Should we make a law forcing social media platforms and web hosts to be bound by the first amendment?

SigSauer

SigSauer

kiwifarms.net
Joined
Feb 8, 2018
Because this shit is getting ridiculous. Google is blacklisting results so that they don't appear in search engines, YouTube is deleting thousands of hours of hard work, FaceBook and Twitter are both doing their part in banning people for hate speech (which isn't illegal in the US), while allowing doxxing and other things that are illegal provided that it's people Jack Dorsey doesn't like, and web hosts can simply refuse to host websites whose content they disagree with.

Should we make the Internet Freedom of Speech Act of 2020 or something and make it so that web hosts and major platforms are bound by US constitutional law?
 
  • Optimistic
  • Agree
  • Dumb
Reactions: tehpope, FuckedUp, Syaoran Li and 8 others
Those companies all desperately deserve to collapse under their own hubris, but it's not likely to happen. Much how the /pol/ board on 4chan and various Discord channels act as a fishing net for lunatics, sites like Google, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and the like all operate under a joined network to identify warning signs, then forward them to the authorities for more in-depth monitoring. They are too useful to intelligence agencies.
 
  • Agree
  • Feels
  • Winner
Reactions: Fek, Just wandering, Iwasamwillbe and 5 others
Fagatron said:
Wouldn't work. They would just host their servers in a country that doesn't really care what American law says.

If America couldn't shut the pirate bay they're not going to stop some backwater shit hole realising they can become a tech giant homebase by further relaxing their internet laws as soon as America does this.
Click to expand...
No, Twitter, FaceBook, Google and YouTube are all American companies. This obviously wouldn't apply to, say, VK, nicovideo or whatever. If it's an American company, they would be bound by US law by default, and that includes the first amendment.

Rand /pol/ said:
How the fuck would that even work? Would mods not be allowed to delete stuff that isn't straight up illegal? Could I spam random bullshit on every forum? Would knitting subreddits not be allowed to delete Armenian genocide denial? What complete and utter retard would consider this a good idea?
Click to expand...
If it's illegal by US law, then it should obviously be deleted, nobody's debating that. Where the fuck are you getting this from other than your own ass?
 
SigSauer said:
No, Twitter, FaceBook, Google and YouTube are all American companies. This obviously wouldn't apply to, say, VK, nicovideo or whatever. If it's an American company, they would be bound by US law by default, and that includes the first amendment.
Click to expand...

That's what I'm saying. Why wouldnt these companies just move to Serbia and permit remote working?

It's not like they have a physical product they need to move around.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AnotherPleb and Orion Balls
SigSauer said:
If it's illegal by US law, then it should obviously be deleted, nobody's debating that. Where the fuck are you getting this from other than your own ass?
Click to expand...
I'm saying how would mods be allowed to delete stuff that ISN'T straight up illegal. Would they be allowed to remove spam or gore? Would they be allowed to delete stuff pushing for genociding Latvians?
 
  • Agree
  • Dumb
  • Informative
Reactions: tehpope, KimCoppolaAficionado, Just wandering and 1 other person
crocodilian said:
Those companies all desperately deserve to collapse under their own hubris, but it's not likely to happen. Much how the /pol/ board on 4chan and various Discord channels act as a fishing net for lunatics, sites like Google, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and the like all operate under a joined network to identify warning signs, then forward them to the authorities for more in-depth monitoring. They are too useful to intelligence agencies.
Click to expand...
Not twitter but google and facebook were built with intelligence agency oversight and youtube was bought by google.

Why would the government nerf their own powerful tools?
 
Unless the US government takes ownership of these companies through force or purchase, there's no way to enforce this. Companies can deny service for pretty much any reason they want, unless it's an illegal denial (like race or sex.)
 
Certainly but it won't happen-
As right believe in allowing corporations a free reign they're caught in a internal paradox-which errodes their position It probably doesnt help that they wouldnt give a shit if the tables were turned.
The left doesnt realize they're tying the noose around their own neck when they applaud this shit.
 
You'll get massive opposition from literally everyone. Liberals don't want it because free speech only means the government can't arrest you (for now) over words except in situations like shouting fire in a theater. Conservatives and libertarians don't want it because muh free market. The authoritarian left doesn't want it because they benefit from it. And the authoritarian right are edgelord neonazis who would rather start a war to seize power rather than bother with society and laws.
 
  • Like
  • Agree
Reactions: Syaoran Li and Emperor Julian
It's impossible to prove companies going against the first amendment. The companies can always claim that something happened either due to a technical or some copyright faggotry.
 
The moment a law like that was passed the larger social media companies would pay lawyers to circumvent it. There's also the chance the companies would see the fines levied at them as a cost of business that would coincidentally ensure others couldn't threaten their stranglehold.
 
No. I value free speech more than most people, and certainly more than silicon valley, but passing a law requiring internet forums respect it would make internet forums worse. I don't want Stack Overflow to become a stream of holocaust denial and shit-posting. Kiwifarms is a quality internet forum in large part because of it's moderation.

What needs to happen is we need to reduce the barrier to entry to creating free-speech spots online. Certain links in the chain need to be tempered against abuse. Those links are,
  • Cloudflare
  • Hosting Providers
  • ISPs
  • Payment Processors
  • Banks
These groups do need to respect the first amendment by providing their services regardless of what they are used for (so long as it is still legal) and not denying service based on someone's speech or expression. If someone calls up a bank and says "You need to drop this person because they deny the holocaust" the banks need to be require by law to reply with "we can't do that".
 
  • Like
  • Agree
  • Winner
Reactions: Thank You Kanye Very Cool, Flynt's Missing Pecker, tehpope and 4 others
Obviously, there's no (sensible) way to implement this directly. There's a lot of gray areas that the law in question would necessarily be unfit to address and would end up being a clusterfuck in the court system (is hardcore porn free speech?). The only way I could feasibly see this working is by way of a "quasi-fascist" business-government partnership. Something kinda like Italian corporatism where industry leaders could receive government subsidies in exchange for a level of government control over what the business does beyond direct legislation. This would make the government partially responsible for the behaviors of the company and thus the company would be required to uphold the constitution. Since the government holds stake in the company, the government would have some power to decide what is and isn't allowed. ie. "you can't delete shit that you disagree with, but go ahead and delete all the spambots and porn you want."

Unfortunately this would be an easily exploitable system and would likely lead to censorship anyway, this time government sponsored.
So basically: tough titties.
 
Rand /pol/ said:
How the fuck would that even work? Would mods not be allowed to delete stuff that isn't straight up illegal? Could I spam random bullshit on every forum? Would knitting subreddits not be allowed to delete Armenian genocide denial? What complete and utter retard would consider this a good idea?
Click to expand...

Exactly. Have fun dealing with spam shit and other shitposting if forums are forced to allow everything.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back