Free Speech and Twitter
The broadest form of the argument in support of an absolutist view on the right to free speech is that it is through argument that we reach higher truth. Only through the exchange of ideas can society evolve its knowledge base. Should we wish to evolve intellectually as a society, we cannot stifle speech, but must let the ignorant speak freely so that their ignorance can be corrected. This position is summarized in this quote from John Stuart Mill:
"The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error."
His position was not new, but was consistent with the times, as the same principle had already been enshrined in the First Amendment to the US Constitution prior to his birth:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
The two are different is particulars, but the same generally. Mill's position was philosophical, applying in all instances, whereas the Constitution's concern was solely in limiting the government's ability to control speech, but making no suggestion that free speech be protected in other contexts. In both instances, however, the right to speak is of the highest order.
Before getting to Twitter, a very cursory overview of the history of the press is in order. Historically, the power of the press has been in the hands of the very few. From the invention of the printing press, those who had access to it, and the paper and distribution means available to them, had a disproportionately loud voice. The same held true when new mass media means were created. Those who published newspapers, transmitted over radio waves, had access to television transmissions, and those who had access to cable transmissions held the power to communicate as they saw fit, while the rest of us could only hope to have our letter to the editor accepted for publication.
Twitter, and other forms of internet communications, has broken down many of the barriers in the past, giving the power of mass communication to regular people in their living rooms. This should come as great news to Mill, as this wide open communication will allow all ignorance to be explored and erased.
Of course, that doesn't seem to be what's going on though.
It would seem counterintuitive that we might today harken back to the days when mass communication was a purely elitist enterprise, controlled by a handful of corporate executives. Were those actually the good old days, when we could trust our news sources to do their best to be accurate and honest?
The position I'm taking, and your thoughts and objections to this is what I am seeking, is that free speech absolutism (a title Elon Musk has given himself) is not an ideal, but places the considerable power of the press in undeserving hands, whose objective isn't to seek higher truths and dispense with ignorance, but is for their own personal gain and self-promotion.
So what is the solution I'm suggesting? We only need to look at the journalistic ethics previously demanded when mass media existed on a smaller scale. An example of them are here: https://www.medialook.al/en/the-5-principles-of-ethical-journalism/
"1. Truth and Accuracy
Journalists cannot always guarantee truth, but getting the facts right is the cardinal principle of journalism. We should always strive for accuracy, give all the relevant facts we have and ensure that they have been checked. When we cannot corroborate information we should say so.
2. Independence
Journalists must be independent voices; we should not act, formally or informally, on behalf of special interests whether political, corporate or cultural. We should declare to our editors or the audience any of our political affiliations, financial arrangements or other personal information that might constitute a conflict of interest.
3. Fairness and Impartiality
Most stories have at least two sides. While there is no obligation to present every side in every piece, stories should be balanced and add context. Objectivity is not always possible, and may not always be desirable (in the face for example of brutality or inhumanity), but impartial reporting builds trust and confidence.
4. Humanity
Journalists should do no harm. What we publish or broadcast may be hurtful, but we should be aware of the impact of our words and images on the lives of others.
5. Accountability
A sure sign of professionalism and responsible journalism is the ability to hold ourselves accountable. When we commit errors we must correct them and our expressions of regret must be sincere not cynical. We listen to the concerns of our audience. We may not change what readers write or say but we will always provide remedies when we are unfair."
While perhaps the government should not enforce these rules (as noted in the 1st Amendment), Mill's ideal cannot be accomplished without an adherence to these standards. Nothing is gained by knowingly promoting false, harmful, unapologetic, unexamined claims. Musk's assertion that he is an absolutist is better stated as that he is simply an unethical journalist. Equating a review board to a censorship committee is to argue there should be no ethical oversight.
I also think it's not a coincidence that those who have chosen journalism as a degree have the most regret (87%). https://thepostmillennial.com/journalism-is-most-regretted-major-for-college-grads. It's impossible to compete and be ethical at the same time.
So, my point is that if we wish to extract the good from free speech, instead of treating free speech like a holy rite, we have to have institutions that are willing to enforce rules on that speech (much like our world class mod team here).
I also want to give credit here, to this article, for sparking many of these ideas: https://philosophynow.org/issues/151/Mill_Free_Speech_and_Social_Media#:~:text=Mill%E2%80%99s%20Argument%20For%20Free%20Speech
"The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error."
His position was not new, but was consistent with the times, as the same principle had already been enshrined in the First Amendment to the US Constitution prior to his birth:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
The two are different is particulars, but the same generally. Mill's position was philosophical, applying in all instances, whereas the Constitution's concern was solely in limiting the government's ability to control speech, but making no suggestion that free speech be protected in other contexts. In both instances, however, the right to speak is of the highest order.
Before getting to Twitter, a very cursory overview of the history of the press is in order. Historically, the power of the press has been in the hands of the very few. From the invention of the printing press, those who had access to it, and the paper and distribution means available to them, had a disproportionately loud voice. The same held true when new mass media means were created. Those who published newspapers, transmitted over radio waves, had access to television transmissions, and those who had access to cable transmissions held the power to communicate as they saw fit, while the rest of us could only hope to have our letter to the editor accepted for publication.
Twitter, and other forms of internet communications, has broken down many of the barriers in the past, giving the power of mass communication to regular people in their living rooms. This should come as great news to Mill, as this wide open communication will allow all ignorance to be explored and erased.
Of course, that doesn't seem to be what's going on though.
It would seem counterintuitive that we might today harken back to the days when mass communication was a purely elitist enterprise, controlled by a handful of corporate executives. Were those actually the good old days, when we could trust our news sources to do their best to be accurate and honest?
The position I'm taking, and your thoughts and objections to this is what I am seeking, is that free speech absolutism (a title Elon Musk has given himself) is not an ideal, but places the considerable power of the press in undeserving hands, whose objective isn't to seek higher truths and dispense with ignorance, but is for their own personal gain and self-promotion.
So what is the solution I'm suggesting? We only need to look at the journalistic ethics previously demanded when mass media existed on a smaller scale. An example of them are here: https://www.medialook.al/en/the-5-principles-of-ethical-journalism/
"1. Truth and Accuracy
Journalists cannot always guarantee truth, but getting the facts right is the cardinal principle of journalism. We should always strive for accuracy, give all the relevant facts we have and ensure that they have been checked. When we cannot corroborate information we should say so.
2. Independence
Journalists must be independent voices; we should not act, formally or informally, on behalf of special interests whether political, corporate or cultural. We should declare to our editors or the audience any of our political affiliations, financial arrangements or other personal information that might constitute a conflict of interest.
3. Fairness and Impartiality
Most stories have at least two sides. While there is no obligation to present every side in every piece, stories should be balanced and add context. Objectivity is not always possible, and may not always be desirable (in the face for example of brutality or inhumanity), but impartial reporting builds trust and confidence.
4. Humanity
Journalists should do no harm. What we publish or broadcast may be hurtful, but we should be aware of the impact of our words and images on the lives of others.
5. Accountability
A sure sign of professionalism and responsible journalism is the ability to hold ourselves accountable. When we commit errors we must correct them and our expressions of regret must be sincere not cynical. We listen to the concerns of our audience. We may not change what readers write or say but we will always provide remedies when we are unfair."
While perhaps the government should not enforce these rules (as noted in the 1st Amendment), Mill's ideal cannot be accomplished without an adherence to these standards. Nothing is gained by knowingly promoting false, harmful, unapologetic, unexamined claims. Musk's assertion that he is an absolutist is better stated as that he is simply an unethical journalist. Equating a review board to a censorship committee is to argue there should be no ethical oversight.
I also think it's not a coincidence that those who have chosen journalism as a degree have the most regret (87%). https://thepostmillennial.com/journalism-is-most-regretted-major-for-college-grads. It's impossible to compete and be ethical at the same time.
So, my point is that if we wish to extract the good from free speech, instead of treating free speech like a holy rite, we have to have institutions that are willing to enforce rules on that speech (much like our world class mod team here).
I also want to give credit here, to this article, for sparking many of these ideas: https://philosophynow.org/issues/151/Mill_Free_Speech_and_Social_Media#:~:text=Mill%E2%80%99s%20Argument%20For%20Free%20Speech
Comments (156)
Quoting Hanover
That's it in a nutshell.
But Hanover, where does the censorship end? What about the greased precipice?
Seriously, though, I think the argument in favor of free speech absolutism is more often that it is binary - either free speech exists and all speech is allowed, or speech is limited and it doesn't exist - and you definitely should want it to exist, whether because it advances knowledge through dialogue or censorship is a slippery slope.
But I don't know about applying the same kind of scrutiny we apply to journalists to regular people. I think most people qualify as unethical journalists, honestly. I mean, who on this forum actually abides by those principles all that consistently?
Not to mention it would be a tremendous pain in the ass to actually sift through shitty far-right and far-left memes all day looking for people not acting like ethical journalists. It only even works on this forum because you guys shut off the inflow of shit-posters and trolls - some of which still get through.
Can we really evaluate intention so easily as to actually say that with any confidence? Musk would have Twitter open to anyone. He might remove the restrictions, but I don't see how that equates to giving power to anyone in particular, even if the worst oftentimes rises to the surface. It is not so predictable who will be heard over the din, and intent is not always apparent.
I would say that the discourse that develops with less limits on speech is somewhat stochastic, insofar as trends can be recognized - but you cannot always point directly to the cause of a bad outcome as it relates to the speech of someone specific. So, it makes little sense to go on a banning spree to reduce far-right extremism, but it makes sense to directly address speech found to be problematic, as it operates against that which is problematic from within the discourse, which is desirable.
The alternative is to put the power to limit free speech in undeserving hands - those of the government. And rights were enshrined into constitutions and human rights declarations exactly because governments could not be trusted with protecting them.
It appears that rather than extract the good from free speech you would prefer to extract the good from censorship. I say this because only through censorship can you eliminate the kinds of speech you do not like, and enforce the ones you do. This is far more terrifying than having to read some false or silly opinion, in my mind. You could apply those journalistic standards towards your own speech, like anyone else, and we would all be the better for witnessing the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error, as per Mill; but now we are on the path to denying even that.
I like what Karl Jaspers said of censorship. He knew a little about it, having lived under a Nazi publication ban. Censorship doesnt make anything better. Both censorship and freedom will be abused. The question is simply: which abuse is preferable? Wheres the greater prospect? Censorship leads to both the suppression of truth and its distortion, while freedom only leads to its distortion. Suppression is absolute, but distortion can be straightened out by freedom itself.
Suppression is absolute, and in that sense the advocate of censorship is an absolutist. Even if we were to legislate truth and enforce truth-telling, we risk placing considerable power of the censor in undeserving hands, whose objective isn't to seek higher truths and dispense with ignorance, but is for their own personal gain and self-promotion. Weve seen this recently with the growing number of state laws criminalizing fake news and misinformation, which have invariably been used to stifle dissent and criticism, such as in Egypt and China. With such rules we create an Official Truth, which is far more dangerous to inquiry and higher-truths. At least with free speech we have a chance to compete with such power on an even playing field.
