Social media and the 1st Amendment (Formerly: Trump seeks to punish Twitter) (1 Viewer)

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    superchuck500

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    Despite Twitter historically granting Trump far more latitude with violations of Twitter terms of service than average members would get, a recent tagging of a Trump tweet with Twitter's fact-checking tool enraged the president. He announced yesterday that he will take retribution via executive order seeking to remove statutory legal protections in place for social media companies, and instructing his executive agencies (the FCC an DOJ) to formulate plans to take legal action against social media companies for "political bias."

    A draft of the order has been released . . . and it is troubling to say the least.

    According to analysis, the order will "reinterpret" a key provision of the Communications Decency Act (Sec. 230) that previously protected social media companies for responsibility for the content on their sites. That section works by declaring that social media companies are not "publishers" of the content posted by third-party account holders (members) - and it is statutory. The Trump order apparently also instructs the FCC to create regulations to make this new "interpretation" of Sec. 230 actionable against social media companies. In addition, the order apparently instructs the FTC (which is not an executive agency) to report to Congress on "political bias" in social media - and to consider using the reinterpreted Section 230 to bring actions against social media companies for political bias.

    Apparently the order also instructs DOJ to work with state AGs to determine what state laws may be used against social media companies for political bias.

    So yep, a Republican president is attempting to restructure the statutory framework that has allowed American social media companies - which are private business by the way - to grow into corporate giants without having to be answerable in court for the content posted by their members. And will do so based on the notion that private business should be held to some standard of political neutrality.

    Further legal analysis will be needed, but it seems highly suspect on several important grounds (including the fact that Section 230 is statutory and is very explicit - it's not subject to rewrite by executive order). More importantly this idea that "political bias" can be defined and made actionable by federal agencies against private companies seems a patent violation of the First Amendment.



     
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    To the extent that Twitter begins to decide what content is and is not allowed is the extent to which their preferential exemption should be disallowed. I think that is Trump's point about Twitter political bias.
    Censoring the content that comes from the President is, at worst, an example of political publishing.
    I thought Trump's point was that conservatives get treated more unfairly by Twitter (ie uneven application of the rules). The fake account thing seems to suggest that Trump gets far more leeway. I think that does show that Twitter applies the rules unevenly, but not necessarily along ideological lines.

    I think an interesting experiment would be to set up a couple hundred fake accounts, a half hard core left and a half hard core right. Have the accounts use the exact same language but directed at different political opponents and then see what happens.
    Trump has been consistently complaining about conservatives and republicans being unfairly treated by twitter where there has been little of any evidence to back up the assertion. Trump would be perfectly happy if politically left commentary was being stifled from twitter. Quite frankly, I think you are attributing way too much intellectual thought content to trump.

    To UTJ's point, the best way to test the theory would be to create fake accounts from both sides and see what happens. However, a fake account tweeting the same exact thing as the POTUS account and being deleted while POTUS account is allowed to continue making such tweets does not support the point that trump is being unfairly sensored or that the rules are applied unevenly.
     
    I think the way Trump has gone about doing this makes it illegal.

    Having said that, though - the issue is larger than "political bias" - even if that is what Trump is focused on. To qualify for immunity, it is not enough, imo, that you not engage in political bias - its that you do not act as a publisher in relation to content beyond a certain limited role (do not make particular threats against individuals, no racist language, etc). The fact that Trump's political views - his content - is censored by Twitter when written by someone else, is evidence to me of engaging in publishing certain content. The fact that Twitter does the same with liberal users does not change the problem.
     
    The fact that Trump's political views - his content - is censored by Twitter when written by someone else, is evidence to me of engaging in publishing certain content. The fact that Twitter does the same with liberal users does not change the problem.
    I'll go you one better. I'd say it's evidence that twitter is engaged in publishing certain user's content. They allow content published from trump but not the same content published from joe blow. And that exemption is most likely due to the number of followers that trump has (my speculation).
     
    I think the way Trump has gone about doing this makes it illegal.

    Having said that, though - the issue is larger than "political bias" - even if that is what Trump is focused on. To qualify for immunity, it is not enough, imo, that you not engage in political bias - its that you do not act as a publisher in relation to content beyond a certain limited role (do not make particular threats against individuals, no racist language, etc). The fact that Trump's political views - his content - is censored by Twitter when written by someone else, is evidence to me of engaging in publishing certain content. The fact that Twitter does the same with liberal users does not change the problem.

    I think it's an interesting dilemma. My general assumption would be that Twitter as a private business is free to set it's rules for service as long as it does not discriminate against a protected class, and to my knowledge political affiliation is not a protected class.

    I think it would be interesting to see the application of the rules more from an inherent bias standpoint than a legal standpoint. If you perform my experiment and the number of expulsion is similar, then Twitter is still managing content, but it's along some sort of decency standard. If the number of expulsions or edits is skewed in one direction or another, then in effect Twitter is managing content along ideological or political grounds. I'm not sure how that matters with regards to section 230 though. From my completely un-educated opinion, my read is Twitter is legally allowed to censor data in whatever way it wants, I don't see an exception to the exclusion of treating it as a publisher based on any sort of conditions of fairness.

    If Trump gets rid of section 230, it would probably put most social media platforms and bloggers out of business.
     
