To end with a metaphor: if the internet's disaffected are now all lined up on deck in an ocean liner, sailing angrily but purposefully toward their own island paradise of internet freedom, lurking in the dinghies below are the jihadists and human traffickers and paedophiles, content in the knowledge that they will soon have far greater capabilities with which to pursue their own far more violent and dangerous ends.

... Don't the FBI and the CIA have access to whatever these platforms may be? Isn't that the whole point?

It seems to me that if someone signs up for an online service and agrees to abide by their terms of conditions for receiving that service... and then proceeds to violate those terms on a regular basis it stands to reason they would lose access to that service.

Those are the same rules we all play by.

They are the rules, Artemis, the trouble is, it's like there are no town squares or public piazzas, only privately owned malls.

The risk is we return to aristocracy, where everything is owned by a few rich people.

> Those are the same rules
> we all play by.

In your culture, it's always about playing by the rules, from the drunken airliner on through the years.

But here in America, we take the free expression of ideas seriously. It's difficult for foreigners to comprehend.

They are the rules.... ~ NicoleK at January 19, 2021 5:09 AM

Which specific rules did Trump violate that have not been violated by others without official Twitter sanction?

NicoleK,

If you are arguing that we should be breaking up monopolies I am with you.

If you are arguing that we should have public social media platforms run by the government as an alternative akin to a town square I am open to such arguments but not yet convinced this is a great idea.

As it stands these are private entities that have terms of service. Neither you nor I could have said half of the things Trump said and retained our accounts.

Crid,

And here you are to destroy another comment section because you don't believe I should be able to communicate.

Is your purpose really to annoy everyone here because you cannot control your own mouth?

With the failure of Congress to repeal Section 230, or make any other meaningful reforms to make the Internet oligarchs accountable, and then overriding President Trump’s veto, the puppet masters see no further reasons to hide their ambitions or power.

In your culture, it's always about playing by the rules, from the drunken airliner on through the years.

But here in America, we take the free expression of ideas seriously. It's difficult for foreigners to comprehend.

Crid at January 19, 2021 5:23 AM

You’re doing yeoman’s work here Crid. Keep it up.

I like Amy's editorial sensibilities A LOT. If she went Substack or whatever, I'd subscribe.

But this piece doesn't really cover the territory. Social Media are worth worrying about, but not like this:

> "I watch online spaces and believe
> it's putting in motion a chain of
> events that could empower society's
> most extreme elements."

At this point, "empower" is a dirty word, immediately arousing suspicions. For thirty years or so it's been promiscuously used and misused by every minority under the sun, never the least able, to describe some sunshine daydream of retributive authority over someone who has no real reason to be impressed by them.

Everything empowers "society's most extreme elements." Running water "empowers society's most extreme elements." So do seasonal bus passes, Hot Pockets in those new school lunch boxes with the cast of Minions on the front, and flu vaccines. Imagining people can be deftly 'dis-empowered' because you don't like their politics doesn't put you on the side of the angels. Abolitionists were extremist. Proponents of gay marriage certainly liked to imagine themselves as extremist.

> ... Trump's social media ban has
> begun a rapid flow of resources,
> brains and attention toward creating
> something unmanageable, and
> therefore terrifying

This guy is not on my team if he thinks the inherent human desire to speak freely is a problem… One made "terrifying" when he sees smart people spending their time as they see fit. Nothing is easier for me to oppose than a presumption that my communications should be "manageable."

Guys, this is straight out of Postrel.

> ...Now the talk is about building
> platforms free from Big Tech's
> centripetal powers, and its
> accompanying oversight.

Exactly what "oversight" is he talking about, and isn't it precisely what brought us to this moment? This guy doesn't want to bring extremists toward a warmer center of human relations, he wants to flatten them with the heaviest hammer ̶w̶e̶, or rather he, can swing.

Yeah, my BTC node went hot a couple weeks ago. Not really a whole lot he can do about that. Which is nice.

Not a Hellenistic scholar or anything, but I suspect the name Patrikarakos translates as something like of the father by name.

[I should check before mouthing off like that. Google: It does.]

Well…

Bad touch, Daddy.

Wfjag Says:

"With the failure of Congress to repeal Section 230..."

That isn't a failure. If Congress were to repeal Section 230 there would be no online comments at all.

