Freedom of speech is quite different from freedom of the press.

You can say what you want, but I don't have to print what you say if I own a newspaper.

That being said, if Youtube and such are now going to start curating content (by pushing "recommended" content and by removing content), we may need to revisit those particular platforms' classification under Section 230 of the DCMA.

that person didn't realize the damage propaganda could do with modern tools. Unfortunate reality is our cognitive biases can be exploited, and complete freedom of speech is not in the best interest of the majority of humanity.

This is a "loophole" that is exploited over and over again by climate change denialists, cigarette companies, nazis...

"Modern" tools are anything but. Throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, and to some extent thereafter (less so as civil-society norms developed, and a shared sense for "reasonable" political advocacy along with those), extremist pamphlets, chapbooks and other printed materials pushing outlandish conspiracy theories were incredibly common. Anyone advocating for freedom of the press would've been familiar with the stuff.

Yeah, and just imagine what politicians could get away with if they had laws that allowed them to prevent people from speaking their mind.

This absolutism is unnecessary. Plenty of modern democratic countries have limits on acceptable speech (France, Sweden to give you a couple examples) and they are not less democratic than the US (I would argue they are more).

Limiting speech within agreed boundaries is not problematic as long as it's a decision taken with a good criteria and with a good goal in mind. It's no different than any other decision we make on how we setup society.

What is or isn't acceptable at the time is largely a matter of fashion and opinions. As an example, have a look at the ALA's compiled list of banned books (some of which are banned for ridiculous reasons): http://www.ala.org/advocacy/sites/ala.org.advocacy/files/con...

I don't think anyone is arguing about the damage of propaganda here. The discussion here is more-or-less Youtube choosing which propaganda it wishes people to see.

To use your idea here - the cognitive biases being exploited are being exploited by youtube itself. In this example, Icke is a relatively divisive character even on the right wing. So it becomes important to ask - of the controversial figures that remain (on both sides) what cognitive biases is Google/Youtube aiming to exploit by allowing them to continue?

The most dangerous mindset of this era is the fallacy of symmetry. That the wrongs of one side are qualitatively and quantitatively mirrored in the other, only in different forms.

If we're not allowed to entertain that one side might simply be wrong enough to need its own correction, then we allow it to continue to march off the cliff. Dragging the overton window down with it.

It is simply not a given that the existence of a piece of propaganda implies that the absence of it (or intolerance of it) is equivalent to propaganda for another side. If I'm corrected from claiming 1+1=2, the other side rests on more than propaganda.

no.

it is

> that person didn't realize the damage propaganda could do with modern tools.

No that person did. It's precisely why he was against censorship. Propaganda is rather useless without censorship. It's why china, north korea, nazi germany, etc had censorship.

> This is a "loophole" that is exploited over and over again by climate change denialists, cigarette companies, nazis...

Right. Imagine if cigarette companies and nazis had the power to censor...

Your comment is actually in support of free speech but you are so blinded by agenda that you can't see it.

Nazis supported censorship and used your exact reasoning to censor. Think about it. The chinese government uses your exact reasoning to censor. Think about it.

And to add another, “When you tear out a man's tongue, you are not proving him a liar, you're only telling the world that you fear what he might say.”

I don't know who David Icke was or what he was saying (according to comments here he's a 5G conspiracy theorist), but deplatforming him won't have the intended effect.

It sure worked well with Milo.

Oh I think it will have the intended effect. A lot of people lose interest if lies or propaganda aren't repeated constantly. It is human nature.

I agree, but at what point does speech cross the threshold of harmful? If I post a video with fake research and claim drinking Clorox cures cancer, should that be allowed to stay up? What we are talking about in this particular case is not a battle of ideas or opinions, but complete fabrications.

I don't know what the answer is, but I do know people who believe some of this crap and will not listen to reason. At least for them, it would have been better if they never heard this stuff.

Good thing this isn’t censorship. It’s a non-governmental media company curating and policing the content it chooses to host and promote.

Where do people get this idea that it’s only censorship if the government does it? Regardless of your view on this, it’s censorship. Period.

And they can censor whatever they like, why not?

That’s not even remotely close to what I said. All I said was it is censorship to remove something after it was posted.

Well, they still have the right to say it.

Does not mean they have the right to a media platform.

I doubt Voltaire or whoever smarter than you said that meant to imply that their intellectual adversary had any /right/ to be published.

Uhhh... fraud has legal definition, as does libel - these are _civil_ issues not _criminal_. That being said, the right to actually say the words is still protected and nobody is allowed to take that right away.

He can still say what he wants. Constitutional law is pretty clear that you can say what you want, but you do not necessarily have a right to how you get to say it.

Newspapers are not required to publish every single letter they get. In the same vein, Youtube has no legal obligations to anybody to let them on their platform.

Fraud is absolutely a criminal issue.

What if you really believe that drinking bleach does cure covid? What if it is cow urine or holy water that you bestow your belief in?

Are we going to also ban religion, and the whole mess of lies it brings with it?

It is not even a slipper slope at your point, it is a cliff with a waterfall

YouTube isn't the internet

Thats not my point of contention.

I disagree with this "Telling people to drink bleach to cure COVID-19 is not protected under free speech.". It is a separate question whether Youtube's actions are limited by free speech protections. What he said would have all kinds of lies, including religion, not be protected under free speech.

