Tag: free expression

France considers requiring Musk’s X to verify users’ age

The French government is considering designating X as a porn platform — a move that will likely have the platform implementing strict age verification requirements.

Such a designation could effectively ban children from accessing the social media app unless it curtailed adult content. Paris has recently upped its efforts to protect kids online by requiring age verification by porn platforms.

“X has indicated since 2024 that it accepts the distribution of pornographic content. It must therefore be treated as such,” Digital Minister Clara Chappaz’s office told POLITICO.

Her team has been tasked with “examining the designation of X in the decree concerning pornographic sites that must verify the age of their users.”

The confirmation follows an appearance by Chappaz on French TV show “Quotidien” on Thursday evening, where she said X will soon receive “the same pretty papers as YouPorn” instructing X to ban adult content or implement age screening.

Porn platforms serving content in France are required to implement age verification measures with a final deadline of June 7, although some are protesting.

Failure to comply could see sites fined, delisted from search engines or blocked completely.

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House passes “Take it Down Act,” sending revenge porn bill backed by Melania Trump to president’s desk

The House passed a bipartisan bill Monday that makes it a federal crime to post real and fake sexually explicit imagery online of a person without their consent, sending the legislation that was backed by first lady Melania Trump to the president’s desk. 

The bill, known as the “Take It Down Act,” cleared the lower chamber in a 409-2 vote. The two “no” votes came from Republicans. The Senate unanimously passed the measure in February. 

The legislation requires social media companies and other websites to remove images and videos, including deepfakes generated by artificial intelligence, within 48 hours after a victim’s request. 

“If you’re a victim of revenge porn or AI-generated explicit imagery, your life changes forever,” Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, said at a March 3 roundtable promoting the bill. 

Cruz, who introduced the bill, recalled the experience of a teenage victim, Elliston Berry, whose classmate used an app to create explicit images of her and then sent them to her classmates. Berry’s mother had tried unsuccessfully to get Snapchat to remove the images for months before she contacted Cruz’s office for help. 

“It should not take a sitting senator or sitting member of Congress picking up the phone to get a picture down or video down,” Cruz said. 

The first lady, who rarely appears in public, attended the March discussion at the U.S. Capitol to advocate for the bill’s passage in the House. 

“It’s heartbreaking to witness young teens, especially girls, grappling with the overwhelming challenges posed by malicious online content like deep fakes,” she said. “This toxic environment can be severely damaging.” 

The first lady applauded Congress after its passage and said the bipartisan vote made a “powerful statement that we stand united in protecting the dignity, privacy, and safety of our children.” 

“I am thankful to the Members of Congress — both in the House and Senate — who voted to protect the well-being of our youth,” she said in a statement. 

According to the FBI, in recent years there have been an alarming number of cases where victims have been extorted that have ended in suicide. Lawmakers said they hope the bill will save lives by providing recourse for victims. 

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Judge blocks California deepfakes law that sparked Musk-Newsom row

A federal judge on Wednesday blocked a California measure restricting the use of digitally altered political “deepfakes” just two weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill into law.

The ruling is a blow to a push by the state’s leading Democrats to rein in misleading content on social media ahead of Election Day.

Chris Kohls, known as “Mr Reagan” on X, sued to prevent the state from enforcing the law after posting an AI-generated video of a Harris campaign ad on the social media site. He claimed the video was protected by the First Amendment because it was a parody.

The judge agreed.

“Most of [the law] acts as a hammer instead of a scalpel,” Senior U.S. District Judge John A. Mendez wrote, calling it “a blunt tool hinders humorous expression and unconstitutionally stifles the free and unfettered exchange of ideas.” He carved out an exception for a “not unduly burdensome” portion of the law that requires verbal disclosure of digitally altered content in audio-only recordings.

Theodore Frank, an attorney for Kohls, said in a statement they were “gratified that the district court agreed with our analysis.”

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Trump Calls for Jailing Flag Burners

In reaction to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech before Congress on Wednesday, raucous anti-Israel protests erupted across Washington, D.C. Protesters vandalized statues outside D.C.’s Union Station with phrases like “Hamas is comin” and “long live the resistance.” At one point, protesters replaced the American flag with a Palestinian flag and then burned the American flag.

