The point is that people who talk about a slippery slope were correct.
The more that you let large and powerful organizations, get away with targeting groups that you don't like, the more likely that those powerful organizations are going to be able to turn the guns on you, or your favorite cause, when public opinion doesn't go your way.
Neutral platforms, that don't discrimination, protects your enemies as well as your self. The slippery slope is real.
The people who oppose neutral platforms have made their bed. Now we'll see if they change their mind once they have to lay in it.
Assuming the issue is with payment processors, it's an existing issue. The same thing happened with Patreon and has been happening with other websites selling adult content for ages. If anything, the slope that they slipped down was the one resulting in Gab's troubles.
Most people don't really want neutral platforms. If you go to a restaurant and another customer is violently drunk, yelling, and really just ruining the night for everyone, we hope they get kicked out so that we can appreciate the restaurant. The person saying, "Yeah but next they're gonna come for [insert whatever thing that shouldn't result in getting kicked out]" could be right and the restaurant may cross what you think the line should be, but that doesn't mean that the restaurant was wrong to kick out the violently drunk person.
Similarly, I've seen dang around on HackerNews giving folks warning about their comments not really being a great fit, because they're low-effort, out of place, etc. In general, it keeps the quality of discussion here /way/ better than you'd see on Reddit. I like that they work to keep it that way... but it could be a slippery slope in the same way.
a violently drunk and yelling customer is causing harm to other customers. If they weren't we would be describing them as violently. How does adult content violently harm other content creators on OF?
If the restaurant kicked out a pair of customer because they happened to be in a same sex relationship, that would be less appreciated by other customers. They would ask the critical qualifying question "What harm have they done?", an question that distinguish the issue from the violently drunk.
> Most people don't really want neutral platforms.
Ok, then you if complain when stuff like this happens, then I am going to tell you "I told you so", and point out how stuff like this was a pretty inevitable result of this thinking.
You just have to sit back and say "Welp, this was the risk that I took, when I refused to support neutral platforms, so I guess I have to just suck it up, because nobody is going to defend me."
If you don't like this, then it is time for you to start supporting neutral platforms.
Pick one. Either support neutral platforms, or accept that I am going to make fun of you, and laugh at the irony, when the absence of neutral platforms comes back to bite you.
You're not exactly leading by example. We are, again, having this conversation on a platform that isn't neutral and works to keep the content high quality.
It seems like your argument really boils down to "Power can be abused therefore no power should ever be used". It's kind of silly. Going back to the same points you ignored, governments criminalize murder. Do you have a problem with that? What about governments using that same power to criminalize weed? Or treat prisoners effectively as slaves? Or enforce segregation? Most folk aren't big fans of the last three but wouldn't want to live in a society where we're too afraid to stop murderers out of fear those same systems could be used to stop good folk. The only real difference is that I have considerably more control over the payment system I'm going to use than I do the government I'm going to live under.
Or take it down a bunch of notches. Most platforms take measures to try and fight spam. Do you remember e-mail before spam blockers improved? It was rough! Imagine the same on here, Twitter, etc. It seems to me those services would become useless quickly. But a service that works to block that isn't neutral, they're making decisions about what they will and won't support. I find it hard to imagine that you would prefer to use sites like that, and yet, that's what you're arguing for.
Nope! You have misunderstood my argument, and everything else you say in your post doesn't actually address the singular point I am making.
Instead my argument boils down to "I told you so", and that things like this happening are a completely expected result of people and platforms becoming less and less interested, over time, in agreeing with the general principles of neutrality.
So, you can't really act surprised when stuff like this happens.
Just don't act surprised. Don't pretend like you couldn't have predicted stuff like this happening. Thats all.
That is the only thing that I ask. Is that you don't play dumb, and be surprised that stuff like this is the result of society caring less and less about neutrality over time.
And if you actually want to address this pretty simple argument, you need to actually talk about this fake surprise, which nothing in the rest of your post did.
The more that you let large and powerful organizations, get away with targeting groups that you don't like, the more likely that those powerful organizations are going to be able to turn the guns on you, or your favorite cause, when public opinion doesn't go your way.
Neutral platforms, that don't discrimination, protects your enemies as well as your self. The slippery slope is real.
The people who oppose neutral platforms have made their bed. Now we'll see if they change their mind once they have to lay in it.