When this discussion happens, people inevitably point out that those are private companies that can do as they please, and that "free speech" is only about forbiding the government from limiting the expression of opinions, not of anyone else.
This is true, and a big problem. We need new laws to enforce free speech in private companies that provide means of expression and are in a position of near-monopoly.
"Justin" shouldn't get to decide what is hate speech and what isn't.
As a very aggressive free speech advocate, forcing companies or individuals to serve certain kinds of content is just as bad as preventing them from doing so. Free speech is both a positive and negative right; I should be able to say whatever I damned well please, and I shouldn't be obligated to say anything I don't. If Facebook wants to keep pursuing their absurd politically-charged censorship policies, they are free to do so.
Forcing Facebook to allow whatever pre-approved speech is "protected" (and who gets to decide that list?), besides being a violation of their rights, is probably worse for the users than doing nothing at all, because it gives users the illusion that Facebook is a platform for free speech. Users should be fully cognizant of the fact that they are not free to speak their mind on Facebook, as this provides encouragement for people to seek freer platforms.
The courts, obviously. As the law stands today, you can't sue FB for closing your account for a perceived violation of their ToS (you can maybe sue, but you'll lose); with different laws you could sue, and the matter would be decided by judges.
The fundamental problem is that companies like FB consider user-generated content as a free resource, much like a river onto which they build dams to make money from its flow.
But speech is fundamentally free (and, arguably, public property); the medium it uses to express itself shouldn't get to regulate it.
What counts as means of publishing? Do comments on a blog? What about forum posts? If a bunch of trolls hijack HN, can they be banned? If so, how would you draw up that distinction into a law?
Illegal content (threats, etc.) isn't a problem: it can be moderated out / censored, and if someone's unhappy about it, they would sue, and if they're right they'd win.
I'm not sure "trolling" can be defined with objectivity; contrarian opinions are what makes freedom of speech interesting.
What's difficult is spam: of zero value, extremely undesirable, and yet not illegal.
The way HN traditionally did this, was to "kill" comments without erasing them; one could still read dead comments if one wanted.
My point is there should be some kind of an appeals process in those matters. The moderators can't also be the judges of last resort.
It's not just that they don't have any obligation. The are private commercial entities. They have incentives to take sides and manipulate what they serve to their users as they please. I absolutely don't get why you trust them at all.
? I don't trust "them"; I rarely trust individuals, and absolutely never any corporation. Corporations are necessary evils that need to be strongly supervised and regulated, in my opinion.
> and that "free speech" is only about forbiding the government from limiting the expression of opinions, not of anyone else.
> This is true, and a big problem.
This is not true, it is a product of people confusing two different things:
> the first amendment to the constitution of the United States
> the unalienable right to freedom of speech
The american tradition is founded on the principle that there are natural rights that can never be given (as people are born with them), only taken away. Among these rights it's the right to freedom of speech and of assembly.
The first amendment (along with the rest) only clarifies the role the founding fathers intended to the government they created: one that shouldn't be allowed to infringe on these rights by legislation or otherwise.
The first amendment doesn't give the right to freedom of speech, only prevents the government from infringing on it, that's right. But it doesn't follow from that that private companies cannot infringe on anyone's freedom of speech, it is a non sequitur.
Private companies can and do infringe on people freedoms of speech and assembly all the time, and what happened to this reporter seems to be another example of that.
The thing is: it is perfectly in their right to do so, as it is very clear in their terms of service that they reserve that right, the right to control what can and what cannot be published on their properties.
The confusion comes from the fact that most of these companies (social media companies) like to pretend that's not the case, that they are proponents of freedom of speech even when it is inconvenient to the powerful.
For an example of that see the Arab Spring, what was publicized in those days as "a revolution powered by social media", "a media where people can freely express their thoughts and exercise their freedom of assembly without government interference".
As we came to realize in the subsequent years is that it was only true because 1) governments underestimated something they still didn't fully understand and 2) there was a temporary alignment between the position of these companies and that one of the revolutionary.
This alignment is over now. Governments worldwide pressure and succeed in making these companies to remove inconvenient speech from their services (examples abound).
In other cases perfectly valid forms of speech gets removed, suppressed or banned from their services for no other reason as they don't align to these companies goals. It's their right to do so and they exercise it.
The important thing is: let's not pretend they are not suppressing speech, curtailing freedom of assembly only because it's their right to do so.
They do curtail freedom of speech (on their premises), they do ban speech that is valid but inconvenient to their goals and objectives. As is their right. It is just that they lose the claim to be (as in the case of a particular service) "bastions of freedom of speech" when they do so.
We are mostly of the same opinion including on the need of something being done about it.
My only objections are:
1) freedom of speech has absolutely nothing to do with the government or its ability to curtail it.
It is a natural right, one that everybody is born with and one that cannot be given, only taken away.
2) social media sites are private property of their owners and, as such, they can impose any limit they want within its (virtual) premises.
The solution to the problem is not regulating it (that in my opinion would increase the ability to curtail the freedom of speech) but to revert to the descentralized web of links that used to define the World Wide Web.
People can self publish and should do it, be it video, audio or text.
People should also, if they want to compete, to invest as much resources trying to be heard as these companies invest trying to be gatekeepers.
We agree in general, just not on these small points.
This is true, and a big problem. We need new laws to enforce free speech in private companies that provide means of expression and are in a position of near-monopoly.
"Justin" shouldn't get to decide what is hate speech and what isn't.