This video debate explores whether social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube have become the modern equivalent of the traditional town square—a public forum for democratic discourse. Panelists discuss the implications of this analogy for platform moderation policies, corporate responsibility for free speech, and the challenges of regulating content in an era of algorithmic amplification. Key topics include Section 230 protection, the distinction between public figures and private citizens in defamation law, the Brandenburg test for incitement, and the tension between platform transparency and business interests. The debate also examines specific cases like Tennessee's drag performance legislation and the broader question of whether tech companies should be held accountable for the content their users generate.
Tech Censorship and Free Speech Debate Panel Analysis
Added:would be okay with with Banning uh false accusations like that right seems insane to me if I host a forum and I want to host a forum for like people that love cats and people step in and start posting dog pictures am I not allowed to ban them now because because I'm gonna lose my section 230.
protection I've never I think the section 230 arguments I've never heard a good one in favor of that what that lady shoe to be the script of these or you're like all of a sudden not allowed to moderate your platform like I think that's the disagreement we have so hold on let's say in itself the entertainment itself has to appeal to Korean interest so sure so let's say that a strippers let's say this if you're going to drag queen reading hour yeah like reading to kids is that like is that sexual entertainment performance any of those other people are doing these people are probably going to get in trouble if they're doing a performance in a public area it's necessarily going to be prurian interest somebody dressed as a stripper what's a go-go dancer it's I don't know but it's probably some sexual what's up [Music] is Twitter and other social media companies right um how they become the de facto Town Square what do we think are we going around in circles or is this it's up to you anyone wants to jump in go ahead or my immediate after you uh I would my opinion I think is that the totality of like the three or four big social media companies has become like the Town Square and they seem to be kind of locked up in terms of moderation policies so like Facebook Twitter Youtube and Tick Tock I guess like those four we're probably like this is like the Newtown Square and everyone agree with that otherwise I I don't um the first thing that occurs to me is that you say has it become the New Town Square and when I think about there's there's two uh angles that I would take issue with that statement the first is that has it become the New Town Square from what were we were we all assembling in some wide open space uh with a bunch of robots in addition um just like yelling random stuff at random strangers and then swiftly disappearing back into the crowd to come again in a later time to do the same thing over and over again that's not typically what we have in mind when we think of the Town Square I think wasn't weren't that wasn't it didn't it actually used to be the case that there were like people like screaming on corners and shouting and like holding pamphlets and doing something like like Town Town Hall meetings were very disorderly the issue that I bring up is not the the chaoticness of the actual thing itself the point is that there's an interminability and and a kind of uninclosedness to Twitter and to social media that a Town Square lacks like among other things which town right like we're not talking about a a community somewhere deliberating about like public action we're talking about randos from across different borders sometimes once again like not even actual people just throwing things and at no point does this culminate in deliberation or an actual increase in public knowledge maybe sometimes it does but it's not fulfilling the function in a liberal Society I think the Town Square analogy is supposed to uh is trying to put his finger on it's more like a national Town Square right so um and I think this is especially true when public congregations uh are get banned perhaps like like let's say during a pandemic or the only option you really have is to congregate online um and just like in the regular Town Square you have people who you know say stupid things raise their hand yell and you have people who are you know standing off on the side maybe having more intricate conversations I don't um just because one happens to be like a more physical place as opposed to like an electronic place I don't think that really detracts from the spirit of when we call it a town square right this it is supposed to be a place for discussion right a place for uh for ideas to be okay I don't want to monopolize may I respond to that quickly okay um I don't disagree with you entirely I think it definitely takes on some of the functions and even monopolizes some of the functions what we associate with the Town Square image um but once again like that doesn't seem to me to indicate that it fulfills the function of a Town Square perhaps it was the case that we lacked entirely for a brief period of time maybe a long period of time the function of a Town Square from from like public discourse and then as a result of social media certain aspects of that were brought back in a potentially toxic and dangerous way what is maybe we should ask ourselves in what is the function of a town square and then we can figure out if it satisfies that or not so we're all working on the same definition well I think for myself the function of a Town Square is a forum where members of a discrete Community can come together and address uh their respective issues um decisions that affect the whole of the community and they can weigh in and then decision can be reached about how these things are going to be addressed each person go back is it is it that deep like as I understood it uh historically a task square is just where people gathered and talked about right it usually