Quote:
Originally Posted by Pete F.
Didn’t Tweety want to restrict or change 230?
What effect on freedom would that have?
Or do you want government control on just the businesses you have political issues with?
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What Trump said, especially now, is irrelevant. 230 is irrelevant. 230 was supposed to let platforms allow free speech, not restricted speech. If platforms are allowed to act as publishers, 230 is a meaningless bunch of words anyway. Lack of access is the problem. Lack of competition is the problem. Lack of freedom in the market is the problem.
That lack of Freedom is facilitated by ignorant or corrupt corporate media and politicians who spread the fear of free speech and create an aura of panic in the public if certain people or ideas are allowed to be expressed--especially, now, fears of imminent attacks by "right wing" terrorists. Seems to me that if on open platforms such terrorists talk about starting riots, they are exposing themselves, which is a good thing. And if they are not allowed on these platforms, they will still plan attacks, more secretly.
But they are, apparently, not the problem. The millions of people who are not terrorists, and don't want any part of rioting or sedition of any kind, are made to be the problem. They are not to be allowed to say things they believe because they would "trigger" folks who have bad intentions to do bad things. If the trillionaire big tech giants can pay off the right politicians, i.e. the ones with the power, or cultivate politicians with big campaign contributions, they can stave off anti-trust, monopoly busting legislation. And so, can make competition less effective. Can more easily control the market.
It's OK with big tech if politicians make a show of it. Bluster about the problem of big tech control. Set up committees to investigate. So long as they don't do anything about it. Healthy campaign contributions can keep it that way. And, in return, political demagoguery about certain speech is the payoff--making it viable to shut down a competing platform, such as Parler, that allows that certain speech And it enables the pols to appear that their hands are tied because of the threat of dangerous speech. Otherwise,--we can be damned sure!--they'd fix it. But they're working on it. Be patient and keep voting for us.
So which speech is the culprit? Depends on whose being paid off. And on the ideological persuasion of the oligarchs. If their persuasion is Progressive, overly aggressive pro-conservative speech might be "dangerous" because it might trigger right wing riots. If their persuasion is "right wing," highly assertive leftist speech might trigger left wing terrorists. I'm oversimplifying it, but that's the drift.
In any event, free speech, diversity of ideas, which run afoul of a current political and social correctness will be stifled and erased by our increasingly more authoritarian, fascistic, crony-capitalist form of Progressive/socialist governance.