this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2023
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Like it or not (I don't), free speech has nothing to do with social media. Platforms are free to do this, it's the government that can't limit your speech like this.
Given those circumstances, I wonder if social media should be treated like infrastructure. That would fuse constitutional rights and the platform itself.
Free speech has nothing to do with social media or governments. Freedom of speech is a universal, natural right that has been with our species since we gained the power of speech through evolution.
yeah not sure about that. Most of human history would say freedom of speech (and most of the concept of natural rights) is a rather newish ideology. In the past, speaking negatively of higher powers (religious organizations, ruling class, etc) could lead to sanctions, imprisonment, or death and that is still very much the case in many countries to this day. We can argue _____ is a "natural right" till you have arthritis in your hand joints but you have to be blind to think governments have nothing to do with it and its enforcement. In a utopia, maybe it is granted naturally on birth but in reality it is a "right" that has to be "fought" for (legally or with arms). Like are you seriously arguing the people of North Kor... Sorry, I mean the Democratic People's Republic of Korea are born with this "natural right" of free speech but if they dare use it they and possibly their immediate family may be subject to torture, rape, reeducation camps, and/or work camps.
I would agree. As long as it doesn't violate the law, people should have the right to express their opinions freely. But nowadays it's getting pretty hard to do so.
I mean it depends, what are you talking about? Yeah I can see the point of not arresting people for dropping the N word or something or maybe doing a Hitler salute but are you referring to people using their own freedom of speech to argue/debate one's own opinion? Maybe a companies right to associate with only those it choose to do so with (unless that discrimination is against those of protected classes). Like no company would probably want to be associated with a known verbal racist, it just hurts their possibility to get new clients or possibly sever current client relations. The reason why many companies go "woke" or stray to the left is because companies never want to have one of their advertisements right next to a Nazi/race supremacist rant, people will start associating the company with what their ad is paying for. Elon is learning in the most ass backwards way of why Twitter did X thing, in this case why twitter wasn't the "haven" of free speech is because advertisers don't want this and advertisers are the ones who pay a hefty chunk of the bills.