Hanover says he doesn't think the government should necessarily enforce the ethical standards he proposes.
Took a little under two hours this time.
For what?
For you to mention the Nazis.
And he would be right. So who else would be given that power? Which ever way you wish to go about limiting free speech, the cure is worse than the disease.
Some sort of advisory board like the mods of this website, apparently. Logistically unfeasible unless it is only applied to public figures.
Just a point of fact. No matter the political party the aims for censorship are largely similar.
Probably, yes. But we do trust the mods of this site by and large, don't we? They have opinions, but when they get out of line they are reprimanded or even banned.
edit: and they are 100% essential, too
There is always censorship do to lack of resources, meaning those who publish do so only after securing the means to publish from those owning the means of publication. Musk is the censor, and should he allow greater exposure to those based upon the interest they garner, then his standard of censorship is based upon popularity. As I would suggest, since resources are limited, publication should be based upon standards aimed at presenting truth, as opposed to the arbitrary standard of who can yell loudest. Those standards were itemized in my post.
The idea that my voice is heard at the level of Trump's is false, which has nothing to do with free speech. It has to do with supply and demand. If speech ought be free on the basis of it being a market commodity I can offer as I choose, that is a far different basis than what Mill suggested for why speech ought be unregulated. That has nothing to do with elevating intellectual discourse, but has to do with a libertarian market view.
I'd prefer the now antiquated concept of self regulation, where news outlets adhere to journalistic standards. That used to be a thing.
Government censorship is an evil to be sure, but so is government propoganda. Should Trump or Biden or their minions post false information, is that not propoganda?
I suppose we'll wait and see, and maybe he'll censor reasonably. I only know he proclaimed himself a free speech absolutist and reopened previously closed accounts.
The Nazis were better known for Goebbels and the use of the media for propoganda. Why do you prefer the free exercise of propoganda by government actors and supporters over its regulation?
Why is one poison preferable over the other?
I'm not sure how this fits into the discussion. It seems like governments in the US are turning toward more regulation for social media sites. I've heard that there is some talk about treating them as public utilities like the phone, electric power, gas, water, and sewer utilities. This would allow the government to have a role in how they are operated and who can have access. I don't know how I feel about that.
I'll bite. What if slavery was legal. Or some other "one-day-to-be" widely condemned practice or belief that goes on commonplace in society that we have yet to determine is grossly inhumane.
Legally (last I checked) if I wanted to I could create a self-hosted private website or blog stating that I dislike "X people" and think they do not deserve to exist. This is passive. Generally speaking if it were active ie. actively recruiting others into a tangible collective that creates real and imminent danger to "X people", that is no longer free speech. Similar to how people can die if you shout "fire" in a crowded theater or that a random stranger on the street just sexually assaulted your child. Interestingly enough even telling someone you know cannot fight that another person who is extremely skilled in fighting is calling them very offensive names, or slept with their wife, etc. All these things can get people killed. "Free speech" is a relative amendment of an absolute, that absolute being "right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness". It is conditional and only exists when the absolute is present and not obstructed.
Moreover, the difference between the online environment and real life is in public (not private homes or establishments that many people mistake as true "public areas") there are the following laws along the lines of: "inciting a riot" (that guy's a terrorist!), "disturbing the peace" (shouting offensive things), "assault" (yelling in someone's face or stating intent to harm), "harassment" (anything short of the aforementioned) that can pretty much shut you up in any and all scenarios where said speech would become a problem (ie. the relative does not exist because the absolute is not applicable). This is a real legal action performed with an authorized law enforcement officer and the person directly in the real world. This would get complicated with said "world" being nothing more than a series of 1's and 0's that anyone can manipulate and "officers" who may or may not ever be known or exist.
The problem is that if I cannot communicate to others in a democracy, that is an absolute. I cannot do it. Propaganda is not an absolute. One person's propaganda is another's truth. So whilst both might be poisons, one is readily identifiable, the other not. There's the problem of censorship.
It's the assignation of power to an institution to determine what is discussed in the public sphere.
So, given that there's clear advantages to placing limits on free speech too (hate speech, incitement to violence, propagation of potentially dangerous lies...) the question is how we achieve that with as little of the disadvantages as possible.
Unsurprisingly (given we've been around as civilisations for thousands of years) we've already come up with a reasonable compromise. We have a system of separate arenas of discourse which have objective criteria for entry (as objective as possible, anyway).
Intellectual debate took place in journals and required qualification in the subject matter (plus peer review in some cases).
Political debate took place in our houses of government and required election to membership of those houses.
Public debate took place wherever and required only the bare minimum rules of polite society.
The problem with free speech these days (Twitter, etc) has nothing to do with struggling to find a system to regulate untruth. We had one of those already. It has to do with governments and corporations wanting to undermine the one we had because it didn't suit their purposes, and a public backlash against that move.
During Covid, Ukraine, the whole 'trans' thing we've seen actual qualified experts in their field banned from speaking in certain areana by nerds in social media companies. We've seen politicians banned from making political statements by their opposition. It's the government's attempts to ban those who are 'off message' that's brought about this faux searching around for how to manage 'disinformation'. How to manage 'disinformation' is bloody obvious. If you're qualified to speak in that arena, speak. If not, don't. It's worked reasonably well for hundreds of years. It only stopped working because the government and their corporate sponsors wanted to push a particular message and they didn't want any inconvenient experts disagreeing with them.
Basically, we already had a system in place. We don't need to 'find' one. We need to stop interfering with the existing one for political and corporate gain.
It all boils down to whether people have the time & skills to argue and argue well. To make matters worse arguments, no matter how well-crafted, may not be enough to convince people of the truth.
I dont know anything about Elons intentions and am skeptical of his dedication to free speech, but Twitter is interesting in that anyone with an internet connection and an email address can secure the means to publish. So Im not sure resources are limited in any significant regard. Since resources are not limited, at least on Twitter, publication need not be based upon standards aimed at presenting truth, as determined by Musk or whatever committee of censors.
Free speech also entails that people have the freedom to seek out information they wish, which might explain better why your voice isnt heard at the level of Trumps.
Mills argument was more about refusing censorship rather than elevating discourse. It ought to be refused because no one is infallible, and therefor, no one can know the whole truth; one cannot arrive to the truth of an opinion without comparing it to opposing and contradictory opinions; even if one was correct in opinion, until he compares it to an opposing opinion he knows only dogma; dogma hinders the mental growth of mankind. His arguments apply nicely to the idea that publication on Twitter should be based upon standards aimed at presenting truth.
Goebbels regulated propaganda. Evidence of this was his editorial law, which basically made journalists Nazi party bureaucrats subordinate to him. The only way government actors can retain the monopoly on propaganda is through its regulation. The only way government propaganda can prevail is by silencing dissenting views. Thats why I oppose regulation.
We can trust them because ultimately the function of this forum is benign.
Nothing in mankind's history suggests governments deserve that kind of trust ruling over the lives and rights of people.
Quoting Hanover
I agree this is the best. But that also requires an audience that appreciates those things.
A good question would be why modern societies have become less critical and more ignorant, and thus more receptive to poor journalism and propaganda.
Quoting Hanover
The two often go hand-in-hand and they go hand-in-hand today. Propaganda doesn't work without first silencing the voice of reason.
Today, government censorship is more insidious since it is hidden. It escapes the common eye. Things aren't outright banned, because governments understand they can't get away with that anymore.
Instead they refuse to give or outright try to deny critical voices a platform (or a large enough platform to make a difference). Critical voices are denounced under the umbrella term "conspiracy theorist" to undermine their credibility and keep them from reaching large crowds, etc.
We all understand the role of government narratives in the modern day, but "government narratives" are nothing but propaganda and censorship under a different guise.
In a healthy society the media provides critical, well-balanced coverage. However, the media are all bought and paid for by those it should be scrutinizing. It would be a mistake to believe we do not live in an environment of propaganda and censorship on par with humanity's blackest pages.
The FCC already maintains some regulatory control over the airwaves because it considers them public property, but, even then it is very limited.
"Congress through Section 326 of the Communications Act, 47 U.S.C. § 326, explicitly declared that nothing in the statute
'shall be understood or construed to give the Commission the power of censorship over the [broadcast] communications or signals transmitted by any [broadcast] station, and no regulation or condition shall be promulgated or fixed by the Commission which shall interfere with the right of free speech by means of [over-the-air] broadcast communication.'
The FCC does impose certain restraints and obligations on broadcasters. Speech regulations are confined to specific topics, which usually have been identified by Congress through legislation or adopted by the FCC through full notice-and-comment rulemaking or adjudicatory proceedings. These topics include:
indecency,
obscenity,
sponsorship identification,
conduct of on-air contests,
hoaxes,
commercial content in children's TV programming,
broadcast news distortion,
accessibility to emergency information on television, and
inappropriate use of Emergency Alert System warning tones for entertainment or other non-emergency purposes."
https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/fcc-and-speech
We might assume Congress limited the application of the Act so as to not run afoul of the 1st Amendment, and it's likely Congress didn't want to provide the FCC greater power because generally speaking the public wants expansive free speech rights.
It's difficult to know where to draw lines. We fortunately (right now) have sufficient social controls to regulate openly racist commentary, meaning we eliminate those from the marketplace just from their being so socially unacceptable that few are willing to interact with them
The problem as I see it relates to the misinformation, which (the more I think about it) invokes the conflict between censorship of ideas and control of propaganda. That is, should Trump declare the election invalid, that is a specific government official (the President no less) making a claim about the legitimacy of the current government and his right to otherwise be in control. Do we just accept the fact that propaganda is an evil that can be controlled by open discourse and passively expect it to whither away, or do we have a more affirmative duty to control it?
I'd also add that not all Western countries permit openly racist comments to be made. As in the example of Germany, they have very strict laws related to holocaust denying and hate speech. Obviously they are a nation that almost destroyed itself from such speech, and they have an interest in protecting against it recurring. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/germanys-laws-antisemitic-hate-speech-nazi-propaganda-holocaust-denial/
I don't agree with this because that assumes anyone was arguing for complete control of the media by a regulatory body. If you look at the FCC site I cited to in response to T Clark below, you'll see that it is possible to provide limited regulation as opposed to complete regulation. My assumption is that even in China where the state has lesser respect for free speech rights, the general public is still afforded some rights to speech.Quoting Isaac
But we're creating a false history in assuming that free speech ever really existed without institutional regulation. The government/private enterprise distinction is an important one, but it's also an idiosyncratic one in current Western nations. That is, it might not be readily apparent to someone from Mars not steeped in contemporary politics as to why we think it so objectionable when the government regulates what we say as opposed to when corporations control what we say. As noted in the OP, there was a time when there were relatively few mass media outlets, who, by agreement, regulated the press based upon some ethical rules they agreed upon. We were operating at that time under a strict regulatory scheme, but no one sees it that way because we refuse to view it as censorship because it was by private enterprise.
