Posted on 04/11/2018 7:27:10 AM PDT by Kaslin
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) grilled Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg Tuesday about whether or not the social media platform was biased against conservatives. Zuckerberg acknowledged that Cruz raised a “fair concern” but insisted that Facebook was committed to being a “platform for all ideas.”
"There are a great many Americans who I think are deeply concerned that Facebook and other tech companies are engaged in a pervasive pattern of bias and political censorship," Cruz said.
He read off examples of Facebook suppressing conservative speech, starting with former Facebook employees admitting to suppressing conservative news in May of 2016. Cruz brought up Facebook shutting down a Chick-fil-A appreciation page and most recently censoring Trump supporters Diamond and Silk.
Ted Cruz to Zuckerberg: Is there Facebook political bias? (video)
"Senator, let me say a few things about this,” Zuckerberg replied. “First, I understand where that concern is coming from because Facebook and the tech industry are located in the Silicon Valley which is an extremely left-leaning place and this is actually a concern that I have and that I try to root out in the company — is making sure that we don't have any bias in the work that we do.”
He said that it was a "fair concern." Cruz then interrupted to ask if any pages from Planned Parenthood, Moveon.org, or Democratic candidates, had been taken down by Facebook.
Zuckerberg replied that he was "not specifically aware" of any of those pages being censored.
Cruz asked if Zuckerberg was aware of the political orientations of the 15,000 to 20,000 people Facebook has working on security and content review.
"No, Senator, we do not generally ask people about their political orientation when they are joining the company," Zuckerberg said.
Zuckerberg concluded his exchange with Cruz by insisting that Facebook is committed to a free exchange of ideas.
"I am very committed to making sure that Facebook is a platform for all ideas," he insisted. "That is a very important founding principle of what we do. We're proud of the discourse and the different ideas that people can share on the service. And that is something that, as long as I'm running the company, I'm going to be committed to making sure is the case."
Bake the dam cake!
As for the private vs public, that was a difference in being a .gov institution, or a private one. Obvious differences in that, but I didn't try to say being publicly held or private. In whole, it's the same theory. If you believe in property rights.
I'll say again, I have 'freedom of speech' on public areas, but FR or FB can shut me down in a second. Just as I don't have said rights on your property.
My freedom of speech doesn't apply to your domain. Nor, should you want .gov coming on FR and forcing them to accept differences. That doesn't matter if it's a private business, publicly traded, or merely your backyard.
Facebook, FR, and or any domain has the right to set their own use. They are allowed to change policies. That happens all the time. If you don't like it, it's a 'free market', choose another service.
“Facebook, FR, and or any domain has the right to set their own use.”
Apples and oranges.
No one here is complaining about censorship of conservative views on DU. We don’t participate there because conservative opinions are unwelcome.
FR is PRIVATELY OWNED. So is DU. Facebook is PUBLICLY traded.
Who owns Facebook? Shareholders!
When Facebook went public in 2012, 70 mutual funds bought shares.
Public companies are and should be publicly regulated.
Are government employees allowed to have political or religious views and opinions? Of course. Should they be allowed to use their position in the government to impose their views on others? Of course not.
Publicly regulated companies are bound by principles of democracy and representative government. Yes, we have a “free market” economy that you referenced. That means government regulated market.
Have you ever heard of “consumer protection”? All developed nations with free market economies have consumer protection as a feature of their free markets.
A person can engage in commerce using their own money, property, time, labor, skills, etc. However, in the marketplace there are regulations in order to protect consumers. Yes, if a person sells a bad apple in a private transaction, there are laws whereby the person harmed can sue and recover damages. But regulation is designed to prevent the bad apple from being sold in the first place.
There are also public safety issues. Online safety is a major issue with companies such as Facebook. That’s why Zuckerberg had to testify to Congress.
I do agree with you that choosing to leave Facebook is an option for consumers who do not like the censorship, selling personal data, and the security breeches of a business such as Facebook. However, this is no reason not to support regulation which protects the marketplace and consumer rights. Consumers should not need to file a lawsuit to get publicly traded companies such as Facebook, YouTube, or Twitter to comply with their own terms of service.
