FTC Launches Broad Tech 'Censorship' Probe Targeting Meta, Uber (yahoo.com) 130
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has launched an inquiry into potential "censorship" by technology platforms ranging from Meta to Uber, marking an escalation in scrutiny of content moderation practices. FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson called for public comment on what he termed "Big Tech censorship," describing it as "un-American" and "potentially illegal."
The broad probe could examine social media, video sharing, ride-sharing and event planning services. The announcement follows long-standing Republican claims that conservative viewpoints face discrimination on social media platforms.
The broad probe could examine social media, video sharing, ride-sharing and event planning services. The announcement follows long-standing Republican claims that conservative viewpoints face discrimination on social media platforms.
I propose an easy test (Score:5)
conservative viewpoints face discrimination on social media platforms
Enter any of the main social networks right now. Navigate 10 minutes in each. Come back and repeat the above claim.
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder which "conservative viewpoints" are being censored? Small government? Fewer regulations? Lower taxes?
Surprising that moderators would crackdown on those....unless they're talking about some OTHER viewpoints
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:5, Insightful)
Evergreen tweet:
Conservative: I have been censored for my conservative views
Me: Holy shit! You were censored for wanting lower taxes?
Con: LOL no...no not those views
Me: So....deregulation?
Con: Haha no not those views either
Me: Which views, exactly?
Con: Oh, you know the ones
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothin' says "free speech" quite like the right to defame others on social media by implying that they're involved in pedophilia. That's why on X you can call anyone a "groomer", just like the founding fathers intended. - Leon Musk
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Well these guys say they're honestly groomers: https://honestgroomers.org/ [honestgroomers.org]
Re: I propose an easy test (Score:2)
Well, duh! Look at the photo of that chick molesting that under eighteen year old! That's CSM for sure.
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They learned from the last load of fascists. You don't say you are censoring degenerates and views that damage the morals of the country, you say you are "defending free speech" by making sure that your views get promoted above all others. And quietly censor people who disagree with you, e.g. X will censor posts containing the word "cis". Keep screaming about being censored to distract from the fact that you are the one doing it.
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:4, Insightful)
Yup, actively advocating during the height of the pandemic for True Merkins to go out and infect others. Well, advocating for not wearing masks, not vaccinating, not being careful, etc, but the same thing effectively.
Re: I propose an easy test (Score:5, Funny)
You mean the vaccine that Trump took credit for and said it would be "a beautiful thing" if his followers all got vaccinated?
Re: I propose an easy test (Score:2)
No, he's always a piece of shit.
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Ah so a bunch of manufactured "scandals" and denial of reality by conservatives
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:5, Insightful)
conservative viewpoints face discrimination on social media platforms
Enter any of the main social networks right now. Navigate 10 minutes in each. Come back and repeat the above claim.
That won't tell you anything. The algorithms show you the feed that the algorithm calculates is right for you (where "right" means "is most likely to keep you clicking"). You won't be able to tell it it's discriminating unless you can see what's being fed INTO the feed, and then see what gets forwarded to multiple different users with different profiles.
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Facebook is spamming MAGA posts in the last few weeks. Zuck has drunk the koolaid.
Are the also investingating X (aka Twitter)? Or does Musk get a pass because of his special role as president?
If this goes through, expect huge increases in flat earth posts again. And anti-vax, etc.
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I already see enough flat earth videos thrown at me.. Ugh.
Re: I propose an easy test (Score:2)
Yep I have had a huge uptick in maggot bot spam reaching my feed..I only see it on Mobile where there are fewer helpful protections available.
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That was some research done that actually showed that rather than bbeing a "liberal bias" the sites either basically just showed you whatevver you already believed (facebook, threads), or tended to surface conservative content more (twitter, youtube). Obviously there are some networks that lean a bit more left, notably bsky and mastodon, but mastodon is kinda tiny and bsky was largely formed af
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:4)
I can understand that you want those who don't fit easily on either side of the spectrum to conform to one- but that's you fighting facts, not them.
You are the aggressor against fact in this particular instance.
Re:I propose an easy test (Score:5, Insightful)
Try posting factual information, like there are 2 genders on reddit or bluesky. Instant permaban.