wasn't a formal issue right like they would get up in their soapbox and maybe discuss issues of the day but this concept goes back a long ways right and and you write about the discrete Community it was it was localized uh by uh debt of it had to be right they didn't have any other uh ways of long distance communication but like it was never really so formal and in different uh areas had different Wars and different Norms surrounding it but yeah as I understood it at least the Town Square was simply a place where people gathered to talk about what they thought right and discuss issues of the day well a Town Square was a Marketplace so I'm collapsing two things together so the value of account Square why we care about that particular thing is not because there's some intrinsic value of one random person getting up box and screaming to a crowd that person could be ignored and nothing could happen as a result that happens in a lot of different places however if you have a robust Community where people are engaging with each other on their day today as they're passing through their places of work and places of purchase and places of leisure and so on and so forth um you end up with a situation at least in the ideal scenario where the things that people are belting out to the crowd are also addressed by members of the crowd in a way where there's some commensurateness between the person speaking and the crowd that's responding to them on Twitter by contrast and I was talking about this with Aaron earlier um a a rando who goes onto Twitter starts off with zero followers has no capacity to be heard at all someone's shouting back at the person of the Town Square by contrast does what happens when we consider social media like Twitter and YouTube to be the Town Square much more so Twitter is that we substitute celebrity culture with politics and I think that's where it becomes dangerous because now real political influence can be gained by propping up people as celebrities Donald Trump or some other major figure uh has has the poor judgment to respond to somebody that person now becomes a major player that's actually a really dangerous set of Dynamics I think and it's not discreet to any particular community so um it doesn't seem like it actually culminates in any kind of decision if anything it arrests right and what is the equivalent of like a counter protest I like it like a online in a town square unless if you're going to say that like the example that Sunday and I talked about was Richard Spencer if I'm trying to counter protest what Richard Spencer is using his social media platform to do on Twitter is that like a um what layer ratio is that supposed to be the equivalent of like countering them um these whole tweets and like retweets or argument yeah I'm posting furry porn like I've seen people do a lot of weird things when it comes online for one interesting problem of a digital protest actually it's not exactly the same thing but when that um was it Texas opened up their lines to like report people for being trans or something or was it was that Florida or Minnesota or something uh that happened and then a bunch of people like did a bunch of fake phone calls and got the phone call line shut down right there's ways to like protest people online I think uh and even on Twitter my yeah whether it's ratios or posting images or retweeting or quote tweeting people whatever right always abortion for Texas sorry I mean hashtag seems to be like that's the whole thing there's a reason why like they trend there are ways to reply oh sorry go on continue but I I asked that question to ask others and I'm curious uh but we'll continue with your your thought yeah um there are certainly ways in which individuals even with no following whatsoever can technically respond however now we run into the question of whether or not it's it satisfies the conditions of an open Forum where uh somebody can respond but categorically can't be heard because the system itself for reasons that are inscrutable to most people for legitimate reasons um uh they just have no uptake or no visibility um there are there are some people who will respond to very big figures they'll make a very poignant point and it will just go unseen whereas at the very least in a literal Town Square and you shout back somebody around you hears maybe the person you're even shouting at here is that is do not think they had like Celebrity Status back then too though like if the town mayor or Socrates right walked in obviously people were going to defer to them more much more so than strangers right of course like you know the issue they show on pinpointing isn't um That Celebrity is an important officials and whatnot will always have an advantage in any public space obviously they do they're better known whatever um the difference though is that in an actual Town Square just because of physical proximity I'm not saying we need to bring back the Town Square itself that's infeasible but the point is whether or not this this counts as one in an actual Town Square um the the uh the square itself is not so designed that a smaller person saying something is actually muted like did they actually physically cannot be hurt fair enough um I asked that though because I also wanted to ask something that Destiny asked uh The Alex Jones and the other panelists there I don't think he got a good answer for and I'm curious given his stance on this as kind of like the de facto Public Square uh what his answer would be to the question and that's should it be a company or corporation's responsibility to guard Free Speech or to make sure that that their customers or the people that are participating on the site have access uh to information outside of their bubble and what does that even look like uh what do we think gang if you think right that the uh social media has become the Town Square right um do the the people that own the Town Square and operate the Town Square have any responsibility to make sure that people are hurt their only responsibility is going to be to make money and maximize profits insofar as they're going to be concerned about that it will only be to cover