No company wants to be held personally liable for your comments.

> you don't believe I should
> be able to communicate.

Well, you shouldn't be allowed in these discussions to feign loyal opposition to a nation, and culture, in which you take no part, and which you've never even visited. Amy's gracious: She'll let you "communicate" here, and in turn, I'll "communicate" that you haven't got a clue what we're talking about, are picking fights through translation tools because you don't know the language, and that your relentless submission to authority betokens a fealty perhaps genetic in origin.

Crid,

What's with all of this "show me your papers" crap?

All you are doing is asserting some random internet poster isn't from around here... and then using your assertion as a justification for why you've determined they aren't permitted to talk.

As others have pointed out this is no different than when Trump spouted birther conspiracies nonstop to claim that Obama wasn't a legitimate President. It was all made up nonsense.

This is especially amusing when the topic of the discussion if internet censorship...

However I don't believe irony is something you comprehend.

So show us your papers.

Crid,

Keep this up and I'll seriously consider commenting on topic in each and every thread until you invariably show up and we can have a back and forth on the details of my origin story.

If AWS could yank parler for "permitting hate speech" and other unmentionables, why hasn't Twitter been yanked for the same reason?

Oh, it's different when we collude to eliminate a competitor of one of our friends.

Take another look at that last paragraph—

lurking in the dinghies below are the jihadists and human traffickers and paedophiles

Social media communities free not just of moderation but of oversight.

That comment assumes that the "moderation" and "oversight" provided by the social media oligarchy has been beneficial, or fair.

Applying that assumption to the Trump Twitter ban assumes that, absent Trump, in-depth political debate is possible in 280 characters per tweet. At best, Twitter is little more than the cacophony of the chattering hordes, bumper sticker philosophy writ large.

@NicoleK: The shortfall in your public-spaces metaphor is that unlike a town, the Internet has infinite space available in which more "private malls" can be built. So let every dissident group have their own.

It does not bother me that Adam Smith's invisible hand works even for bad guys. Better that they have speech platforms than that we not have them.

> At best, Twitter is little
> more than the cacophony

Not fair. At best it's an unprecedented resource for timely (instantaneous) information & expertise from the broadest imaginable spectrum of participants. (Until he gave it up at the request of his fellow board members from Facebook, a year of Marc Andreessen's Twitter feed was ten times as enlightening, and twenty times as amusing, as a five years' worth of Time, Newsweek, Scientific American, Architectural Digest and the New York Times put together. He did it for fun, unassisted by staff.) You wouldn't believe what they said about Elvis: Cacophony has always been a scare word.

There are assholes, too. But they were always out there anyway, Patrikarakos' dinghy people, as were the good ones.

Anyway, it's here now. Or in a few years, something even better. The gatekeeper thing is over. There will be undesirable dislocations, but it's got to be for the better.

I mean, a lot of these dislocations are a GODSEND. Centralized media was / is a nightmare. (I've made my living there as it crumbles, in the showbiz corner.)

Remember Hugh Sidey? James Reston?

Who needs it?

It is a wild claim that Trump incited violence. The dems called for violence dozens of times, even Pelosi called for uprisings, and harris said riots should continue. The last 9 months of riots killed roughly 50 people and destroyed tens of billions in property. Dem prosecutors refused to press charges in most cases, further encouraging violence. The message of leniency has led to doubling of murders in many cities, 277% increase in carjackings in Chicago. This is who is inciting violence, the dems. So the excuse is bogus. The total death toll from Proud boys or whatever, best I can determine, is about 4.
The idea that it is ok for twitter et al to decide the president is dangerous is itself dangerous. Trump would be a continuing political force after leaving office. Tech oligarchs have decided to deplatform an opposition politician. They are also banning multiple republ members of congress. They are not just deplatforming alex jones or Qanon but actual elected political opponents of the dems. very scary.
If you complain about election irregularities on youtube, your video gets pulled but if you call for the death of republicans, or whites or men, no problem. You cannot point out on twitter that after Ferguson BLM actively targeted cops (and over the past year during riots too). Moderation of "violence" on social media sounds innocuous but is not applied evenly. Conservative speech is violence but woke violence is speech. See how that works?

