Democracy"

So, a judge and a Ministry of Truth?

I don't know who's right or wrong here but to me it doesn't feel right to have a national entity controlled that decides what I am allowed to say.

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#4
post #3

> "Judge Alexandre de Moraes, speaks during the inauguration of the Center for Combating Disinformation and Defense of Democracy" So, a judge and a Ministry of Truth? I don't know who's right or wrong here but to me it doesn't feel right to have a national entity controlled that decides what I am allowed to say.

America's far reaching free speech, enabling people to knowingly lie to the public, is more of an exception than the standard

Being the first constitutional democracy, several mistakes were made (and carve outs to get the deal done)

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#5
post #4
post #3

> "Judge Alexandre de Moraes, speaks during the inauguration of the Center for Combating Disinformation and Defense of Democracy" So, a judge and a Ministry of Truth? I don't know who's right or wrong here but to me it doesn't feel right to have a national entity controlled that decides what I am allowed to say.

America's far reaching free speech, enabling people to knowingly lie to the public, is more of an exception than the standard Being the first constitutional democracy, several mistakes were made (and carve outs to get the deal done)

I think it's better to allow people to lie in public than let the government decide what's the truth.

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#6
post #5
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America's far reaching free speech, enabling people to knowingly lie to the public, is more of an exception than the standard Being the first constitutional democracy, several mistakes were made (and carve outs to get the deal done)

I think it's better to allow people to lie in public than let the government decide what's the truth.

This isn’t even true of American free speech.

Defamation laws do exist. And you cannot knowingly lie under many circumstances (for example, executives at companies, advertisements, making medical claims, etc).

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#7
post #5
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America's far reaching free speech, enabling people to knowingly lie to the public, is more of an exception than the standard Being the first constitutional democracy, several mistakes were made (and carve outs to get the deal done)

I think it's better to allow people to lie in public than let the government decide what's the truth.

It will be courts deciding, not a ministry of truth, like what Brazil is doing, which includes discovery, fact-finding, and lawyering from both sides.

Another approach I think would be good to roll out is to use Bluesky's stacked moderation for community notes. Open fact checking platform where people can subscribe to those they trust (can be more than one)

https://bsky.social/about/blog/03-12-2024-stackable-moderati...

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The problem with allowing knowingly lying is that the damage is done in the first message and rarely is undone with retraction or fact checking. Threat of penalty will reduce how much this happens, and as another commenter pointed out, is in some circumstances

Knowing you are lying, and then telling those lies to influence others, ought to be criminal, at least civilly penalized

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#8
post #6
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's better to allow people to lie in public than let the government decide what's the truth.

This isn’t even true of American free speech. Defamation laws do exist. And you cannot knowingly lie under many circumstances (for example, executives at companies, advertisements, making medical claims, etc).

If you knowingly lie and get sued then a judge will decide if you're guilty of anything, which is very different than having the government decide beforehand what you can and what you can't say.

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#9
post #8
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn’t even true of American free speech. Defamation laws do exist. And you cannot knowingly lie under many circumstances (for example, executives at companies, advertisements, making medical claims, etc).

If you knowingly lie and get sued then a judge will decide if you're guilty of anything, which is very different than having the government decide beforehand what you can and what you can't say.

Yes, people are talking about expanding what is covered by the law. Right now politicians and media outlets are mostly free to lie without repercussion.

Twitter, being a media organization, is knowingly spreading and promoting false information. Elon has on several occasions done this himself and removed community notes correcting him. That later part is more concerning to me. A notable example of late was his retweet of the false info about Arizona voter registration. Fortunately, Maricopa country has a great county recorder who shares the actual data: https://twitter.com/stephen_richer

Stephen's correction of Elon: https://twitter.com/stephen_richer/status/177564477582965559...

Re: Brazil Supreme Court orders investigation of Elon Musk over fake news

#10
The definition of free speech in Brazil is more modern and better than that in United States.

Musk is mistaken, because the accounts of disinformation and violence are of people that place bombs in airports. Freedom of speech should not condone violent actions and it appears he wants to enable such behavior by giving Twitter accounts to those individuals.

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