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Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

arstechnica.com

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Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#151

Post by JediWing »

Guthur wrote: post #18

The problem i believe we are coming to is that all secular governance eventually replaces the role once taken by church and religious philosophy. It starts to become the arbiter of moral truth and with out any real moral center it can only but fail spectacularly. The second and third political theories of racial and social idealogies more rapidly succumb to this due to a more overt desire to place the state at this m…

People can most certainly believe in a collective moral code that is, at times, at odds with the laws of their country, and simultaneously not dictated by a central religious authority.

Desiring the state to more closely model one's personal moral code isn't a signifier that people are placing the state at the "moral center", it's an indicator that they want those with a monopoly on violence to act in accord with what they believe is right.

I do believe the collective moral codes are drifting from those dictated by religions, but I hardly think that is a bad thing, given the rigidity and absolutism of many religions.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#152

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

noslenwerdna wrote: post #98
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

which direction are you imagining? the one originating from the dude who used a swear word? or the one originating from the company who felt comfortable ignoring the dude and the request? after all, anyone can feel comfortable demanding anything, what matters is what they get : e.g. TFG felt comfortable demanding that his political rivals be imprisoned, did he get it?

"dude who used a swear word"? You left a bit out here. He is a representative of the government demanding that a private company censor speech supporting policies it opposes and speech about the president's family among other things. "A February 2021 message in which Flaherty asked Twitter to remove a parody account related to Hunter Biden's daughter said, 'Cannot stress the degree to which this needs to be resolved…

he's actually not a representative at all, we elect those

he's a random government bureaucrat who didn't appear to have any actual power besides sending angry letters, and who Facebook felt totally comfortable ignoring

the article presented a great example proving me right here: even he admits facebook ignored his impotent wails when it didn't suit them to satisfy him

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#153

Post by LexiMax »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #137
mullingitover wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Historically, religion doesn't have a great track record with its use of moral authority.

Mandatory reminder that many of the "but the Crusades" arguments are also misleading. Sure, ~1.0-1.7 million people died in the Crusades according to modern scholarship. However, the Crusades were an extremely diverse set of conflicts that spanned a 196-year period, with both sides having their own atrocities. The last 196-years of secular government has killed, let's just say, way more than ~1.0-1.7 million people.…

The last 196 years of secular government took place in wake of the industrial revolution and the unprecedented population growth which those advances enabled.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#154

Post by NotYourLawyer »

plagiarist wrote: post #130
NotYourLawyer wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When Trump complained about “Obama judges” he was rightly ridiculed. Why is ok to cast aspersions on judges nominated by Trump?

I think because Obama didn't extort a foreign country, commit an insurrection, or sell top secret information to US adversaries.

Trump should have been impeached and convicted for those things, which have nothing to do with the judges he appointed.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#155

Post by adfhbaidnioni »

edgyquant wrote: post #72
mullingitover wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sad that that is the effect and that papers need to list who nominated a judge. It matters because Trump appointed, and the GOP Senate confirmed, a batch of federal judges who the bar association determined were Not Qualified, because they were found to be lacking in "integrity, professional competence or judicial temperament." The past two GOP presidents have eschewed bar association recommendations entirely and i…

No this doesn’t matter. The president and senate are who pick and approve the judges not the bar association.

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Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#156

Post by quickthrowman »

hgsgm wrote: post #29
moduspol wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Him being a trump nominee makes me suspicious, but also sad that that is the effect and that papers need to list who nominated a judge. They don't, they just choose to do so. It's the same way pundits, authors, and broadcasters often get labeled "right-wing" or "conservative" while similarly left-wing ones don't get labeled. It's an editorial choice to call the reader's attention to it and imply relevance. Beyond t…

After the Senate ran a party-line unpresidented and unconstitutional multi-year campaign to block Obama's nominations from entering office without even a hearing, and then packed the courts with their own judges, it absolutely is relevant who appointed a judge.