    I'm not understanding how you are making that jump. If anything, it clearly shows that the POTUS account gets considerable preferential treatment compared to others who say the exact same things that trump tweets. I'd say it goes to the exact opposite of what others and trump point out about twitter and social media. Twitter suspended an account for saying exactly the same things that trump says yet trump's account has not been suspended. Can you go further in your explanation?

    I think Trump's tweets should stand so everyone can see for themselves what he is.

    Stop Hype Ignore Trump.... aka S.H.I.T...
     
    I think it's an interesting dilemma. My general assumption would be that Twitter as a private business is free to set it's rules for service as long as it does not discriminate against a protected class, and to my knowledge political affiliation is not a protected class.
    I agree. I am just talking about Twitter's, and others, statutorily granted immunity from liability.

    I think it would be interesting to see the application of the rules more from an inherent bias standpoint than a legal standpoint. If you perform my experiment and the number of expulsion is similar, then Twitter is still managing content, but it's along some sort of decency standard. If the number of expulsions or edits is skewed in one direction or another, then in effect Twitter is managing content along ideological or political grounds. I'm not sure how that matters with regards to section 230 though. From my completely un-educated opinion, my read is Twitter is legally allowed to censor data in whatever way it wants, I don't see an exception to the exclusion of treating it as a publisher based on any sort of conditions of fairness.

    If Trump gets rid of section 230, it would probably put most social media platforms and bloggers out of business.
    I am no expert at all on Section 230 or government regulation of social media so I am not exactly sure how the application works either. It just seems to me it should go beyond political bias. And those things can be extremely difficult (I am sure some on this site can attest to that). For example - derogatory racist language is clearly something that can be censored without giving up the liability shield. But what of language that isn't prima facie racist but many do interpret as racist?
    But if Twitter censors what it considers to be radical/racist/destructive/etc language from the left and the right then they are engaging in content creation, imo.
     
    I agree. I am just talking about Twitter's, and others, statutorily granted immunity from liability.


    I am no expert at all on Section 230 or government regulation of social media so I am not exactly sure how the application works either. It just seems to me it should go beyond political bias. And those things can be extremely difficult (I am sure some on this site can attest to that). For example - derogatory racist language is clearly something that can be censored without giving up the liability shield. But what of language that isn't prima facie racist but many do interpret as racist?
    But if Twitter censors what it considers to be radical/racist/destructive/etc language from the left and the right then they are engaging in content creation, imo.

    Whether I agreed with the content of the flagged posts by Trump or not, I immediately felt like Twitter had messed up. When they began to make value judgments on the truthfulness of posts, they opened a Pandora's box of potential challenges to their policy. You make an excellent point about language, but it could also extend to many sets of opinions as well. If someone who is not an elected official states an opinion as fact, is Twitter going to flag that statement? Will they need to set up rapid response research teams to comb through millions of fact dependent claims? It's just my opinion, but capitulating to any group demanding that any particular person's posts be scrutinized more carefully is an invitation to more trouble than the company wants.
     
    I can see why Twitter did what it did, though. I don't know the legalities. But I can see where people look around and see what's happening at Facebook and want to avoid it - I think if things continue the way they are, Facebook will only really be appealing to disenfranchised voters. And without a campaign to push their clicks and visits, I wonder at the viability of their platform.
     
    Trump has been consistently complaining about conservatives and republicans being unfairly treated by twitter where there has been little of any evidence to back up the assertion. Trump would be perfectly happy if politically left commentary was being stifled from twitter. Quite frankly, I think you are attributing way too much intellectual thought content to trump.

    To UTJ's point, the best way to test the theory would be to create fake accounts from both sides and see what happens. However, a fake account tweeting the same exact thing as the POTUS account and being deleted while POTUS account is allowed to continue making such tweets does not support the point that trump is being unfairly sensored or that the rules are applied unevenly.

    Over the past week end Trump tweeted an attack on Comcast. He is much worse... and Americans are overwhelmed with evidence of his insanity.

    This is a must read.


    Opinion | The Court-Martial of Donald J. Trump - The New ...
    www.nytimes.com › 2020/06/15 › opinion › trump-military

    www.nytimes.com › 2020/06/15 › opinion › trump-military

    1 day ago - The Court-Martial of Donald J. Trump ... President Trump delivering the commencement address at the United States Military Academy in West ...
     
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    How are they making that happen? Has Facebook really become that overrun with middle-aged to elderly white people?

    yes. absolutely yes.

    for many middle aged women, its the ONLY source of news for them. ( in my area anyway ) Anecdotal of course, but i had to ween my wife off FB "news" and back on obtaining news from paper/traditional sources.

    Not MAdisonville Mamas. ( and yes, this is a REAL group with REAL women that literally post about EVERYONE ELSES laundry - look it up )
     
    How are they making that happen? Has Facebook really become that overrun with middle-aged to elderly white people?

    You can't presume it's all genuine. Facebook has filed legal action over the past few months against various companies that have figured out how to manipulate likes and other activity (through various methods including fake accounts) and they sell their services.

    Twitter recently discovered that nearly half of "Reopen America" support was perpetrated by bots. It seems that this illegitimate activity typically skews to the American political right.



     
    I’m assuming the NAACP meant complicit, not complacent.
    Probably trying to not directly accuse them of having chosen a side. I think Facebook would rather be seen as letting it happen versus making it happen.
     

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