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Injunction issued in case about social media pressure from US Government

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

#501

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

gcoakes wrote: post #169
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

This is one of those times where I look at what someone says, and think, "Aren't you the same people who thought X about Y, and now, you think something that seems totally contradictory because Y' happens to support the opposite side?" Then, I realize all sides are comprised of heterogenous people with ideas that happen to have similar throughlines, and I'm comparing your statement to something I read from someone I…

if an IRS employee told you that you needed to delete a social media post, you'd obviously realize they have no authority to do so, just like a BLS employee for example, and you could tell either to go stuff themselves in as polite a fashion as you prefer

in the case of a police officer, our current society is one in which police officers can and often do immediately assault and/or shoot and/or kill you for doing or being something they don't like, regardless of whether you're right or wrong, and they can do so with little question and no internal criticism or retribution or punishment, which is an entirely different issue in and of itself

the same is obviously not true of Steve who works at the IRS. Steve would be tried for murder. So would Flaherty.

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

#502

Post by evandale »

emodendroket wrote: post #487
evandale wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Your conception of what constitutes an “opinion” is different than any other one I’ve ever encountered.

What's your conception of an opinion?

To me am opinion is a belief you have that's not based on facts.

Why do you want your government to have a belief not based on facts? Furthermore, why would you want the government to push this belief on its people?

Lastly why would you care about the opinion (remember: an opinion is a belief that isn't based on facts) of a corporation to the point that you'd defend their right to make statements that aren't factual?

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

#503

Post by leereeves »

singleshot_ wrote: post #494
leereeves wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see why there needs to be any coercion. The offense here is not against the social networks, it's against the people whose speech was suppressed. Whether that suppression was done with threats, requests, subtle hints, or an automated system, if the government's intent was to suppress speech, the means employed make no difference. Edit: imagine an extreme case in which a social network independently created an…

Well, that’s definitely not true. The government can suppress speech when it sends an emergency action alert to commandeer tv and radio stations during an emergency, for one example. The fact is that the means employed make every bit of difference when it comes to whether or not the content based speech restriction is tailored as narrowly as possible to achieve a compelling government interest. On the other hand, may…

I'm obviously not saying the means never make a difference in any case. I'm talking about this case.

I'm saying that using minimal means does not make an unconstitutional action acceptable; you're pointing out that using excessive means can make a constitutional action unacceptable. That's a different situation and not really a reply to my comment or this case.

To make it more relevant, can you point to a single case where a court has ruled that a constitutionally limited action was permitted simply because the means were unintrusive?

A compelling government interest, as you said, could justify the action, but what is the compelling government interest here?

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

#504

Post by snowwrestler »

GeekyBear wrote: post #313
snowwrestler wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speech does not censor speech; this is an essential core of the concept of free speech. If I tell you to take down your comments, I am not censoring you. I’m speaking. It’s only censorship if I can force you to take them down. The same is true for federal officials; just telling someone to shut up is not censorship. Without an actual threat of force, it’s not censorship or intimidation. Note that I’m not arguing that…

> Speech does not censor speech We know from the Twitter document dumps that government officials on both sides of the aisle have been demanding that speech (and speakers) critical of them, their preferred policies and/or their political party be censored. > intimidation requires an actual threat Threatening to yank section 230 of the Communications Decency Act if platforms don't ramp up their censorship is an actual…

Come on, none of the people involved in this case had the power to “yank” Section 230. I feel like you don’t have a solid handle on how government actually works, which is hampering this discussion.

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

#505

Post by ifyoubuildit »

ponow wrote: post #491
staticman2 wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" 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…

> Why should free speech be a right? You cannot be serious.

I think you might be reading something that's not there. Asking the question doesn't imply an answer. And it's probably better if people can answer it rigorously rather than just repeat the claim because everyone else does.

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

#506

Post by afavour »

evandale wrote: post #502
emodendroket wrote: post #487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your conception of what constitutes an “opinion” is different than any other one I’ve ever encountered.

What's your conception of an opinion? To me am opinion is a belief you have that's not based on facts. Why do you want your government to have a belief not based on facts? Furthermore, why would you want the government to push this belief on its people? Lastly why would you care about the opinion (remember: an opinion is a belief that isn't based on facts) of a corporation to the point that you'd defend their right t…

> To me am opinion is a belief you have that's not based on facts.

> Why do you want your government to have a belief not based on facts?

There's some kind of fallacy at work here, you're establishing what your personal definition of something is then arguing with OP while taking your personal belief as fact.

"Opinions are not based on facts" definitely isn't a universally accepted definition of an opinion. An opinion doesn't have to be based on facts but it's not precluded from it.

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

#507

Post by artificialLimbs »

Brusco_RF wrote: post #369
roflyear wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

They don't have enough channels to do that? They have to do it via veiled threat to a speech platform to delete users posts? How can anyone defend this behavior? Just because it's your guy doing it? If Trump was telling Twitter to delete posts that hurt his re-election chances would you feel this same way?

Unbelievable that you're being downvoted at all. The authoritarian minded have definitely increased substantially as this site has become more popular and drawn increasingly larger crowds. When it was dominated by those capable of logic and reasoning and having some knowledge of the world, authoritarianism would get smacked down hard and rightfully so.

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

#508

Post by dragonwriter »

calgarymicro wrote: post #489
dragonwriter wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reading over pages 4 and 5 of the injunction[0], it seems government employees are now barred in any way from discussing any social media content or company policy that isn't explicitly illegal with social media Whether or not any involved content is “explicitly illegal”, they are explicitly permitted to discuss that content so long as it is related to threats to public safety and security of the US, content that m…

Lying about an election to mislead voters on election processes (i.e. time, place, and manner) is illegal.[0] "Threats that threaten the public safety or security of the United States" are also illegal. The judge lists several other things that are also illegal, such as malicious cyber activity and criminal conspiracy, so it doesn't seem like that section is intended to contains exceptions to section 8. [0] https://w…

> Lying about an election to mislead voters is illegal

The big exception is, of course, the last, which covers any content that isn’t protected by the Free Speech Clause whether or not it is expressly illegal.

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

#509

Post by ndr »

DannyBee wrote: post #408
commandlinefan wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why defend them? Because a depressingly large percentage of people would actually like to see the first amendment overturned.

Or, you know, because this is just a preliminary injunction, not a decision on the merits and evidence?

"The Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits in establishing that the Government has used its power to silence the opposition"

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.lawd.18...

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

#510

Post by jasonlotito »

nashashmi wrote: post #428
doitLP wrote: post #20

> Doughty said that one Flaherty [White House director of digital strategy] message in February 2021 accused Facebook "of causing 'political violence' by failing to censor false COVID-19 claims." Flaherty also wrote in a July 2021 email to Facebook, "Are you guys fucking serious? I want an answer on what happened here and I want it today." Sure sounds like a relationship where the power only goes one direction and th…

Now imagine if the same words were used by the trump admin personnel! Left media would scream words like bullying. This gives complete justification and vindication of how the trump admin behaved! Untouchable. This country is officially over.

> Now imagine if the same words were used by the trump admin personnel!

You don't need to imagine. This happened.

> Left media would scream words like bullying.

That you don't know this happened says everything.

> This gives complete justification and vindication of how the trump admin behaved! Untouchable.

No.

> This country is officially over.

Incorrect, again.

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