How is it unconstitutional? Article II Section 2 of the Constitution says that the President shall nominate, with the advice and consent of the Senate […] judges. The Senate did not consent, so Merrick Garland was not given a confirmation hearing.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#157

Post by axus »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #63
axus wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if they did it to me, it's bad, but to Facebook it's OK? In some court cases the actual harm matters, and sometimes it's the principle that matters.

if the random government bureaucrat "demanded" something of you you didn't want to do, and you laughed him or her out of the room, both actions are okay it seems Facebook was more polite than that, instead just ignoring the random government bureaucrat when it suited them also, in American courts, it is the actual harm that matters. No harm, no standing, no court case.

There are "criminal attempt" and "conspiracy" charges, so in general it's possible, but probably not in this case.

If I'm reading this right, the plaintiffs felt harmed because their information they might have received was effectively censored. Not all of the sources were, but enough of them were removed that would have been published without the government's intervention.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#158

Post by gjsman-1000 »

areoform wrote: post #146
Guthur wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd beg to disagree. The track record of secularism from the French revolution, to empire and idealogy had quite a lot of blood on it's hands. The body count is most certainly not skewed to religion by any stretch.

We now live in the most peaceful time in human history. And just to be clear, we're contrasting this time of unprecedented peace with entities that have killed in spasms of violence with no apparent public casus belli than "my book is better than your book and it told me to do so?" Spasms that, in one set of instances, led to the deaths of a significant fraction of the global population? “Estimates of the number of p…

> We now live in the most peaceful time in human history.

I would say we live in the most widespread Uneasy Peace in human history. And unlike religious peace which had occasional conflicts, a break in the peace now would mean annihilation. Is general peace, risk of annihilation better than occasional petty wars without annihilation?

> And just to be clear, we're contrasting this time of unprecedented peace with entities that have killed in spasms of violence with no apparent public casus belli than "my book is better than your book and it told me to do so?"

I quoted The Washington Post's opinion, which is hardly the number most favorable to religious causes. Plus, older books had higher numbers than newer scholarship.

https://apholt.com/2019/02/19/modern-scholars-on-the-casualt...

https://apholt.com/2019/01/30/death-estimates-for-the-crusad...

> NAZI 'DIVINE RIGHT' TO RULE ASSERTED; Dr. Ley Says Reich's 'Mission' to Dominate Other Nations Is Among War Aims WOULD WIPE OUT BRITAIN 'Annihilation' of Obstacle to German Destiny Demanded by Labor Front Head

Well, considering that they murdered priests and pastors in their camps, were they really friendly to religion? Particularly Catholic Priests, who represented 94% of the clergy they executed.

> Or, doctrines like "Manifest Destiny" that were religious in origin and preached in church?

Let's not confuse Protestant fundamentalism motivated by political ends with religion in general.

> The only way to end the cycle of violence is by embracing the scientific method, rationality, and empathy. Anything else is a step to madness.

So said the French Revolution. They did everything they could to break away from religion - they even invented a new calendar starting at year 0 because... anyway. Didn't go so well, there were a few smaller revolutions afterward to get to modern France.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#159

Post by commandlinefan »

efitz wrote: post #131

This thread baffles me. There are a lot of replies that either didn’t read the article (or even the headline) that seem to be government apologists, or arguing that a particular email isn’t coercive enough, etc. A court found that the government abused its power and infringes on people’s first amendment rights by using its intimidation power to coerce social media to censor free speech of citizens. Freedom of speech…

> Why defend them?

Because a depressingly large percentage of people would actually like to see the first amendment overturned.

Re: Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

#160

Post by artificialLimbs »

ethanbond wrote: post #107
viggity wrote: post #82

The Hunter Biden laptop story was actively suppressed on Twitter and Facebook specifically because the FBI told them it was Russian information, despite the fact that the FBI had verified it was legit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter_Files

From that exact Wiki article: > Musk tweeted that Twitter had acted "under orders from the government", though Taibbi reported that he found no evidence of government involvement in the laptop story, tweeting, "Although several sources recalled hearing about a 'general' warning from federal law enforcement that summer about possible foreign hacks, there's no evidence—that I've seen—of any government involvement in th…

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