Here is the terms of service for Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/terms.php
These things are fairly well vetted legally. Almost everything in them is reasonable. The only questionable issues are with regards to what constitutes “discrimination” and “hate speech.” These are very broad and subjective terms which are being used to infringe on and attack Constitutional rights and liberties. When you allow liberals to define these terms, it basically gives them latitude to shut down all conservative speech. It’s happening, and you’re supporting it.
Your position allows liberals to take over companies such as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter because it allows rules to be applied unequally and arbitrarily. Your position empowers and enriches them. It allows them to use public financing, just like they use tax revenues, to attack conservatives. They don’t even have to use their own money.
I don't have free speech at walmart, waffle house or facebook.
Sue for fraud. Or have .gov get involved in breach of contract. But, that's it. Outside of that .gov shouldn't have the power to control and change private parties, or publicly traded companies. This comes down to private property, of which I don't see you defending.
We disagree and nothing will change that.
JZ better have his own personal hideaway already stocked up. He won’t be so fancy & famous & wealthy a year from now. He is teetering om total disaster.
“You don’t have free speech on another that is not yours. End of story. Stop pushing for more .gov to accept other views.”
Free speech is one of the important issues, but you are on the wrong side of it. Stop pushing anarchist views.
“I don’t have free speech at walmart, waffle house or facebook.”
Publicly traded companies are regulated.
“Outside of that .gov shouldn’t have the power to control and change private parties, or publicly traded companies. This comes down to private property, of which I don’t see you defending.”
Our tax dollars are used to regulate the investment banking industry. Our tax dollars pay for oversight. Our tax dollars go to regulate and implement consumer protection laws.
Imagine going to YourBank.com and applying for a loan and being declined because you posted a pro-Trump statement on social media. Or how about getting kicked out of college or having your degree revoked? Are you ok with that?
Companies that censor political and religious speech should not have access to public money. Take it private.
So what. And .gov does a very poor effort in oversight. In the past .gov forced such businesses to make bad decisions, or businesses lobby .gov to change policies. That happens all the time. .gov shouldn't be in the business, nor do they have the power to tell a company to whom they can censor or not.
I can't believe I'm arguing with a FReeper on property rights, and he's not defending such rights.
We don't see eye to eye on this one. So go bake the dam cake. While your at it, try your freedom of speech at walmart. A nice, publicly traded company. Yep, that's not we need. .gov telling a businesses they must accept BLM on their property, either physical, or on a domain. Yep, a businesses can't prevent commies from being on their domain. We need more .gov is the cry from people like you. I disagree.
“I can’t believe I’m arguing with a FReeper on property rights, and he’s not defending such rights.”
We are debating freedom of speech. You support the ability for liberals to dictate what speech is allowed and not allowed in the market place.
What property right is being violated by requiring Facebook to quit discriminating against conservative speech and news? How are the executives no longer secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects? Do you know what property is?
The only “property” you’ve been talking about is intellectual property. Intellectual property is 100% under the purview of Congress as per the Constitution. You should read it. Intellectual property does not exist apart from an act of the government.
Article I, Section 8, Clause 8, of the United States Constitution grants Congress the power “To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”
This is the basis for patents and copyright.
Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 grants Congress the power “To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.”
This is the basis for trademarks and business names being reserved to avoid consumer confusion.
Freedom of speech is based on natural law. Intellectual property is the suspension of natural law in order to provide a benefit to society as a whole. Trademarks, copyrights, business names, domain names, patents, and more fall into this category. This is not real property. Real property is real estate (or more specifically land and what is affixed to the land).
Facebook exists as a legal construct through contract and ip laws. It’s very existence and possibility of ownership is 100% contingent upon a federal government that oversees, regulates, negotiates and enforces treaties, and generally operates to PROTECT THE RIGHTS of the public (i.e. mainly US citizens).
And right now the rights of citizens to exercise their free speech is being violated. And citizens have even lost major sources of income due to this. It is the job of the federal government to be sure that these giant companies do not abuse their power and rob citizens of their rights.
Facebook, Google, YouTube, Twitter and other social media platforms that are publicly traded are modern-day communication channels. They should be regulated. They must be regulated. And they are regulated.
