I have been meaning to get into this for a while because I keep hearing the same mantra that since these social media platforms are privately owned they can do as they like. Well speaking for myself, I don’t think that at all. People don’t sign up for Facebook or Twitter, or open a blog post on some commercial website, building up their own profile based on knowing the political ideology of the people who set the platform up. They are therefore in danger of having quite a bit of the value they have created stolen from them because of some political preference harboured by the people who run the platform. Once these forms of social communication are established and individuals are asked to join and build their own online presence on these platforms, the law must do as I say in the title, it must make it illegal to suspend or deny service to people because they say things the proprietors of such platforms disagree with but which are not in themselves illegal to say.
So let me choose a couple of recent examples of how things are working out. The Rebel is a Canadian online broadcasting website that entirely devotes its resources to defending conservative positions in the media. Quite large in Canada, and now with a presence in Australia, but hardly at the level of the government-funded CBC. But this was in the news just this week: The Rebel disrupted as it loses its domain provider. The story is from The National Post:
The ultra-conservative online Canadian media outlet The Rebel reportedly went dark in some parts of the world Monday after a technology company stopped directing traffic to its site.
Rebel proprietor Ezra Levant told Reuters he was given 24 hours notice of — but no explanation for — the move.
“If this was a political censorship decision, it is terrifying — like a phone company telling you it is cancelling your phone number on 24 hours notice because it doesn’t like your conversations,” Levant told Reuters. He did not identify the company.
It is terrifying, and if and when they come back online, you may be sure they will be more circumspect thereafter. The voices on our side are being thinned down while those on the other are amplified at every turn.
Then there’s Facebook. People go onto Facebook to keep up with family and friends, and some of those people think and say things that your standard issue modern lefty doesn’t like to hear said. Things that are perfectly legal and legitimate to say, but which many of those on the left do not approve of. Here is the principle that needs to apply: If you can say it on a published printed page you must be able to say it on Facebook, and if others don’t like it, they don’t have to read it. Meanwhile Zuckerberg is angling to run for president in 2020 as a Democrat.
This is from Facebook’s Community Standard on Hate Speech:
Facebook removes hate speech, which includes content that directly attacks people based on their:
race,
ethnicity,
national origin,
religious affiliation,
sexual orientation,
sex, gender or gender identity, or
serious disabilities or diseases.Organisations and people dedicated to promoting hatred against these protected groups are not allowed a presence on Facebook. As with all of our standards, we rely on our community to report this content to us.
What is an “attack”? And who judges? Each and every time, the adjudicators are from a left, if not a far-left perspective. Two things should therefore happen. First, these tech providers must be open to being sued for suspending and forcibly closing accounts unless the company can prove in court that what was being said could not be legally said in public. Second, these are now part of modern social infrastructure in the same way as banks and hospitals. They must be compelled by law to accept and maintain on an equal basis anyone who wishes to participate in their services. This is not something the market can or will fix. There can be only one Facebook. It only works if everyone can join. If the proprietors of Facebook don’t want to work within the new rules, then they can sell up to someone else who does.
#Republican candidate for US Senate. Radical philosopher & social critic. Captain, lawyer, agitator, rebel. The most dangerous #Libertarian in America.
That is, a prime candidate to end up banned at Facebook. This is what did it.
Just got banned from @facebook for posting this to my campaign page. Not politically motivated #censorship at all …
Do you not see a problem that needs to be fixed? Then keep your head in the sand. I’m not sure it can be fixed, but to think the market will self-correct is just a form of self-delusion.
And then there was this: After Charlottesville, Even Dating Apps Are Cracking Down on Hate. From which:
The Silicon Valley companies that make money off social media and online services have started to enact strong measures against extremism, barring white nationalists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis and others who follow creeds they deem racist and hateful.
Facebook and Twitter have developed tools to allow users to report hate speech and harassment. PayPal has blocked hate groups from using its financial services, and the ride-hailing services Uber and Lyft have urged drivers to report unacceptable customers. Airbnb took steps to stop white nationalists from renting rooms through its app before their gathering in Charlottesville, Va.
