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Ted Cruz on Alex Jones Facebook ban: ‘Who the hell made Facebook the arbiter of political speech?’
The Hill ^ | 07/29/18 | Brett Samuels

Posted on 07/29/2018 5:50:15 PM PDT by yesthatjallen

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on Saturday pushed back against Facebook for banning conspiracy theorist and InfoWars founder Alex Jones, suggesting the platform was infringing on the First Amendment.

"Am no fan of Jones — among other things he has a habit of repeatedly slandering my Dad by falsely and absurdly accusing him of killing JFK — but who the hell made Facebook the arbiter of political speech? Free speech includes views you disagree with," Cruz tweeted.

Facebook, a private company, announced Friday it had banned Jones from the platform for 30 days over content that it said violated its community guidelines. The site also removed four videos from pages run by Jones and InfoWars after they were reported to the site.

The ban means that Jones's personal page is suspended, barring him from posting content there or sharing content to the Infowars page, according to CNN.

Zuckerberg has faced intense criticism for months over his platform's handling of hate speech and conspiracy theories.

The company said earlier this month that, despite taking down videos and other content pushing hoaxes, Jones’s Infowars account doesn’t qualify for a ban from the platform.

Zuckerberg said in an interview last week that it's difficult for the platform to ban accounts that push conspiracy theories, such as Holocaust denials, because it is "hard to impugn intent" from those users.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: alexjones; cruz; facebook
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1 posted on 07/29/2018 5:50:15 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
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Comment #2 Removed by Moderator

To: yesthatjallen
Fakebook is a free enterprise. Government has no business telling it what it can and cannot (or must and must not) publish.

The free market will destroy Farcebook, if justice be done.

3 posted on 07/29/2018 5:54:44 PM PDT by IronJack
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To: yesthatjallen

InfoWars is certainly aptly named.


4 posted on 07/29/2018 5:58:31 PM PDT by bigbob (Trust Sessions. Trust the Plan.)
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To: yesthatjallen

Tru dat!


5 posted on 07/29/2018 5:59:13 PM PDT by pke
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To: yesthatjallen

Well Ted — it is their FREE web site so, yes, they can pretty much do what they want. WE can also do what we want and mock the web site for its ridiculous bias.


6 posted on 07/29/2018 6:01:49 PM PDT by plain talk
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To: yesthatjallen

Abandon Fecebook

Every login provides money that is used against US.


7 posted on 07/29/2018 6:03:16 PM PDT by Lurkinanloomin (Natural Born Citizen Means Born Here of Citizen Parents__Know Islam, No Peace - No Islam, Know Peace)
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To: yesthatjallen

I don’t think the government should tell social media that they should publish all legal content but if they were to write a law saying this, they could call it Net Neutrality.


8 posted on 07/29/2018 6:03:22 PM PDT by sportutegrl (Being offended is a choice.)
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To: IronJack

Fakebook is a free enterprise. Government has no business telling it what it can and cannot (or must and must not) publish.

Would you make the same argument if, in the next Presidential debate, they let the RAT candidate speak as long as it wished and then limited the Republican to twenty seconds... with the sound down? It’s their TV network, after all.


9 posted on 07/29/2018 6:07:55 PM PDT by Pravious
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To: IronJack

Not unless they lobby and get in bed with government(s).

And visa versa.


10 posted on 07/29/2018 6:09:24 PM PDT by RushIsMyTeddyBear
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To: IronJack

No it is not a free enterprise. It was started with seed money from the CIA technology research agency. Would you be happy if Verizon decided to block all text messages to you when you were identified as a Republican? To make it impossible for phone calls to go through to you because you were known to be a trump voter? Quit making excuses for this Democrat left-wing fascists organization that sucks at the government teat.


11 posted on 07/29/2018 6:15:54 PM PDT by DesertRhino (Dog is man's best friend, and moslems hate dogs. Add that up. ....)
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To: GOPe Means Bend Over Spell Run

I’m almost ready. What a colossal waste of time Facebook is. And Twitter? America’s bathroom wall? Don’t get me started.


12 posted on 07/29/2018 6:16:57 PM PDT by Hildy (The worst part of betrayal is that it never comes from your enemies.)
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To: yesthatjallen

At best they are an unregulated political action committee


13 posted on 07/29/2018 6:17:29 PM PDT by DesertRhino (Dog is man's best friend, and moslems hate dogs. Add that up. ....)
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To: yesthatjallen

Facebook is private property and they can decide who gets to use their private property. By the same token, I dont have to use their private property.


14 posted on 07/29/2018 6:22:04 PM PDT by taxcontrol (Stupid should hurt)
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To: GOPe Means Bend Over Spell Run

A private business is free to set the terms and conditions of service. Progressives love to point that out. In this case I would point it out, except I want to be fully consistent.

Who doubts that the customers of Facebook are fully capable of deciding to accept their terms of service or decline and go elsewhere (like gab.ai !!). Who doubts that the customer could walk away so quickly and in such numbers as to put Facebook out of business? Who doubts that the customers could do this far faster than any government bureaucracy could pass any rule to force Facebook to rethink their policy?

Once again we are at a fork in the road with respect to the Constitution. As far as I am concerned, private property is private property, and that the owner has an unalienable right to decide who to serve and under what terms. Progressives love this as well, that is until I remind them that in the name of civil rights, they destroyed the unalienable property rights of people who owned lunch counters in the south.

As much as I detested how those business people denied blacks basic human dignity of a place to eat and relieve themselves, we could have chosen a path that did not destroy or infringe on the rights of property owners. But no, we allowed government to seize a power that was not enumerated and thus that is really null and void, except that we also allowed government to validate that usurpation of power.

And now we are hinting that we would be happy to see Facebook be turned into a “public accommodation”. Shame on us. And we rant against big and ever bigger government.


15 posted on 07/29/2018 6:23:17 PM PDT by theBuckwheat
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To: DesertRhino
Sorry but it is a free enterprise.

It was started with seed money from the CIA technology research agency. Are you saying the didn't build that?

Would you be happy if Verizon decided to block all text messages to you when you were identified as a Republican? To make it impossible for phone calls to go through to you because you were known to be a trump voter?

Hell no, I'd be pissed as hell. So much so, I would find an different provider.

16 posted on 07/29/2018 6:44:40 PM PDT by Sir_Humphrey (Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people -Socrates)
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To: DesertRhino
Sorry but it is a free enterprise.

It was started with seed money from the CIA technology research agency.

Are you saying the didn't build that?

Would you be happy if Verizon decided to block all text messages to you when you were identified as a Republican? To make it impossible for phone calls to go through to you because you were known to be a trump voter?

Hell no, I'd be pissed as hell. So much so, I would find an different provider.

17 posted on 07/29/2018 6:45:43 PM PDT by Sir_Humphrey (Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people -Socrates)
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To: All

Sorry for my double post


18 posted on 07/29/2018 6:46:41 PM PDT by Sir_Humphrey (Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people -Socrates)
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To: yesthatjallen

bookmark


19 posted on 07/29/2018 6:56:08 PM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: Pravious
What Republican would be stupid enough to accept a debate on those terms?

Oh ... never mind ...

20 posted on 07/29/2018 6:59:13 PM PDT by IronJack
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