The only debate is how regulations should impact their ability to serve the public. Right now, the regulation is inadequate.
Allowing these entities to have control over what content is allowed is unthinkable. It is not even remotely acceptable. It is like the phone company telling you what you can talk about on the phone and who you can call. Your approach is to say phone companies are property and the executives should have the right to determine who can and can not use their services and how. And your answer is that consumers are free to switch phone companies if their phone company suddenly decides to quit allowing them to have conservative conversations.
It is simply unthinkable.
Facebook is not a news organization. It is not a political party. It is not a private homestead. It is not a non-profit charity. It’s also not a retail store like Walmart. It is a communications venue for the general public.
It is a private business with access to capital in American markets that the taxpayers financially support.
“Yep, that’s not we need. .gov telling a businesses they must accept BLM on their property, either physical, or on a domain. Yep, a businesses can’t prevent commies from being on their domain.”
BLM is an evil entity, but the American citizens who join it do have freedom of speech. And they are free to exercise it within the limits of the law. (In other words, no terroristic threats, etc.) And the proper way to counter idiocy is with facts and information, not criminalizing speech.
“We need more .gov is the cry from people like you. I disagree.”
We don’t need more government. We need the government to fulfill its basic function of protecting the rights of citizens.
If Facebook had remained the private property of Zuckerberg and his investors, I would generally agree with your position, especially if their censorship policy based on liberal bias was disclosed BEFORE monetizing the personal data of their subscriber base. When he uses the markets to raise capital and grow his business globally it must be subject to regulation. The job of the government is to protect the rights of the people.
You, nor I have free speech on the domain space of someone else. End of story.
“... the domain space of someone else.”
You obviously did not read, or at least did not comprehend, what I said about the definition of property. So, rather than doing the work of learning something new, you’ve chosen to just repeat mantras.
Do you use a public email service such as Gmail or Yahoo? Or do you exclusively use a private-label email to a domain name you own? Because, I guarantee you that the vast majority of Free Republic participants use the free, public email services. And that’s not limited to us. The majority of people do not have their own private email on a domain name that they own.
If everyone went along with your position, Google could tomorrow start blocking any emails sent to or from a Gmail account if it contained any conservative speech in it. They could even neglect to inform you that such communications had been blocked because they are under no obligation to do so. Or they could even wait until October to do this in order to tilt the balance of a national election. Are you fine with this?
All of the major cellular carriers could do the same. They could decide to no longer allow conservatives to send and receive text messages. They “own” their networks. They should be able to decide what’s allowed and not allowed, right?
You do not seem to be very knowledgeable about how large corporations operate. But this is a very real scenario. You are used to hitting a subscribe button to receive text messages from someone like the president. This happens automagically. But mass text messages are carefully managed by phone carriers. They prevent spamming. If they did not, we would get bombarded with text spam night and day. Those who want to send text messages to an opt-in list must follow some rigid guidelines and still may sometimes experience having their communications blocked. Now, what if the carriers hire some liberal employees who decide, with or without the company’s blessing, to block messages from conservative PACs or news groups, etc.?
Your solution? Easy peasy, right? Just switch carriers. Of course this also means that all of your subscribers will have to switch carriers and pay termination fees to do so. But that’s no big deal. Gotta protect the “property rights” of those carriers, right? Otherwise, Jimrob will be FORCED to let BLM run rampant on Free Republic.
And what if all the major carriers do the same? Easy, right? Just form your own carrier and get all conservatives to leave their phone companies and join the new conservative one. I mean, after all, no conservatives ever have differing opinions do they? All you have to do is say the magic phrase “property rights” and they will suddenly see the light and port their numbers to your new carrier. No problemo. If they have friends who are apolitical and do not want to switch carriers, well, they can just get new friends. And if they have liberal family members that they still want to be able to communicate with by phone, well, time to find a new family.
Or, you could sue, right? Going up against a multi-billion-dollar corporation, if you have unlimited financial resources, will easily be resolved within a decade. And if you are living in a Disney fantasy world, a knight will ride in and save you just as soon as you write the carrier a harshly-worded letter threatening to sue. They will immediately cave and comply with all of your demands. You will be a world-renowned hero.