Most remarkably, perhaps, the efforts have even spread to the free-wheeling world of dating apps, where users have for years been welcome to screen potential lovers based on everything from height to religious beliefs.
And to be more specific OkCupid Banned Me for Supporting Our President by Cassandra Fairbanks.
While on vacation in Florida, I was informed by other Twitter users that my OkCupid account — which is largely inactive — has been suspended. This was presumably due to my open support for President Donald Trump.
On the weekend following the disastrous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, I had been scheduled to speak at a rally in support of free speech in Boston. Despite many of the speakers being people of color, and the most exciting speaker of the day being Va Shiva from India who addressed the crowd while standing in front of signs that read “Black Lives Do Matter,” the rally was falsely labeled a “white supremacist” rally by the liberal media and the city’s joke of a mayor, Marty Walsh.
Threats and accusations immediately rolled in, from hundreds of people who just blindly follow whatever the mainstream media tells them — and suddenly I was branded a “Nazi” for daring to agree to speak at a rally supporting our most important right. It was exactly what Trump supporters had worried would happen following the “punch a Nazi” meme. All it takes to now be tarred as “literally Hitler,” no matter the color of your skin or actual political beliefs, is support for our president. . . .
I have reached out to OkCupid to confirm that my ban was due to supporting the president — as obviously they will be unable to provide a shred of evidence that I am racist or belong to a “hate group.” The company had not responded by press time.
She then adds at the end what I think is the biggest mistake we make: “I personally believe that companies have a right to deny service to anyone they want.”
Well I do not. Is it illegal to say what these people say? Then you just have to put up with the possibility that if you go on a dating site, you might end up paired with a Democrat. After the interview date you can work out whether you are compatible or not. This categorisation of others by people who are politically and morally clueless in every way is a serious problem and should not be permitted. If you open this kind of service, open to any and all, no discrimination should be permitted by law based on race, religion, creed etc etc or on one’s personal beliefs however repellent they may be to you or to the proprietors of these “social” media platforms.
The laws should be just like the laws that apply to renting out your house.
Ageist, racist, sexist
Having been brooding on this for two weeks now, I feel I have no choice but to refer to the Human Rights Commission an egregious and unacceptable case of ageist, racist and sexist public comment, found on the ABC of all places. As an elderly, Caucasian male, I am disturbed that someone is able to make these kinds of comments in the public space without the Human Rights Commission coming down on them like a tonne of bricks. This is taken from the Q&A transcript dated 31st of March 2014, and as will be seen, Ms Eltahawy is already being prosecuted in the United States for infringing the free speech of others.
MONA ELTAHAWY: Well, you’re talking to someone who got arrested for spray-painting over a racist and bigoted ad in the New York subway and I’m going to stand trial very soon in New York soon for this and I – so I have many thoughts on this. First of all, in the United States, the people who go on the most about freedom of expression and it’s my right to say this and my right to say that are usually old, rich, white men who parade under the term libertarian. And what it ends up basically meaning is: I have the right to be a racist and sexist shit and I’m protected by the first amendment. And it’s utterly ridiculous. Because when you look – if you look at this ad that I sprayed over – now, I’m – I love the first amendment. As a US citizen, because I am Egyptian-American, I love the first amendment. I love that it protects freedom of expression and freedom of belief. But here is the thing: if a racist, bigoted ad is protected as political speech, which it was – the New York subway didn’t want this very racist and bigoted ad but a judge deemed it protected political speech?
TONY JONES: What did it say? Are you allowed to tell us?
MONA ELTAHAWY: I can tell you because it – I mean it’s outrageous. It said: “In the war between the civilised man and the savage, always choose the civilised man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad.” And I thought: are you fucking kidding me? In my subway? How can you put this up? And the subway – the subway authorities did not want this ad, because they said it was going to incite people and so they took it to the hate group and it’s been classified as a hate group by the – it’s the Southern Law Centre, right, Ken? Is that what they’re called?
KENNETH ROTH: Southern Poverty Law Centre.
