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from the Smells-like-censorship-or-teen-spirit dept.
On the Daily Dot:
The Facebook pages of Richard Spencer, the alt-right leader who was famously punched in the face last year, have been suspended.
The pages for the National Policy Institute, a lobbying group of sorts for white nationalists, and Spencer's online magazine "altright.com," vanished on Friday after Vice sent the social network an inquiry about hate groups. They had a combined following of almost 15,000 followers.
The action was taken just days after Mark Zuckerberg emphasized during his testimony before Congress that Facebook does not allow hate speech. But it wasn't until Vice flagged the accounts that Facebook suspended them. The social network said in a statement that it identifies violating pages using human monitors, algorithms, and partnerships with organizations.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Whoever on Saturday April 14 2018, @08:25PM (10 children)
So you think that Citizens United was wrongly decided, then?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jmorris on Saturday April 14 2018, @08:42PM (9 children)
No, it doesn't apply to this situation, try to keep up. Citizens United says people can join into a single corporate "person" to jointly pay for political speech.
The gay wedding cake precedent does apply, it says a business can't refuse business because they disagree with the expressive content of the material they are being asked to work with. Exactly as I warned for years. The line begins here [ ] for everyone to apologize and admit I was right as to what the consequences of that would be. But while we lost that battle we WILL use the side effects of that loss to win this battle today. You guys established the precedent that a business has no right of conscience, no right to say "I don't agree with this speech and refuse the business", you established the rule that a business has to transmit whatever the customer wants it to say. So how can Jack and Mark now argue they have the right to refuse to obey rules they heartily supported? Rules established in causes they personally donated to? No, time for them to BAKE THE FUCKING CAKE! One law for all or anarchy, choose wisely.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Whoever on Saturday April 14 2018, @09:36PM (7 children)
How do you think people join into a single corporate person? They incorporate, just like forming a business. The Citizens United decision was based on prior decisions granting businesses 1st amendment rights. First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti.
You also appear to think that the court meant only natural persons when it decided Citizens United. I don't think that this is true.
But let's take your line of thinking. If businesses don't have a 1st amendment right, they shouldn't get that right simply by forming an association. So, any industry lobbying group should not have 1st amendment rights. Since the NRA is mostly funded by gun manufacturers, it should not have a 1st amendment right, etc.. Is that what you want?
Also, newspapers are businesses. Are you of the opinion that newspapers should not have 1st amendment rights? How about Fox News?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by jmorris on Saturday April 14 2018, @10:08PM (1 child)
Last attempt. Apparently Vox Day is correct about communication across several SDs of IQ. Argh.
Citizens United says a corporation can speak. So Facebook or Twitter can buy a political ad if it wants. The gay wedding cake precedent says that once a business accepts a paying customer it must accept any customer, regardless whether it disagrees with the expressive content servicing that customer entails. Yes there is an obvious conflict between the two, I argued that very point for years and lost. If you are still confused, ask someone else to explain it to you because I'm done.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Whoever on Saturday April 14 2018, @10:58PM
Just because you are unable to clearly write a coherent argument doesn't make you more intelligent than others.
I could make an argument about how the wedding cake can be distinguished form this situation by anyone with half a brain, but I won't bother.
Go fuck yourself and take your imagined superiority with you.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Arik on Sunday April 15 2018, @01:51AM (4 children)
It's a mistake to extend human rights to legal fictions. If the various stockholders, officers, and employees want to spend money on political speech, they shoudl be free to do so, but the corporation itself should be absolutely prohibited from having any hand in it.
But he's right about another point. If a baker can't offer a cake with writing on it and then refuse to make it with writing he finds offensive, how does facebook get the right to refuse to carry writing *they* find offensive, hmm?
The safe harbor concept is predicated explicitly on the business not doing this. And if that goes away then they can be sued by anyone and everyone that finds anything anyone ever said on facebook offensive.
Which, now that I think of it, wouldn't be the worst thing that could happen.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Whoever on Sunday April 15 2018, @02:21AM (3 children)
But that's the key issue, isn't it? They didn't get as far as discussing what the cake would look like, what messages it might include. The baker refused to make the cake not because of any message on it, but because of who the customers were.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Sunday April 15 2018, @02:40AM (2 children)
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Whoever on Sunday April 15 2018, @03:06AM (1 child)
Without discussing the actual text, you cannot possibly know that. Besides which, it's quite clear that the baker's objection was to people getting married, not to any speech that might or might not have been involved.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Sunday April 15 2018, @03:13AM
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2018, @05:36PM
>You guys established the precedent that a business has no right of conscience
"Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, 573 U.S. ___ (2014), is a landmark decision in United States corporate law by the United States Supreme Court allowing closely held for-profit corporations to be exempt from a regulation its owners religiously object to, if there is a less restrictive means of furthering the law's interest"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burwell_v._Hobby_Lobby_Stores,_Inc. [wikipedia.org]