their ass when it comes to liability it's not really going to be in the interest of promoting one idea over the other I think I think with respect to look I think the question itself is a bit fraught you're asking if like a private company owns the the space of public discourse and I don't think that's that's really an app comparison for one thing well well yes you you disagree that it's a public town square right um but for those like lactoid or or destiny even who say well I mean they do right well let's let's pretend that it is for a second though right um in that case uh now the responsibility becomes whatever the public determines it to be now we've directly linked the responsibilities of the companies because they are uh presiding over a specifically public service that is being anointed as like a central part of democratic deliberation um if if a if a Democratic Society determines that it should be legally responsible there really is no ethical component to this that is the ethical link it is directly connected to law um here we run into the additional problem though and why characterizing it as a public space is is an issue in the first place um who's public space we have people from Russia we have people from Canada we have people from the United States even in this panel we have multiple nationalities present um it's it's it's it managed according to whose lights right lactoid said this is like a national conversation but really like Twitter is host to International users and it's going to expand like right now our conceptions of like what constitutes free speech is going to be biased in favor like the first amendment and stuff like that but Sunday is a Canadian uh lactoid obviously are an American um the European conception of free speech is going to be incredibly anemic compared to the American but I'm just biased to say that um I don't know that Twitter like adopting any sort of like um all I I that just begs the question like uh moderating this panel are you debating on this panel to answer the question directly yes yeah absolutely companies have like a responsibility to freedom of speech it's always so odd to me that like otherwise very Lefty people every Lefty people will just like for some reason like when you ask them about censorship right this is why I think authoritarianism is actually often like their underlying motive from those things uh when you like when it comes to like uh terms of censorship like they immediately flip into like the most free market like and cap you can possibly imagine well no they just you know they're just there to make profit we can't even criticize them right we shouldn't even be able to like come together and say well no like you uh like you're you were managing freedom of speech in this country and you're basically reducing it and eating away at it and eating away at the Spirit of what it was intended to do um as to how that affects other countries I mean ultimately I wish American free speech uh interpretation was the law in all countries ideally America would be the country but that's a whole different conversation I feel like the other countries thing is kind of a red herring um like who cares how other countries manage it we should probably manage it according to U.S standards right and then you would do whatever compliance you need to exist as a service in those countries but like we obviously we have our uh standards here like if one country said it was okay I have child porn we wouldn't be like oh well we need to make sure that Twitter like works for them in the United States we would moderate in the United States based on whatever we think our U.S values ought to be there but it's function its function as a public space though is not dependent on the place in which its head offices are situated or where it's well it kind of is yeah I would expect like a company that's situated in Britain to operate under British values no I'm not I'm not I'm not disagreeing with that but what I'm saying is that the argument that it fulfills the role of a public square that is satisfied regardless of whether or not the company itself is situated legally in the United States or elsewhere for example it fulfills the same function in Canada as it does in the United States it fulfills the same country uh function in in the UK oh sure it can but I that it's a it's a fundamentally different question for them as Canadians because they're using a us-based company for their Town Square which is kind of weird that would be a weirder question would that be for them to answer I guess or they could pass laws if they feel like they want to see reform or change like from a legal process but well yes but I don't think lactoids argument would change if for example Twitter is located in Canada or the UK lactoid would it change I mean from where we can ask him from like a legal perspective yeah I guess it would change because it would be domiciled in a different country and it would have different rules apply to it but well exactly you're not talking about the legal I'm not talking about that right well I think even from an ethical responsibility even from a moral responsibility would change if Facebook passed a law saying that women needed to cover or Not Alone sorry if Facebook passed a rule saying that in every picture of a female the female needed to wear the hijab right and males needed to accompany them in public in all public pictures obviously I would protest the out of this this is crazy okay but if somebody made like a Muhammad book or something and it was like from Saudi Arabia and it was popular online that was there where I was like okay well I mean that's Saudi Arabians like social media if they if they want to have this rule in their I mean it makes sense it's like I'm not about to tell them you need to go change your platform to comport with my American values that wouldn't make any sense so I think that the company uh the company headquarters and like where the company comes from is is actually kind of important I think so the ethical question of how they work it does I just don't think it touches on the Public Square question I'm not disappeared with anything that