Tag: free speech

Another Tech Company Attacks “Health Misinformation”

Discord recently announced an update to its terms of service that prohibits “false or misleading health information that is likely to result in harm.” Through clouds of corporate-speak, the new rules go on to imply that criticism of the COVID-19 vaccines, disputing the guidance of health authorities, and advocating for unapproved treatments will be banned on the platform.

This is disappointing in part because Discord has largely remained decentralized, allowing users to form and regulate private servers, and has stayed out of meddling in what users can and cannot say except for broad, less-intrusive rules.

I’m in charge of moderating Out of Frame’s Discord server, and these rules put us in an awkward position. To comply and keep Discord from banning our server, we must play the role of justices of the Supreme Court, interpreting passages such as:

​​​​​”Discord users also may not post or promote content that attempts to sway opinion through the use of sensationalized, alarmist, or hyperbolic language, or any content that repeats widely-debunked health claims, unsubstantiated rumors, or conspiratorial narratives.”

and

“We allow the sharing of personal health experiences; opinions and commentary (so long as such views are based in fact and will not lead to harm); good-faith discussions about medical science and research […]”

Not only do these rules include numerous terms that are subject to interpretation (conspiratorial, good-faith, alarmist) and that would be ambiguous enough to enforce fairly if they didn’t require moderators to be experts in the current scientific consensus regarding any particular medical issue, but they also require us to know the unknowable. No one can be galaxy-brained enough to predict the future and calculate all the possible consequences of a piece of information being distributed. Not users, not moderators, not algorithms, or anything else can know for a fact whether a concept will “cause harm.”

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Millionaire Book-Writer And Professional Board-Sitter Chelsea Clinton Attacks Substack Authors As “Grifters”

Chelsea Clinton wants to talk about grifting. That’s just great.

The fruit, apparently, doesn’t fall that far from the global elitist narrative tree.

Perhaps looking to ride the coattails of those ganging up on “controversial anti-vaxx misinformation” (read: any uttered thought not handed down by Dr. Anthony Fauci from the heavens above) or perhaps looking to drum up support by her Twitter sycophants, Chelsea Clinton took to her Twitter account last week to lash out at Substack for providing a platform for free speech and for people to voluntarily subscribe to newsletters they’re interested in and willing to pay for.

Wow, sounds nefarious, Chelsea! Glad you stepped in.

The first daughter took exception with the “anti-vaxx grift” that is supposedly taking place on here on Substack, citing a Guardian article written last week as her source.

“A group of vaccine-sceptic writers are generating revenues of at least $2.5m (£1.85m) a year from publishing newsletters for tens of thousands of followers on the online publishing platform Substack, according to new research,” the Guardian wrote last week.

“Why is Substack facilitating science denialists’ ability to profit from destructive lies (and comfortable profiting themselves)?” Clinton asked.

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Let’s Back Up A Sec And Ask Why Free Speech Actually Matters

The Joe Rogan/Spotify controversy is still going on and has only gotten more vitriolic and intense. Claims that Spotify must walk away from its $200 million contract with the world’s most popular podcaster for promoting vaccine misinformation have sparked a lot of debates about freedom of speech, online censorship, what exactly those terms mean, and whether they can be correctly applied to the practice of Silicon Valley deplatforming.

When confronted with accusations of quashing free speech and promoting censorship, those who support online deplatforming in this or that situation will often respond with lines like “It’s not censorship, it’s just a private company enforcing its terms of service,” or “Nobody is obligated to give you a platform,” or “Freedom of speech isn’t freedom of reach,” or by posting the famous XKCD comic which says “If you’re yelled at, boycotted, have your show cancelled, or get banned from an internet community, your free speech rights aren’t being violated. It’s just that the people listening think you’re an asshole, and they’re showing you the door.”

And of course it’s true that nobody is legally guaranteed the right to speak on an independent online platform. But even if we ignore the fact that this censorship behavior is not being driven solely by the wishes of independent corporations and is in fact happening in increasingly close coordination with the US government whose officials openly threaten Silicon Valley platforms with repercussions if they don’t regulate speech, the fact that it is technically legal for those companies to silence voices they don’t like is not a sound argument. It doesn’t prove that censorship isn’t happening or that the deplatforming is okay, it just proves that it is technically legal for those giant monopolistic platforms to do those things. A casual glance at history shows that plenty of terrible things have been done which were perfectly legal at the time.

