761–770 of 783 posts
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…
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You notice there how I was specific about "nazi policies" right? It's to avoid a discussion like this one. I don't care about party affiliation per se, I am talking about advocating specific policies and worldviews. Things like ethnonationism, eugenics, categorizing certain minorities as inherently criminal, white natalism: things that, if you could present them to a 1945-style straw nazi they'd say "yup that's us."…
> Because I do disagree with them, and don't want them here? Is that not the case for you So you would prefer that they congregate in their own private echo chambers, rather than come to a place with differing ideals where their own convictions could be challenged? How can we ever bridge the gap if we push people into their own bubbles?
Debating nazi policies in public forums is already a win for the nazis. You don't debate people out of these views you prevent them accomplishing them. Bridging the gap is some liberal bullshit. If they want to repent and rejoin polite society the path is well established.
These people will kill you if you stand in their way. The fact that you don't perceive that as a real threat means you are not standing in their way. Debating their talking points in their venue of choice is not standing in their way; you tell because they're happy to do it.
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> That doesn't appear to have happened That appears to be exactly what has been happening. It seems we disagree on this point.
> That appears to be exactly what has been happening. None of the Twitter Files involve a government order to censor speech. There's begging, cajoling, suggesting, implying, etc., but they don't have the power to order in most of these cases, and that's evidenced by the fact that quite a bit of the time the social networks said no . Do feel free to cite an actual order to suppress speech that we can specifically disc…
Several of the Twitter Files have given concrete examples of Government officials providing lists of specific examples of speech and/or speakers that they want censored.
Again, here's an example that has already been provided in this sub-thread:
> We released a list of 354 names Maine Senate Angus King wanted taken down for reasons like “Rand Paul visit excitement,” “followed by [former Republican opponent Eric] Brakey,” and my personal favorite, “mentions immigration.” For balance we also released a letter from a Republican official at the State Department, Mark Lenzi, who tells Twitter about 14 real Americans “you may want to look into and delete.”
https://www.racket.news/p/capsule-summaries-of-all-twitter
All of which were backed up by threats from both parties that if the platforms do not do more to censor speech the politicians will get rid of the legal immunity platforms have traditionally had (going back to the postal service, telegraph systems, and the phone company) that those platforms are not legally liable for the contents of the speech of others sent through their system.
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I'm not sure what you think this changes about what I said. It's literally not a merits decision. There are even plenty of times they get issued and dissolved days later.
"Temporary restraining orders" (TROs) are extremely preliminary. This is not a TRO. This is a "preliminary injunction" (PI). A PI is a different phase of the case. Granting a PI is extremely an significant and consequential action by the judge. Think about it this way-- if the judge is right and conservative voices were suppressed-- the PI has the potential to change the political landscape in which the legal challen…
PI's exist to maintain status quo. It's not that interesting. What evidence standards are used also varies a lot (some courts only use admissible evidence, some do not).
In this case, it will likely be overturned on standing grounds, for example, fairly quickly, if not other grounds.
It has tons of problems everywhere. On standing, for example, it clearly ignores binding supreme court precedent - the court decided, with basically no discussion of why, the states have parens patriae standing to sue on behalf of their citizens in cases like this, but they literally do not, and haven't forever (going back >100 years). I expect this will be raised almost instantly in the request for a stay.
Actually, i just found the stay request, they already filed it:
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.lawd.18...
"This Court concluded that Plaintiff States have standing under a parens patriae theory despite the Supreme Court’s clear statement that “[a] State does not have standing as parens patriae to bring an action against the Federal Government.” Alfred L. Snapp & Son, Inc. v. Puerto Rico, 458 U.S. 592 (1982); Haaland v. Brackeen, 143 S. Ct. 1609, 1640 (2023)."
"The Court also held that all Plaintiffs have standing despite their failure to present any evidence of ongoing or imminent harm. See Attala Cnty., Miss. Branch of NAACP v. Evans, 37 F.4th 1038, 1042 (5th Cir. 2022). Additionally, the Court’s conclusion that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their First Amendment claims fails to properly apply state-action doctrine and ignores the voluminous evidence presented by Defendants that contradicts Plaintiffs’ conclusory allegations."
I don't think this injunction is gonna stand very long.
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It's still rooted in evidence, and that evidence doesn't need to be conclusive. This was to say the injunction is not completely on a whim, agreed on everything else you wrote.