"By deleting (Trump's) account, (Twitter) shut down a large part of his ability to provoke civil unrest. Trump has not been unfairly 'censored' and free speech does not give someone the right to stoke violence and insurrection: either in principle or in law. "

Utter bilge. Both in its unstated assumptions and its conclusory blatherings.

> I'll seriously consider commenting
> on topic in each and every thread

A visiting child tosses mashed potatoes at the table: Needy disruption is your purpose anyway.

The techno platforms perform more like public utilities than private companies. I eagerly await the day they all fall under the regulation of every single state's utility commission. When half of the states (and probably more than half of the other countries in the world) ban their platforms, justice will have been reached.

cc Says:

"It is a wild claim that Trump incited violence."

Take it up with the lunatics who stormed the Capitol building.

They are the ones contending that Trump sent them there to attack Congress.

If Trump's own supporters contend that he put them up to it then the claim isn't exactly "wild".

Should it be looked at closely?... sure... but it is entirely plausible given what he said and what occurred immediately thereafter.

If you really think everything he said was perfectly fine, why don't you prove it by going to your local airport and reading his speech verbatim over a bull horn.

I wouldn't recommend it... but the point I am trying to make is you are probably also smart enough to also know that would be a bad idea.

Crid,

You're on thin ice bud. Keep it up and every thread will end up being just be you and I endlessly debating where I was born.

It's your call.

As far as I can tell, Trump told his supporters to march on the capital (not Capitol) "peacefully." If a handful of them took it upon themselves to storm the Capitol Building, that's on them. Nothing Trump did.

What I find puzzling is that Social Media sees fit to censor such speech that may or may not be "inciting." Why just not let people post as they wish and let concerned citizens tag the FBI if they're so worried about it.

Censoring is not the way to fight or prevent insurrection.

Censoring is not the way to fight or prevent insurrection.

Patrick at January 19, 2021 9:32 AM

In fact it is more likely to backfire and cause insurrection.

I’ve often wondered if Germany didn’t give the neo Nazis a long second wind by banning all Nazi symbols, books etc. after WWII.

Patrick,

Here is the transcript of the speech:

https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2021-01-13/transcript-of-trumps-speech-at-rally-before-us-capitol-riot

Here are some choice quotes:

"We took them by surprise and this year they rigged an election. They rigged it like they’ve never rigged an election before."

"All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by emboldened radical-left Democrats, which is what they’re doing. And stolen by the fake news media. That’s what they’ve done and what they’re doing. We will never give up, we will never concede."

"Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore and that’s what this is all about."

"We will not let them silence your voices. We’re not going to let it happen, I’m not going to let it happen.

(Audience chants: “Fight for Trump.”)"

"He’s got guts, unlike a lot of people in the Republican Party. He’s got guts. He fights, he fights."

"And he looked at Mike Pence, and I hope Mike is going to do the right thing. I hope so. I hope so.

Because if Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election."

"We want to go back and we want to get this right because we’re going to have somebody in there that should not be in there and our country will be destroyed and we’re not going to stand for that."

"For years, Democrats have gotten away with election fraud and weak Republicans. And that’s what they are. There’s so many weak Republicans."

"They’re weak Republicans, they’re pathetic Republicans and that’s what happens.

If this happened to the Democrats, there’d be hell all over the country going on. There’d be hell all over the country. But just remember this: You’re stronger, you’re smarter, you’ve got more going than anybody. And they try and demean everybody having to do with us. And you’re the real people, you’re the people that built this nation."

"Democrats attempted the most brazen and outrageous election theft and there’s never been anything like this. So pure theft in American history."

"We don’t have a free and fair press. Our media is not free, it’s not fair. It suppresses thought, it suppresses speech and it’s become the enemy of the people. It’s become the enemy of the people."

"Republicans are, Republicans are constantly fighting like a boxer with his hands tied behind his back. It’s like a boxer. And we want to be so nice. We want to be so respectful of everybody, including bad people. And we’re going to have to fight much harder."

"Because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong."

"We’re going to see whether or not we have great and courageous leaders, or whether or not we have leaders that should be ashamed of themselves throughout history, throughout eternity they’ll be ashamed."

"We will not be intimidated into accepting the hoaxes and the lies that we’ve been forced to believe.

Over the past several weeks, we’ve amassed overwhelming evidence about a fake election."

"You will have an illegitimate president. That’s what you’ll have. And we can’t let that happen."