And really that's precisely the only control we have right now to runaway offensive speech. Kanye can't engage in anti-Semitic talk not because the US government can stop him, but because Adidas executives won't allow it. That we're satisfied with Adidas censorship but not Congress censorship is an interesting sociological fact. It's why I'm concerned about Musk. Maybe he'll not be as good a censor as my favorite shoe manufacturer.
As noted below in my cite to German anti-censorship laws, they have taken a different approach, largely because their history demands it. They have lost trust in the populist movement in bringing forth positive change for obvious reasons.Quoting Isaac
Sort of because Twitter is new and the cost of entry is very low, as compared to how difficult it was when I was younger to get my letter to the editor published about whatever nonsense bothered me at the time.Quoting Isaac
It was Trump who was posting, which means it was the government doing the posting complaining about the non-government regulating him, and also claiming the government lacked the right to regulate the government, if you follow that confusing road.Quoting Isaac
You make an odd turn at the end of this paragraph. You start by making what I take to be an incorrect statement that the government regulated anti-trans speech (which it did not), but then you equate corporations to the government. If you're going to blur the distinction between private and government, then you're going to impose a duty on private outlets (like Twitter and I guess this site) to publish everything and eliminate moderation.
People also speak without knowing what they're talking about all the time. I assume that's always been the case.Quoting Isaac
The system in place is whatever arbitrary set of rules the owner places upon the outlet, usually designed around maximizing profitability. Are you aware of a different system?
Such is a conspiracy theory in itself.
I take a conspiracy theory to be a theory based upon perceived self-serving or malicious motives by the actor without evidentiary support, which I think are properly called out due to their lack of credibility.
I think what Tzeentch said can be said without it being a conspiracy theory: people are denounced because they are perceived to be conspiracy theorists, even if it isn't only to maliciously undermine them.
But isn't calling out a conspiracy theory of any kind an attempt to undermine? Isn't that the purpose of calling it out? And how does Tzeentch's supposed conspiracy theory actually constitute a conspiracy theory according to your definition? Are Tzeentch's motives actually malicious or self-serving here?
That's not a conspiracy theory where I live. That's proven fact.
We have a government actively trying to deplatform and intimidate critical voices.
I assume you live in the United States, so are you unaware of what for example the CIA gets up to? Those things are all publicly available.
Isn't it common practice in the United States to threaten dissidents and whistleblowers to such an extent they have to find amnesty in another country? What do you think that is?
That seems too nebulous. We have to really know if they are malicious or self-serving according to some criteria. An interpretation of your comment towards Tzeentch could be that you think he is malicious and are intentionally undermining his theory based upon his perceived intentions, but I wouldn't make that judgement because I can't read your mind.
My position is that if there is insufficient evidence to support a theory other than that there might be a motive by some people to commit a certain act, the theory fails for lack of evidence.
That there are instances where there is adequate evidence to support the allegation, then that is not a conspiracy theory. I'm not interested in sorting out particular examples where there is adequate evidence and those where there is not.
My comment was specifically directed at stating that where a conspiracy theory has been alleged and there is not sufficient evidence that the underlying act occurred, it is appropriate to call out the the theory as a conspiracy theory in order to undermine the credibility of the speaker.
And my point was that this practice of stigmatization is being weaponized by those in power to silence critical voices.
Shit. I misunderstood you. My bad.
I also prefer the print media's self-regulation--in an open atmosphere where the quality of self-regulation can be publicly examined. Noam Chomsky spent a lot of time dissecting what he thought were the deceptions and strategic omissions of the newspaper-of-record, The New York Times. The NYT is better than most. It takes more than self-regulation to produce a great newspaper -- it also takes a large audience and revenue.
Twitter (and other social media) are not analogous to 'the press'. Print and broadcast news companies have a limited number of more or less professional staff producing and editing copy. Twitter, Facebook, et al have billions of contributors, and the task of the social media companies is to keep a lid on the proceedings. Their problem is not maintaining high levels of quality; it's to prevent their descent into the hellscape of trash (which will repel major advertisers).
On the other hand, social media and the press have similar enterprise issues: maintaining the customer base (the advertisers) by delivering the commodity (the eyeballs) to maintain cash flow and profitability. The market contributes to self-regulation: if the public drifts away from the product, the advertisers (and revenue) goes with them. That last is the sad story of old print media.
Revenue follows eyeballs and the advertisers decided that the eyeballs on the internet were more accessible and targetable than the eyeballs on the local daily newspaper.
Free speech and the market!
I hadn't even thought about the FCC and similar agencies. Problem is, as you note, government has an ownership role in the airwaves that it doesn't with the internet.
The idea that some sort of censorship might have or will stop Germany from destroying itself doesnt really work. Legal philosopher Eric Heinze calls it the Weimar fallacy. Weimar Germany had quite significant hate speech laws for the time and Nazis were routinely censored. The propagandist Theo Fritsch, and Streicher and Holtz of Der Sturmer, for instance, were fined and jailed frequently for their anti-Semitic publications. Maybe they werent censored enough, or maybe their censorship gave them a platform, but either way hate speech laws proved ineffectual on the one occasion when there was any real argument for it. It didnt work.
I would argue it might have even fuelled their desire for vengeance. In a debate with Otto Welles, Hitler himself cites the censorship of the Nazis as one of the reasons for the Enabling Act. In other words, they used their persecution as an excuse to persecute others.
Chomsky has a good point about Holocaust denial. He notes that in countries where Holocaust denial is a crime, Holocaust denial is taken more seriously, whereas in the US it isnt.
Instead let such discussion take place in the open, where ridiculous ideas can openly be shot down and ridiculed.
That's the power of free speech.
I don't follow. It seems the strength of regulation isn't at issue so much as the content. If one regulates, say, incitement to violence, one can do so extremely proactively and yet not touch political propaganda. It's possible to allow people to lie their heads off about the economy but insist on only peer reviewed multiply corroborated facts on health - for example.
Quoting Hanover
But this contradicts itself. You say institutions (newspapers) used to have an ethical code, but then conflate this with Adidas's corporate PR management. The two are not necessarily the same. I'm not saying they aren't, but the case is not made by simply pointing both out and assuming. It's possible the cantankerous old farts such as myself are actually right and society has actually changed. It's possible that journalists used to think of themselves as arbiters of truth and now think of themselves as financial assets. Cultures do change, after all and not always for the better.
Quoting Hanover
Yes, but the cost of entry isn't low is it (or wasn't - that's the problem), taking social media in general (I don't take part in any social media at all, so they're all a bit of a blur to me).
The sitting president was unable to enter, for example, to talk about political matters.
Being a practising medical professor was not sufficient to debate the issue of masks during Covid.
Being aligned to the Russian state bars entry.
On multiple occasions being qualified, well-respected, peer supported and at the forefront of one's field was insufficient entry requirement to say what one wanted to say on various social media platforms.
If you're repeating one the approved narratives, you could be a chimpanzee and they'd let you on, but those who would prefer to voice alternative opinions find the bar set very high indeed. No qualification short of god seems to be enough.
Quoting Hanover
It seems difficult to believe, given the significant links between politicians and social media entities that this was free of politics. When Trump supporters went to Parler, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeded furiously that Google and Apple should remove the app from their stores. Within days they did. A few days later Amazon closed their servers. within a week the enterprise had crumbled completely. You're not going to tell me that wasn't political.
Quoting Hanover
The line is already blurred. Twitter and Facebook have both admitted to having direct links to the government of the US where the allowed content and direction of their censorship is discussed. Facebook have testified that they were directly instructed, for example, to suppress talk of the Hunter Biden laptop (since found to be almost certainly genuine). As if lobbying power wasn't already enough to blur the lines. It's not me doing the blurring.
And no, I wouldn't, and haven't been, arguing for an elimination of moderation. What I'm arguing is that normal moderation has been around for centuries and worked perfectly well. We don't allow hate speech, incitement, defamation, and (depending on the platform) uninformed opinion. What's changed recently is not a sudden need to re-look at these normal acts of moderation. What's changed recently is one power group wanting to use moderation to impose a political narrative and another wanted to resist that (and I suppose a third jumping on that bandwagon to have the free-for-all they've always wanted but never had). I've no time at all for this third camp, but support the second.
Quoting Hanover
As I've demonstrated above. This is no longer the case. One could be barely out of short trousers and speak endlessly with zero qualification about, for example, how brilliant vaccines are, but a tenured professor with 25 years experience in medicine cannot even hint at any problems with vaccines on exactly the same platform. Qualification is not the issue. The correct narrative is.
Quoting Hanover
Yes. Suitable qualification to speak on the subject.
The issue now is social media. But since the major sites are owned by huge corporations (or one individual) -- Google (YouTube), Meta (Facebook, Instagram), Twitter (Musk) -- you'd think we're in the same situation. What's changed?
What's changed is the business model that social media companies follow. It's quite different from newspapers, television, and radio. Tristan Harris has done good work on this. The issue is that what is more likely to go viral, get views or clicks is often the most outrageous, inflammatory, and divisive. This isn't suppressed because clicks, shares, and likes is exactly what is being sold.
So it's not that we should censor ignorance and stupidity -- it's that we shouldn't be promoting them, which is what these companies are doing. For money, as always. Yet more evidence to abolish capitalism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLfr7sU5W2E
But isn't censorship the issue here? The OP is in response to Elon Musk's removal of censorship from Twitter. This removal is newsworthy because it hasn't been done by other social media corporations.
So the state of affairs we currently have is not as you describe where 'anything goes' so long as it gets clicks. It's one where potential clicks are sacrificed for some other objective.
You don't think RT or Tass reports would gain thousands of 'clicks' if they were allowed (using YouTube as an example here)?
You don't think discussion of Hunter Biden's laptop would have been click-bait heaven for Facebook?
The Wuhan lab leak theory was going viral before it was throttled.
Twitter used its 'obtained without authorization' policy to block the account of an activist group responsible for the BlueLeaks on police misconduct.
I can see the argument that social media algorithms lead to ever more divisive and inflammatory views, but on the subject of censorship, it's the human CEOs and management who are making decisions, and they're making them against what would make good click-bait (though presumably still for monetary gain).
He's still censoring just as much as before, it's just getting more publicity because he's allowing Trump and Kenya back on and liberals don't like it. There are still plenty of things you can't say, and rightfully so.
What's more interesting is the idea of subscriptions. If he goes forward with that idea, then it truly does change things because it's changing the business model.
Quoting Isaac
Rarely, and only when there's political pressure to do so. It doesn't change the basic technology underlying social media, optimized for views.
But yes, these private owners have always been allowed to dictate terms of service. That's what we accept when we click "agree" to them. They can censor anything they'd like, because they own it. I don't necessarily like that, of course, but it's always been that way.
