Posted on 10/03/2022 12:06:30 PM PDT by libstripper
The Supreme Court said Monday it would take up a case that could fundamentally change the way Google and other tech companies are governed by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects them from lawsuits over content created by users.
In 2015, Nohemi Gonzalez, a 23-year-old U.S. citizen studying abroad in France, was murdered by ISIS terrorists who fired into a crowed bistro in Paris. Her family filed suit against Google, arguing that YouTube, which Google owns, aided and abetted the ISIS terrorists by allowing and promoting ISIS material on the platform with algorithms that helped to recruit ISIS radicals.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Or creating bigger inroads for Big Tech to censure “undesirable” speech.
If they can’t be sued for content, they shouldn’t be able to censor views they don’t like. They’re either publishers, who control the content, or they’re just platforms with no liability for content. Can’t have it both ways.
I would consider them guilty because they’re censoring content already so why didn’t they censor this terrorist content? It’s obvious that if they are exercising editorial control they are a publisher not a content unmoderated forum that they can avoid liability for the content that they’re publishing.
The recent revelation of FedGov collusion with corporations to censor shows that the Left are literally fascists. This is textbook definition of Fascism.
If they have total immunity to what is posted, then they should have no right to censor any of it. If they want the right to control the content posted by users, then they must risk liability for what they do allow.
Exactly. Either allow us to sue for damages when they allow harmful content. Or sue for censoring us and giving an illegal campaign contribution to the left.
I am reading a very interesting book, it has opened my eyes to the fact that these people actually believe that there is some mystical greater General will of the public that they are attuned to and the general polling doesn’t represent what the public really want but only they know what the public really wants, it is up to them to implement the general will even if the public is unaware of it. Basically these people are nuts!
The “general will” was the guiding light of the French Revolution through all its twists and turns. It is centralized, all powerful, all demanding, and knowable to the true believers in FREEDOM.
See Hayek’s fourth chapter of The Constitution of Liberty.
They only want to censor content they disagree with politically, and they think that is a viable argument to continue the status quo.
What do you think Nancy Pelosi is referring to when she says that we’re anti-democratic? In her mind democracy has to do with her interpretation of the greater General will of the public which is unknowable to all but her, the public is not aware of it because is metaphysical and in the public subconscious
That really depends. Many laws like this will only apply to the big companies, whether the little ones are just ignored or legally exempt.
But it also depends on the content removal process. Obviously any company will take some time to remove offending content, the issue with Google et al is thottmef censor some things, but not others that lead to violence/crimes. So theoretically, FR already doesn’t host any content that leads to illegal activity, so what’s there to go after? By the time the Dems canchange the content laws to hit FR that hard, we’d likely already be shooting in some areas!
Ever making stuff worse the Left has absurdly lumped any speech that undermines their ridiculous philosophy into the same category as the pedophile luring victims.
I propose tha platforms be liable only in the scope where they have weighed in on legal speech. But I would put a lower bar for suing them when they did. For example if they slap "misinformation" due to a fact check on something that is plausibly true they should be considered in violation. That is they should have to have very good reason to be convinced they got the fact check right.
Well I agree they should take down criminal activity on their sites, and only held liable for it if they don’t act quickly upon learning of its existence on their platform. That was the main reason for Section 230 - to allow the internet to blossom without the burden of having to read every post. It’s more or less what the “report abuse” button was created for. And Section 230 was how some sites like Backpages claimed immunity from prosecution when they allegedly allowed blatant solicitation for prostitution. The DOJ took down their site.
We’re talking about speech though, not crime; speech that would otherwise be protected if you were walking down the street, talking to a friend on the phone, protesting outside city hall, or discussing “science” in a laboratory. Sometimes it’s not pretty speech but it’s not criminal. And the giants have taken the bits of Section 230 they want, while also censoring and flagging and shadow-banning speech that doesn’t suit their politics. Worse yet is the numbers of former government officials who have joined the ranks of big tech and the widely reported “leaks” that the large platforms have a direct line to government agencies on which they are told which speech to censor, flag or remove. That cannot be tolerated but I am not sure how to reverse it. The staff in these companies (ironically founded by mostly libertarian capitalist types) are entrenched with brainwashed, narrow-minded leftists. Perhaps the free market will - if Musk really does hold fast to an “free town square” business model for Twitter, and if it gains traction among users, that alone could force other sites to lessen their grip a bit.
My third paragraph had proposed how I think lawmakers might address it.
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