Yeah, the idea that Parler was some free-speech bastion is nonsense. They were explicit and judicious with their use of the ban hammer to remove wrongthink from their platform - they just didn't consider the crazy and often extremely violent threats on their platform as wrongthink.
I've always liked this interpretation of MPAA ratings.
“If a man is pictured chopping off a woman’s breast, it only gets an R rating; but if, God forbid, a man is pictured kissing a woman’s breast, it gets an X rating. Why is violence more acceptable than tenderness?”
— Sally Struthers
I'm confused as to how some people here are simultaneously digging on Parler for speech they "allowed", and then also that "they weren't really free speech".
What is it you wanted them to do? I think it's pretty reasonable to not have "See me on Parler @ParlerLovesNaziPussy" as that content that Parler could not control outside of their platform.
Restricting usernames seems like a prudent move, even for a free speech platform.
People aren't digging on parlor for speech they allowed while criticizing them for not being free speech.
They are criticizing them because they heavily advertised to people that they should go to parlor claiming that it was meant to fight for free speech because Twitter and other platforms were restricting free speech. Except Parler itself was restricting free speech on it's own and thus people are rightfully pointing out the hypocrisy. It shows that Parler wasn't in favor of free speech, it was in favor of "our side".
> just not enough of the things that Amazon wanted.
One of the major allegations in the lawsuit is that the company took down everything that Amazon wanted, and that a few days ago Amazon apparently replied that they were "okay" when the materials they asked were taken down.
Seems like this will be one of the facts to establish in the suit, however it's part of the body of evidence to support the idea that 1) the suspension was a termination and 2) the termination was unwarranted which in my opinion as a complete lay person seems less sure of proving.
> Parler is founded on the idea of absolutely unmoderated speech. Even if they win this one, the writing is on the wall for them.
Absolutely untrue. Parler isn’t a free speech site. Gab on the other hand is and even they moderate. Their policy is to only allow first amendment protected speech, but that excludes quite a bit.
I believe "absolutely unmoderated" speech isn't technically correct here. As I understand it, Parler does have a form of moderation wherein a "jury" of 5 people evaluate flagged content within a 24 hour window of being flagged. If 4 vote for removal, content is removed. [1]
Naturally, if such a platform is dominated by extremists then extreme speech will remain effectively unmoderated (I can't speak to the fraction of the [former?] Parler userbase that is/was made up of violent instigators).
[1] Kara Swisher's interview with the Parler CEO on the Sway podcast (I haven't actually used Parler beyond taking a look once out of curiosity)
> Big Tech will at least pay lip service to the idea of moderation
You are not really watching if you think that is what is happening. They are controlling the narrative. They are promoting some topics and pushing down other. Facebook deleted WalkAway, a group that had full moderation, did not allow any posts which called for violence, and which was pure political speech. Reddit is deleting each and every sub that goes against what their management believes; over 2000 have been banned last year only.
They are not paying lip service. They are directing narrative. They are banning things they don't like. They are deciding which scientific exports are orthodox and which are banned. They are controlling language. They are controlling thought. If you don't think that's happening, then they are controlling your thoughts as well.
This is the most dangerous time for us to be in and this will not end well. Censorship is the tool of cowards. Censorship is the tool of authoritarians. We are literally watching Big Tech and Big Media openly rewrite history. We are in 1984 + Fahrenheit 451 and half of us have bought so far into this narrative of protectionism we do not see it at all.
But...that's what moderation is. Promoting some topics and pushing down others. Deleting certain groups which repeatedly break policies (which, by the way, are not limited to posts that call for violence). Deciding what is "orthodox" and what is not. This is common, even on this site. When a HN mod deletes a flagged thread because it doesn't follow the rules, are we all plunged into 1984 + Fahrenheit 451? When a comment is deleted and someone is baned even though they didn't literally call for violence, have they seized control of our thoughts?
The way I see it, Amazon (or Facebook etc) didn't censor Parler in the unilateral and totalitarian way you allude to. At some level, every company has to have the freedom to choose who they do business with, every person has to have the freedom to choose who they associate with. Amazon just said "no, I won't sell you AWS anymore". They didn't threaten Parler, Amazon does not have the power or authority to threaten Parler; They didn't and can't prevent Parler from choosing another provider. What's happening here is that Parler knows that no one else will voluntarily do business with them either.
Almost everyone in the industry has turned their back to Parler on their own. That cannot be censorship in the same way the lonely kid who no one wants to play with cannot be described as being censored in any meaningful sense of the word. Honestly I find it a worrying trend to be sure, but to portray individual free actions as censorship is to make the concept of censorship meaningless; It conflates the real dangers of authoritarian censorship with ordinary choices & biases that we take for granted every day.
I believe that companies are largely on their own team, neither right nor left.
How long before labor begins to be de-platformed for unionization efforts in the big tech companies? I know that there are already allegations that Amazon is acting in an extremely anti-labor way. Will the current argument of "platforms have a right to choose what content they will allow on their service" (which is a common argument for what is going on, among others) also apply in the case that pro-unionization groups are removed? These organisms will do whatever is necessary to protect themselves from what they perceive as threats, both external (political) and internal (labor).
> I believe that companies are largely on their own team, neither right nor left
Wat? Dude, Twitter, Reddit and Facebook's moderation policies are clearly left to far-left. They've done no blanket banning for calls to violence from the left. None of these people have had their pages, accounts or posts censored:
Right now the winds are prevailing from that direction, yes. Were the opposition to have a single party government I suspect things would be different. Currently anti-trust legislation looms over them and they are gravitating towards the graces of those in power as well as removing accounts that legitimately do advocate violence (albeit not as evenhandedly as they should).
I'm okay with this. We've had Republican/Conservative vs. Democrat/Liberal in every other form of media that I can remember. What's wrong with that split with "Social Media" or with hosting providers (think publishers), etc.
The problems seems to be that conservatives thought these services should be neutral but the services themselves have not thought otherwise. It will sort itself out over the next five to ten years.
Parler is founded on the idea of absolutely unmoderated speech. Even if they win this one, the writing is on the wall for them.
EDIT: This is not as true as I thought. Interesting information below!