Kinda. It depends on whether you mean the legal definition of admissible evidence or just "stuff" It is mostly meta evidence - statements about what evidence will show at trial. Which assumes it's valid and admissible and actually shows that and .... In this case, this isn't on a whim but I wouldn't say it's on the evidence either - especially given the consistent misquotes.
They were not particularly diplomatic on the evidence part: "Additionally, the Court’s conclusion that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their First Amendment claims fails to properly apply state-action doctrine and ignores the voluminous evidence presented by Defendants that contradicts Plaintiffs’ conclusory allegations."
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"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." They literally did not. This is a preliminary injunction, not a decision on the merits. This is why the court is clear they are allegations, etc. There is a ton of issues with this injunction and rationale, and it will almost ce…
>> This is why the court is clear they are allegations "Plaintiffs have shown that not only have the Defendants shown willingness to coerce and/or to give significant encouragement to social-media platforms to suppress free speech with regard to the COVID-19 pandemic and national elections, they have also shown a willingness to do it with regard to other issues, such as gas prices, parody speech, calling the Presiden…
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"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." They literally did not. This is a preliminary injunction, not a decision on the merits. This is why the court is clear they are allegations, etc. There is a ton of issues with this injunction and rationale, and it will almost ce…
The injunction is quite harsh and I agree that it's likely to be seriously modified in its final form. As fare as predictions go do you think the gov will come out clean or it'll end with "gov did a bad thing"? And if so will _you_ come back and say "i guess the government did do a bad thing"?
Honestly - it's hard to say. I think it will be that some people in the government asked for things they shouldn't have (let's ignore if they are illegal things or not or whatever for a second). The government is big. My experience with any large company discovery is that somebody somewhere says or does something stupid. It's hard to believe that won't be the case for the government here[1] :)
I think some people take the view that's okay (despite imbalance of power), and others think they should only be allowed to ask for things that are affirmatively okay.
Historically, the court result has been the former, though usually it's closer to "state/feds pass law saying x, ask you to do x, law gets overturned as not okay".
I think it may be decided to be closer to the middle now if it makes it to SCOTUS - but i'm not sure what that looks like. It's hard to come up with bright line standards, but bad facts make bad law - if the there are senior officials ordering censorship, ....
I don't think folks will go all the way to saying the government may not ask for things that later may be decided to be illegal to ask for.
[1] I would personally be much more concerned if it was senior officials vs random worker bees. Unlike some corporations, the government is actually pretty darn good at retaining evidence,etc. So if senior officials ordered it, the likelihood of a record existing is much much higher than "CEO who verbally tells a junior software engineer to do something bad" or whatever.
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The injunction is quite harsh and I agree that it's likely to be seriously modified in its final form. As fare as predictions go do you think the gov will come out clean or it'll end with "gov did a bad thing"? And if so will _you_ come back and say "i guess the government did do a bad thing"?
First, i always admit when i'm wrong, you can find plenty of examples on HN :) I don't go through life pretending i will always be right, and I try to learn from the times i get it wrong :) As for what will happen - Honestly - it's hard to say. I think it will be that some people in the government asked for things they shouldn't have (let's ignore if they are illegal things or not or whatever for a second). The gover…
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You're going to have to do better than linking to a verified Twitter user if you want most people to take you seriously. Just the fact you get your news from Twitter makes me think you're just spouting what you heard in your echo chamber.
Twitter and Substack are the only places a post like this isn’t censored: https://twitter.com/jathorpmfm/status/1677001591407116296 On Reddit/Facebook it just gets banned. I regularly read /r/Covid19 to see the fraudulent studies they push so I can counter them with my own studies. Like the Twitter guy says it’s their side that doesn’t want debate.
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"Temporary restraining orders" (TROs) are extremely preliminary. This is not a TRO. This is a "preliminary injunction" (PI). A PI is a different phase of the case. Granting a PI is extremely an significant and consequential action by the judge. Think about it this way-- if the judge is right and conservative voices were suppressed-- the PI has the potential to change the political landscape in which the legal challen…
I'm aware of TRO vs PI's, i'm a lawyer :) PI's exist to maintain status quo. It's not that interesting. What evidence standards are used also varies a lot (some courts only use admissible evidence, some do not). In this case, it will likely be overturned on standing grounds, for example, fairly quickly, if not other grounds. It has tons of problems everywhere. On standing, for example, it clearly ignores binding supr…