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Stripe bans Trump campaign

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Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#971

Post by nobody9999 »

nullc wrote: post #819
nobody9999 wrote: post #691

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I said: >If the government were to attempt do as you suggest, the courts would slap them down hard. The issues around Operation Choke Point[0] that you linked to were investigated by Congress and the Department of Justice and, as I said, smacked down hard . The above isn't analogous to the current situation, but the result was exactly as I said it would be. Thanks for making my point for me. [0] https://en.wikipedia.…

Some elements of Operation Choke point were shut down hard, others never even got enough due process to see their day in court. We recently made the prime actors of one of these initiatives the vice president. ( https://reason.com/2019/08/26/secret-memos-show-the-governme... )

So what?

How is that relevant to Stripe? They aren't the government. They're not even one of the top ten biggest payment processors.

I can only conclude that you're not arguing in good faith. More's the pity.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#972

Post by [deleted] »

rayiner wrote: post #799
systemvoltage wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., not "Build a wall and Mexico will pay for it" or outright banning people based on religion (remember Muslim ban?). The problem is that these are not conservative principles. This is just hate spewing, plain and straight.

> There shouldn't be any problem with these discussions when they're posed without hate. Immigration for example should be discussed in terms of cost/benefit and immigration of talent, policies, etc., The idea that immigration is solely about “cost/benefit” and “talent, policies, etc.” is an inherently liberal, and indeed quite radically liberal framing of the issue. The International Convention on Civil and Politica…

[deleted]

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#973

Post by rayiner »

tptacek wrote: post #967
rayiner wrote: post #606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What counts as “horrible hateful speech?” The media has been publishing articles recently with outright racist slurs against white people (using phrases like “unbearable whiteness”). Is that hateful speech? (I think so but then again I’m an elder Millennial.) And does the fact that it’s the President saying something warrant giving him more or less latitude? The right and moral thing to do was to give the duly electe…

I'm surprised you keep bringing this up, because you know the counterargument here. "Whiteness" is in fact a problematic term. Italians, Jewish people, and the Irish have all been excluded from "whiteness" at times. The term expands as needed to provide solidarity against Black people. "Black", on the other hand, is an actual ethnicity --- the one we created when we kidnapped millions of people in Africa and stripped…

So I guess I don’t understand the counter-argument. I assumed you agreed using “whiteness” as a pejorative is a problem.

I agree anti-Black racism is far more destructive. But I’m not trying to establish a hierarchy of the kinds of racism. I think anti-Black racism is far more destructive than anti-Asian racism, but as an Asian I’m pretty happy to see both kinds be deemed taboo in polite society.

We can’t have someone’s skin color being used in pejorative terms, and insofar as there are many people who think it’s acceptable, that only underscores why I’m tremendously skeptical of private sector censorship, where those people will disproportionately be in charge of shaping debate.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#974

Post by Jochim »

yurielt wrote: post #969
Jochim wrote: post #874

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is a clear difference between people clearly going to the same bakery over and over to harass and old guy,There is a clear difference between people clearly going to the same bakery over and over to harass and old guy. Look back a few decades and this is exactly the same argument that segregationists were using. You've basically just said: "That shopowner has a right not to deal with blacks, why do they keep…

Except he was not denying them service just not engaging artistically lol stop being dishonest and trying to compare him to racists that denied service when he only denied artistic expression. From your comments it is quite obvious that you actually know a lot about the case. However you keep conveniently just leaving things out to fit your framing, please just drop the charade and the dishonesty.

The man offered a service where he would produce a cake for your wedding. The man refused to provide that service exclusively to LGBT couples. There's no charade or dishonesty to that at all and it's just as abhorrent as the people that made the same weak argument about potential black customers during segregation. You can try to pretend it's about "artistic expression" but in the end it's about wanting the ability to discriminate against a protected class that you don't like.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#975

Post by ineedasername »

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #600
ineedasername wrote: post #580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the government should instead step in and decide what companies can and can't do with their own services & infrastructure? That sounds a lot more fascist to me than a company saying, up front, "Here's the rules for using our service. Violate them and you can take your business elsewhere." And considering the ToS citations were I service of a potentially criminal act, fascism doesn't enter the picture: This is as m…

> Violate them and you can take your business elsewhere. Here, I fixed it for you: Violate them, and if you are not someone whose political views we support, you can take your business elsewhere.

It's not Twitter's fault that a lot more extreme right people with violent or racist views have suddenly spoke out. That doesn't make Twitter biased.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#976

Post by ineedasername »

imperio59 wrote: post #665
ineedasername wrote: post #503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how it's anti competetive. The free market advocates on HN would say that other people will create other companies and gain the market share current companies have turned down. Or that existing niche companies will find an expanded market serving them. It's also important to note that companies aren't cutting ties with Trump because of his political ideology, they're cutting ties with him because there's…

We could say there is a strong argument Joe Biden and his family broke the law, and indeed there's a criminal investigation into Hunter and associates. However not only did all the big tech companies not withdraw support for Biden or prevent his campaign from using their apps, they doubled down and censored the story so most voters would not hear of it before the elections. Again, big double standards at play here fr…

Biden wasn't using Twitter as one of the tools to commit the crime.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#977