In response to the flag burning, former President Donald Trump told Fox and Friends on Wednesday that he believed those who burn or damage the American flag should face jail time. Trump also brushed off those who would point out that flag desecration is First Amendment-protected speech.

“You should get a one-year jail sentence if you do anything to desecrate the American flag,” said Trump. “Now, people will say, ‘Oh, it’s unconstitutional.’ Those are stupid people. Those are stupid people that say that.”

“We have to work in Congress to get a one-year jail sentence,” Trump continued. “When they’re allowed to stomp on the flag and put lighter fluid on the flag and set it afire, when you’re allowed to do that—you get a one-year jail sentence, and you’ll never see it again.”

This isn’t the first time Trump has called for imprisoning flag burners. 

“We ought to come up with legislation that if you burn the American flag you go to jail for one year,” Trump said during a 2020 rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma. “We oughta do it. We talk about freedom of speech…but that’s desecration,” he added.

However, Trump is simply wrong. In 1989, the Supreme Court ruled in Texas v. Johnson that flag burning is protected speech. While you can still face property destruction-related charges for burning someone else’s flag (as occurred Wednesday), burning a flag you own is protected political expression.

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Australian Ministers Urge Stricter Online Censorship of “Misogynistic” Speech

The Australian government’s commitment to online censorship is playing out in yet another way – the perceived harmful influence social platforms have on young men and boys.

Aligned media outlets agree these sites are showing too much content that is branded as misogynistic and promoting harmful gender stereotypes.

Meanwhile, government ministers want to see the companies behind platforms “do” (aka, censor) more.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland, known for her pro-censorship stance, and Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth are both quoted in a Guardian article about an “experiment” the outlet carried out by setting up fake accounts representing “generic 24-year-old males” on Facebook and Instagram.

The accounts did not interact – the goal was to see what would be showing up in their algorithmically-recommended feeds. And that the device and the email used to sign up were new, was apparently enough for the Guardian to believe they were safe from Meta’s tracking.

The article’s conclusion is that over the following several months, the feeds started to “veer into more highly sexist content,” especially on Facebook.

But it looks like the majority were memes about sitcoms, Star Wars, “dudebro” memes, Daily Mail, etc., news posts, while Instagram’s biggest “offense” seems to have been showing images of “scantily-clad women.”

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Tennessee Woman’s ‘Fuck Em’ Both 2024′ Sign Is Protected Speech, Rules District Court

A federal judge has ruled a Tennessee woman can’t be fined for saying what we’re all thinking, even if it’s in the form of a yard sign.

This past week, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee ruled that the town of Lakeland, Tennessee, violated resident Julie Pereira’s First Amendment rights when it fined her for placing a “Fuck Em’ [sic] Both 2024″ sign in her yard.

According to her First Amendment lawsuit filed last month, Pereira’s sign “simply and cogently” expressed her own opinion that neither major party candidate was an acceptable choice for president. A Lakeland code enforcement official disagreed, slapping Pereira with daily fines of $50 for violating the city’s prohibition on “obscene” signs.

The city only stopped fining Pereira after she covered the u on her sign with tape. By that point, she’d wracked up $688 in fines and other fees because of her sign.

But, unwilling to either pay those fees or dilute the “potency” of her message, Pereira sued the city of Lakeland for violating her First Amendment rights.

“In the interest of protecting not only my rights, but all citizens in the state of Tennessee this case has been taken to the next level because of its constitutional impacts,” she wrote on Facebook, per the New York Post‘s reporting.

In a brief, three-page ruling, the U.S. district court agreed with Pereira. The court barred the city from taking any further enforcement action over her sign and instructed the city to reimburse Pereira for the fines she’d paid, plus $31,000 in attorneys fees, and $1 in nominal damages for having her constitutional rights violated.

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Florida stripper sues state over law raising age requirement

A 19-year-old is suing over a Florida law that raises the age requirements to work in adult entertainment establishments, saying it violated her constitutional rights and made her lose her job as a stripper.

In a lawsuit filed Monday, Serenity Michelle Bushey said she and at least eight other performers were fired from Café Risque, a strip club near Gainesville, because of the state law that increased the minimum age to 21.

The lawsuit, which also includes Café Risque and two adult businesses in Jacksonville as plaintiffs, seeks a permanent injunction stopping enforcement of the law.