You know, you weird freaks remind me of the old days when there was no such thing as left-handed people. Everyone was right-handed as was good and natural. If someone used their left hand, it was because they were mentally ill and it had to be headed off before it got worse. This was after the time when it was socially acceptable to simply blame it on witchcraft or demonic possession and burn/drown/crush/stone them or put them through some sort of exorcism. Once society got that out of their system, they still reacted with disgust at left-handedness and so had to come up with pseudo-scientific psychology-based explanations for why they needed to extinguish it. There are still plenty of people alive in the US who were still kids when "fixing" left-handedness was practiced in many areas of the country.
After left-handedness, there were things like homosexuality which only even became legal all over the US in 2003 from a Supreme Court case (which could potentially be reversed since the current court doesn't care about stare decisis and there are still laws on the books against it all over the place). That only stopped being classified as mental illness in 1973. Although it took years and years for most of the psychologists/psychiatrists who still considered it such to die off and there are still some left, not to mention, disturbingly, new ones whose ideology is not informed by their modern psychological training. Of course, even without homosexuality as a diagnosis, it was replaced with sexual-orientation disturbance, which was more or less just a name change, then in 1980, that was replaced with ego-dystonic homosexuality which focused on the conflict between being homosexual and a self-image that rejected homosexuality. While that is a real thing, the actual diagnosis still left some psychological professionals with the option to decide that the homosexuality was the problem and try to "cure" the condition by getting rid of the homosexuality part rather than fixing the self-image problem. Then in 1987, it was "sexual disorder not otherwise specified".
As for 2 genders, here we have, first and foremost, a problem of semantics. Before any argument on this, it is important to establish the meaning of terms. One of the big problems here is that the "only 2 genders" people are typically using a different definition of "gender" than the typically more educated people who accept that gender is not so fixed. The former are basically using gender as synonymous with "sex", while the latter are using the sociological meaning where gender is a social construct related to the characteristics of both biological sex and things like sexual orientation, etc. As such, there are, of course, multiple genders from a sociological perspective. In fact, it's not even just a spectrum, it's multi-dimensional, not linear. The sociological version is really the more appropriate version in this day and age. The word gender itself comes from the Latin "genus" which is a word that might be familiar from biological classification which goes kingdom-phylum-class-order-family-genus-species. What it literally means is basically the same as "type" or "kind". So, for example, it would be correct to say "What gender is it? Animal, vegetable or mineral?" Technically it has always been appropriate to use it to distinguish between biological sexes, but that was not its exclusive use, although it did become more popular. Then sociologists specifically began using it to refer to sex-related traits rather than sex itself.
So, for your claim to have any relation to "truth", you have to first be clear of what connotation of "gender" you're actually using. Otherwise what you're saying is just a bunch of pointless spitting into the wind, as is any reply to you. Be specific, be clear. Words mean things, but they can mean multiple things, be clear which meaning you're using.
Of course, semantics aside, I could ima
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Thank you for the taking the time to write a thoughtful response. Debate has to be rooted in shared understanding of the words and meanings, else, like you say, "bunch of pointless spitting into the wind".
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Frankly, the world needs more of it.
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Hand waves away a set of reasoning with a shit ton of factual points in it, without at all trying to argue against the interpretation of those facts.
I love stupid people. Thank you for amusing me today.
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I wonder (Score:3)
illegal under what law? (Score:4, Informative)
I wonder what (they think) is "potentially illegal" according to what law?
As we have been told repeatedly, censorship is when the government tells you what you cannot say. If a platform says "you can't publish that on our platform, go find another place to say it" that may be objectionable, but it is their right.
Re:illegal under what law? (Score:5, Informative)
I wonder what (they think) is "potentially illegal" according to what law?
King Trumpy the first, doesn't like it, therefore illegal.
Re:illegal under what law? (Score:5, Interesting)
Nazi-dominated student groups carried out public burning of books they claimed were “un-German.”
Here is a wild quote from hitler,
“37 percent represents 75 percent of 51 percent", hitler said
Math is no longer true/false logic, the answer is whatever the fascists say it is. I think trump is trying to beat hitler's record of 53 days. [theatlantic.com]
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oblig. xkcd [xkcd.com]
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Is censorship illegal ? If we are not talking about 1A, what laws are on the book preventing it?