But back in the real world, some of us just want our fundamental freedoms protected. And the way to do this, again in the real world, is for Congress to get off its butt and do its job of protecting those freedoms rather than staying awake at night trying to think of some new way to steal money from the treasury.
Domains are intellectual property, which means they are created by an act of Congress. No one has the natural right to a “domain” name. Staking a claim to a name takes away the natural right of everyone else to use the same name (in other words, a restriction on speech). Congress establishes rules under the Constitutional provisions I cited in order to create intellectual property such as domain names.
Ownership of real property is an extension of natural law. Ownership of intellectual property requires the participation of society, whether by consent or compulsion. It is not based on natural rights. This is the same principle that other laws follow. The right to own and use a gun is based on the natural right of self-defense. The law that requires us to drive on the right side of the road is arbitrary, but it is the result of the right of people to form a representative government that can make such arbitrary decisions. If personal safety requires temporarily ignoring an arbitrary law, the right to protect yourself and property takes precedence. And arbitrary laws NEVER supersede fundamental rights.
“You, nor I have free speech...”
It’s a very dangerous thing to stake a fundamental liberty such as free speech on simplistic, rote sound-bites and apply them to complex matters. But the first six words of your statement shows that you are ready to quickly flush 1st amendment rights down the toilet because of >> insert XYZ.
Freedom of speech, press, and religion, as expressed in the first amendment, are such essential and fundamental rights that anything that abridges them needs to be carefully and thoughtfully scrutinized.
For you it is simple. Someone “owns” something. “Case closed.” “End of story.”
Your response reminds me of a child who stops his ears and repeats something over and over. I doubt you’re reading, listening, or thinking (which is particularly ironic considering the screen name you’ve chosen). That makes this a one-sided conversation. But in case I’m wrong, I’ll test by asking you one simple question:
Who owns the Internet?
Lol...not public.
'Who owns the Internet?'
Great question, do we know? Second, do you have a right to the internet?
I've read your stuff, you've put in the effort. But, we disagree. I believe in private property, and the idea of that said owner in control and censoring the content allowed there if needed. In a market economy, another owner will provided service to people like yourself or others. There is already enough laws and such that .gov can intervene if there is fraud.
'But back in the real world, some of us just want our fundamental freedoms protected'
Sure, you can have all of those freedoms on your property and in the public eye. Try going to walmart and handing out religious material. While your at it you can hoard all you want at your house. But, if you choose to download vast amounts of material, your provider can limit that.
'They should be able to decide what’s allowed and not allowed, right?'
That's correct. They are allowed to limit the flow of material if they so choose. But, that is also on the uaction rights of the service when they applied for the sale of the spectrum from .gov. Second, you shouldn't be a subscriber of a service that would do that. It's your stake in the market to look at what the provider would do. Just as in the past people would actually be interested in Banks and their prospectives. This was all before FDIC.
Even Cruz was grandstanding.
“Lol... [Gmail and Yahoo email is] not public.”
Yes, it is. This is common nomenclature to describe the “free” email accounts most of the general public uses:
https://www.everycloudtech.com/dangers-using-public-email-address-business
https://www.utdallas.edu/~bxt043000/Motivational-Articles/Secure-Email-Discussion.pdf
https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-pros-and-cons-of-hosting-email-privately-versus-at-Google-Apps
https://inboxpros.com/does-a-private-or-public-whois-effect-seo-email-deliverability/
“Great question, do we know? Second, do you have a right to the internet?”
The idea is for YOU to consider and giver YOUR opinion. But you have wisely avoided staking a very definitive position, if you are unsure. But it is a fundamental question YOU should have the answer to before defending Zuckerberg’s unlimited control of everything Facebook.
The Internet is a collective platform in which people and companies share and pool resources which are owned by those parties. Most of the protocols used to make the Internet work are open source. If you care to explore the property rights concepts I’ve posted earlier, natural law dictates that some things cannot be owned. Not everything that exists is owned. Legal ownership implies exclusive right to something which is way of prohibiting others access or the usefulness of something. For example, no one owns Mars. No one has the right to demand payment for accessing Mars. Now, if a company provides transportation to Mars, they can charge for that. But until someone builds an outpost on Mars, it is a frontier that anyone can stake a claim to.
