Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government • Hacker News Board

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

#471

Post by ImPostingOnHN » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

stale2002 wrote: post #416

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Republicans have threatened it as well: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/502... S.5020 - A bill to repeal section 230 of the Communications Act of 1934. Sponsor: Sen. Graham, Lindsey [R-SC] you're now free to respond to the substance of the post you replied to: it was, in fact, a GOP controlled Senate which performed the action in question

Ok, so then we can agree that the gov definitely is engaging in illegal violations of first amendment rights! Looks like you agree with the judge here from the article.

Looks like you've still failed to articulate the credible implied threat Facebook felt from the Biden administration's requests,

or how that ties in with the GOP-controlled senate bringing the CEOs before them:

did they do that because the Biden administration ordered them to, as a result of Facebook ignoring one of the requests?

It's a laughably bipartisan conspiracy theory, and thus nobody would actually feel threatened by it.

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

#472

Post by JackFr » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

roflyear wrote: post #334

AbrahamParangi wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t give a rat’s ass about the free speech rights of the government . Why on earth would I? The government is already massively constrained in what it can say and that’s entirely appropriate because the purpose of free speech is to protect the right of the weak to speak even when the strong disagree with them. You may disagree with the ruling but if you’re on the side of free speech, you should definitely cheer i…

You can't think of a scenario where the government should be able to express a thought about something? ;)

For instance, if you're the FAA, you should express opinions about airline operations, air safety, etc. That is your role. If you are the FDA, you should express opinions about food and drug safety. And in both those cases note that you are a regulator, and within your domain, it is your role to regulate the players.

If you are the White House, you are not a regulator of anything. It is fine to express your opinion. In fact the White House has a daily press briefing for specifically that purpose. It is fine to call out people with whom you disagree. Perfectly OK to call them dangerous charlatans and liars. It is not OK to censor their speech. It is not OK use the implicit coercive force of the executive branch to encourage third parties to censor them.

It's not hard to understand.

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

#473

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #466

chipsa wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're a private citizen, yes. If you're a government employee, speaking in the course of your duties, then it's not your speech, it's government speech. The First Amendment doesn't protect the right of the government to speech, because the government doesn't have rights. What does that even mean, for the US Government to have a right to speak without fear of action being taken against it by the US Government?

> If you're a government employee, speaking in the course of your duties, then it's not your speech, it's government speech. This would make quite a few Congressional hearings unconstitutional. For example: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/4-tech-industry-titan... It'd probably also apply to the President saying "lock her up" about a private citizen. Is that unconstitutional pressure from an elected official? >…

> This would make quite a few Congressional hearings unconstitutional

Well, maybe, if you ignore the Constitutional carte blanche for Congressional proceedings of the Article I Speech and Debate Clause.

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

#474

Post by staticman2 » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

AbrahamParangi wrote: post #314

brasic wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the entire injunction. It’s only seven pages. Then tell me with a straight face that you think it’s a good thing for free speech. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.lawd.18... It amounts to “no one from these 8 government agencies may communicate with anyone working at these three non profits, 20 social media companies or any similar organization” I’m not defending the behavior alleged here but…

I don’t give a rat’s ass about the free speech rights of the government . Why on earth would I? The government is already massively constrained in what it can say and that’s entirely appropriate because the purpose of free speech is to protect the right of the weak to speak even when the strong disagree with them. You may disagree with the ruling but if you’re on the side of free speech, you should definitely cheer i…

" I don’t give a rat’s ass about the free speech rights of the government...the purpose of free speech is to protect the right of the weak to speak even when the strong disagree with them."

That doesn't sound right to me. You basically just argued "The purpose of a right to free speech is to protect the right of free speech." It's circular reasoning. Why should free speech be a right?

Out of curiosity I pulled up an article in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

One principle put out by John Stewart Mill is that free speech is valuable because it leads to the truth. If this is correct you should arguably be concerned if the government can't engage in it because we will all be lead away from the truth.

The article says "... arguments show that one of the main reasons for justifying free speech (political speech) is important, not for it's own sake but because it lets us exercise another important value (democracy)."

So if we accept this then if censoring the strong undermines democracy it could be bad, especially if they became strong because the weak elected them into office to represent them.

The article quotes someone who says "Speech, in short, is never a value in and of itself but is always produced with the precincts of some assumed conception of good."

In other words, don't argue free speech is good because free speech is good.

