Sounds like the slippery slope fallacy. The argument isn't being made to remove all posts from all members of a certain political party or ideological background. It's not even to remove all posts by a single person. It's to address and, hopefully prevent, posts that incite violence and unrest.

Literally every platform, including HN, has guidelines around what should and should not be allowed when users contribute. Having those rules defined is great, but enforcement is what makes sure the rules are followed. For a long time, and perhaps still, Twitter was selectively enforcing those rules to users. Facebook seems to be doing the same. Twitter finally applied those rules, rather loosely, to Trump via a couple of minor footnotes to his posts (not censoring at all). Then Twitter put a soft censor, meaning it was still viewable though not through normal user behavior, on a post that very clearly incited violence. I think the fact that these platforms have gone so long without enforcing their policies to this particular person has given the impression that there are no policies and no enforcement and, by extension, that they're open platforms accepting all speech. They aren't, never were, and as private entities are not beholden to be.

If this is about posts that incite violence and unrest, then Facebook and Twitter should definitely be removing anything that tries to justify rioting, and certainly anything that argues that it's necessary. As far as I can tell they're not - and not only that, the activists and many of the journalists who're pushing for this ban would almost certainly object if they did.

I agree with your assessment of the situation. I also agree with getting rid of posts that incite violence.

I am just concerned about whether it grows over time into eroding away the ability to speak on the internet.

This is just one thing. We don't even have any visibility in the true special sauce - the algorithms that determine what to show to people. Do you see the problem with this or you think that people who are responsible for these algos are good samaritans and they don't need any public oversight?

> I am just concerned about whether it grows over time into eroding away the ability to speak on the internet.

By this reasoning, we'd be crippled to make any decision for fear of what that may lead to. This leads back into the slippery slope fallacy. When something larger is at hand, then we can re-visit, but this is not large enough to merit that amount of mental and emotional effort to justify and discuss. Granted, that's entirely subjective, but I fail to see this as a very large issue. It's only making the news because these social media companies have gone so long without enforcing these policies.

> This is just one thing. We don't even have any visibility in the true special sauce - the algorithms that determine what to show to people. Do you see the problem with this or you think that people who are responsible for these algos are good samaritans and they don't need any public oversight?

This is extremely problematic and I agree. This isn't really the topic of this discussion, but it's definitely a problem. Social media companies are already censoring and filtering posts via their algorithms. That wouldn't be the case if feeds were purely based on a time-series (as they used to be).

Thanks for sharing your perspective. I guess it is a bit excessive to think about future repercussions, my conscience is only guided by past examples of slow erosion. I hope that silicon valley folks remain vigilant and self-critical.

Regarding the algos, I agree, it is an entirely separate problem.

The Facebook TOC has rules against violence. Zuckerberg has previously said that inciting violence is where he would draw the line for a political figure. Trump's post incited violence -- if you don't believe me, look at the way police officers felt empowered to treat protesters and reporters over the weekend.

Now that Trump has crossed that line, Facebook has contorted it. In the process, Zuckerberg and Trump talked on the phone.

To those of us who oppose this, it's because the neutrality argument has gone out the window. Would anti-China protesters in HK be able to get away with breaking the TOS? Can they call Zuckerberg on the phone?

I think breaking the TOC should be applied universally across the board. But you can't write the TOC that picks sides (I don't think violent statements are acceptable by either side).

My fear is that there are people on Twitter asking to ban President Trump's account. Slowly, eroding constitutional rights (I know Twitter is a private platform, but come on, it is really a public place of discourse). Right now its violence, then it's hate, then it's policy and the environment, then it's anything against democrats. We become blind to what's acceptable and what's not.

This is a slippery slope. Be careful, tread slowly.

If we're being honest, and I sure hope we are, several accounts have been banned for more minor infractions. Trump has shown his narcissism time and again; this isn't opinion. The mere fact that he refused to use the official White House social media handles and insisted on using his own personal ones, allows him to carry his influence/reach well beyond his term as president. That is not an accident.

He's flouted federal rules and guidelines and now we're debating whether private companies are allowed to operate as they always have?