Platforms have several advantages from being platforms, like not being legally responsible for what people are posting there (within limits). It feels right to have obligations as well. You can't say both "I'm not responsible for their political viewpoints" and "I'm free to select the political viewpoints of my members".

A church is not a platform.

> A church is not a platform.

But a pulpit is a platform.

> You can't say both "I'm not responsible for their political viewpoints" and "I'm free to select the political viewpoints of my members".

not only can you say that, it's pretty much a requirement for public platforms to exist on the internet. You are on Hackernews right now. If Hackernews was legally liable for the content users create, it would cease to exist. Likewise, if not being liable meant Hackernews could not moderate the site as they see fit, it would go to hell.

You should be able to make a Christian platform, a left wing platform, a conservative platform, moderate accordingly, and still be able to operate it without facing legal threats that would immediately render operating it impossible. The reason platforms have both rights is why we have a public internet.

Should phone companies be able to ban people for their political opinions? ISPs? The water company? The electricity company? Why do they have to tolerate people using their services to push some political viewpoints?

Let's say there is an easement should there be right to block use of that based on political options. After all it is private property.

The more worrisome "inversion of speech" would seem to be that institutions have the same free speech rights as humans.

Social media platforms are increasingly akin to the pubic forums of old, where essentially all meaningful exchange of ideas takes place — and where excommunication functions like "free speech zones" designed to marginalize and render the exercise of political expression inert.

I would suggest a relevant precedent might be laws limiting media ownership.

I'd also point out that institutions of a certain size exercise control over human in a similar way to governments — and the "private business" distinction becomes increasingly blurry when we consider how deeply these companies collide with law enforcement and govt agencies to censor information.

It's a complicated topic!

The problem with that comparison seems to me that old public forums did engage in plenty of restrictions. if Facebook functioned like the Ecclesia, these rules would apply[1]

    Do keep to the subject being discussed.
    Do treat each subject separately.
    Do not address the same subject twice in the same day.
    Do not be insulting and invective towards a fellow citizen.
    Do avoid slandering a fellow citizen.
    Do not interrupt the proceedings by standing up or shouting or speaking on anything that is not in order.
    Do not lay hands on the presiding officers or interfere with their duties.

"The Board of Presidents were authorized to impose a fine of up to 50 drachmas* to anyone who violated the above rules." (that's about two months of salary).

In fact funnily enough the ancient Board of Presidents is really not that different from Facebook's community oversight board. You will not find any public assembly in history that did not enact rules of conduct and excluded offenders if necessary.

[1]https://studyingreece.edu.gr/7-rules-of-public-speaking-in-a...

I dig the historical context!

My (perhaps sloppy) comparison with respect to public forums wasn't meant to be specific to Ancient Roman strictures, but that's solid trivia.

Perhaps the closer analogue would be modern public spaces in the US — although that too only goes so far.