“As with similar performers around the state, Bushey earned her living through her art while providing entertainment for the benefit and enjoyment of her audience,” the complaint said. “Plaintiffs have a clear legal right to engage in protected speech of this nature.”

The complaint, which was first reported by the Tallahassee Democrat, names Florida’s attorney general and two local prosecutors as defendants. It was filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed HB 7063in May, saying it would deter human trafficking.

But the companies in the complaint disputed that, saying they’ve longemployed adult entertainers, cooks, waitresses and security guards younger than 21 with no instances of human trafficking.

The clubs said they hire performers under 21 to increase the talent pool and attract young adult audiences. Many young entertainers use the job to support themselves through college, they said.

The plaintiffs, represented by Gainesville attorney Gary Scott Edinger, saidthe law violates their First Amendment right to free speech.

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Appeals Court Upholds Ban on Student Wearing ‘Only Two Genders’ Shirt

A U.S. appeals court on June 9 upheld a ban preventing a Massachusetts middle school student from wearing a shirt reading “There are only two genders.”

Another prohibition by school administrators, this time blocking the same student from wearing the shirt with “only two” covered by tape, on which was written “censored,” is also allowed under court precedent, according to the ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

“The question here is not whether the t-shirts should have been barred. The question is who should decide whether to bar them—educators or federal judges. Based on Tinker, the cases applying it, and the specific record here, we cannot say that in this instance the Constitution assigns the sensitive (and potentially consequential) judgment about what would make ‘an environment conducive to learning’ at NMS to us rather than to the educators closest to the scene,” U.S. Circuit Judge David Barron wrote for a unanimous panel of the court.

In Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, the U.S. Supreme Court in 1969 ruled that a ban on students wearing armbands in protest against the Vietnam War violated the students’ First Amendment rights.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani cited the ruling when in 2023 she ruled in favor of the administrators at the John T. Nichols Middle School (NMS) and Middleborough School District in Massachusetts against Liam Morrison (L.M.), the boy who wore the “two genders” shirt to school.

“[The school] permissibly concluded that the shirt invades the rights of others,” Judge Talwani said before quoting Tinker. “Schools can prohibit speech that is in ‘collision with the rights of others to be secure and be let alone.’”

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Mistrial declared after jury in case of tiki torch carrier from 2017 Unite the Right rally could not reach verdict

A mistrial has been declared in a Charlottesville, Virg. trial after a jury couldn’t reach a verdict to convict a Unite the Right attendee for carrying a tiki torch at the 2017 far-right rally.

Prosecutors accused Jacob Joseph Dix of committing a state felony by burning the tiki torch, which intimidated others. Three jurors voted guilty, eight said not guilty, and one did not make a decision after almost 12 hours of deliberating.

The prosecution argued that because Dix was part of a group where one of the participants broke the law, he must be found guilty. The defense claimed that Dix should be judged on his actions alone and saying “You will not replace us” was protected speech under the First Amendment.

Prosecutor Shannon Taylor said she intends to re-try the case. “It is our commitment to retry this matter,” Special Prosecutor Shannon Taylor told CBS.

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States Keep Passing Unconstitutional Age-Verification Laws for Porn Sites

Last Friday, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear signed a controversial bill requiring age verification for individuals seeking to use pornography websites in the state. While the bill seeks to prevent minors from accessing explicit materials, the law will require a substantial invasion of adults’ privacy.

The newly signed law started as an unrelated bill aimed at tightening penalties for child sexual abuse and other crimes, with the age-verification provision of the bill added as a floor amendment in March.

“Pornography is creating a public health crisis and having a corroding influence on minors,” the final bill reads. “Pornography may also impact brain development and functioning, contribute to emotional and medical illnesses, shape deviate sexual arousal, and lead to difficulty in forming or maintaining positive, intimate relationships, as well as harmful sexual behaviors and addiction.”

The bill requires pornography websites to limit access to adults and to verify a user’s age by accessing their government-issued identification or using another “commercially reasonable method of identification that relies on public or private transactional data.” Under the law, sites that violate the law face $10,000 fines for each instance that a minor accesses pornography.

As a result of this law, it’s likely that major porn websites will cease operations in Kentucky rather than develop a complex and invasive age-verification system. PornHub has so far left seven states that have adopted similar laws. 

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