What we have with the Internet is communication. People and companies and other entities communicate. Some of the infrastructure belongs to the government. We certainly pay for some of the costs for the Internet to run via government regulation and oversight, i.e. tax dollars. So we all have a stake in it, so to speak.
“I believe in private property, and the idea of that said owner in control and censoring the content allowed there if needed... Try going to walmart and handing out religious material. “
Property rights and the right to free speech are BOTH fundamental rights. And sometimes they come into conflict. So your assertions are not completely invalid. But the question comes down to which takes precedence in various cases.
So our debate comes down to which of us has the better and more accurate analogy in comparison to Facebook. Is Facebook more like Walmart, or is it more like phone carriers?
“They are allowed to limit the flow of material if they so choose. But, that is also on the uaction rights of the service when they applied for the sale of the spectrum from .gov. Second, you shouldn’t be a subscriber of a service that would do that. It’s your stake in the market to look at what the provider would do. Just as in the past people would actually be interested in Banks and their prospectives. This was all before FDIC.”
I cannot tell from your answer if you are referring to phone carriers, email providers, banks, etc. when saying property owners have the right to control speech. If you are saying that phone carriers should be able to censor the content of text messages based on the political ideology of the executives or employees, then you are pretty much going out on a limb and sawing it off. If every contract, service, relationship, entity has the power to regulate speech, then there is no free speech.
It is very ironic that you cite the purchase of spectrums from the government. How exactly did the government get to own spectrums? For someone who has staked a position entirely on the principle of property ownership, you’ve sure gummed up your own argument.
We have a lot of law dedicated to real property, for example. Most real property has easements to allow access to utilities. This is an infringement on your property rights. But it a legal infringement because the government sanctions it, because it is necessary in order to make utilities available to the public. You are supposed to be fairly compensated for this infringement on your property rights. In the 80s Congress added cable television to the list of those who could come on your private property to install cable lines. In exchange for taking some of your property rights they gave you... Public Access TV stations, which the cable companies must make available.
If you own real property, you have the right to the airwaves on and above your property. The problem is that using these airwaves for most frequencies and power levels will necessarily spill over onto other people’s property. So Congress taking “ownership” of the airwaves is depriving you of some of your natural rights as a property owner. What do you get in return?
When you drill down and explore the issue we are debating, you will find that Congress ALREADY regulates sites like Facebook. It ALREADY has Constitutional authority to do so. But you say we have too many laws, but whatever laws we have are sufficient, so just sue if any are broken. Sorry, but your easy answers do not resolve a real world problem.
Facebook and other Internet giants are engaging in political censorship. They are doing it in a dishonest, though possibly not illegal manner. Your solution is essentially to take your marbles and go home. I say we must fight. Facebook should not have the right to market itself as a means of connecting and communicating with everyone, solicit personal information, and then sell access to that information as a commodity, and then limit free speech on their platform.
The thing you are failing to grasp is that we are discussing the regulation of a multi-billion-dollar multi-national corporation. This is more akin to making foreign policy and negotiating international treaties than it is regulating small businesses. Facebook has a larger trade volume than the GDP of many nations.
The protection of free speech AND the protection of property rights (especially real property and possessions, as opposed to intellectual property which is arbitrary) are both essential. But protecting and preserving them does not allow us to stick our heads in the sand, retreat to an Amish lifestyle, or apply cookie cutter formulas to complex situations.
I do not disagree with your concern for protecting property rights or the right of Jimrob to control the content of the website he owns.
What I disagree with is treating this as the ONLY concern. Free speech is being trampled upon. It is the duty of our federal government to adjust federal laws and regulations, and use its enforcement powers, to be sure this situation is remedied.
This is not a “big government” solution. It is the practical reality that some government is necessary and has a job to do. I believe in the conservative principle of limited government. But the “property” rights you are defending are ones arbitrarily created by our government. It is up to our government to address the situation.
I shouldn't force a vegetarian restuarant to serve meat.
Cloudfare changed their policies a few months ago. That's on them. They have the right to pick their interest.
'If every contract, service, relationship, entity has the power to regulate speech, then there is no free speech.'