Post by leereeves »

nobody9999 wrote: post #970
leereeves wrote: post #840

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer, and I don't know the details of this case, so I won't speculate about how this case might be resolved under current law. But the general principle I would apply here is that people who own important infrastructure shouldn't be allowed to interfere in elections (Trump 2024 in this case, I assume) by refusing to allow candidates to use that infrastructure. I don't think that's controversial in the cas…

Your argument makes little or no sense to me. 1. When it comes to political actors, forcing a person or organization to support a specific candidate (who isn't even on any ballot at the moment) amounts to political coercion and is antithetical to a free society; 2. Which candidate do you hate the most? If what you were saying was reasonable, then you could be forced to provide material support for that candidate. How…

I'm not comfortable with the idea of "reverse boycotts", in which businesses can hinder candidates by denying them services. That gives business owners far too much power over elections (and Citizens United already gives them too much, IMO). I want democracy, not plutocracy.

> Which candidate do you hate the most? If what you were saying was reasonable, then you could be forced to provide material support for that candidate. How would you feel about that?

Absolutely fine, if that "material support" was merely providing the same business I provide everyone else, at the usual cost. To me, paid services are not "material support", a phrase I would only use to describe in-kind contributions (that is, services provided for free).

And 99% of businesses already act that way. The local office supply store doesn't discriminate based on politics. What's backwards about expecting big tech to act like other businesses?

> Stripe is not a utility like electricity or the phone company. Nor are they anywhere close to a monopoly... [candidates] have other options for online payment processing

That's an important point, and here's the rule I would propose to account for it: treat refusing to do business with a candidate while doing business with their opponent as an in-kind contribution to their opponent. If the cost of finding an alternative is small, denying services will be allowed as a small in-kind contribution.

I'm not a lawyer and I'm talking about how I think things should work, not what the current law is, but I believe that's the legal principle behind the Equal-Time Rule, so it's not entirely legally unprecedented.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#978

Post by tptacek »

rayiner wrote: post #973
tptacek wrote: post #967

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised you keep bringing this up, because you know the counterargument here. "Whiteness" is in fact a problematic term. Italians, Jewish people, and the Irish have all been excluded from "whiteness" at times. The term expands as needed to provide solidarity against Black people. "Black", on the other hand, is an actual ethnicity --- the one we created when we kidnapped millions of people in Africa and stripped…

So I guess I don’t understand the counter-argument. I assumed you agreed using “whiteness” as a pejorative is a problem. I agree anti-Black racism is far more destructive. But I’m not trying to establish a hierarchy of the kinds of racism. I think anti-Black racism is far more destructive than anti-Asian racism, but as an Asian I’m pretty happy to see both kinds be deemed taboo in polite society. We can’t have someon…

Thanks for the response. We are probably closer than I thought we were one RTT ago.

I think pejorative anti-whiteness is problematic as a communication strategy; it's counterproductive and you have to be steeped in a national conversation that only a couple hundred thousand people are having to understand how to take it (and I do not think that's true of anti-Black racism).

I also think that a lot of people selling anti-whiteness as an important doctrine are grifters.

But I also think it would be better for everyone if the term died out. I know it won't; Irish/Czech/Spanish people intermarry with German/Scottish people and their kids have no better term, I guess? But there's a notion that "if Black pride is positive, it should be positive to have White pride as well" which I think is deeply wrong. Maybe it was growing up along the South Side Irish parade route in Chicago that programmed me this way, but I see no evidence of European ethnic heritage being suppressed in the US.

I do not trust Twitter, Facebook, or Amazon to censor appropriately in the least. But that doesn't make it hard for me to evaluate these most recent decisions to cut off violent extremists! I'm fine with them booting Parler and DJT even though I'm less than fine with the idea of them evaluating all speech --- of course, that's one of the reasons 1A advocates so strongly support CDA S230.

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#979

Post by nobody9999 »

jo032 wrote: post #185
nobody9999 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's not a parallel at all. All the Hollywood studios (a bunch of different entities) conspired with each other not to hire those people. Stripe is a single entity and isn't (AFAIK) working with others on the payment processing industry to block a specific set of people/groups. And it's protected (and IMHO, should be) because it's a political organization -- Stripe has the right (as do you or I) to choose whether…

you are being intentionally obtuse. there is obviously a difference between a t shirt vendor and 1/2 of a duopoly on online payments. the other of which also (coincidentally in your view) took the same measures to restrict people from using their services at the exact same time with no realistic alternative

>there is obviously a difference between a t shirt vendor and 1/2 of a duopoly on online payments.

Except there isn't a duopoly in online payments. In fact, Stripe is just one of many (and not anywhere near the largest) payment processors[0].

[0] https://www.business.org/finance/payment-processing/largest-...

Re: Stripe bans Trump campaign

#980

Post by anigbrowl »

gfodor wrote: post #948
anigbrowl wrote: post #735

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's perfectly OK to punch someone back after they've punched you first. You're not obliged to stand there and keep reasoning with them while they hit you again.

Put this in a frame and hang it. It describes war. If that is what you seek, so be it. Everyone argues their war is just. But war is always the same, no matter how just it is. If that is not what you seek, consider how to move towards peace. The worst thing to do is to cause a war when you wanted peace, because you didn't understand what was happening.

Spare me the theatrics. Suggesting that the person getting hit (in this metaphor) is the one seeking war is like an abuser blaming their victim for having made them do the bad thing again.
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