MONA ELTAHAWY: That’s it. They have deemed it a hate group. They have deep pockets, these libertarian, you know, old rich white men. And they took it to a judge and the judge deemed it protected political speech. I am fine with protected political speech but surely it should be my right to protest racism and bigotry? I am the one who got arrested. When you have an ad like that, you know, can you imagine, under any circumstances, in the New York subway that you would have an ad like that that either talked about the black community, the Jewish community, the gay community? Absolutely not. The reason that I protested it was because I believe, as a US citizen who has lived in the US for the past – I now live in Egypt but I was in the US for 13 years, Muslims are fair game. So let’s talk about who the subjects or, like, who were the people targeted by this: it’s my right to say and do whatever I want?
Of course, you can vilify and demean old, white males all you like and Gillian Triggs won’t turn a hair. We are not amongst her protected groups. As she said, the law should “retain the impact on the victim’s group as a relevant consideration when assessing whether something is ‘reasonably likely’ to intimidate or vilify.” I suspect nothing that could ever be said to me or about me would lead to a moment’s concern since she has made her judgment and that is that. But also from this same interview, there was this:
Accusing the Coalition of hypocrisy, Professor Triggs said: “One of the disturbing aspects of the freedoms debate … is the inconsistency in approach.
“Those who emphasise individual freedoms have remained curiously silent in the face of the mandatory detention currently of about 4700 asylum seekers in remote detention centres in Australia and Christmas Island.”
Obviously not the sharpest knife in the drawer since she confuses the right to free speech with saying nothing at all. But even worse cannot see that having manadatory detention for illegal migrants is not a human rights issue. You do not have a right to enter another country illegally when you have already landed in an intervening port, i.e. Indonesia. And if they really were in fear of their lives, Manus Island, Indonesia or Cambodia would each work just as well.
A slapp shot from the point
It’s only a minor thing in the face of all of the other repressive activities in the US, but Mark Steyn’s travails within the court system, after having been sued by Michael Mann over his hockey stick, is quite significant in its own way, possibly more so because Mark is one of the few who is willing and able to fight back. In an article he brilliantly titles Slappstick Farce – and you will have to read the article to understand how clever it is – Steyn discusses how difficult it has been within the American system to deal with Mann’s lawsuit. One more example of how someone on the right finds dealing within the system so difficult.
I don’t think much about the First Amendment these days. As a practical matter, it’s simply not feasible in a global media market to tailor one’s freedom of expression to the varying local bylaws. So I take the view that I’m entitled to say the same thing in Seattle as I would in Sydney or Stockholm, Sofia or Suva. But, were Dr. Mann to prevail, it would nevertheless be the case that his peculiarly thin skin and insecurities would enjoy greater protection under U.S. law than they do in Britain, Canada, Australia, and other jurisdictions. It would thus be a major setback for the First Amendment.
That’s worth making a noise about. Up north, following a similar SLAPP suit from the Canadian Islamic Congress, my publisher Maclean’s, who are far less ideologically simpatico to me than NR, nevertheless understood the stakes — and helped get a disgusting law with a 100 percent conviction rate first stayed by a hitherto jelly-spined jurist and ultimately repealed by the Parliament of Canada. This too is a free-speech case. Free speech is about the right to thrash out ideas — on climate change, gay marriage, or anything else — in the public square, in bright sunlight. And you win a free-speech case by shining that sunlight on it, relentlessly. As we embark on our second year in the hell of the D.C. court system, that’s what I intend to do.I don’t think much about the First Amendment these days. As a practical matter, it’s simply not feasible in a global media market to tailor one’s freedom of expression to the varying local bylaws. So I take the view that I’m entitled to say the same thing in Seattle as I would in Sydney or Stockholm, Sofia or Suva. But, were Dr. Mann to prevail, it would nevertheless be the case that his peculiarly thin skin and insecurities would enjoy greater protection under U.S. law than they do in Britain, Canada, Australia, and other jurisdictions. It would thus be a major setback for the First Amendment.
The comparison is with Macleans, which is something like The Bulletin once was, and National Review, which is supposed to be the stalwart beacon of freedom on the right, is part of Steyn’s continuing disenchantment with the magazine in which he writes. Hardly anyone is standing up for freedom in the US any longer, with the dangers to wealth and reputation so large that the risks of being anything but a leftist jerk are just getting too high.
Law of Markets 