[tweet]https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1597336812732575744?s=46&t=N2Bm0qga5nQvugo-nE7eSg[/tweet]
If it is his intent to bring down the barriers that would assure meaningfully reliable tweets, then all I should expect to see is more unreliable information coming from Twitter.
The link between the use of social media and the acceptance of misinformation as valid and a belief in conspiracy theories is fairly well established. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11109-021-09734-6 What this means is that in his quest to promote free speech for the sake of free speech, he's just fueling belief in false information.
My expectation from all of this is that it will only breed greater polarization from those who demand evidence based information from those who are more willing to accept conspiratorial theories. Not that I ever actually logged into Twitter, nor that I have actually tweeted, but the prospects of that ever occurring have in any event fallen.
Well, Im sold. I cant wait to see what he exposes.
The researchers in your study find that social media usage alone appears incapable of promoting beliefs in conspiracy theories and misinformation. Rather, individuals must possess a belief system hospitable to conspiratorial information. So it cannot be said that he is fuelling belief in false information by making such claims, at least until he explicitly asks people to believe such false information.
People must already possess the mental framework, which we might blame on other factors such as education. As weve seen, however, those who declare themselves the authorities on such matters are often not that very good at it, and will censor true information from both those with and without the belief system hospitable to conspiratorial information. Such information ought not to be censored so that those who do not have that mental framework can better compete with those that do.
It can be said he is fueling those with conspiratorial mindsets, just not causing them.
It can be, and often is said, that people can fuel human activity with their expressions, but I find the analogy to be somewhat false. Personally I do not think Elons expressions (nor anyones) has the kind of force to manipulate matter and people in such ways, like oxygen fuelling a fire. People will receive the information and run with it however they will, and according to their own will and volition. Thats why he who dispenses such information cannot be blamed for how others act upon it.
You mix an empirical claim with a moral claim. Whether shutting down Trump reduces the influence of Trump is an empirical question, and the data indicates it does: https://www.vox.com/recode/22421396/donald-trump-social-media-ban-facebook-twitter-decrease-drop-impact-youtube.
Whether Trump is morally responsible for the bad choices people make based upon the encouragement they receive from Trump is a different matter. I blame the person for their bad choice. I blame Trump for encouraging bad behavior, but not for the choice the person made based upon that encouragement.
That is, if I encourage you to steal and you do, I'm not a thief, but I'm also not a terribly moral person either.
What I don't get OP is why single out Twitter in this way. Free speech is an issue that touches all social media platforms. I suppose it's about reach - Twitter has ~ 450 million users on any day.
Censoring someone certainly reduces his reach. Thats why it is a double evil because not only is his free speech violated but so is our right to hear it. Either way, the hatred of what Trump says and the efforts to silence him indicates that he also influences people in an opposite direction, towards committing censorship and other violations of basic human rights.
I agree with what you say about morals. Simple morals and manners ought to be enough to refrain one from being disrespectful, mean, lying, bigotry, encouraging immoral behavior etc.. But weve tried developing moral behavior with coercion, censorship, ostracism and the results are nothing to be proud of.
That is an interesting way of thinking about it! And because the speaker and the listener both benefit from free speech, they both have a responsibility to use it wisely: the speaker (to not violate rules of respect and decency) and the listener (to be careful and judicious with the media they consume).
Quoting NOS4A2
I think censorship and ostracism can be used responsibly when counteracting speech that is downright hateful, violent, or utterly false. However, their use should be limited. While relying on the speaker, listener, and community to police themselves is not a very satisfying approach, that is probably the safest method. We as a society should put more emphasis on the responsibility that comes with free speech. The problem is when some individuals blatantly disregard the "rules", and how society should cope with them.
You sound remarkably complacent. If the main platform for discussing global warming were run by fossil fuel companies would you equally shrug with "oh well, they're private companies, so not much we can do..."
There's always something we can do. Protest. Kick up a fuss. Make a noise. Same as always.
I think a lot of people on the left are simply allowing devastating corporate power plays because they thought (with unbelievable naivety) that it'd work for them during covid and Trump.
But there's a really serious problem here where a corporate-government alliance are controlling public discourse to further their private interests. We can't just let that go with a shrug.
Quoting Isaac
No kidding. Not once did I suggest we remain complacent.
Quoting Mikie
That's what's needed, and there's plenty we can do to bring it about. The censorship issue is secondary.
Quoting Isaac
Great, so go do something about it.
I'm surprised that folks are so undiscriminating about speaking truth and speaking falsely. To tolerate untruth is to tolerate the undermining of all communication and the whole of society. Even capitalism cannot function without standards of truth in advertising without honest accounting, and so on. If politicians, salesmen, police, and ordinary people had the right to lie, society would collapse.
People are obviously not undiscriminating about speaking falsely, don't be naive. The things you think are false other people think are true. They disagree with you, astonishing though you may find that.
Freedom of speech has nothing whatsoever to do with actual truth, it has to do with power.
It's about who is going to have the power to declare what is true and what is not. The matter of what actually is true doesn't even get a walk on part.
Currently mooted...
Anyone who cares more about some nutters advocating anti-5g headwear than they do about the CIA policing what is and isn't allowed on social media needs their head examining (or possibly some more powerful anti-5g headwear).
I assume you think that, and by and large I disagree. Obviously I cannot totally disagree. But I think we can, and that we need to, find the truth, agree what is true and enforce the truth. You know the warning, "don't buy a pig in a poke", (A poke is a cloth bag) The reason is that unscrupulous persons might sell you a cat in a poke, claiming it is a pig. If you let the cat out of the bag, you will know it is not a pig. We can agree, I think, that a cat is not a pig. At the point where we cannot agree such things, talk has become meaningless and the market unusable. And we ought to be able to agree that losing an election is not winning the election. and if we cannot, democracy has become unusable.
I didn't say we couldn't. I said that internet censorship has nothing to do with such a quest.
Quoting unenlightened
Really? And this has bothered you for how long?
It's the same political shenanigans, just now they've invented a new cudgel 'disinformation'.
https://twitter.com/time/status/1598573430919544832?s=46&t=ZI09DXDb3lbX37sxfJE48g
Quoting Isaac
Are we having a conversation? I don't understand what you are saying. Americans cannot agree about their elections and do not trust the results. Their democracy is not working. Are we in agreement about that?
Yes, we are in agreement about that. What has that got to do with either truth or censorship?
The truth cannot be established here (insufficient data) and censorship is, in any case, completely unrelated to truth but rather is being used to further various political ends.
Both sides (but more the left than the right at the moment) are using 'disinformation' to promote a (largely corporate) agenda. I really can't see any relationship at all with your (legitimate) concerns about actual truth.
No one to my knowledge is even considering censoring speech which is in opposition to actual truth, like promoting flat-earth theories or denying gravity. What's being mooted (or currently censored) is opinion, not truth.
Opinion about the trustworthiness of the FDA/CDC.
Opinion about the trustworthiness of US intelligence and media on Ukraine.
Opinion about the trustworthiness of electoral institutions.
... and so on. This isn't science, not even close. It's politics.
Truth cannot be established, because it has historically not been sufficiently valued, has not been protected, and rewarded, but has been betrayed and actively persecuted. And that is why I am troubling to make truth the centre of my interventions here. The philosophy of freedom without qualification which I rather suspect you are still promoting, is the political philosophy that has produced a society in which lies flow so freely that the truth cannot be discerned.
America has valued freedom above truth, and is paying the price. Unfortunately, they have also exported their distorted values around the world. And if you cannot see the connection with the topic, I cannot think how to explain it to you any clearer.
I agree, I just don't see what it's got to to with social media censorship. You opened with...
Quoting unenlightened
...and now with...
Quoting unenlightened
...so this is not a broad, generalised complaint, it seems directly related to social media censorship somehow. You even say...
Quoting unenlightened
... But you haven't explained it even once yet.
Social media firms are censoring opinions which do not align with their corporate agendas.
Some people are resisting those attempts.
What has that conflict got to do with the valuation of truth? Neither side value truth. Neither side particularly disvalue it either. Their issues are just issues on which the truth is not really known so they can proselytise to their heart's content about it. They are all about matters of opinion.
If there's any relationship between internet censorship and our lack of concern for truth, it's the abuse of the term for political ends.
Nothing is going to devalue truth faster than everyone acting as if it can be established by a team of Google employees just because they call themselves 'fact checkers'.
As I said earlier, we used to have a system in place for getting as close to the truth as possible - academic training, scientific standards, and peer review. Censorship has chucked all that out the window in favour of cheap labels.
So you are saying - that my talking about the importance of truth is irrelevant, because neither side values the truth? You are complaining because I have not chosen which lie I prefer?
This is literally unbelievable.
No. I'm saying you talking about truth is irrelevant because the issue - social media censorship - is not about truth. It's opinion that's being censored. The issue is about power, not truth.
Quoting unenlightened
How could you possibly chose which lie you prefer? Ignore lies. Your concern is clearly not lies, it's opinions. You mentioned the election. Neither you nor I have access to the raw data (even if it were sufficient to establish the truth). So any discussion you, I, or 99.999% of Twitter users might have about the election has nothing whatsoever to so with truth. It has solely to do with which source of information we trust.
And you are wrong. But there is no problem with you expressing your opinion on any media. You have lost the truth as even a concept, and been reduced to mere opinion, and you cannot even see the importance. What a shame!
So...
Quoting unenlightened
...or are you just mouthing off? Any chance of actually defending your assertions?
Quoting unenlightened
And you're the one claiming to be concerned with truth and here you are deliberately lying for effect. It is just blatantly false that "there is no problem with [me] expressing [my] opinion on any media". You know as well as I do that there are loads of opinions I would not be allowed to express on social media. Loads of opinions have been banned from discussion.
Quoting unenlightened
Is it, or is it not an opinion - the matter of who we trust to provide us with accurate information? It's nothing to do with truth. Who we trust is an opinion.
Unless you personally checked the election results then any discussion on the election is about who we trust (an opinion), not whether the election was rigged (a fact).
Quoting unenlightened
As I said. If you think the important thing here is whether people can discuss the election and not the fucking CIA having direct control over what is discussed then you've lost all credibility.
Im not so sure about that. Posterity tends to work out the truth even after efforts to censor it occurs. The Roman Inquisition did all it could to silence the heliocentric theory but their truth was eventually superseded by heresy.
Thats why any censorship used in the service of truth is really in the service of dogma. Freedom of speech is the only context in which proper trial and error can occur, and truth can finally work itself out. So if America exports mistrust in the institutions of power then so much the better, in my opinion.
Quoting NOS4A2
The story you tell is rather inconsistent; limitations on the freedom of speech are always limitations on speaking the truth in the interests of lies and deception, yet somehow the truth escapes eventually.
That certainly happens and needs to be prevented as far as possible. The means to do this is an absolute defence in law of the right to speak the truth, not the right to tell lies. such a defence could apply to wiki-leaks, to any whistle-blower, to cases of libel and slander, and so on. But this is not what America stands for, or you defend, or people here seem to support.