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Elon of course. His X company is not nearly as popular as he would like, therefore it must be the fault of liberals. So please investigate all of X's competitors and Make Oligarchs Flatulate Often!
Let meta formally admit they were censoring... (Score:2)
and watch the focus stay only on censorship against conservatives and around covid, which was real per Zuck's own admission, and not the censorship of people posting about Israel or Palestine. That's the one kind of censorship that is nearly ubiquitous, so much so that MSM and government won't acknowledge it
witch hunt (Score:5, Informative)
Until they do away with section 230, it's legal to do just about any amount of censorship on your platform unless it is government funded.
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Until they do away with section 230, it's legal to do just about any amount of censorship on your platform unless it is government funded.
Government funded censorship is legal until someone comes along and fucking does something.
Last guy had to write a check for $44 billion.
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
Good thing he was able to get a big pile of Saudi money, and another big pile of Russian money, and oh yeah then used that platform to illegally provide free advertising for a presidential candidate.
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
All of those softballed his orangeness by not calling him a fascist traitor.
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>Last guy had to write a check for $44 billion.
The users who didn't want to participate in a right-wing cesspool have left, so Musk basically wasted his money. Conservatives continue to labor under the delusion that people just have to be awoken to the truth (but not "woke", because that's the opposite thing) and then they'll come around to the right-wing way of thinking.
Thing is, it doesn't work like that. Most people just find attempts to influence their political views to be annoying, like when you've seen that ad for mushroom coffee for the tenth
Re:witch hunt (Score:5, Interesting)
The users who didn't want to participate in a right-wing cesspool have left, so Musk basically wasted his money.
Oh. No. He got value for his money.
He drove the left-wing of our political spectrum off of the largest communications platform in the world. He kneecapped them. They are now scattered across dozens of fractured communities with minimal exposure of their ideas to the majority of unaffiliated people. The far right are now free to salute publicly, while the left are forced to hide away in small safe-spaces. He drove the left underground and out of sight. He used his new-found power of the press to normalize the far right, both in the USA and Europe. He shifted the Overton window to the right. Globally. The effects will be felt for generations.
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
They are reforming on bsky pretty quickly, and the independent journalists who were depending on Twitter for reach are now running more of their own sites and sharing content to more networks. What Leon did was definitely effective in its time, but has led journalism to build a better structure. If it survives this administration it will be stronger than before.
That is however a big if.
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Musks X was never about appealing to the common person. The common person fled that site when their feeds about their favorite celebrities and cat pictures got replaced with howling assholes screaming at everyone about "white genocide" or whatever innane fucking nonsense the blueticks are ranting about this week. They all left. All thats left is the most toxic echo chamber imaginable.
It was about radicalizing the conservatives from regular reagan "small goverment" stuff to far right "black people having job
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I do not believe people are noticing. At least your basic person in the U.S. seems to believe that Elmo is rooting out corruption. The problem is that la Presidenta and Elmo know that getting a story-line out first is important, any corrections made later or fact checked are lost in the miasma of the follow on bullshit they generate.
A good example the $8 Billion Elmo recently claimed he saved from a contract that got pulled back. It turns out that the $8 Billion figure was on a gov. web site until it was co
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Because it's not about what the law says it's about what the courts will do when you're in front of a judge. And we have hundreds of completely incompetent and corrupt judges that were put in place specifically to do the bidding of a organization known as the heritage foundation. Up to an including
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While the 'be a dictator' ruling was an obvious attempt to throw-away the rule-book, obeying the rules, is the point of a judge. The problem is, when a judge upholds the rules, he depends on the government and government does whatever president Trump/king Musk demands. Undoing any rule is simple for government.
The point of DoGE is is more than blocking the courts: It is the executive arm and the other arms (judicial, legislative) are subsidiaries: Any ruling from a judge must be approved by the execut
Re:witch hunt (Score:4)
Canceling useless contracts and stopping gross waste of the tens of thousands I pay in taxes every year? Sign me up.
