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Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

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Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#51

Post by wongarsu »

ptdcc wrote: post #25
Tyrubias wrote: post #13

In a sane world, the US as a supposed bastion of free speech and personal liberties would enact legislation that requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts due to rules violations and offer everyone the chance to appeal. That would serve as a counterbalance to more authoritarian regimes insisting companies like Meta censor people, even if the US can’t guarantee it for people…

[flagged]

There were plenty of "specific, articulable reasons" to ban that account for rule violations

There is a valuable discussion about whether those rules should be there. But as long as they are, enforcing them on all platform users is the just thing to do

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#52

Post by KaiserPro »

traverseda wrote: post #30
KaiserPro wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts wouldn't that violate free speech though? forcing a company to keep something up/take something down is entirely up to them no?

You can be protected by safe harbour provisions, or you can editorialise your content. I don't think you should have both. Free speech does not cover scams and fraud, something that happens on their platform. Society doesn't take any action against them for publishing illegal content, scams, libel, fraud, because they aren't a newspaper. They're more like a newspaper printing house. In my opinion they should probably…

> You can be protected by safe harbour provisions, or you can editorialise your content.

Aha, now this is an interesting distinction. I'm not an expert in this, as you might imagine, but what counts as editorialising?

To my naive eyes, having an algorithm that re-arranges posts, or injects new subjects seems like editorialising to me.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#53

Post by spwa4 »

737min wrote: post #11

Context: the popular account is a promoter of Muslim Brotherhood, banned by US and many Mideast countries.

It goes quite a bit further: the Muslim Brotherhood are fascists (as in actual fascists) and (religous) racists, of the supremacist kind. They are in control of the most famous university in islamic countries: Al-Azhar. Long ago they were a supporter of Adolf Hitler, and today are known for being the parent organization of Hamas and they are supporting the genocide in Sudan (meaning they are sponsoring Arabs committing genocides on black Africans (muslim black Africans if that matters), because they're black)

They are considered a terrorist organization by most countries, including their host country of Egypt.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#54

Post by KaiserPro »

like_any_other wrote: post #35
KaiserPro wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts wouldn't that violate free speech though? forcing a company to keep something up/take something down is entirely up to them no?

Don't conflate the broad concept of free speech, with the specific attempt at its defense that is the 1st amendment of the US constitution. Giant unaccountable companies privatizing the public square harms free speech. Forcing them to at least reveal why something was censored would help free speech more than it would harm it. Unless you subscribe to the myopic legalistic 1st amendment position that "free speech" is…

I'm british, so I am not an absolutist by any stretch of the meaning. I just know that whenever I have queried why companies like facebook are not held liable for the content they promote, I am told that the 1st amendment allows them to do pretty much what they like, along with Section 230

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#55

Post by funimpoded »

KaiserPro wrote: post #21
Tyrubias wrote: post #13

In a sane world, the US as a supposed bastion of free speech and personal liberties would enact legislation that requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts due to rules violations and offer everyone the chance to appeal. That would serve as a counterbalance to more authoritarian regimes insisting companies like Meta censor people, even if the US can’t guarantee it for people…

> requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts wouldn't that violate free speech though? forcing a company to keep something up/take something down is entirely up to them no?

It shouldn't. But under this Supreme Court it might.

Corporations are creations of the state and treating them as strictly private, especially when they're trampling rights, is illiberal horse-shit, and is straight up insulting when done under the guise of defending liberalism. And there's plenty of room for nuance, we don't have to (and already do not) regulate family businesses or 50-employee enterprises like we do transnational mega corporations with more capital than many entire countries.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#56

Post by [deleted] »

ptdcc wrote: post #25
Tyrubias wrote: post #13

In a sane world, the US as a supposed bastion of free speech and personal liberties would enact legislation that requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts due to rules violations and offer everyone the chance to appeal. That would serve as a counterbalance to more authoritarian regimes insisting companies like Meta censor people, even if the US can’t guarantee it for people…

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#57

Post by hsuduebc2 »

737min wrote: post #11

Context: the popular account is a promoter of Muslim Brotherhood, banned by US and many Mideast countries.

This seems to be "unverified accusations from critics". It's not really fair to accuse someone from this.

Do not underestimate Meta for being purely immoral. I'm pretty sure they would assisted russians with persecution if they wouldn't be sure now about potential backlash.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#58

Post by funimpoded »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #18
Tyrubias wrote: post #13

In a sane world, the US as a supposed bastion of free speech and personal liberties would enact legislation that requires companies to provide a specific, articulable reason for suspending accounts due to rules violations and offer everyone the chance to appeal. That would serve as a counterbalance to more authoritarian regimes insisting companies like Meta censor people, even if the US can’t guarantee it for people…

[flagged]

I once spent an hour or so tracking down and reading parts of the twitter files specifically highlighted by people loudly complaining about them (as I figured those would be the worst bits) and it was mostly pretty yawn-worthy in context.

That might be why they didn't get more attention.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#59

Post by Jiro »

skywhopper wrote: post #49
ptdcc wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

“Free speech” has never meant you can say or do anything you want.

Which is true here, except "do anything you want" is "be displeasing to Kuwait".

It's all "they're a private company, they can ban anyone they want" right up until they ban someone who promoters of that idea don't like. Then they're suddenly horrible people for being a private company that bans anyone they want.

Re: Meta deletes popular 1M follower account after Kuwaiti request

#60

Post by jandrewrogers »

edent wrote: post #36
gatlin wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do Americans often try to use dollars in Europe?

Yes. Everyone has a story about being stuck behind an irate American who can't understand why their currency isn't accepted abroad. I've seen it in the UK - when a tourist tried to leave a tip in dollars for a bemused waiter.

US currency is accepted in a surprisingly large number of countries abroad. Just not in Europe proper. US dollars are even accepted in some European sovereign territories outside of Europe.

It is very convenient for Americans. Depending on the parts of the world you've traveled it is easy to get the impression that the US dollar is a sort of universal currency.

Which isn't to excuse the people in your story. It is pretty easy to find out if US currency works where you are traveling.

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