This becomes important with the supposed democratisation of speech by the internet, which turns out to be no such thing. What we got is the freedom to say anything, and the bombardment of lies and bullshit to the extent that no one can trust anything that is said. Thus communication of the truth has been reduced, not increased, and particularly in America, ordinary people are more bamboozled with complete nonsense than ever.
Now there is no infallible recipe from distinguishing truth from falsehood, as has been indirectly pointed out to me here. However, society relies on truth for every function, and must defend it or collapse. So we have law, that seeks the truth when it is disputed, and tries to make the distinction case by case.
We have fire alarms to warn us if there is a fire in the building, and if someone sets the alarm off for fun, or to get a break from work, they deserve censure for their dangerous deception that undermines the functioning of the alarm system. There is and should be no right to call fire when there is no fire.
There will always be people trying to deceive for personal gain or for a cause, and there will always be people deceived, and honestly spreading falsehoods. Perhaps everyone does their bit. But the inevitability of failure is the mark of every ideal, and no reason at all to abandon it. Defend the right to speak the truth, but defend also the right to hear it, which means to not have the truth drowned out by lies and bullshit.
So explain how this would work. I write "the judiciary are all corrupt and accept bribes" on Twatter and it gets flagged as 'lies', but it's alright because unenlightened's brilliant scheme defends my right to speak the truth. Now. Who's going to check whether what I've said about the corrupt judiciary is true...?
If the judges are corrupt as a whole, there is no solution. If everyone lies all the time, there is no discernible truth. If you are telling the truth we are fucked. Probably, you are, and we are. So then it is time for a revolution, or the collapse of civilisation until folk start to value truth again. The only answer to corruption is to call it out and end it.
But you're arguing in favour of removing the means by which we could call it out. That seems contradictory.
If the answer to corruption is to call it out, then isn't it vitally important we have good means of doing so which are not open to suppression by the very corruption we'd like to call out?
The agencies currently involved in censorship are...
The government.
The media.
Private internet corporations.
Asset management firms.
Intelligence agencies.
The judiciary (if it goes to court).
That's almost exactly the list of people I'd like to be free to call out the corruption of. The same people you're suggesting ought to be able to suppress speech they think is untrue.
If you think your call out on twitter will change the judiciary or any other thing, then you are sadly deluded. If twitter even had a reputation for honesty, it would help. There is no contradiction in what I say, what is important is the truth, and I defend your right to tell the truth as best as my impotence allows. In the current situation where the truth has already been devalued and corruption is not merely allowed but actively lauded and supported, there is nothing much to be done, but I am still doing my bit to advocate for the truth. And you cry contradiction which is not true. For shame!
A minute ago what's said on Twitter could bring about the end of civilisation, now it doesn't have any effect?
The only answer to corruption is to call it out and end it, only don't bother because it won't work?
Make up your mind.
Quoting unenlightened
There's a direct contradiction. You're advocating for both censorship by institutions controlling public discourse and the ability to freely call out, via public discourse, corruption in those institutions. That's a direct contradiction. You clearly cannot have both.
Quoting unenlightened
Don't bother. Apparently it has no effect, and anyone thinking it might is just sadly deluded.
Yes, but this is a misstatement by Musk, and intentionally so. It is a misuse of rhetoric in order to sustain his unsustainable position he is a free speech absolutist.
Within American jurisprudence we have set an extreme limit on free speech, and it is the incitement to violence standard, so Musk invokes that language to censor under the guise he's different from his predecessor in his brand of limited censorship. He's just a American with fundamental American standards.
But you must wonder then why Kanye hasn't been arrested if his speech is akin to screaming fire when there is no fire. The reason is simple. Musk's standard avoids the critical word within American law of "imminent," meaning only speech which might evoke imminent (i.e. immediate, clear and present and the like) danger is illegal. It's the not subtle distinction between rousing those with pitchforks to here and now assault the Capitol building versus complaining in public about the stolen election.
Under Musk's revised standard, all who hold any view that will offend large market shares can be censored.
That is not free speech. That's the free market speaking. Musk has committed himself to the proposition only that he will publish that which gets him the most customers. He's well aware that catering to racists and anti-Semites isn't the path to that.
Irony of ironies. The rules of basic human decency are being protected by corporate America to protect market share under the pretense that American Constitutional standards demand such.
As perverse as it is, I guess the right result was reached. Ye's drivel has been swept into the dustbin.
:up: :100:
I am advocating an absolute defence in law for the right to tell the truth. If you speak the truth I defend your right to free speech. But you don't speak the truth, you lie about what I have said to my face. That I condemn. No censorship of the truth, no penalising of anyone who speaks the truth, Penalties for liars like you. It really isn't that complicated. I advocate censuring and censoring lies and liars. I clearly cannot have either, let alone both, in a corrupt world, but I continue to demand the impossible because it is what we ought to aim for as a society.
But you are totally full of shit in everything you say because you know full well what unmoderated freedom on the internet results in, and you choose to pontificate and argue here precisely because the moderation actually increases the freedom and does not diminish it.
Free speech is about the freedom to share any genuinely-held belief in the context of a civil discussion. It was never about yelling fire in crowded theaters, freedom to slander, lie and deceive, or to threaten and incite violence, etc.
To pretend that it was reveals a keenness for limiting free speech.
I don't know if anyone has been paying attention, but the collusion between government and big tech that Musk has exposed via his takeover of Twitter is hard proof of the complete failure of the entire western governmental structure (which is by and large based on and led by the United States's governmental structure).
Of course it simply proved what most already suspected, but to have it out there like that - quite confronting. It's great that it happened. Thank god for 'free speech absolutist' Elon Musk. With outright denial out of the way, the only flavors that are left are to take strong opposition to this unholy alliance between government and big tech or to defend evil.
I wonder which the denizens of this forum will choose.
As long as you have political careers relying on political donations from corporations, you'll have said 'unholy alliance'. Ironically, such corrupt mutual backscratching is excused as an exercise in free speech.
And the fact that the only institution who could be appointed to wield such power is the one we have just agreed is utterly and irredeemably corrupt makes it even less of an appealing option.
In the last two or thee years who would you say has benefited financially from freedom of speech? Of the biggest industries in the world - pharmaceuticals, arms, agrochemicals and tech - what examples do you have where their interests have been served by freedom of speech?
I'm struggling to see why, if the big corporations are benefitting from free speech now, they would be seeking to restrict it. All major moves to restrict free speech recently have been instigated by government, big tech, or media and have almost entirely promoted situations which they've benefitted financially from. Are you suggesting they've grown a conscience and are acting against their interests now?
Where do we have disinformation? To name a few topics:
- Covid
- Ukraine
- US elections
Just so happens to be the topics in which there are certain opinions we're not allowed to have. That last one of course being very relevant to this topic.
Yes, but the doctrine "more free speech!" is itself an ideological injunction that is bound to be challenged under its own terms. The market can exercise its free speech through censorship. It says "Nazis and racists are bad for business". It can only be prevented from enacting this stance by restricting its free speech under the dictat of free speech absolutism.
Quoting Isaac
No, I was referring to unrestricted political donations being protected as a form of free speech in the US.
Youre right; what Musk is doing is not free speech. Its simply a revision of Twitters terms and conditions and standards of moderation, which invariably run contrary to free speech.
The shouting fire in a crowded theater canard has somehow buried itself in the American consciousness, for whatever reason, despite the law being unequivocal on it for over half a century. But it isnt immanent dangerthe clear and present danger test was overturnedits immanent lawless action. The timeframe between the incitement and the lawless action is important. Of course Kanyes tweet is not a call for immanent lawless action, nor was it intended to be, and Musk is way off the mark.
Ive noticed a tendency for Americans to equivocate between the 1st amendment on the one hand and free speech in the other. The 1st amendment isnt free speech and in fact has little to do with it. Its only a threadbare guarantee that government will not violate free speech and other basic human rights, which of course it violates on numerous occasions. It doesnt offer any insight into the principle at all, why it is required, or why people ought not to censor another.
A far superior and more absolutist position is held by the UN declaration of human rights, Article 19, which no government would dare to adopt, even despite its tremendous influence.
I suppose I disagree on the interpretation here by taking the free market speaking freely to be a form of free speech. But, yes, Musk is a hypocrite and a grifter and will take full advantage of his celebrity status and those enamoured by it to slip all sorts of contradictory BS past.
I see. How weird. It's a wonder America needs any other constitutional rights at all then. If political donations are a form of speech, then virtually any other behaviour becomes equally protected.
Should have tried calling abortion a speech act.
Yep.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC
"The ruling represented a turning point on campaign finance, allowing unlimited election spending by corporations"
So, if corporations are people re free speech, again it seems to give them a right to say "no" to free speech absolutism through censorship and create an odd paradox for American free speech advocates.
From what I've heard, although the proof is hardly fully assessed, is it is alleged the Democratic National Committee and the Biden campaign were able to have tweets removed critical of Biden. Both these organizations are non-governmental and neither were in power at the time of events.
It seems, if true, the best you can say is that Twitter aligned itself with the Democrats, acted as an anti-government (i.e. anti-Trump) agent, and suppressed negative Biden comments and tried to get Biden elected.
So, if true, we now know that Twitter was not a reliable news source. Shocking. Do you now suggest we mandate journalistic ethical standards upon all media outlets to be sure all reporting be fair and balanced? Do we shut down media outlets that fail to meet our prescribed journalistic standards?
If a "free" press means an unregulated one, then we can't cry foul when it freely chooses to publish nonsense, incorrect information, hate, propganda, or only articles the owner happens to agree with.
That is freedom. You can't complain about a corrupt Twitter if that was what the Twitter owners freely chose.
The problem is that any regime that takes upon itself the task of determining truth has failed. Wed probably all still believe in the Vegetable Lamb of Tartary or that the sun revolves around the earth if Truth? was never undermined by other voices.
The freedom to say anything, like the freedom to pass gas or salivate, is a condition of life, something that we do by virtue of being a human. This includes telling lies, uttering falsities, and so on. In limiting that right to a governing body, we bestow the right to lie on that governing body, while attempting to deny it to everyone else. This is far more conducive to lies than it is to truth, in my opinion.
My suggestion wasn't so much about non-person speech (like in corporate giving being a form of speech), but in stating that the speech limitations existing in the US are those dictated by economics. That is, we can openly be racist and scream it from the rooftop, but only if we own that rooftop. The regulations against hate speech result from media outlets refusing to publish it because publication will damage the publisher's profitability.
Speech is not absolutely free as long as there is a punitive response to certain speech, and it's false to claim that who imposes the punishment is what determines if the punishment is meaningfully restrictive to that freedom.
That is, if my racist rants result in Musk taking down my posts, how is that a more free system than the government taking down my posts?
Not surprising, no. Just more proof that governments shouldn't be trusted, especially not with the power to limit free speech.