"The radical left knows exactly what they’re doing. They’re ruthless and it’s time that somebody did something about it."

"The Republicans have to get tougher. You’re not going to have a Republican Party if you don’t get tougher."

"When you catch somebody in a fraud, you’re allowed to go by very different rules.

So I hope Mike has the courage to do what he has to do. And I hope he doesn’t listen to the RINOs and the stupid people that he’s listening to."

"We won in a landslide. This was a landslide. They said it’s not American to challenge the election. This the most corrupt election in the history, maybe of the world."

"Together, we will drain the Washington swamp and we will clean up the corruption in our nation’s capital. We have done a big job on it, but you think it’s easy. It’s a dirty business. It’s a dirty business. You have a lot of bad people out there."

"If we allow this group of people to illegally take over our country because it’s illegal when the votes are illegal when the way they got there is illegal when the states that vote are given false and fraudulent information."

"And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore."

Calling this a "peaceful" speech is kind of the same as saying the following statement is just someone innocently complimenting a restaurant:

It's a lovely place you've got here... it'd be a shame of something awful happened to it.

Orion, there's no debate, you're a foreigner here to abuse our hospitality. Is it a problem that it's being made clear? Amy's had other needy, presumptuous people visiting over the years.

@Aretmis: Apparently you don’t know much about the way the First Amendment protects speech. They wouldn’t be liable for my comments, provided they did not allow unprotected speech to remain posted after they received notice (e.g., kiddie porn, soliciting violence against identifiable persons and groups, and similar, narrowly defined limitations). Neither bloggers, such as Amy, nor large news media outlets, such as the NYT, find this burdensome or see any appreciable liability exposure.

What it would expose them to is liability for breach of contract and other bases for liability when they arbitrarily excluded content and commentators - such as any discussion of the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop, including emails alleging his father’s knowledge, participation and use of government power to protect against investigation of his son’s and other family members’ activities.

Having to abide by the same standards as everyone else hardly seems to be much of a burden. Almost all speech enjoys First Amendment protections, and the person alleging that the content is not protected has the burdens of proof and persuasion. This eliminates most of the whiners.

Wfjag,

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230

"(1)Treatment of publisher or speaker
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."

Without section 230 this protection would be removed.

The publisher itself might be held responsible for content provided by users.

Get rid of section 230 and say bye bye to all social media comments.

Ok, Artie. You may find "implicit incitement" in some of what Trump said. (Isn't it true, though, that only dogs can hear "dog whistles"?)

Now, to be fair, why don't you catalog the explicitly inciting comments of Biden ("take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him"), Pelosi ("drag him out by the hair"), Schumer (the Supreme Court will "reap the whirlwind" and "won't know what hit them"), Harris ("protests [resulting in death and arson] should continue"), Maxine Waters ("if you see a Trump supporter in a restaurant, confront them") Chris Cuomo ("who said that protests should be peaceful?"), DeNiro ("I want to punch him in the face") etc., etc.

As I said before, you are a numismatist who specializes in one-sided coins. Since there are no such things, your observations are meaningless and should simply be disregarded. When you begin to acknowledge that coins have two sides, maybe you will earn some respect.

> Get rid of section 230
> and say bye bye to

What would we think of pending legislation in your nation?

Six's tweet from Bali feels aproppos.

Jay R,

You are drawing a false equivalence for a variety of reasons.

Trump referenced things like "fight" or fighting" over 20 times in that one speech alone. He referenced others being weak and how his supporters needed to be strong multiple times. He indicated that something needed to be done to stop this. He told them what was going on was illegal and that the election was stolen. Then he sent them to march on the Capitol building under the premise that if they weren't victorious they wouldn't have a country anymore.

That isn't the remotely same as some stupid comment Biden made about how he personally would beat Trump up if they were in high school. First of all it wasn't a repeated drone of the same rhetoric over and over. Secondly it wasn't about what the crowd needed to do on Biden's behalf. Thirdly it was about an imaginary conditional "if" they were in high school.

Even with all of those differences Biden later indicated that he regretted the statement. Trump continues to insist that everything he said was perfectly fine.

Some of us can tell the difference between a jay walker and a serial killer... others such as yourself insist a criminal is a criminal and to draw any distinctions at all is just unfair.

