Biden Administration Faces Preliminary Injunction Against Putting Pressure on Social Media

[tabzer]

Who doesn't love Sam Jackson?

People who love Samuel L. Jackson, motherfucker.

 

[Foxi4]

Okay now boys, we had our giggle and we all used a couple swear words - with blessings of Saint Jackson, I think we can move along, before this turns into the EOF.

 

[tabzer]

I think we can move along, before this turns into the EOF.

Afraid of being promoted?

 

[Foxi4]

Afraid of being promoted?

I was king of EOF long before you came up with your first shitpost, don’t threaten me with a good time when you know you won’t be able to keep up.

 

[tabzer]

I'm just baiting for it. I don't need to be involved afterwards, do I?

Oh. On a completely unrelated note. Is that a bannable offense?

 

[Maq47]

With McCarthy at the helm, they're Noah's Ark without a captain, and the monkeys are flinging shit everywhere.

Oh, this is GOLD. I'm saving this quote somewhere.

 

[tabzer]

Oh, this is GOLD. I'm saving this quote somewhere.

He should start a blog.

 

[supermist]

You’re clearly more interested in doing your own thing instead of sticking to the topic, so I’m just going to ignore your attempts at detailing the thread.

Cop out.

 

[Jayro]

Cracking down on the spread of misinformation vs. censoring "free speech" are two very different things. Sure, you can *freely* spread fake news, false "covid vaccine kills people" nonsense, etc... but that doesn't exempt you from consequences, like having the misinformation you posted be removed from public view and/or being banned from the platform for such offenses. Especially if it's in the private company's TOS agreement.

Consequences... Funny word, that one. It's something always being overlooked by the right-wing nutjobs when they're flying off the handle.

 

[Foxi4]

Cracking down on the spread of misinformation vs. censoring "free speech" are two very different things. Sure, you can *freely* spread fake news, false "covid vaccine kills people" nonsense, etc... but that doesn't exempt you from consequences, like having the misinformation you posted be removed from public view and/or being banned from the platform for such offenses. Especially if it's in the private company's TOS agreement.

Consequences... Funny word, that one. It's something always being overlooked by the right-wing nutjobs when they're flying off the handle.

I don’t think anyone has a problem with a platform removing content that is not compliant with their TOS or community standards. SM’s are private companies, they get to decide what is or isn’t hosted on their servers or who gets to use them. You cross into murky territory when the government starts exerting pressure on them to censor content - that’s what’s not acceptable, and arguably unconstitutional.

 

[Xzi]

I don’t think anyone has a problem with a platform removing content that is not compliant with their TOS or community standards. SM’s are private companies, they get to decide what is or isn’t hosted on their servers or who gets to use them. You cross into murky territory when the government starts exerting pressure on them to censor content - that’s what’s not acceptable, and arguably unconstitutional.

Where does hosted/promoted content cross the line into being unconstitutional, though? Seems like stochastic terrorism is probably a good bet, and I can think of at least one platform which fights tooth and nail to allow for it. There has to be some mechanism by which third-party moderation is introduced when the original moderators are just there for decorative purposes.

 

[Jayro]

I don’t think anyone has a problem with a platform removing content that is not compliant with their TOS or community standards. SM’s are private companies, they get to decide what is or isn’t hosted on their servers or who gets to use them. You cross into murky territory when the government starts exerting pressure on them to censor content - that’s what’s not acceptable, and arguably unconstitutional.

Most right-wing nonsense is anti-government, so I can't really blame the government for wanting to step in there.

Post automatically merged: Jul 8, 2023

There has to be some mechanism by which third-party moderation is introduced when the original moderators are just there for decorative purposes.

Sounds like Discord, 100%.

 

[Kurt91]

Cracking down on the spread of misinformation vs. censoring "free speech" are two very different things. Sure, you can *freely* spread fake news, false "covid vaccine kills people" nonsense, etc... but that doesn't exempt you from consequences, like having the misinformation you posted be removed from public view and/or being banned from the platform for such offenses. Especially if it's in the private company's TOS agreement.