you're saying oh I think I think it kind of does too because like if the Public Square if the Public Square owned by a foreign company well it's not a Public Square then it's owned by a company which is well but that's right we're begging a question that's exactly what the point is is owned by a totalitarian countries that really like a public free Spare a Square I don't think so Saudi Arabia maybe but isn't that kind of what we're at right now because Facebook and uh YouTube and all these things are in a way totalitarian they don't answer to constituents the answer to shareholders right well this is part part of the problem well on that let me ask should they should the government protect right uh people's right to if quote unquote right to be on social media and to have a voice on social media such as are you asking if we have a constitutional right to a Twitter account uh I'm asking if they if they have the right to freedom of speech and the government does protect you right to be able to have your right of freedom of speech in a public space right if you're in a public space passing out pamphlets for your stupid ass uh belief system no one can come and stop you from doing that right um not the government not other people Etc uh the government will protect you uh should they not do so in social media as well I think if uh if major politicians like like Joe Biden and Donald Trump are tweeting out a good portion of their messages Maybe um I I I I loathe being on the side of lactoidness but unfortunately if we're in a situation which um like these spaces are monopolizing over a specific type of political discourse that's very effective whether or not I think that's a good thing I think you would need very strong reasons for excluding people from that Trump right like like it is like what do you mean the band Trump are you talking about oh no no I'm saying Jack Dorsey single-handedly thought that he had a compelling reason to ban you know a world leader at the time from his platform and I guess he would defend that on the basis of I have the right to do that it's my private company this is not the Town Square even though it's utilized by public officials but should he be doing that no he should not or like he shouldn't have the ability to as an individual actor decide that he is not going to host a world leader I wouldn't be comfortable object or C Advance Obama you know that case is tricky because at the time Donald Trump uh was fermenting what very well could have been an insurrectionary action right yeah like I think we can agree that even public officials like if if you know Biden gets on and just starts spamming the n-word it's probably okay for him to get banned from Twitter right for blatant TOS violation but if we're trying to say that Twitter is supposed to function as like the Town Square then why would a why would a sovereign or president ever be subject to that I don't think I should be actually well I think in this particular case though um Trump was engaging in something that I think would not even be acceptable in the context of of normal politics anyways um he was he was calling into question an election trying to overrun the will of the people as I've been determined legally um like I I don't know well let me ask you directly Sunday do you think that um election denial or an election uh questions about uh the free and fair election in a country good uh be censored by a toss company not whether they can or can't I'm not asking legally whether they can or can't but I'm asking should should a company should a corporation censor people questioning the legitimacy of an election well that's uh that's that's an impossible question to answer um once again like where and and at who's behest these are private companies um the questioning the legitimacy of an election that's tantamount to like a a Prelude to a declaration of Civil War you're saying that the the Constitution has been overrun and the people have been betrayed by its leadership um there's only if if you actually accept that thesis there's only two possible outcomes you concede to what you believe is tyrannical rule or you fight against it so the question is whether or not the the people in the position of decision-making Authority have what I would deem to be just reason to think that these claims are spurious at the end of the day there's going to be a human being making these decisions so we're saying on the grounds of like the undermining of the election could potentially lead to violence and that's why it needs to it there's a case for it to be de-platformed even though it's coming from a public official because if we're worried about like violence right significantly more Americans um will have died from covid-19 vaccine disinfo right then we'll you know from the Insurrection or something like that as far as I know um like less than three people died at the inspection or something like that um you know if it were a murderer or something like that this would be cut and dry but if I'm like a Weinstein brother disseminating nothing but vaccine misinfo and I'm responsible for the deaths potentially of a thousand misleading thousands of people you know he's not going to be in a jail so he's going to be in a mansion by the end of the night I think that there's uh I think there's a difference I think some deaths were willing to accept we should be willing to accept a democracy other deaths were not willing to accept if as part of our engagement of freedom of speech some people end up spreading information that causes harm to other people like we can call it stochastic to everything we want that's a form of freedom of speech that's that's a negative repercussion of freedom of speech that we accept as part of having the right to freedom of speech so the coveted misinformation or anything else we accept that that's a that's a cost of freedom of speech however a direct call to violence we don't consider that freedom of speech that's not a cost we're willing to bear for somebody's saying we should go out and kill all black people like any debts associated with that are too much because that type of speech has no value we don't value