I must've missed the part where Trump is actually going to pass any of DOGE's savings back to the average American taxpayer. Aside from the warm fuzzy feeling of schadenfreude, are you genuinely getting anything tangible out of this?
Keeping boys out of the locker room and sports teams my daughter competes on? Absolutely.
Trans youth are a tiny, tiny minority. I'd I'd like to remind you that the last time certain people had a problem with their kids associating with minorities, they opened their wallets and sent their kids to private schools.
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Canceling useless contracts and stopping gross waste of the tens of thousands I pay in taxes every year? Sign me up.
I must've missed the part where Trump is actually going to pass any of DOGE's savings back to the average American taxpayer. Aside from the warm fuzzy feeling of schadenfreude, are you genuinely getting anything tangible out of this?
Yeah. What Government transparency can actually look like. What strong-minded competent leadership is capable of when communicating effectively to 300+ million citizens. What The Swamp is pissing our money away on. What the JFK files buried for over half a century. And I’m willing to bet you’re purposely ignoring the fact that tax reduction is probably going to be a very public goal (if not already), to align with what The People would like to see as the end goal for DOGE.
The hell would we
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Iâ(TM)m far more grateful for being unburdened by what has been.
You mean for example kings? [theguardian.com]
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Yeah. What Government transparency can actually look like
Ah yes. Because if there's one thing Musk, Trump, and the current White House are, it's transparent. I mean they were so, so clear about who is in charge of Doge with everyone from the White House being absolutely clear that Musk is not in charge and is just an advisor... Well, except for Trump who seems to be boasting to whoever will listen that he put Musk in charge of Doge. So transparent. Then there's all of Doge's actions, which are all so clearly announced and vetted by Congress as legally required in
Musk is claiming he'll send refund checks (Score:2)
Somewhere along the line the Democrats stopped lying. Not sure why, but they just stopped. At best the stretch the truth just a little. But even that they're afraid to do.
I get that literally all media is right wing now. I mean, CNN is on record saying they're trying to turn into fox news. And everyone is running scared of Trump's Gestapo and cancelling anything that looks even a little like diversity or
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For another comment, I needed to verify the number of federal employees. I searched google for "how many federal employees are there" The top result was literally just a text excerpt that said:
" There are too many federal employees. Excluding active-duty military and Postal Service employees, the federal workforce exceeds 2.4 million"
I just searched it again and now it says:
"REDUCING THE UNNECESSARY FOOTPRINT OF GOVERNMENT: President Donald J. Trump is committed to reducing the size and scope of the federal
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Let's fix our unsustainable debt and deficit first.
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So, you or I might see a couple hundred bucks back, if we're lucky. Right now it's all just talk, and you know what they say about the value of talk. But let's assume some refunds actually do materialize, odds are they'll be heavily biased in favor of the wealthy. Those broligarchs at Trumps inauguration weren't there just to keep the room warm.
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
Get back to us when it actually happens.
Re:witch hunt (Score:5, Insightful)
That is one of the dangers of being low information.
The discussions of DOGE refunds are happening now.
I would love it if someone who is high information and in the know can explain this to me.
On one hand republicans keep saying the debt is an existential crisis.
On the other hand they want to add trillions to the debt by lowering corporate tax rate and cutting refund checks to the people.
It was the same shit under Obama .... nonstop the debt the debt the debt... republicans would take the floor with their props and debt clocks and sound the alarm nonstop for Obama's entire 8 year term in office. When Republicans finally took power the first thing they did was push tax cuts for the rich on the nations credit card adding trillions to the debt.
I remember listening to the hearing a week ago on government oversight and the ranking member pointed out this same contradiction taking place in real time with republicans hyperventilating over debt at the very moment their party was actively working to advance a tax cut scheme that will add trillions in additional debt.
All moot anyway. DOGE doesn't have the legal authority to do most of the crap they are engaged in and will most certainly be shit on by the courts. There are never going to be any refunds.
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Trump is musing about it publicly. That doesn't translate into actual action until it actually happens. Of course, the actual probable outcome even if we do all get cut small checks is that we'll be taxed many times that amount. For one thing, it seems like the only strategy that Musk and his subordinate Trump understand is indiscriminate firing. Which really worked out great for Musk at Twitter, assuming that dropping the value of the company through the floor was the goal. They have no clue what they're d
Re:witch hunt (Score:5, Interesting)
For myself and the conservative friends I circulate in, we are pleased as punch with the things that Trump is doing currently.