We do this all the time. Stormy Daniels anyone? Contract is a contract. That is a legitimate purpose of .gov to get involved. The enforcement of such contracts. Just as remediation has entered the market. You sign away the ability for redress with such actions. You limit your ability of 'speech'. This happens all the time, NDA. I understand your frustrations, but to me your going at it with a Bernie Sanders approach.
“We do this all the time. Stormy Daniels anyone? Contract is a contract. That is a legitimate purpose of .gov to get involved. The enforcement of such contracts. Just as remediation has entered the market. You sign away the ability for redress with such actions. You limit your ability of ‘speech’. This happens all the time, NDA. I understand your frustrations, but to me your going at it with a Bernie Sanders approach.”
Hyperbole much? Two can play at that game.
You are out of your cotton-picking mind. Yeah, I intentionally used trigger words. No one said that free speech is an unlimited right. But the examples you use are false. By your standards Facebook can put in the fine print of their terms of service that by using their site you pledge your soul to Satan, renounce all of your Constitutional rights, and give your firstborn to their eternal service. Your assertion shows zero comprehension of contract law.
You can’t win an argument based on reason, so you come up with the most ridiculous claims under the sun. I’d just outright call you a liar if it weren’t so obviously phony that NO ONE on this site will believe you.
You’ve said already that my pro-free speech position is supportive of forcing bakeries to make custom homosexual wedding cakes. That’s the kind of tactic that Democrats use: accuse your opponent of the opposite of the truth. Now you’ve taken it a step further and claimed my position is a Bernie Sanders position.
Next you’ll be informing us that George Washington, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson were liberal, atheist Marxists (yeah, before Marx was even born they were Marxists... they just didn’t have a name for it yet).
You made a few good points about property rights earlier, but your stubborn desire to be right, no matter what the facts of the matter are, is causing you to dig yourself into a deep hole. It’s one thing to weigh free speech versus property and contract rights and lean in one direction. It’s quite another to drag a fundamental right behind the barn, and torture and murder it.
That’s what siding with Facebook is: turning property rights (including the conjured rights of domain names) and forging them into a bludgeoning weapon to beat lady liberty to death. I’d like to believe you are doing so out of total ignorance rather than depraved malice. But the outcome is the same: with people like you, freedom will fall. It really is that simple. You can be stubbornly right-in-your-own-mind all you want. But free speech is guaranteed for a reason: it prevents tyranny.
Google and Facebook are turning to evil entities such as Southern Poverty Law Center to decide what speech to restrict on their PUBLIC and MONOPOLISTIC platforms. These are people who want conservatives DEAD. But you will shout from the roof top their right to do so because of PROPERTY RIGHTS, PROPERTY RIGHTS, and PROPERTY RIGHTS. But you won’t take an hour or two to read up on what constitutes true property rights, where they come from, and what their limitations are... even when it is spoon fed to you.
I’ve encountered people who just want to argue a point for the sake of argument, but you take the homosexual wedding cake.
Are you even a real person? I’m really starting to wonder if you are an experimental AI that Facebook is using to troll Free Republic. What kind of nonsense is this? Are you smoking crack? Did you forget your meds?
You take straw-man to a new level. You’re a Wizard of Oz flying monkey... grasping at straws.
I have not heard a single word from you favoring free speech. Until you prove otherwise I’m going with the Facebook AI theory. I’m arguing with a robot that is programmed to advance Zuckerberg’s rights above everyone else on the planet.
Bernie Sanders? Homosexual wedding cakes? Really, that’s what you’ve got?
“We do this all the time. Stormy Daniels anyone? Contract is a contract. That is a legitimate purpose of .gov to get involved. The enforcement of such contracts. Just as remediation has entered the market. You sign away the ability for redress with such actions. You limit your ability of ‘speech’. This happens all the time, NDA. I understand your frustrations, but to me your going at it with a Bernie Sanders approach.”
Hyperbole much? Two can play at that game.
You are out of your cotton-picking mind. Yeah, I intentionally used trigger words. No one said that free speech is an unlimited right. But the examples you use are false. By your standards Facebook can put in the fine print of their terms of service that by using their site you pledge your soul to Satan, renounce all of your Constitutional rights, and give your firstborn to their eternal service. Your assertion shows zero comprehension of contract law.