He won't act from conscience. He'll count beans. If removal of the post will increase profits, that's what he'll do. It has nothing to do with consistent application of standards, good citizenship, or anything beyond gaining the best return on investment.
It wasn't the government. It was the opposition party.
There's no evidence Twitter was coerced. If they did delete tweets, it's because they were aligned.
Doesn't Twitter have the right to its own opinion?
True.
I think you're taking the present social climate for granted. We just happen to live at a time when it's not ok to talk crap about Jews. This in turn produces the regulation you're talking about.
If, for instance, it came to light that the social sphere was being manipulated to the detriment of the health of the country, it would be reasonable for the government to intervene. Mistakes could be made there, but it would still make sense to try.
In a system where there are only two parties that swap seats every few years that's a meaningless distinction. The same people who bought Twitter to censor and withhold information from the public and spread misinformation are the people in power now. Ironically some of them are the loudest complainers about "misinformation".
Like I said, the US system, and by extension the entire western system is irreparably broken.
Its Musks property, thus he has the freedom to determine what can and cant be said in his platform. If the government steps in and tells him he can never censor a post, for example, they will be denying his freedoms. The fact that freedoms overlap in such a way is a core problem for rights advocates. Corporate censorship, however, is just as wrong as government censorship, and for the same reasons.
There are few practices as closely linked to totalitarianism as propaganda.
When political entities spread lies, censor and withhold information they're mimicing totalitarian regimes. The fact that they don't show it proudly on their banners makes them closet totalitarians.
We wouldn't want nazis controlling our government under the excuse they're only nazis when they're not in office.
Not really. There's no regime that ever existed that hasn't censored something or withheld some information or lied sometimes or produced some sort of propaganda. What defines a totalitarian regime is not that these things are done but the extent they are done.
If Musk uses Twitter to spread Aryan supremecy, is that speech prohibited propoganda only if he associates with an established political movement, but not if he's just speaking his individual mind?
Seems all sorts of arbitrary distinctions being drawn here?
I haven't said anything about prohibiting speech.
When a food contains vitamin C, we are well within the realm of an orange. But the food might also be a kiwi or even a potato. Yes, there are some negatives that almost all forms of governments share but they can for all that be very different, even categorically so, because their categorisation is not as simple a process as identifying a common instance of a negative behavior.
When I'm eating a pie and find bits of shit in it, I'm going to stop eating the pie, regardless of whether it's a cherry pie or an apple pie.
And you'll understand that when the chef comes around and protests, saying there were only a few bits of shit in my pie, that's not going to motivate me to continue eating.
Ah, I see, so you've left your lying/censoring state behind and are now living... where?
As I said, according to your own analogy you are eating little bits of shit then. 'Cos that's all there is to eat and it beats total shit. Else, move to N. Korea, right?
As far as I'm concerned the people who are eating the government's shit pie, and trying to convince themselves they're enjoying it, are those defending the actions of Goebbels's slightly more sleazy bastard children.
Also, why would I move anywhere?
You can stop avoiding the point now, namely that a little bit of shit in your pie ruins your pie, and a little bit of totalitarianism in your state ruins your state.
Censorship etc is not uniquely totalitarian. Therefore, e.g., having a little bit of censorship in a state does not equate to having a little bit of totalitarianism in a state. And even if you get over that, you'd have much work to do demonstrating your thesis. A shit pie analogy won't do it. You're skipping a bunch of steps and elevating rhetoric over analysis. Keep in mind that the operative part of the term totalitarianism is "total" not "little bit". Littlebitarianism is not the bogey man here. Start from that realisation and work your way up.
Totalitarianism refers to the belief that one ideology possesses the complete truth - this being by definition wrong makes every totalitarian system revolve around lies to keep the ideology intact. Propaganda, censorship, withholding of information, etc. are all instrumental to protecting the government ideology - we call them 'narratives' these days. And that's exactly what we're seeing today.
E.g. again:
Quoting Tzeentch
You make some comparisons and suddenly magic happens and you've transformed regular government malpractice and corruption into totalitarianism:
"a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state."
https://www.google.com/search?q=totalitarianism&oq=totalitarianism&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l2.3808j0j1&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
But the magic doesn't work because no matter how many times you repeat the word, the U.S. (for example) is still not N. Korea, Nazi Germany, or Stalinist Russia.
Overly simplistic, and I don't need to tell you that.
Ideology plays a key role in totalitarian regimes.
These regimes operate through terror, however that terror is exercised in large parts by the ideologically possessed masses, without which the state would have but a fraction of its power and would look more like a classical dictatorship (authoritarian, but with very limited influence over citizens' private lives).
How does this relate to Twitter; anyone who expressed "dangerous" opinions (read: dangerous to the preferred narrative) gets cancelled, and possibly ruined.
There's your ideologically possessed 'cancel crowd' operating through plain terror. We call it 'political correctness' for crying out loud.
And now we're given hard proof that the political elite are purposefully instrumentalizing it.
Kind of, but I think ideological control is more complicated and deeper than you paint it, which seems to be progressive/PC = bad vs libertarian (or who?) = good. It encompasses this dichotomy and more. It's structured in the very way we express ourselves regardless of our surface ideologies and forms the basis on which we can coherently fight battles we think are important but hardly ever get us anywhere. Maybe for another thread...
So then government sponsored propoganda is acceptable free speech, even though it is a characteristic of totalitarian regimes?
As I said, I believe free speech is about the expression of genuinely-held ideas. It would be exceedingly difficult to prove someone espouses ideas that they do not genuinely hold and that's a rabbit hole I would not enter.
So if you're asking if I believe it should be legally punishable, then no. Besides, I don't think there's anything in the track record of states that suggests they're remotely capable of wielding such power responsibly, especially not the current political elite. Quite the opposite in fact.
The only cure for propaganda is free and open discourse.
The telltale sign of unhealthy public discourse is an aversion to criticism, exactly like the one we see today.
Aversions to criticism are only held by people who know their ideas are flawed. At the same time it reveals a deep personal (ego) investment into those faulty ideas - this is the element of ideological possession also seen in totalitarian societies. Debate is feared and is by definition personal, so it is avoided and dissonant voices are silenced.
I wonder if this deep investment into political ideas could also be witnessed in the '30s and '40s.
Yeah. Private companies can implement whatever policies they like to control speech by the very same freedom the absolutists want. But an absolutist (and I wouldn't count myself as one) could still make the argument that institutions ought not to use their freedom to constrain speech - that is, they can still make the moral argument about what moral actors ought to do without contradicting themselves about what they would like to see moral actors allowed to do.
And in this I'd agree with them. Twitter ought have the freedom to censor whatever it sees fit, but it ought not abuse that freedom. Where I'd disagree with absolutists is that I think the distinction between things like hate speech, incitement and abuse on the one hand and 'disinformation' on the other is as clear as day and attempts to blur the boundary are disingenuous. Censoring genuinely held beliefs is dangerous. Censoring hateful language is just normal civility. There's no reason at all to confuse the two.
Tape worms are a condition of life; one to be avoided. Lies are likewise parasitic on truthful communication and likewise weaken it, by destroying trust. Trust is the very fabric of society, the foundation of the economy, of investment, and of trade. The thesis of Gibbon's Decline and Fall is that the collapse of the Roman Empire was first and foremost a moral collapse. I think we are heading for a second dark age, and for the same reason.
Quoting The Baden
That's a rather low bar you're setting, and one that fabulous wealth does much to lift a country over, even if the trickle down doesn't lift all boats.
That's just false speculative psychoanalysis. Aversion to racist rhetoric is fear of eventual oppression. That people speak of the evil they intend to impose is a reality, and stopping it makes sense. It's for that reason Musk censored Kanye.
I offered a counter-example to your specious claim that it is only those fearful of the validity of their claims who wish to suppress their opponents. As if the reason I don't want racist speech on Twitter is because I'm secretly fearful that the racists are correct.
The ability to persuade someone does not hinge upon the veracity of the statements, as if we live in world where justice always prevails. History is replete with examples of bad people convincing people to do bad things.
To the extent we can reduce the impact of those who wish to spread their hate to avoid future acts of hate, I see as a good thing. It's not as if one suddenly commits a racist act without preceding that with racist speech and thoughts.
I assume the 'we' in your second sentence is somehow rendered immune from the 'people' in your first?
If it is the case that 'people' are prone to being convinced to do bad things by speech acts, even when those speech acts are well countered by contrary voices, then I'm struggling to see how these same people can be convinced to use censorship in a socially responsible way.
...Oh, hang on... I get it. The people doing the censorship are just better people because they're probably middle class and have a university degree... Yep, all makes sense now. As you were...
The comments I'm making aren't controversial. The reason marketing and advertising work is because it's possible to convince people to do things they otherwise wouldn't. A course in advertising would not entail just telling the students to tell the truth because it is truth that convinces.
The US prohibits governmental censorship, so the role of the censor falls upon the free market, and it censors extensively. Right now the right is up in arms because it is learning Twitter did as the DNC asked it. Previously the left was up in arms when it learned that Hannity had a direct line to Trump's campaign staff. The news we get is the news they decide to tell us for whatever ulterior motive might exist.
The question is who you trust with the responsibility of correctly informing the citizens. Is it the government, the middle class with degrees, or whoever has the most power to control the private press, whether that be the gizzilionaire who can purchase the outlet outright, the former president, the current president's campaign leaders, or whoever else might be able to win the political battle to control it?
If you suggest average Joe has any ability to be meaningfully heard without concern of some sort of censorship from some authority regardless of what he says, that's never been the case. There are things I cannot say here, on Twitter, on Facebook, or pretty much anywhere that will not result in a rebuke from the market. And when I say "rebuke," I don't mean they'll just embarrass me with the truth of what they said and leave my position in shambles, but they will cancel me. My job, my reputation, and whatever else they can damage, they will. It is not just about winning the war of ideas. It is about winning a political battle and who controls what.
It's not as Mill suggests, nor which you seem to want to adopt, which is that society sits at an academic table and debates ideas, with all concurring when the truth is said, and through this point/counter-point, the truth emerges and from that truth another truth then emerges. If it were, I'd agree that only those fearful of the truth of their position would try to gag other members at this hypothetical table.
The force of one's position and what causes its acceptance is not truth. If it were, we'd not be having this debate.
The types of overt racist opinions you're referring to can't be found anywhere in the public sphere. I have no doubt that such opinions wouldn't survive the crucible of free ideas for very long either, should they be ever be reintroduced.
Yet the modern "anti-racist" crowd is one that exemplifies exactly what I am talking about - an allergy to criticism. They're bullshit peddlers and they know it, so they are hostile to criticism.
Quoting Hanover
Well, apparently you're fearful about something.
Like I said, I've no doubt that such ideas wouldn't survive the crucible of free ideas, so if ignorant people feel like burning their fingers then they can have at it. I don't know what you're scared of.
Maybe is right.
It does sound like you don't trust the average person with the freedom to be introduced to ideas, which testifies of a very dark image of man indeed.