that whatsoever but we do value the ability to speak freely about things that other people might consider harmful even if those things at the end of the day do manifest in some real harm it's a directive speech not like an informative or inquisitive speech right that's the difference well no not just directive to be clear because somebody could direct you not to get vaccinated right technically or it can also direct you not to get vaccinated using implicature not a not a direct statement that somebody can clearly point to and say hey this unequivocally means this sentence in all cases like it's always going to be subject to interpretation or in many cases will be subject to interpretation I think potentially that's different I think if you tell like somebody on the internet you should not get vaccinated or you should get vaccinated like I think that speeches much more on the table to get regulated than like talking about what you think the efficacy of facts covered vaccines are right one is like a direct call to something you're not like having a discussion about the merits of it or like the underlying truth value which is like ultimately the point of this um the first part though is like the discussion of truth and the other thing you should be able to like tell somebody like hey I think you should get vaccinated or hey I don't think you should get vaccinated I I don't I don't think that obviously some calls to action like aren't bad enough to where like like imminent violence under different pests that I would consider them to be like those specific phrases to be banned but I think that like the only like category of speech that I'm like willing to go after is going to be like uh not like true seeking kind of like inquisitive speech but more like go do this or let's all get together and do this right one is directly I think one's completely different than the other what are some very what are some very money and well organized uh actors um flood the online space with misleadingly phrased questions that tend towards a specific interpretation like Purdue asking questions about um like the efficacy of vaccines has this actually been adequately researched and the direct implication the read that most reasonable people who are otherwise uninformed will take from this is I should probably hold off a little bit and now you actually have a real public danger that's not just confined to one nationality now you have a real public danger where a bunch of people are suddenly holding off on the vaccine the disease meanwhile is spreading and like like you see how immediately bring this up to climate change as well same deal you end up with an interminable kind of arrest of of action and address of of serious issues with a very short time scale um like like that that's a problem yeah the lactose is the threshold for you is that it has to be explicit and that anything short of that could not reasonably be interpreted as a true call to action I yeah so I my opinion this like follows essentially like what the Supreme Court said in Brandenburg right the idea is it's got to be like imminent like an imminent a call to like imminent violence that has to be somewhat credible right there needs to be something behind it and it needs to be like imminent let's go do this like directive action because this like implication of well we can draw a line from something like the true seeking question that you're asking today to them like it's implied or like a reasonable person could Intuit that this actually has like a directive kind of statement hidden within or someone could come to a direct statement like before you know it all speeches on the table right but who judges now now we can censor uh people trying to call out Purdue Pharma you know the people who are like hey this shit's actually addicting well hold on are you telling if you point out that's addicting then some people might not get it and so you're basically telling people not buy Oxycontin and so like they're dying or they're in tremendous amounts of pain we're gonna censor you now like you can basically do anything but who judges what is imminent how is that judge that is going to be a person drawing a line at some at some level analysis that is an inevitable factor in every single censorship decision yeah and I think this is like on the responsibility of companies to have like a much more transparent and clear TOS not like we're just going to ban hateful conduct it's like we are going to like in in this kind of situation like example a b or c or you know if there's something that like according to I don't know U.S Supreme Court uh precedent or whatever about what is the definition of imminent uh violent action or a call to you know credible threat of violence things like this that makes sense to me do we think uh there's been a lot of talk on on this uh topic of uh toss right um and moderation Decisions by tech companies uh there's been a lot of talk that tech companies um I've been putting their thumb on the scales to promote certain ideologies and to demote or Shadow ban or get rid of other ideologies one do we think this is happening and to what degree and what's the solution to this if you do think this is happening or if it's not happening what is happening instead what are you thinking I mean I think it's pretty obvious that the there's a lot of stuff that's related to the conservative agenda that's not very popular on social media platforms like most people that are gonna be asking questions about like climate change or vaccines are probably going to be right leaning and if that type of stuff is being heavily moderated then conservatives are probably going to feel like they're getting moderated out more than anything else and the students reflect that right so like I think uh it was of all people banned on Twitter um with like four or five times uh more conservative leaning people get banned than left-leaning people that may be true but I think it's I think it's well let's assume that it's true it's also been determined nonetheless that conservative coded tweets are massively more Amplified than left-wing coated ones so it may be the case that conservatives