Stripe bans Trump campaign • Hacker News Board

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#581

Post by pixl97 » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:54 AM UTC

koolba wrote: post #349

astura wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stripe (and every other credit card processors) have long refused to do business with a broad amount and types of businesses. For example, Stripe themselves don't serve most travel sites. https://stripe.com/blog/why-some-businesses-arent-allowed It's a super common practice to deny some customers for basically all financial services companies.

If they stopped providing services to all political campaigns that’d be comparable.

If they stopped doing business with groups advocating for the violent overthrow of the government that would he compatible.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#582

Post by cwperkins » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:54 AM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #521

npunt wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self-preservation was certainly a part of why there was inaction, as was financial motive. I also think they were rather naïve about their roles & responsibilities and the real world consequence of their own platforms, as well as lacking in a sophisticated understanding of how to do content moderation or even politics. These topics are both very old (social organizing, radicalization, usenet), and very new (primary m…

In their defense, I agree with you that this is a first time when global internet connectivity + social media + hatespeech cocktail has become poisonous to our societal health. We need to deeply think about all this - allowing peaceful, objective, conservative opinions and policy (such as the Lincoln Project) while condemning hate speech, violence, white supremacy and other racist behavior. "He who fights with monste…

We really do because our discourse is being dominated by crazy voices.

What do you think about this?

Minority, Women-Owned Businesses Get First Bid on New PPP Loans - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-07/minority-...

What about voices like James Lindsay and Christopher Rufo?

We are doubling down on this new era where we are experimenting with the thesis that Discrimination can and will create (long-lasting) Equity. With policies in place for decades like Affirmative Action in the US and BEE in South Africa I'm not convinced in the thesis. Corporations in the US have now went further with more Corporate Affirmative Action programs like Microsofts commitment to hire more Black employees which is being looked into by the Department of Labor as Discrimination (https://abcnews.go.com/Business/department-labor-investigati...). Microsoft is 4.5% Black employees so they are underrepresented as it is.

How do we have discussions on Race? Can Discrimination create Equity?

“The defining question is whether the discrimination is creating equity or inequity. If discrimination is creating equity, then it is antiracist. If discrimination is creating inequity, then it is racist.” ― Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#583

Post by nobody9999 » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:54 AM UTC

johndevor wrote: post #316

avianlyric wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom of speech has nothing to do with newspapers or news, and never has done. It only protects you from government, nothing else. There are legitimate concerns regarding monopolistic behaviour of large digital gatekeepers. But we don’t solve that by deciding to restrict their speech (which is what forced speech would be). You solve it by either making them utilities or breaking them up to create more competition.

> Freedom of speech has nothing to do with newspapers or news, and never has done. If somebody speaks in the woods, and there's nobody there to hear it, do they make a sound? Yes, they technically have free speech, but in reality not really. The purpose of speech is that you might persuade somebody else. If there's nobody to talk to, you might as well not speak at all.

Facebook, Twitter, et al are not public squares.

You can speak all you want in public spaces, on your own property (whether that be your home, your blog or your mastodon instance) mostly without limit.

But Facebook, Twitter, Google, HN or any other private organization is under no obligation to host or amplify your speech.

The government can't censor you and you may speak your mind in public spaces. You may also do so in private spaces, with the permission of the owners of those spaces.

You seem to be under the misapprehension that certain private actors are required to allow your speech. That's not true. They are responsible only to their shareholders and to a lesser extent, their customers -- and in this case their customers are advertisers and not you. You are the product being sold.

If you don't think that's right or fair, then don't interact with those private actors. If enough people chose not to deal with them, they would lose their power and influence.

I voted with my feet years ago. If you haven't, then you're part of the problem and not the solution.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#584

Post by kelnos » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:55 AM UTC

awb wrote: post #562

dukeofdoom wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few issues: 1) The most radicalized are by Q. Which itself is a disinformation campaign, contributed to by government entities. 2) Bernie sanders brags about occupying government buildings. Would he be held to the same standard? OAC praised BLM protesters marching on the White House a few months ago, with Antifa trying to breach police lines and storm the White House. Should we throw her in jail for sedition. How a…

> Bernie sanders brags about occupying government buildings. Would he be held to the same standard? OAC praised BLM protesters marching on the White House a few months ago, with Antifa trying to breach police lines and storm the White House. This is "what about"-ism. It deflects responsibility and puts the focus on other's behavior. In this philosophy for one side to accept that what they did was bad, it requires eve…

> Occupying a building is a form of civil disobedience, which in the US is a respected form of protest.

Assuming the owners of said building do not want you there, occupying a building is at best trespassing and at worst breaking and entering.

Civil disobedience is explicitly breaking a law because you believe it to be unjust, with the full expectation that you will be arrested and possibly punished for your actions.