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

#475

Post by evandale » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:55 PM UTC

afavour wrote: post #429

evandale wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol I gotta say I've been trying to read the defenders of this and take them seriously but your incredulity matches mine... .. and people are replying to you and _still_ defending the government and think they should have unilateral power over their people I'm kind of speechless about how many people think this ruling is a bad thing.. like who in the hell out there believes the government should have OPINIONS? Can on…

> It's as stupid of a concept as a corporation having an opinion.. opinions are reserved for PEOPLE and I have no idea how you could come up with an argument to change my mind on that. I guess I don’t understand your point here unless we’re being ultra-literal and saying a corporation can’t have an opinion because it doesn’t have a physical brain developing individual thought. An example of “corporate opinion” off th…

> because it doesn’t have a physical brain developing individual thought.

You summed up my point with a single sentence I can agree with, can't argue there!

In your scenario what's the opinion Facebook has about advertising? I'm in favour of more bike lanes in my city but I don't consider that an opinion. Describing _why_ I'm in favour has an element of opinion but voting yes/no is not an opinion to me. Plus, any old why isn't good enough for an opinion. For instance, if Facebook says they're in favour of advertising because it helps them make money then I don't think I can consider that an opinion.

I suppose corporate slogans and mission statements are opinions (We believe the customer is always right) but it's hard for me to call that an opinion because are your values actually opinions? I would say that they can be formed using opinions but I would be reluctant to say they're opinions themselves because of the "strength" of them I guess?

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

#476

Post by afavour » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:55 PM UTC

causi wrote: post #318

afavour wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Flaherty specifically didn’t get what he wanted (that’s why he was mad!) so I think it’s misleading to say the power only goes from government to Facebook. If anything this example shows the exact opposite with Flaherty sending indignant anger in the other direction.

I don't see why one's judgment of the situation should depend on whether the government was successful in intimidating Facebook. What matters is that they tried.

I was specifically responding to the OP's point that this demonstrates power flowing from government to Facebook. The fact that FB ignored the request and did not suffer consequences demonstrates that power does not in fact flow that way.

You're welcome to judge the appropriateness of the event as a whole however you want! I'm not over the moon about it either. I wasn't arguing that it's wonderful this interaction occurred.

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

#477

Post by JackFr » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:55 PM UTC

roflyear wrote: post #355

cscurmudgeon wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The rights apply to people not the govt lol Edit: Amazing, a perfect factual comment is downvoted.

I'm just saying there are times where you may want the government to be able to express opinions....

The daily White House press briefing is an excellent venue.

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

#478

Post by mrguyorama » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:56 PM UTC

plagiarist wrote: post #114

ceejayoz wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> His rally crowds have no power to act Jan 6 would like a word. (There's every indication Trump was internally pressuring as President , too, not just via rallies as candidate . https://apnews.com/article/060ca2399a744b4a9554dbd2ec276a90 ) > Who did TFG send his demands to? TFG definitely sent in the same sort of requests. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/elon-tru... > When the White House called…

It's like when a rightist explains that Donald was a great president because he didn't "drone strike people like Obama did." The doublethink is ridiculous.

Or when hosting a private email server is worthy of being locked up but only if you are Hilary Clinton specifically.

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

#479

Post by ethanbond » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:57 PM UTC

vuln wrote: post #417

ethanbond wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

James Baker was Deputy General Counsel at Twitter lol. His official job was to be involved in exactly these types of decisions. He left the FBI in 2018. Raise complaints about the revolving door between govt and industry if you want, but this is cut-and-dry not about a government official pressuring a private company. It's about a private company hiring a former government official (years out of service) and then tha…

> former government official (years out of service) and then that person doing the job they were hired to do. You honestly believe that “retired” Intelligence Community members just “retire,” so naive. I’m sure he was hired for his law qualifications and not his IC network, reach, or influence. Did he get read out of every program and give up his clearance upon leaving the FBI? Very doubtful.

You are aware that his job at FBI was also General Counsel, right?

Seems like one of the best candidates in the world for GC of Twitter if you ask me.

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

#480

Post by mrguyorama » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 5:58 PM UTC

ModernMech wrote: post #386

calgarymicro wrote: post #384

I wanted to point out several factual issues with this ruling, some of which I mentioned yesterday on another post. For starters, the judge severely misquotes an email: >However, various emails show Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits through evidence that the motivation of the NIAID Defendants was a “take down” of protected free speech. Dr. Francis Collins, in an email to Dr. Fauci told Fauci there needed…

This new crop of politicians in robes seem to be worse than the rest. I’d expect this kind of malpractice from Fox News Channel, not the federal judiciary.

A reminder to others that Trump appointed HUNDREDS of hand picked judges all over, not just the supreme court. All while calling legal challenges to his actual crimes "Legislating from the bench"