You can’t win an argument based on reason, so you come up with the most ridiculous claims under the sun. I’d just outright call you a liar if it weren’t so obviously phony that NO ONE on this site will believe you.
You’ve said already that my pro-free speech position is supportive of forcing bakeries to make custom homosexual wedding cakes. That’s the kind of tactic that Democrats use: accuse your opponent of the opposite of the truth. Now you’ve taken it a step further and claimed my position is a Bernie Sanders position.
Next you’ll be informing us that George Washington, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson were liberal, atheist Marxists (yeah, before Marx was even born they were Marxists... they just didn’t have a name for it yet).
You made a few good points about property rights earlier, but your stubborn desire to be right, no matter what the facts of the matter are, is causing you to dig yourself into a deep hole. It’s one thing to weigh free speech versus property and contract rights and lean in one direction. It’s quite another to drag a fundamental right behind the barn, and torture and murder it.
That’s what siding with Facebook is: turning property rights (including the conjured rights of domain names) and forging them into a bludgeoning weapon to beat lady liberty to death. I’d like to believe you are doing so out of total ignorance rather than depraved malice. But the outcome is the same: with people like you, freedom will fall. It really is that simple. You can be stubbornly right-in-your-own-mind all you want. But free speech is guaranteed for a reason: it prevents tyranny.
Google and Facebook are turning to evil entities such as Southern Poverty Law Center to decide what speech to restrict on their PUBLIC and MONOPOLISTIC platforms. These are people who want conservatives DEAD. But you will shout from the roof top their right to do so because of PROPERTY RIGHTS, PROPERTY RIGHTS, and PROPERTY RIGHTS. But you won’t take an hour or two to read up on what constitutes true property rights, where they come from, and what their limitations are... even when it is spoon fed to you.
I’ve encountered people who just want to argue a point for the sake of argument, but you take the homosexual wedding cake.
Are you even a real person? I’m really starting to wonder if you are an experimental AI that Facebook is using to troll Free Republic. What kind of nonsense is this? Are you smoking crack? Did you forget your meds?
You take straw-man to a new level. You’re a Wizard of Oz flying monkey... grasping at straws.
I have not heard a single word from you favoring free speech. Until you prove otherwise I’m going with the Facebook AI theory. I’m arguing with a robot that is programmed to advance Zuckerberg’s rights above everyone else on the planet.
Bernie Sanders? Homosexual wedding cakes? Really, that’s what you’ve got?
I do[Even though Heller vs. DC said differently--all rights, and that was on PRIVATE PROPERTY].
And, yet you still skipped over the contract part. We disagree. You can praise Obama, but not on my property.
The monopoly practices of FB and others is a separate issue.
“I do”
Do what? Believe that free speech is an unlimited right?
First, it isn’t. No rights are unlimited. But more so, you’ve spent the entirety of this thread advocating those very limits.
“yet you still skipped over the contract part”
You apparently did not read my entire post, because I most certainly did not skip over the contract issue. In fact I’ve been bringing up contract law throughout our discussion.
“The monopoly practices of FB and others is a separate issue.”
Of course they are not. They never have been. They never can be. Your attempt to compartmentalize issues just underscores your simplistic approach to the subject at hand by resorting to Democracy-in-a-can catch phrases like “property rights.”
Property rights, like all rights, have limitations. You have the right to own property. You have the right to own guns. But the government can and should regulate the manufacture and sale of guns because some people have lost their legal right to own a gun due to a felony conviction. So your rights do not mean that you can manufacture and sell guns from your property without complying with the law.
The fact that Facebook is a monopoly for a particular method of communications is 100% relevant to why the government can, does, and must regulate entities such as Facebook.
You’re supporting the covert replacement of our representative government with a plutocracy. And when it takes the form of political hegemony, free speech has been trampled upon. Accepting this as status quo is no solution. There must be a remedy.
“You can praise Obama, but not on my property.”
I’ll add this to my list of ridiculous assertions on your part even if you meant it hypothetically. I’ve had no praise for that man.
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