If you follow your line of thought then David Icke should be prosecuted. And then YouTube is still wrong here, acting as a judge, jury and executioner vigilante.

No, they just decided, as a commercial entity not under the jurisdiction of the First Amendment, to stop cutting him checks. Get a grip, they're not executing him.

He's not commenting on that. He's commenting to the guy who suggests that "drinking bleach cures covid" should not be covered under free speech.

It's not censorship by any means; YouTube isn't the government. David Icke and his ilk should feel free to take their lunatic fringe theories to the lunatic fringe corners of the Internet like Breitbart etc. They won't be "censored" there.

Wherever did people get the idea that the only form of censorship is governmental?

It's quite literally in the definition of censorship, and has been since its origination in Ancient Rome. More importantly, the restriction on censorship has been tied to government action since it was first enshrined in the First Amendment.

A private party can choose not to spread the content of a third party. That is not censorship. That is one party choosing not to spend their own resources to further the interests of a different party. If the third party has an issue with that, they can spend their own resources creating their own platform to spread their own ideas.

Ah, the etymological fallacy. Certainly the office of censor started in ancient Rome. However there have been plenty of other censors throughout history, and many that currently exist.

Consider: 1. The Catholic Church's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_Librorum_Prohibitorum 2. The https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority 3. The Hays code: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code 4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast_Standards_and_Practi...

None of them are governmental. All exist to police speech.

In general, merely declining to publish something should probably not be called censorship. It is indeed a fine line between maintaining editorial control and suppressing speech. However, when one publishes just about everything, but excepts certain viewpoints with the explicit goal of suppressing them, the term starts to fit a lot better.

Is any of this against the First amendment? Of course not. But it's still clearly censorship.

If you want to get technical about it, the Catholic Church was deeply embedded in most European governments when the Index Librorum Prohibitorum was issued, and was the official state religion for multiple kingdoms.

The Hays Code was issued by the MPAA as a voluntary set of guidelines governing the then vertically-integrated studios and theaters. Importantly, they were not prohibitions on movie content. Many film productions did not adhere to the Hays Code and many independent theaters similarly ignored it. Indeed, the body established to enforce the code did not even how the power to order studious to cut material... The only instance of the Hays Code having an impact on films was during the short Breen era, which lasted only 6 years, and this only affected films shown in vertically-integrated theaters owned by the studios. Independent theaters continued to ignore the Hays Code, as they always did.

And the Broadcast Standards was a decency code intended to mollify advertisers, i.e., other private parties, who generally did not want to be associated with certain types of content. As with the Hays Code, it was a series of guidelines, not a prohibition, and late-night shows generally flaunted the Broadcast Standards with impunity.

In other words, not censorship...

Just private acts of self-interest to protect their market position.

If someone is putting signs on your lawn, you're censoring them by removing those signs.

YouTube is a de facto public utility at this point. IMO if they want it to be a closed ecosystem, they should not allow public access the way they currently do. There's no good alternative to YouTube (yet) but I hope there is some day.

Pushing people to the fringes just breeds more hatred, outrage, misinformation, and extremists.

Imagine if there was just one phone company and they only let people who they agree with have phones.

Terrible analogy. YouTube is not the only video host. Video hosts are not the only way to share or consume content.

Nope, it's not.

The whole rest of the Internet is flush with video content -- it's no monopoly like the phone company used to be.

YouTube is an offshoot of an ad company. A private, for-profit enterprise that uses video content from its users to sell adverts.

Now, if you want to say the Internet is a public utility -- that's getting closer. And if the Internet writ large somehow managed to block certain content, that would be of great concern. That would require government intervention, like you see in China and some other places.

But that is not what it's happening here.

YouTube is not a de facto public utility. It is not currently used as the primary means of news by any segment of the population, by any government entity anywhere in the world.

It is not a means of communication like Zoom or the telephone. It's just videos. Lots and lots of videos. It provides entertainment to billions of people, but that doesn't mean YouTube is a utility. It just means its very popular.

> It is not currently used as the primary means of news by any segment of the population

This is wrong. I'm ~19 in the UK. My entire demographic gets their news from either Google, YouTube, Facebook and word-of-mouth, younger people even more so.

I don't doubt that people that are 19 hear things through the rumor mill. That is how the 5g rumor spread and why the UK has so many destroyed 5g towers right now. But there is a difference between the gossip spread through social networks, and news.

Also, to note--Google doesn't generate its own news. It sources it to news organizations...Similarly, YouTube News coverage are just segments of news broadcasts by news organizations...

Google News for sure, but non-mainstream YouTube sources (so called independent creators) are collectively more popular than BBC or newspapers. Again, at least in my age group.

I agree, OP is just out of touch with current realities. Sorry but I will side with the the notion that Youtube IS a public utility. The free market allowed these monsters to grow (Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc) and become extremely powerful. They cannot now to claim "they are just another private company" when people are totally marginalized from public discourse if they dont play along.

The other thing is the partenalistic stuff, please remove the content so those brain dead morons(not me) dont get influenced.If the ideas are so wacky, you need more light and debate and shame, not censorship and secretism. Maybe I am one of those brain-dead morons, but for me the standard is very clear, if a video/tweet is illegal, remove it and block the account, otherwise, let it be.

Unfortunately this is a very unpopular opinion nowadays.