The next question should be, given such an image of man, why trust people with power at all? Those in power are almost by definition the worst of the lot.
https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/government-trying-influence-speech-social-media-how
https://www.npr.org/2021/03/25/981203566/5-takeaways-from-big-techs-misinformation-hearing
https://thehill.com/policy/technology/563470-administration-puts-new-pressure-on-social-media-to-curb-covid-19/amp/
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/digital-services-act-package
https://techcrunch.com/2022/11/21/elon-musk-twitter-netzdg-test/amp/
This is what's changed, why your "'twas ever thus!" approach is wrongheaded. You (along with the general trend around censorship) want to try and tack on 'information' to civility. It's not an accidental move, it's a power play and it's a new one (basically since Russiagate/Covid era).
There's always been constraints on speech based on civility It would be wrong for me to call all the blacks in my neighbourhood criminals even if it were actually true. It would be wrong because it's impolite to negatively group people by inherited characteristics.
Likewise if I were to say "all my followers ought to kill the nearest Jew", that too would be wrong because it might cause untrammelled harm. It too would be wrong even if the Jews around me were actually conspiring to do some awful thing. That still ought to be dealt with more carefully than incitement to racial violence.
It has nothing to do with 'information' or @unenlightened's tiresome invocation of truth. It's to do with restraining one's speech to get along with others. And, yes, some people do seem to need a little nudge in that direction sometimes.
What's new is the attempt to control the dissemination of actual information by hooking it on these already existing social rules and then pretending (as you do here) that they're one and the same thing and things have always been that way. They haven't. I'm not suggesting it's never been this way, I'm not knowledgeable enough about history to make such a claim, but in my lifetime, in the UK, I've never experienced the level of information censorship we seem to be experiencing today. I've been in academia for nearly 30 years, I've seen more papers turned down, media posts flagged, expert opinion work mysteriously dry up... these last few years than in all the years before, and it's alternative professional views on Covid, transgender issues, Russia, etc which are targeted, not racism, homophobia or misogyny. Views counter to a specific political agenda, not views counter to basic politeness.
So what I'm objecting to is the politicisation of censorship, not censorship in general. It's the use of it to persuade, rather than merely gatekeep - this modern trend toward labelling every idea one doesn't personally agree with a 'lie' or 'disinformation' (getting unpleasantly common here too), and expecting to have it expunged from conversation. It's cancerous to intellectual progress. Science is conducted by interrogation, not by popular vote.
[tweet]https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1600243756074049537?s=20&t=O-PH7eo-vhDBKvoCtytwcg[/tweet]
James Baker is the former general counsel of the FBI under James Comey. Baker was effectively forced out of the FBI due to his role in the Trump/Russia saga and has reportedly found himself under criminal investigation regarding leaks. For whatever reason he was hired by Twitter, and it was he who vetted the first batch of Twitter Files without the knowledge of new management. Given the incestuous relationship between social media companies and the "intelligence community", and the growing litany of examples of their disinfo campaigns, it's no wonder the statist fears over Musk's free speech absolutism ring the loudest. They are losing their grip on public opinion.
[tweet]https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1600274469104234497?s=20&t=vudVQq_jHYZsE_yHr5Ti8w[/tweet]
When you say "actual information", it starts to sound like you mean things that are true, rather than things that are false. How tiresome of you!
No. I merely mean views about what is the case (information), as opposed to views about what ought to be the case (instructions, ideology), or sentiments about what is the case (emoting).
When I tell you what time the train is due, I'm providing you with 'information'. I'm not claiming it's unquestionably true in claiming that it's information. I might be mistaken, or the train might be delayed. Someone else might disagree. None of which means the type of data we're dealing with no longer classifies as 'information'.
Unless you're of the bizarre opinion that scientific investigation is somehow 'finished', then matters of fact are always in the process of being interrogated. Or at least they were, until your ilk decided that some things were just 'true' in perpetuity and questioning them constituted the new sin of 'disinformation', policed by it's attendant priesthood of 'fact checkers'.
You are of course entitled to your views about what is the case, and in particular about what ought to be the case and how you feel about these things. Is that not what we are doing here? Exchanging ideas about what is the case and what ought to be the case and how we feel about it? Please don't pretend that I am the ideologue here and you are the disinterested scientist. We are interrogating matters of fact and matters of morality together in this thread, and we assume - or at least I do - that our views are honestly held {held to be true, that is}, and open to interrogation and that we both hope that the truth will eventually prevail. And this despite your suggestion that speaking of truth is tiresome.
How ought we, as a society, deal with talk; should we regulate it at all, and if so, how? That is the topic isn't it? And I am not speaking on behalf of any kind of "ilk". I am speaking my best understanding of the problems we have in society, and how we might improve society. Don't misrepresent me as some totalitarian propagandist, please. I am an old fart long retired conversing with other thinkers on an obscure website, not an agent of the devil. I don't claim a monopoly on the truth, nor do I think that anyone else has one; I claim that we ought to care about it, and if we don't care about it and try to conserve and preserve it, it will not flourish. And that would be of great cost to society.
So I am wondering what it is that you disagree with, exactly? I does not help very much to retreat from truth to views, it does not exempt you from supporting your views in debate or make them more real or honest, let alone believable. These are my views, and they are what I think is true. If it doesn't matter to you whether your views are true or not, then... but I don't believe that is the case at all.
Yes, that is what we're doing here because this site is generally well moderated (censorship is limited to matters of civility). That is not what is happening on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc, which is the subject of this thread as I understand it. What's happening on those platforms is that ideas about what is the case are being censored for no other reason that that they do not agree with what a particular group of people think is the case.
Discussion of the potential lab origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus was banned. There's nothing uncivil about discussing the origins of a pandemic virus. There's nothing impolite about it. It simply wasn't the narrative that powerful actors wanted presenting so it was banned. It was banned using exactly the approach you're advocating where some things are deemed 'true' and others 'false' and that some body of people know the difference.
Likewise with election fraud, Russian hacking, the progress of the current war in Ukraine, the efficacy of vaccines in certain circumstances, the efficacy of cloth masks, the public health utility of lock downs, the properties of a 'woman', the origin of Hunter Biden's emails, the beneficiaries of BLM donations... all issues which have been banned in one way or another from discussion or dissemination on these platforms. None of which are anything to do with politeness or civility, racism, sexism or any other 'ism. They are to do with powerful people constraining the public discourse to promote their interests.
If you disagree with all those examples of censorship, then we indeed have no matter of disagreement between us, but you opened with...
Quoting unenlightened
...which, since people had only been speaking of Twitter, Facebook and the like, would seem an odd response if you were referring only to actual lies (matters which the speaker knows to be false but utters anyway). I can't think of a single example where Twitter have censored lies (maybe some Russian state posts might come into that category).
So we're not talking about lies here at all. We're talking about different opinions about what the truth is, and the fact that some of those opinions are being censored.
Quoting unenlightened
If you want to be treated like a decent person, then try acting like one.
Quoting unenlightened
...does not engender a charitable interpretation.
Quoting unenlightened
Quoting Isaac
Let's be honest. This is the basically what we are talking about. Not about the limits of the Overton Window. The instances of someone being a victim of some activist cancel culture is very, very rare. Without any moderation and no supervision, I simply wouldn't go to that kind of sites. Why interact on a site where the vast majority are questionable bot pushing viagra or so-called Nigerian bankers making lucrative business proposals?
I've changed my mind.
Quoting Isaac
... It's testament to this that absolute brazen lies like...
Quoting ssu
...are allowed to stand for everyone to marvel at. Well done.
Yes, of course, over the course of the Covid pandemic, the Russiagate saga, the war in Ukraine and the transgender debate social media have hardly banned or restricted anything...
... I mean there was that minor occasion where they banned even linking to an article critical of the presidential candidate during an election.
... there was that trivial moment when discussion of the origin of the most deadly pandemic for decades was banned.
... there was the very minor ongoing situation where an entire campaign group were accused of hate speech because of their views about feminism.
... the absolutely miniscule banning of an entire country's state output whilst that country is conducting a war.
... the barely noticeable banning of the sitting president of the most powerful nation on earth.
... the almost negligible ban on disputing the CDC policy on pandemic management.
... and it's, of course, barely affected anyone. Only a handful of Harvard professors, the most cited academic ever, the president of the US, investigators for the UN, a couple of award winning investigative journalists responsible for some of the biggest exposures of government corruption ever, editors of the world's leading medical journal... practically no-one really.
It's not you or I, our friends, our work colleagues, relatives, people who we know that are banned. That's what I meant with very, very rare.
But if some student of Philosophy in Mainland China would participate in this Forum, lets say about the current protests, alarm bells would go off in China. Computer algorithms at work.
And of the examples you gave, well, at least investigative journalist have through history stepped on the "wrong toes". Of course there has been an Overton window even before. It's now just the ease that you can use social media.
Let's assume that you are right, and we are indeed in a situation where the space of allowed
public discourse on social platforms was intentionally constrained so that 'powerful people could promote their interests'. Nevertheless, do people who debate with you here, in this OP, want to help 'the powerful people'? As well as many others, they do not like what Mask is doing now for entirely different reasons. It is difficult to say why, but they likely reject your arguments without considering them seriously or view them as negligible and insignificant.
Further, it would be reasonable to assume that even 'powerful people' and those fired recently by Mask have not simply acted 'to promote their interests'. We do not deal here with pure cynical or ideological schemes or calculations. Is there an effect of the desire to remove obstacles and act without hindrances?
Quoting Isaac
Here, you offer the different explanation. It is better than the previous one. Yet, what is going on is not completely understandable.
The press companies are private companies. They have the right to act for their own personal gain and self-promotion.
Anyone can claim to abide by these principles, and anything can be characterized as being in line with those principles.
Of course there are things gained: power, money, leverage.
The problem at hand is that people love to pretend that things like power, money, leverage don't really matter.
It's a strange idea that information and truth aren't products with market value.
Self-censorship makes the phenomenon seem rarer than it is.
Some people self-censor their opinions on so many things because they know stating them would get them banned, ostracized.
Like I always say: Might makes right.
Speak for yourself. I've had colleagues who've experienced several situations like the ones I described.
Besides which, I don't much care if you or I are banned. I care that experts are prevented from discussing important matters.
The real struggle is not between East and West, or capitalism and communism, but between education and propaganda.
Martin Buber
His using education as the antonym to propoganda is clarifying. The absolutist free speech we demand appears in academic settings where there is a bona fide effort at extending our education, but maybe less so elsewhere.
https://jacobin.com/2022/12/canadian-military-train-ukrainian-fascists-azov-centuria/
Don't like the data? No problem. Just call it 'Russian disinformation' and watch as it disappears in the righteous book-burning.
Almost forgot. 140 odd character summary for the Twitter generation who can't make it through a whole article without breaking into a sweat.
The US government getting involved in the suppression of free speech from TikTok on the grounds it is being used maliciously by the Chinese.