So you are satisfied with the work he is doing even though the methodology violates US laws and traditions? The ends justify the means?
This is not a pejorative, but simple analysis: "by any means necessary" is a valid position to take.
Bear in mind that the ends may not be what you imagine them to be, and if "by any means necessary" is allowed, you will have no recourse when one day you find the ends are not to your liking.
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First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out
-because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out
-because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out
-because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me
-and there was no one left to speak for me.
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Goddamn dude that is one crazy take.
For myself and the conservative friends I circulate in, we are pleased as punch with the things that Trump is doing currently.
Smaller government through closing of unnecessary departments? I'm there. Canceling useless contracts and stopping gross waste of the tens of thousands I pay in taxes every year?
You're a fool if you think any savings will trickle down to your pocket. Why aren't you concerned about the executive branch overstepping it's bounds? Congress controls funding. If you want to dissolve or defund a department then congress has to vote.
Focusing the military on doing their actual job (kill people and break their shit) rather than wringing their hands about sex-based quotas, "white anger" and identity politics? What took so long!?
I don't know who you are talking to, but I haven't been so hopeful for the future in years.
Settle down grandpa, Wheel Of Fortune is on and your cup of sleepy time tea is ready.
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While DoGE is busy counting all the dollar bills belonging to government, it has, to date, demanded only one thing is unnecessary: People running the government and teaching people, the job of running the government: Why would the 'boss' of government think it doesn't need people to make it work?
My answer: Generative AI.
The states decide which nationality, which race, which sex, and which religion can go to school, buy a house, or run for government office: Yay, government of stupid white people, by
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There's definitely government waste as in any large organization, but what the current administration is doing is basically you trying to cut wasteful personal spending by quitting your job and then beating up your foreign neighbors because they aren't paying you to keep your yard presentable.
The other issue is that apparently these "geniuses" can only account for things in terms of dollars instead of other value - they seem to only be looking at the cost side of the ledger, not the benefit. Take Ukraine fo
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For myself and the conservative friends I circulate in, we are pleased as punch with the things that Trump is doing currently.
Do you subscribe to the golden rule? Do you hold yourself to the same standards you would want others to apply to yourself?
Smaller government through closing of unnecessary departments? I'm there.
There are means of legally perusing such changes by going to congress and building consensus for changing the law. The president does not have article I authority to act in contravention of law. Neither does he have article III authority to override judicial determination of what the law is. Nixon tried this shit and was not only beat down by the courts congress passed additional la
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People are literally being disappeared to Gitmo right now.
The claim is that its only "dangerous people" being sent there. The reality is that there is absolutely no due process and zero transparency in the process of who is being taken there.
The only statements coming from the white house are jokes about how they are chaining people up. What little information that's leaking out indicates they are simply grabbing anybody they can to make the quotas that trump is pushing.
Is your crowd celebrating this? Do yo
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
Yes. They do think it's a good thing, because they are racists. The time they want to go back to because they thought America was greater then is before slavery was prohibited*, before vaccines were invented, and before women were allowed to vote.
* For those not convicted of a crime in a nation where most people commit felonies regularly, that is
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
For myself and the conservative friends I circulate in, we are pleased as punch with the things that Trump is doing currently.
I'd like to think that this is mostly because you don't know how anything works, but I'm afraid that's giving you too much credit in the wrong department.
Smaller government through closing of unnecessary departments?
Cue: The "finding out" phase.
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Until they do away with section 230, it's legal
It's legal with or without that. In fact, without it, if they don't censor then they'd be even more liable. Your argument is in want of something more akin to the fairness doctrine.
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It's legal with or without that. In fact, without it, if they don't censor then they'd be even more liable.
It's true that without it, they would be obligated to police content — but it's often argued by conservatives that the rule should be that you either have to moderate everything or nothing, that you are either a publisher or a platform but can't be both. This argument has been made here ad nauseam. It's always easier to ruin a space than it is to make it someplace people want to be.