just on average or conservative coded because of how we determine these things based on superficial characteristics conservative coded uh uh actors are just breaking TOS more often maybe they just have less self-control when it comes to using slurs right it obfuscates the point to just say that conservatives are being disproportionately targeted or or banned as a result of these toss and enforcements because uh like when you actually look into it sometimes it's just flagrant and ability to follow even just the most um basic anti-harassment policies and stuff like that it's and there's a difference between being banned because you're a conservative or were you banned and you also happen to be a conservative you know sure I didn't go through every single band I just know that like four to five times more conservatives are banned um I look at like Shadow Banning right which Twitter said it wasn't doing it turns out it was um which I think is fraud but um Shadow Banning I mean at least my perception is this happens more often to conservatives I don't know like what are you talking about when you say conservative voices are like Amplified more on social media you think that's true well what are you talking about when you say conservatives are banned more I have a study okay uh-huh well I think to be clear I think we have to be careful when we say conservative and more like let's say somebody calls somebody the n-word on Twitter that's probably a bannable offense if we think that that happens who's who's more likely to be doing that it's probably going to be a conservative account right so well are they are they talking to Candace Owens or are they talking to normal yeah so I think that's because the slurs against us aren't banned yet it's unfair um sure but that's not true wasn't Hassan removed off of twitch for saying I can't even say it can I we're on YouTube we can say cracker all we want over here yeah but is WIC on Twitch oh you're not on Twitter no I'm definitely on Twitch right now on the twitch Ward oh that's a good question Sunday do you think that uh they should lift uh Destiny's twitch band what was the band 4 initially it was it was uh you were saying something the effect of rednecks need to mow down BLM rioters or something like that uh no I don't know what my band was for but it definitely wasn't that because it was a long time ago okay well if it wasn't it was a truth statement and it got banned for it this is the evidence of the problem well what was the truth that American hero uh Kyle written hero no hold on that wasn't even what I got banned for will you guys get this idea from because essentially no that happened like a year that was like two years ago when I was the first one that was the first I got unpartnered for that I didn't get banned for that well so do you have any idea what you got banned for because now I thought I knew but if my my guess is that uh I think when I was fighting with people I called somebody some human and apparently they decided that that was bandwidthy now I think that's what I've heard from twitch but I don't have an official reason I don't know officially okay the redneck Moon people dancing if he was banned for that arguably the other thing no that's that's dumb okay fair enough um what about uh or strike that reversity yeah sure if it was lack of transparency right that's the problem here so you banned you don't even know why that's crazy well that's a that's a twitch specific issue right that's the I mean like that that sucks I don't I don't like that they're they're TOS is impenetrable they don't give adequate explanations for why they ban people that's annoying and that sews distrust towards them that doesn't really well that doesn't really bear on the line with well that doesn't really bear on their uh their responsibilities the platform unless we're already construing them as a Town Square now we've already identified two different companies I think another I'm selling like the Town Square thing like another reason why that falls flat is that I don't think Twitter as far as I know is in the end like interested in litigating um slander libel so and like a Town Square that would be actionable like I wouldn't be able to just go up and start talking about um how Stephen sexually abused me allegedly um without there being repercussions to that as opposed to well I think well no you you can yeah you just you you detect the speaker in that case the because of section 230 the social medias do actually function kind of like a downscore like somebody go on Twitter and say some like that and um Twitter doesn't get banned for that it's the person that would like suffer criminal charges or I'm sorry civil charges um anybody the same in a town square if somebody goes into fan spinning into town square that then you're not going to sue the street you would see the person making the speech yeah but there's recourse there like I don't see like like what's the difference for a recourse what do you mean by that because in a town square if you do it you can take them to civil potentially Criminal Court um as opposed to if you try to her like report another user on Twitter they said this thing about me can't they just always back up and say this is a matter of opinion even if there are slanderous reliable statements within what they're saying yeah they could say it's a matter of opinion but it's going to be the exact same whether it's on Twitter in a town square where the defamation happens doesn't make a difference or or they could deny it was them and say they were hacked or something I don't know if that defense has worked for anybody yet and I imagine in Discovery you could probably fight that yeah I'm not I'm not sure the specifics of how a legal case would go about uh in the differences between a legal case uh brought online versus brought uh in in person I'd imagine they'd still have the same standards of uh evidence needed to convict and defamation is uh at least in America historically pretty high right like the standards you need to meet are actually very hard to meet um and well not it becomes that's not necessarily true especially for public figures yeah for