Consequences... Funny word, that one. It's something always being overlooked by the right-wing nutjobs when they're flying off the handle.

Nobody's said anything about consequences for what you say. They're talking about the government censoring people in a way that simply screams "We found a loophole!". If the sites themselves decide to ban you for what you say, all the power to them. I'm sure a number of people banned on this site were removed because of what they said/did on this site. I have no argument against that whatsoever.

It's when the government steps in and coerces the site into banning and censoring people that there's an issue. That's not just "consequences for what you say", that's flat-out censorship. That's what people are upset about and what the discussion is about.

If I hire a hitman to kill somebody for me, that's still me breaking the law and getting charged with murder. If I blackmail somebody to kill for me, that's STILL me breaking the law and getting charged with murder. The end result still gets tracked back to me and I get punished for it. Taking that logic towards this, if the government is pressuring/blackmailing a website into censoring/banning/deplatforming/removing somebody to silence them, that is still the government censoring free speech. The website wouldn't have done so without the government making them do it.

 

[Xzi]

It's when the government steps in and coerces the site into banning and censoring people that there's an issue. That's not just "consequences for what you say", that's flat-out censorship. That's what people are upset about and what the discussion is about.

If I hire a hitman to kill somebody for me, that's still me breaking the law and getting charged with murder. If I blackmail somebody to kill for me, that's STILL me breaking the law and getting charged with murder. The end result still gets tracked back to me and I get punished for it. Taking that logic towards this, if the government is pressuring/blackmailing a website into censoring/banning/deplatforming/removing somebody to silence them, that is still the government censoring free speech. The website wouldn't have done so without the government making them do it.

The problem is that Republicans are trying to protect criminal activity by conflating it with "free speech." I say social media sites that don't remove such content in a timely manner should be held liable for it, along with the person that posted it. That would be consistent with laws against sites hosting pirated content, and downloading an illegitimate copy of Tears of the Kingdom isn't exactly equivelant to doxxing someone or sending them death threats.

 

[KingVamp]

We have a guy who keeps egging on people, even after Jan 6. Deplatforming should be the least of his problems.

NewsMax being forced off of cable also helped.

Aren't they back on?

 

[Xzi]

Aren't they back on?

I don't know, haven't been keeping track.

 

[Kurt91]

The problem is that Republicans are trying to protect criminal activity by conflating it with "free speech." I say social media sites that don't remove such content in a timely manner should be held liable for it, along with the person that posted it. That would be consistent with laws against sites hosting pirated content, and downloading an illegitimate copy of Tears of the Kingdom isn't exactly equivelant to doxxing someone or sending them death threats.

For a site the size of Facebook or Twitter or whatever, I would do things slightly differently.

I don't trust AI to auto-moderate things, but I would be fine if it tagged posts and sent the posts for manual review. Posts that are both tagged by the AI as well as reported by actual users would be bumped up the priority list. (Also, users reporting a post would direct the AI to double-check said post ASAP as an initial measure to ensure if necessary, it makes it onto the moderation list, but it would not take direct action itself) Anything that comes up that is obviously illegal under laws that existed at the time of the original posting would be forwarded to the authorities, as they are already illegal. Anything that is illegal under current laws that did NOT exist at the time of the original posting would be removed and replaced with a notice that explains the reason and points out the specific law that the post violates. (It would not be fair to punish somebody for something that was perfectly fine at the time.)

I would consider something like this enough to be considered good-faith moderation and prevent the social media sites from being held liable, under the final condition that some sort of authority were to perform periodic inspections of the moderation policies on the company's side to ensure that they aren't doing anything like drastically understaffing or underfunding or whatever. After all, even with a process like this, the sheer size of these websites means that occasional things are very likely to slip through the cracks and remain unnoticed for a length of time.