It's not that I "specialize in one-sided coins"... it's that you are a binary thinker that sees everything as having just two sides and then calls everything even when it suits you.

This is not about coins Jay R. These actions are not even remotely on the same part of the spectrum of behavior.

They are distinct.

Second, and most chilling: the 0.1 per cent that is Isis and al-Qaeda and Stormfront will have the decentralised platforms they have always craved to more effectively operate.

Maybe Stormfront will join forces with the QAnon Crazies and the MAGA Militia and then they’ll join forces with ISIS and al-Qaeda in a combined quest to destroy the Satan-worshiping pedophile Jew-and-gay-accepting liberals.

QAnon Crazies to al-Qaeda: “Hey, very sorry we didn’t help you guys out on 9/11. We should have. There were lot of godless liberals in the World Trade Center towers. Probably a lot of Jews too.”

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend” and all that.

Jay R,

I also love this little game you just played:

"Harris ("protests [resulting in death and arson] should continue")"

https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-afs:Content:9579800331

So when Harris specifically supports protests but not riots... you just casually insert "[resulting in death and arson]" there for fun?

That is not honest.

But hey... you've got to make a coin and its not gonna strike itself unless you start putting words in peoples mouths.

Needless to say, what Trump did just prior to his seditious horde storming the Capitol is not comparable to the items you've brought to the table.

"By deleting (Trump's) account, (Twitter) shut down a large part of his ability to provoke civil unrest. Trump has not been unfairly 'censored' and free speech does not give someone the right to stoke violence and insurrection."

What a load of malarkey!

And then that author goes on to lump Trump in with Nazis, jihadists, human traffickers and paedophiles?

Double a load of malarkey!

It is hard to follow what he wants to say (which might very well be worthwhile listening to) when he is engaging in such anti-Trump (and anti-Trump supporters) virtual signalling.

Trump, in his pre-stormin’-the-Capitol (“Hang Mike Pence!”) speech:

“You will have an illegitimate president. That’s what you’ll have. And we can’t let that happen."

We “can’t let that happen” means “Biden must be prevented from becoming president by any means necessary.”

There’ s no other way to spin that.

And any means = ANY means.

There’s no other way to spin that.

“What a load of malarkey!

Welcome to Amy’s blog, President Biden! (as of tomorrow.)

Orion, tell us about the 'spectra of behavior' in your country. Just for fun, use your native language.

Crid,

Well sometimes we have people who promote peaceful protests for just causes... and other times we have people provoke a howling mob of rabid mouth breathers to attack the legislative branch of government.

That pretty much sums it up at this point.

What are things like in your dark dimension of despair and agony?... you can speak English... I'm not sure if the nattering screeches of your species work so well using a computer interface.

Wordy. Where?

Oh, Artie. Once again you go out of your way to miss the point -- and thus prove my point.

Obtuse is as obtuse does.

With all due affection,

Jay R

Jay R,

You don't actually have a point because you are drawing False equivalences... that means your reasoning is flawed. Ergo your point isn't reasonable.

Even Mitch McConnel is in agreement with me:

"“The last time the Senate convened, we had just reclaimed the Capitol from violent criminals who tried to stop Congress from doing our duty. The mob was fed lies. They were provoked by the president and other powerful people,” McConnell said on the Senate floor"

Here is a hint... if you find yourself more partisan than Mitch McConnel you may have gone overboard.

Artemis, if you posted a quote like that without attributing it to anyone, they’d think it was a commie liberal who said it.

JD,

I suspect that in a few weeks after many of his supporters realize that Trump no longer has any influence or power, that he never really delivered on any of his grand promises, when the Republican party turns its back on him, and after the conservative news media stops peddling his nonsense... the extreme right will declare that Trump was a commie liberal plant put in place to destroy the Republican party and the last 4 years are really Democrats fault anyway.

We'll have to see how the situation evolves, but I don't think a sober analysis of reality is in the cards.

> We'll have to see how the situation evolves

Insight from distant shores!

Apparently you also have issues with people from Hawaii too...

Are they not American enough for you either?

The point is, you're not from America, you've never been here, and there's no reason to care what you think.

Crid,

For someone who keeps insisting there is no reason to care what I think you certainly seem to want my attention.

The best way to demonstrate you do not care what someone thinks is to ignore them entirely.

Intrude no more.