When most people talk about "protesting", I don't think that's what they're talking about.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#585

Post by nmfisher » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:55 AM UTC

igetspam wrote: post #573

nmfisher wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was more that “just because losing access to Facebook/Twitter means nothing to you, doesn’t mean it means nothing to someone else”. But to more directly address your point, I ask you - what crime has Trump been convicted of?

The private entities are not the justice department. They are not the judiciary. They are not lawyers and they are not juries. They do not require criminal conviction before taking action. Your question is irellevant. But to give you a partial answer anyway: Many criminals are never convicted. Many _known_ criminals are never convicted, due to lack of undeniable proof. Some criminals are convicted on lesser crimes, j…

The question is not “what legal power does Twitter have”. I’m not saying they legally can’t kick him off their platform.

The discussion is whether they should be able to kick someone off their platform who has been convicted of no crime, because of how integral they have become to the political process.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#586

Post by throwawehh » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:56 AM UTC

ashayh wrote: post #460

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just categorizing everyone protesting as "fascists" is ignorant. These people think the election was rigged, and they don't trust institutions. They think that our democracy is at risk, and your solution is to push them, deplatform them, and remove all hope of legal political influence? Reacting to this anxiety with force is going to cause a war if it continues.

> These people think the election was rigged, and they don't trust institutions. The don't come up with these conclusions themselves. Only one very influential "leader", with a Twitter following of 88M, has been claiming elections are a fraud in America: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-longstanding-history-c... https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37673797 Appeasing his followers has been tried for the pas…

I disagree and feel that's a very simplistic explanation. If anything the past four years of democrat reaction to Trump has directly contributed to the situation we're in. The failure to acknowledge this simple fact is startling.

If you were a Trump supporter who was just called a fascist, racist, bigot, white supremacist, uncle tom, unintelligent rube during the past four years, and you watched as the media, hollywood, elites, and democrat party tried everything possible to undermine your legally elected President, including unmasking of family/friends/campaign, bogus 2+ year Russia investigation peddled as fact by the pundits 24/7 7 days a week, impeachment #1, daily conspiracies of all variety, and I could go on; would you trust the outcome of the election?

There were hundreds of sworn affidavits including by democrats and independents, factual things worth investigating if not to simply bring closure to the numerous issues, and the democrats instead not only slammed the door shut, they opened have and continue to deride conservatives & Trump supporters.

How on Earth is it not clear why people don't trust the election results or even more so how we ended up with 50,000+ people in DC and a small subset ending up inside the Capitol building?

To top all of that off, for over 3 months this past summer in multiple cities across the nation, blm/antifa threw very often violent protests that were watered down by the media as "mostly peaceful", despite millions of humans seeing with their own eyes what was happening. People were shot and killed in multiple places, multiple police officers were injured and killed. They tried to storm the White House & Portland Federal building.

How can you still claim it's all due to just one person? I find it to be total nonsense.

I'm sure I'll be downvoted for saying the above, but failure to at least recognize what I'm saying is a colossal mistake. This is what the other side is feeling.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#587

Post by pixl97 » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:56 AM UTC

adventured wrote: post #549

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russian opposition is tamest of the tame, yet, it is routinely deplatformed and prosecuted, guess for what, calls for extremism and violence! And a large portion of population believes that to be true, because government controls most sources of information. I think US might look exactly same in a few years. The mighty benevolent Party will care for thankful citizens, with the exception of a few outcasts who can't ev…

And it's no coincidence that Russian dissident Alexei Navalny spoke out against big tech conspiring together to censor Trump. He sees exactly what they're doing and knows where it leads. All big tech has to do now is tighten the screws further, and they can use their new standard to wipe out any challenger from the right half of the political spectrum before they ever gain traction (whether in media, with payment pro…

Fox news, one of the biggest news organisations in the US, is left?

I'll go with Noam's take on this. There is no liberal media in the US.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#588

Post by DeadReckoning » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:57 AM UTC

This is the start of antitrust against big tech. They’ve made enemies on both sides

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#589

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:58 AM UTC

darkwizard42 wrote: post #443

amelius wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a small market, getting even smaller ...

...which could be viewed as the overall market is deciding not to cater to these views... which is also absolutely legal (and creates a market opportunity for someone else if the group not supported supports it)

[deleted]

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#590

Post by sillypecan » Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 4:59 AM UTC

The real danger isn’t in what people say on a platform where everyone disagrees. It’s going to be what happens when we have divided into different social networks, payment processors, banks, social networks, films, and credit unions. Do you know what you call people you can’t talk to? Enemies. It may be satisfying, but I can’t approve of these actions when I can foresee the horrific conclusion.