Yes, and I don't care about free market. We're already doing this, we're forcing private companies to do business with people they don't want to do business with right now.
I don't even care so much about social media, but banks and services that provide basic infrastructure to keep your own web services afloat shouldn't be allowed to discriminate people based on their politics.
It usually seems to be based on people's bigotry or sexual misconduct. I haven't yet seen a politics-based ban.
Regardless, politics is not a protected class, nor should it be. If your political view is fascist, why should you have the same protections as someone who is born a minority? One thing can be changed and can be thought of as evil; the other can't.
This is like saying that words don't mean anything, so we should stop trying to use them. No one agrees on a hard line between fascist and not-fascist, but that doesn't mean it's entirely an artificial distinction.
Is the ACLU fascist? What about Ron Paul? Obviously "no" to both of those.
And what about neo-Nazis who describe themselves as fascists?
> Trump was labeled a racist and it's as stupid as calling Biden communist.
Someone should tell that to Richard Nixon's Justice Department, who successfully sued Donald Trump for being racist in 1973[1]. Or you should tell the white supremacists who celebrated Trump's victory[2]. If you're going to fish for weak "both sides are the same" examples, you're going to have to find an example that isn't so easy to counter-argue.
> You should have protections so the corporations and bankers don't have too much power over politics.
Unfortunately the First Amendment gives corporations and bankers an enormous amount of power over what they choose to say and publish, which means they have political power. You can't do anything about that except scrap the First Amendment.
Sure, there are people who identify themselves as fascists. I didn't said it doesn't exist. But nowadays anything even remotely outside the status quo is called fascism by the lunatics on Twitter.
> Unfortunately the First Amendment gives corporations and bankers an enormous amount of power over what they choose to say and publish, which means they have political power. You can't do anything about that except scrap the First Amendment.
As you pointed out yourself, Trump was sued for refusing service to blacks. And yet, the 1A is still here.
> Or you should tell the white supremacists who celebrated Trump's victory[2]. If you're going to fish for weak "both sides are the same" examples, you're going to have to find an example that isn't so easy to counter-argue.
It's funny that you're posting Richard Spencer, because in this elections he was against Trump and he was celebrating Biden's victory.
He was supported by libertarians, nationalists, plain old conservatives or some liberals even. You can't be everything at the same time and this is a very stupid argument to make. Same goes for Biden.
> Regardless, politics is not a protected class, nor should it be.
I think it should be, because attempting to ban political views gets in the way of finding out which political views are better. I don't know what "fascist" is, but I can definitely imagine political views like "Communism is a good way to run the country" or "Capitalism results in the best outcomes for everyone" being banned and I really don't like it.
No. He was tolerated despite his politics until he (arguably) incited a seditious attack on Congress and his own vice president.
> I think it should be, because attempting to ban political views gets in the way of finding out which political views are better.
The problem is that "political views" is not a defined term. What if I employ 50% Irish employees and have someone who says, "I hate the Irish and wish they'd never ruined this country"?
It harms my business to have that person around. It is bad for my brand, it's bad for my other employees, and maybe I just don't want to hear those comments myself. Why should the government be able to force me to pay that person?
Or, in the case of social networks, why should the government force my employees to publish that content, maintain it, and keep it backed up for millions of people to see?
> I don't know what "fascist" is, but I can definitely imagine political views like "Communism is a good way to run the country" or "Capitalism results in the best outcomes for everyone" being banned and I really don't like it.
These kinds of comments are protected by the First Amendment. You can publish them, and you can shout them on the street. But you can't force people to like you or employ you if you say them. These ideas won't die out because of social pressure.
Also, thousands of websites (including Parler) already ban one or both of the statements you included. It's just that no one really cares because they're small sites.
So at what point do you say that a company is too big to be allowed to decide what they publish? Is it 100M users? Or 500M? If MSNBC or Fox News had 2 billion viewers, should they also be forced to air videos produced by any group?
I don't even care so much about social media, but banks and services that provide basic infrastructure to keep your own web services afloat shouldn't be allowed to discriminate people based on their politics.