To really answer the question of whether the increasingly widespread practice of Silicon Valley censorship via algorithm and deplatforming is a major problem and whether an increase in speech restriction is desirable, we need to take a step back and ask ourselves why free speech even matters in the first place. Why is it something that’s written into constitutions and upheld as sacrosanct in so many nations? Why is it a value we’re told has supreme importance all our lives?

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Law student government rejects free speech group because debate can cause ‘real harm’

For the second time recently, Emory Law School in Atlanta is dealing with a controversy involving a student-run organization seeking to squelch debate in the name of preventing harmful speech.

Its Student Bar Association, the law school equivalent of student government, denied a charter to the Emory Free Speech Forum (EFSF) in part based on the “lack of mechanisms in place to ensure respectful discourse and engagement” at its events, such as a moderator.

This could cause a “precarious environment” and “potential and real harm” on fraught topics such as race and gender, “when these issues directly affect and harm your peers’ lives in demonstrable and quantitative ways,” the rejection letter said.

A charter comes with eligibility for university funding and the use of university resources. Given Emory Law’s “well-established promotion of free speech values” and EFSF’s “overlap” with other chartered groups, the letter said, “we fail to see a need” to fund it.

A week earlier, three law professors pulled their essays from a forthcoming issue of the Emory Law Journal in response to student editors ordering one of them to remove “insensitive language” from a “hurtful and unnecessarily divisive” critique of the concept of systemic racism.

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The Age of Intolerance: Cancel Culture’s War on Free Speech

“Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners.”—George Carlin

Cancel culture—political correctness amped up on steroids, the self-righteousness of a narcissistic age, and a mass-marketed pseudo-morality that is little more than fascism disguised as tolerance—has shifted us into an Age of Intolerance, policed by techno-censors, social media bullies, and government watchdogs.

Everything is now fair game for censorship if it can be construed as hateful, hurtful, bigoted or offensive provided that it runs counter to the established viewpoint.

In this way, the most controversial issues of our day—race, religion, sex, sexuality, politics, science, health, government corruption, police brutality, etc.—have become battlegrounds for those who claim to believe in freedom of speech but only when it favors the views and positions they support.

“Free speech for me but not for thee” is how my good friend and free speech purist Nat Hentoff used to sum up this double standard.

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Twitter’s new CEO Parag Agrawal previously rejected free speech in favor of “healthy public conversation”

In a far-reaching November 2020 interview, Twitter’s new CEO Parag Agrawal, who was the company’s Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at the time, rejected free speech protections that are enshrined in the First Amendment of the US Constitution, wished the company had censored QAnon sooner, and touted the company’s approach of censoring content based on “potential for harm.”

“Our role is not to be bound by the First Amendment, but our role is to serve a healthy public conversation and our moves are reflective of things that we believe lead to a healthier public conversation,” Agrawal said in response to a question about protecting free speech as a core value and the role of the First Amendment.

He added that the company now focuses “less on thinking about free speech, but thinking about how the times have changed.” In this context, Agrawal said the role of Twitter is increasingly moving toward recommendations and “how we direct people’s attention is leading to a healthy public conversation that is most participatory.”

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Authors and Their ‘Progressive’ Book Publisher Sue Sen. Elizabeth Warren Over Free Speech

Aprogressive publishing company and the authors of a book critical of the U.S. government’s response to the coronavirus emergency have sued Sen. Elizabeth Warren for allegedly attempting to pressure Amazon.com into yanking their title, The Truth About COVID-19: Exposing the Great Reset, Lockdowns, Vaccine Passports, and the New Normal.

Joining Chelsea Green Publishing and authors Dr. Joseph Mercola, an osteopath, and Ronnie Cummins in the suit against Warren is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a well-known vaccine critic who wrote the forward to the book.

The lawsuit is based on a lengthy letter Warren wrote to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy accusing the company he runs of “peddling misinformation” by labeling the book a “best-seller” and allowing it to be at the top of results when consumers search for information about COVID-19.

Chelsea Green Publishing was founded in 1984 to promote “progressive politics” along with “sustainable living…and, most recently, integrative health and wellness,” according to its website, and its titles have earned accolades from The New York Times and several other outlets.

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