If the rule is that you either have to moderate all the bad things or none of them, then that's a bigger win for the trol
Re: witch hunt (Score:2)
Even if they do away with 230 moderation will be protected by the 1A. Section 230 just prevented a bunch of unnecessary litigation to prove that point.
So what if they did? (Score:5, Informative)
Platforms can moderate however the hell they want to. The First Amendment gives them that prerogative.
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While that is true, governments can pass laws to allow or protect these platforms from being sued over or found responsible for the posts of their users. This is lever that this and previous administrations have used to get companies to censor in a way that the ruling class wishes. The only real difference is the use of doublespeak, calling for censorship of the other points of view while calling it "free speech"---there's no way truth social would let comments criticizing trump stay, especially if they w
Re:So what if they did? (Score:5, Informative)
Only if the courts determine that the First Amendment trumps (no pun intended) whatever law/concern the government puts forward against it.
Now you'd think that would make the social networks safe, since our courts are supposed to operate on precedent, and there's a whole lot of first amendment law precedent ... but we have a Supreme Court that has shown it's willing to completely throw out precedent, and literally just make the law up when they feel like it.
With such a court, none of our constitutional protections are guaranteed.
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That’s not for you to decide. You’re just gonna have to wait and see how it flushes out with the investigations and the lawsuits. Ultimately, it will be the courts that decide.
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I agree, the courts these days are more and more off-frequency with the letter of the law. The law (First Amendment as well as Section 230) says it's 100% up to the platform owners.
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The First Amendment gives them that prerogative.
If, as you say, the First Amendment allows companies to say one thing and do another, the Federal Trade Commission wouldn't need to exist.
I somehow don't think that argument will hold up in court.
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Correct, false claims are not covered by First Amendment protection.
I'm not sure what that is supposed to do with the topic at hand or my post about content moderation.
Allow free speech. Censorship bad. (Score:2)
Yeah, why can't we inform people about generic Viagra? A lot of people, especially Republicans, need to sere my generic Viagra ads. They can get 50% off if they act now.
Oh and I know this is a nerds website, but I would like to discuss sports. Let's talk about the NFL.
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Oh and I know this is a nerds website, but I would like to discuss sports. Let's talk about the NFL.
For real. Did someone call Andrew Ferguson a lost Redditor once and he never got over it?
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OMG, Fox needs to stop with the Get It Back Up commercials!
This is rich (Score:5, Interesting)
Coming from the administration that effectively came up with the idea to deplatform every American user from TikTok. [archives.gov] Then of course, when Trump thought it would help him win the election, he flip-flopped on it. Now of course, if you go on TikTok it immediately recommends a steady diet of right-wing propaganda by default, unless you go in and start fiddling with the content preferences. I'm sure that's just a coincidence.
When they make claims of "censorship", they're just upset that they're not the ones doing it. Musk rather famously tweaked X's algorithm so that content containing certain words and phrases is deprioritized. Can you guess which side of the political spectrum is most likely to be using those words and phrases?
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Musk also tweaked it so that his posts become more popular. Is he popular, or is it just artificial? Is he a top tier player in PoE2 or is it artificial? Is he a genius or just a scrub that pretends? Is he finding fraud in his illegal search of databases, or is he just lying?
Based on what? (Score:2)
I'm constantly amazed by the supposedly "conservative" people to suddenly want to regulate what private companies can do. If you don't like the moderation policies - the answer isn't government intervention, it's to start a competitor.
Oh wait, they tried with Truth Social etc. Yea, the group of people that want to go there isn't big enough I guess?
Then they bought Twitter and changed it's policies, but whoops - like half the people left.
I'm not going to speculate what the reason is - just that it seems like
Re: Based on what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing on earth is less surprising than alleged conservatives being hypocrites.
Their whole name is horse shit. The only thing they want to conserve is their privilege. Everything else is there to be consumed.
His name is actually pretty clever (Score:2)
I know because we're seeing Trump ignoring the law and just doing whatever the fuck he wants and there's a lot of people who voted for him that are quite upset. I'm sure it won't last. TV will t
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Also, you are using alt accounts to manipulate the moderation system.