This whole thing would be specifically for ILLEGAL content only. Anything submitted that does not break a specific law would be the same penalty as filing a false police report. The government does NOT get to step in and insist that something that does not break any existing laws gets removed. If the site wants to simply moderate and remove anything that goes against their specific policies, they're free to do so.

Finally, and this is personal preference, I wouldn't know exactly how something like this would be enforced, but it needs to be fully legal for absolutely any government correspondence with these social media sites be transcribed and posted on a front page or something, for 100% transparency with no legal method for government retribution. And no, you can't complain that it would be detrimental or dangerous, I'm pretty sure that the government shouldn't be sharing volatile secrets of national security with a social media site for any reason.

 

[Xzi]

I don't trust AI to auto-moderate things, but I would be fine if it tagged posts and sent the posts for manual review. Posts that are both tagged by the AI as well as reported by actual users would be bumped up the priority list. (Also, users reporting a post would direct the AI to double-check said post ASAP as an initial measure to ensure if necessary, it makes it onto the moderation list, but it would not take direct action itself) Anything that comes up that is obviously illegal under laws that existed at the time of the original posting would be forwarded to the authorities, as they are already illegal. Anything that is illegal under current laws that did NOT exist at the time of the original posting would be removed and replaced with a notice that explains the reason and points out the specific law that the post violates. (It would not be fair to punish somebody for something that was perfectly fine at the time.)

I would consider something like this enough to be considered good-faith moderation and prevent the social media sites from being held liable, under the final condition that some sort of authority were to perform periodic inspections of the moderation policies on the company's side to ensure that they aren't doing anything like drastically understaffing or underfunding or whatever. After all, even with a process like this, the sheer size of these websites means that occasional things are very likely to slip through the cracks and remain unnoticed for a length of time.

This whole thing would be specifically for ILLEGAL content only. Anything submitted that does not break a specific law would be the same penalty as filing a false police report. The government does NOT get to step in and insist that something that does not break any existing laws gets removed. If the site wants to simply moderate and remove anything that goes against their specific policies, they're free to do so.

This doesn't fix the problem if the human moderators are also in support of allowing the site to host criminal activity, though. With the exception of Twitter, all the 'mainstream' social media sites do a pretty good job of removing that stuff quickly. It's more the 'Truth Socials' of the world that are consistently and persistently crossing the line.

 

[Foxi4]

Most right-wing nonsense is anti-government, so I can't really blame the government for wanting to step in there.

Free speech is specifically protected for the purposes of criticising the government (among other reasons), be it rightfully or wrongly. You just listed one of the core reasons why it’s protected speech under the First Amendment.

Where does hosted/promoted content cross the line into being unconstitutional, though? Seems like stochastic terrorism is probably a good bet, and I can think of at least one platform which fights tooth and nail to allow for it. There has to be some mechanism by which third-party moderation is introduced when the original moderators are just there for decorative purposes.

The First Amendment is a limitation placed on the government, not the platform. If it’s not illegal, it is necessarily protected and a moderation decision is up to the platform. I don’t know what’s confusing here. We already know that the government has access to special portals which fast track moderation of posts that contain illegal content - that’s your mechanism.

 

[Kurt91]

This doesn't fix the problem if the human moderators are also in support of allowing the site to host criminal activity, though.

Did you miss the part about the "authority performing periodic inspections" I mentioned? Easy solution.

Once a post has reached moderation, whether it gets removed or not, a hidden little flag gets ticked to mark that it's already gone through moderation, and the moderator's name in particular is put there. First of all, this would work as an efficiency viewpoint because it prevents re-moderating the same content multiple times when it's not necessary. Second, it would be easy to have a random number of these posts that supposedly passed moderation get sent to the inspecting authority during said inspections to verify that illegal content is not passing through, and (if it does happen) the moderator responsible being listed for investigation on whether it was an honest mistake, such as clicking the wrong button (totally understandable, people do make mistakes, especially on repetitive tasks), or if it's a pattern of "mistakes" indicating that it's being done intentionally.