Is this not logically equivalent to the North Koreas banning Western media, with the only distinction that we trust our governments to ban but not other ones?
Is the rule that US citizens have a right to hear only from those designated safe?
I would argue that North Korea has very different reasons for banning western media. The US is not banning specific messages, it's banning a specific platform.
I feel like in general we need a serious update of our conception of free speech. The kind of censorship classical liberalism had in mind is is still relevant, but it's only half the picture. The real battle now is the battle for algorithms and attention spans. Free speech is no longer just about getting your message out there, because it will just die in the ocean of information.
There's also a new enemy of free speech, that works in an entirely different way: the targeted lie. We're now able to handcraft lies for the people most likely to believe them. The liar is no longer obligated to keep their story straight. They can sell a dozen different stories to different people.
This is a huge problem, and one that cannot even be meaningfully addressed if we're stuck with classical liberalism's conception of "free speech".
The Twitter saga offers a nice case in point. Perhaps the most important takeaway from the "Twitter files" is that we have a very serious problem on our hands, and we have not yet developed the tools to deal with it.
There are a number of concerns about TikTok that do make it different (like concerns that is being used to track user's locations and invade their privacy), but some are the same.
From https://www.npr.org/2022/11/17/1137155540/fbi-tiktok-national-security-concerns-china:
"They also worried about potential abuses of TikTok's algorithm, and specifically that it could "be used to subtly indoctrinate American citizens" by censoring some videos and promoting others."
This is to say they don't want the Chinese government to have the right to speak to American citizens in it own terms, which is to specifically declare that some sorts of speech cannot be spoken for the danger it imposes. And I think most would agree that we shouldn't allow our free speech rights the power to destroy us (the idea that the US Constitution is not a suicide pact) by allowing foreign governments to distribute their propaganda on US citizens. I compare this modern Tik Tok issue to the days when enemy propaganda leaflets would be dropped from airplanes.
But to say that we're blocking speech due to the message it imposes directly conflicts with the notion that we should allow everyone to speak freely because eventually truth will prevail.
Quoting Echarmion
I think that's right, which is the result of greater access to mass media, now that everyone has a computer and can post. When mass media was in the hands of the very few, there was more of an agreement to abide by journalistic ethics, which were emphasized to those studying to become journalists, to now that no longer being the agreement.
Twitter has shown that the DNC and Biden Campaign were given control of the message to disseminate, which is no different than when we learned that Sean Hannity of FoxNews was directly communicating with the Trump campaign and offering advice to them during the Capitol riot. The distinction between journalism and marketing is now forever blurred.
With Internet anonymity, it's something anyone could do, regardless of location, age, whatever.
The topic is also related to bullying. If a kid isn't reading this stuff themselves, other kids in their circle might.
Some say it's purely the responsibility of parents to deal with, others add school teachers.
As far as I can tell, this is a fair case for proactive censorship. Something like, what good is a society that does not try to look after children and what they do?
Note, though, there are also positive examples, like this one:
Ice Bucket Challenge dramatically accelerated the fight against ALS (Jun 4, 2019)
Anyway, I'm guessing most would want this stuff minimized both via some sort of censoring and education. Arguments, informed opinions, ...?
[sub]Examples
U.S. says 82 youths have died in "choking game" (Feb 14, 2008)
Ingesting and Aspirating Dry Cinnamon by Children and Adolescents: The Cinnamon Challenge (May 1, 2013)
Factitial Dermatitis Due to the Salt and Ice Challenge (Apr 2014)
Mom believes son died from choking game online (Mar 22, 2016)
Correction: The Choking Game on YouTube: An Update (May 17, 2016)
Teens are daring each other to eat Tide pods. We dont need to tell you thats a bad idea. (Jan 17, 2018)
Salt and ice challenge leaves teens with severe burns (Jan 26, 2019)
What Is the Momo Challenge? (Feb 26, 2019)
Current Trends in Social MediaAssociated Skin Harm Among Children and Adolescents (Apr 2019)
Authorities warn of viral TikTok challenge causing fires (Jan 22, 2020)
FDA warns about serious problems with high doses of the allergy medicine diphenhydramine (Benadryl) (Sep 24, 2020)
Dangers of the TikTok Benadryl challenge (Jan 7, 2021)
TikTok, Tide Pods and Tiger King: health implications of trends taking over pediatric populations (Feb 2021)
[/sub]
I'm not sure I like that notion. It premises freedom on its utility, while I think of freedom axiomatically as an end in and of itself. It would be regrettable if free speech did not contribute to our collective knowledge and enlightenment, but if that were the case, shouldn't we still value free speech as more fundamental than whatever outcomes come from it? It seems safe to say that often free speech results in the good guys losing, as, for whatever reason, lies, misinformation and speciousness prevail in the court of public opinion, but still, we are glad that everyone gets to speak, as not only do I want freedom for myself, but I want freedom for others, as I would take restricting their freedom as odious in and of itself, but also, transitively, a restriction on my freedom to hear them, even if in principle alone. Put simply: I want my freedom, and I want everyone to have their freedom too - because it's right. The benefit of greater understanding is great too, but it's secondary to the enjoyment of the mere pure right itself.
I think the "free speech because free speech is how ideas progress" argument is weaker than "free speech because it is an inalienable right no matter it also is good for the progress of ideas". With the former, when free speech does not result in better ideas prevailing, then the door is opened to saying, "Well, I guess that didn't work out, did it?"
Of course if you want to talk to yourself in your own private language, in your own private echo-chamber, you can do what the fuck you like, but as soon as you are talking to other people, there are rules, because there is interaction. Generally, fraud, deception, threats and bullying, and various sorts of wind up and manipulation are frowned upon.
One might liken free-speech to the free market. The market is only free if it is regulated to exclude shysters, robbers, fraudsters, and so on. In the village market, one can rely on the honesty of neighbours who will have to come back again and again to the same customers, but in the global economy, and the tech-economy that no one is ever able to be competent in all fields, regulation is essential.
We can argue about the rules, that's one of the rules, but to suggest that there be no rules is to run around naked in public screaming "look what I've got!" Thanks, but no thanks.
Free discussion amongst equals is how truth can prevail, but only amongst honest equals committed to the project that truth should prevail. There is no education to be found in the talk of the dishonest, the foolish or the insane.
Freedom comes from order, not chaos. We have the freedom of the skies because the skies are heavily regulated, to the extent that even flocks of birds have to be dissuaded from flightpaths of aircraft.
I was trying to understand whether these last few clauses were directed at Musk or those who would use a platform like Twitter. From what you say in the following, it seems to be Musk:
Quoting Hanover
I think that's mistaken. It seems to me that Elon Musk is highly idealistic in all sorts of ways, and that there are genuine principles at play here. But I should think that this is beside the point because the thread is presumably about something which transcends Musk's personal motives. Inculpating Musk on the basis of motive won't answer the question about Mill and free speech absolutism. If the thread is to go beyond a personal criticism of Musk, then we must at least take him at his word instead of claiming that he is merely hiding behind the facade of free speech absolutism.
Quoting Hanover
And in this post "self promotion" narrows to "material gain," which I would say is an even more difficult charge to sustain. Bean counters don't acquire Twitter. The value of these social media companies is highly dubious, even more so now that their main source of income (micro advertising) is coming under scrutiny. Tesla is hands-down the better investment, and Musk was in a perfect position to refocus his energies there. Instead he made an idealistic intervention into Twitter, which from a financial perspective was foolishness.
I think free speech absolutism is the wrong road, but I don't think the personal charges you are bringing against Musk stick. Even if they did, I think the more interesting conversation would take him at his word. Returning to your thesis:
Quoting Hanover
This isn't an argument against free speech absolutism, it's an argument against Musk. There is no inherent connection between free speech absolutism and placing power in the undeserving hands of a tyrant or oligarchy. Even if we think Musk is a tyrant (or someone who is greedy, unscrupulous, and undeserving), the argument would seem to be invalid.
Quoting Hanover
Granting this for the sake of argument, does the ideal require institutional censorship?
I myself do not think Mill would accept Twitter as a counterargument, mostly because Twitter isn't even 20 years old. Presumably Mill's anti-censorship argument takes a much longer view than 20 years. To his credit, all of the garbage on Twitter will likely be irretrievably lost in the next 30-40 years, just like the public square banter of the past.
Regarding Mill and free speech absolutism, the first question is historical: Did Mill promote a form of free speech absolutism? I would uncritically venture to claim that he did, and in the very section of On Liberty that you quoted from. There he is launching his argument that, The power itself is illegitimate, namely the power to coerce in matters of thought or opinion. He denies the power even to governmentseven to the best of governments.
The second question is whether free speech absolutism would further Mills goal as it is interpreted in the thread, namely, "reaching higher truth." Suppose we look at all of history and the degree to which it has achieved Mills goal, and then we theoretically tinker with the variable of free speech. How do we suppose the tinkering would affect the degree to which Mills goal is achieved? If we turn the knob towards free speech absolutism, is Mills goal better achieved? What if we turn the knob away from it?
I think this thought experiment favors free speech absolutism, because history itself acts as a refining fire, burning away intellectual dross, especially as empires fall. The fire is not overwhelmed by too much raw material, and everything that is of high quality will pass through unscorched. The propagation of low quality material is more costly and therefore probabilistically less likely to occur than the propagation of high quality material. Humans are more keen to pass on what is valuable, beautiful, useful, and true, than they are to pass on the dross. Furthermore, any "scorching" would come more from censorship than from anything else. Thus at least on the long view, free speech absolutism seems to aid Mills goal.
But the third and final question asks which of the two better further Mills goal: free speech absolutism or intentional truth-seeking? In this case I think the answer is that intentional truth-seeking is much better at furthering the goal. At the same time I do not think that either Mill or Musk would disagree with this, and I also do not think that intentional truth-seeking (including journalistic standards) necessarily requires censorship. The idea here is that truth does not require censorship to help it win the day (or the century, or the millennium). Since intentional truth-seeking and good journalistic standards will further Mills goal even where censorship does not exist, journalistic standards do not represent a counterargument to free speech absolutism. I am sure Musk is in no way opposed to journalistic standards, nor need he be. He would probably just say that Twitter is the public square, not a journal, but that those who freely adhere to strong journalistic standards are crucially important voices within the public square. Apparently neither Mill nor Musk would be forced to sacrifice journalistic standards for the sake of free speech absolutism.
The reason I myself am not a proponent of free speech absolutism is because I believe some limited censorship aids the health of a society, and I am thinking of things even beyond Musks willingness to adhere to U.S. law. I dont know Mill so well, but I would be willing to follow Plato and Aristotle when it comes to this topic. I would have agreed if your original statement had been leveled at Twitter users rather than Musk, and so would Plato. It seems to me that an undue focus on Musk has mucked up the analyses. Beyond that, Im not convinced the characterization of free speech absolutism is as robust as it ought to be, but thats for another day.