You are using AC to hide your identity, how can anyone trust you? It would be literally insane.
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Hey, buddy. This is one of the voices in your head, there is a autographed donald trump book in the bottom of the hudson river. You have to go down to the very bottom without oxygen & wait 10-15 minutes for it to appear. If you do that you will be rewarded with a all expenses paid trip to heaven with all those virgins. hitler will be there! Me and the other voices love hitler!
Social media censorship is legal (Score:2)
Facebook doesn't have to post what they don't want to. Neither does Twitter, which regularly silences voices critical of Musk.
Weaponization of the DOJ (Score:5, Informative)
Trump's DOJ is sending letters to members of congress who called Musk a 'dick':
https://bsky.app/profile/rober... [bsky.app]
Serves them right! (Score:2)
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Meta, etc are private property. (Score:2, Flamebait)
The 1st amendment doesn't give you a platform for your speech. What it does is protects you from being persecuted by the government for your speech. The rest of us have the right not to listen to your bullshit and can kick you out of our circles. This very may include work if your speech becomes a significantly distraction in the work place.
So if Meta, etc, want to censor their platform, that's there discretion. It could cause users to migrate to other platforms that they deem more friendly. We see this wit
cesspool (Score:2)
Zuck the right fists, this all goes away. (Score:2)
Censoring of what sort of views ? (Score:2)
This seems like a complaint for censoring some views, Republican views. But at the same time Trump Signs Order To Deport Foreign Students Who Support Palestinian Freedom [huffingtonpost.co.uk]. 'So it seems to me that All speech is free but some is more free than others' (sorry George).
Re: (Score:2)
Is Twitter included? (Score:2)
Twitter is "deboosting" certain comments. Specifically, anything critical of the government or which questions if people are being manipulated through propaganda.
Will this be looked into, or will it be washed under the rug like all those Republican requests to censor someone's comment?
republicans should just stop making (Score:2)
Great! (Score:2)
I'm looking forward to hearing from Bernie Sanders and AOC over there on Truth Social.
Striving for Republican-Only Media Stop Them! (Score:2)
I would care (Score:3)
I hate censorship and don't support anyone doing it nor do I think corporations especially large ones with anti-trust concerns get to do as they please cuz 1st amendment. I believe corporate rights should be weighed against competing public interests similar to expressions in Marsh v. AL.
Musk has tweaked Twitter's algorithms to explicitly boost himself personally and his now far right wing political ideology. I can only presume the FTC has absolutely no interest whatsoever in looking into Musk. The administration has already fired 5 IGs actively investigating Musk's various enterprises.
The current administration has corruptly and petulantly blacklisted associated press from participating in whitehouse events because they don't agree with the APs style guide in reference to naming of Golf of Mexico. Trump has repeatedly threatened the revocation of broadcast licenses because he doesn't agree with news reporting.
In the absence of credible reason to believe this would be a consistent non-partisan application of law and not just an excuse for further political bullshit I can't support FTC's efforts even though I think the government has some affirmative role in protecting the free speech interests of the people.
No gay cake for you! (Score:2)
So, the right is OK with saying business owners should have the right to deny service to individuals and corporations with whom they clash philosophically, as long as it is related to homosexuality, etc. But you can't deny service to those who promulgate dangerous falsehoods during a national/global emergency. Uh-huh.
Amazon must be in this list too (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Republics only approve of Citizens United when it relates to campaign contributions. When it's a company actually exercising its free speech rights to, for example, criticize a piece of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, as if by magic, those free speech rights disappear!
In January, a federal judge dismissed Disney’s lawsuit against the governor, which had claimed he and others retaliated against the company for criticizing a controversial parental rights education law. That law, dubbed “Don’t Say Gay,” limits school classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity.
The judge ruled that Disney lacked legal standing to sue DeSantis on its claim he violated the company’s First Amendment rights by pushing to change the Reedy Creek Improvement District due to Disney’s opposition to the law.
Disney had appealed the dismissal of that suit.
source [cnbc.com]
As someone already said earlier in the discussion, it's ultimately up to the kangaroo courts and lately there's been a lot of partisan bias in play.
Re: (Score:2)