public figures the standards are very high uh but for our private citizen not necessarily that I don't think what's the threshold for being a public versus a private citizen though yeah I'm not sure the the difference here something you fight about in front of a jury or you'd have to convince the judge probably I guess yeah the lines he's researched this one the lines here are not definitive but even even among like non-public figures defamation cases are comparably difficult to win compared to other forms of injury because it's like like one of the civil cases that you have to produce you kind of like Mal intent well that's only for public figures that's what makes it hard for public figures I don't believe you have to prove male intent for just a normal citizen I think you could prove some level of Valentine because of the person's like under a reasonable expectation that this is the truth about this other person and like and they say it but it turns out that they're wrong and they're like oh sorry I guess I was wrong like I had reasonable belief to believe it though I mean if that's the standard for confirmation yeah but I think the difference is because for a reasonable like why are you making these claims publicly about a person if they're not like a public figure and if it's not like a newsworthy thing so here's something interesting it comes about as a direct result of this flattening of social media that we were talking about earlier um if someone like Donald Trump highlights a small account Slanders them and by so doing increases their profile by orders of magnitude and then somebody else piles in on that person is that person therefore being criticized as a public figure I think that'd be a really hard sell the difficult part is yeah like when it comes to a lot of this is case law a lot of this is jurisdiction dependent and a lot of this is going to be defining the exact lines is just it's just going to be there's no real clear answer here as to like what's a public figure uh Who's acting in the course of a public figure um like what level of like Mal intent you have to show I think as far as the log is concerned isn't just you know malice is not going to have anything to do with like disliking somebody real well I think it's the only two things you have to demonstrate is that the person knew that it was false or they were acting with like a reckless disregard um for whether or not the same I was even true I'm a civil litigation attorney I've been practicing but like oh okay well then you'll know anything more than me okay um my understanding was what you're talking about from Mal intent I thought that that was um it falls under the actual malice standard set by the New York Times B Sullivan case but that only applies to public figures so like publishing incorrect information about a private citizen I thought that that could get you in trouble for defamation you'll have to prove that they were acting with malice if it's not a public first person because for private citizens um the standards for defamation are way way way lower that was my understanding to avoid the chilling effect of publishing wrong information about like public figures essentially well let me ask you this so so I guess I mean I probably misspoke so let me explain a little bit so when I'm talking about Mal intent are you guys familiar with that like concept of like negligence this idea of like you have this obligation to somebody and like you you violate that that application yeah and so like you have an obligation to somebody to like uh you know you if you say something about somebody that is like wrong that you know is wrong and that is like going to cause damages and you do so negligently right um I mean technically that's going to be the standard for a private citizen now this is again more of like a just experience thing of it just seems like in order to win those like you have to show some kind of well like they there's some kind of like hidden agenda right there was some kind of mountain um because otherwise otherwise how do you show negligence right how do you show that they were acting because if they were given information that doesn't sound right wait for negligence you would just have to demonstrate that the person was not when they were publishing or making the statement um and I think it's it's like it's that standard is way lower than like actual malice right yeah like if I negligently publish something about you lactoid like somebody's like oh lactoid's a rapist and I was like oh I'm gonna publish that right you might be able to sue me for defamation because I'm being kind of negligent but if somebody gives me that information about a public figure right we'll say Wick massively popular panel host and I publish it that you I have to actually meet a higher standard there to be suited for defamation YouTube show not only did you know it was wrong you were like grossly negligent or malicious in your publishing information yeah like did that person do everything that would be reasonably necessary to attempt to determine whether or not the statements that they were making were true um when and like they could provide evidence that they were by showing research editing fact checking their work um uh trustworthiness of sources stuff like that right that's right you're right exactly like you have to show like some level of um you know hey like I wasn't at machine because of XYZ reason even if the evidence is false out of curiosity just for my own uh edification um do streamers count as public figures so for example if um if they could okay so does there have to be a threshold like for example do you have to be Destiny sized or I'm pretty sure all of that none of this is gonna be hard I think this is all gonna be argued in front of a judge you've got to try to convince someone like this person for these purposes ought to be considered a public figure essentially it seems like it would always be a relative too so like someone like Destiny versus someone like I don't know like asthma and gold for example I don't know off the top of my head the relative sizes are but I think it's roughly 50 larger um like would Destiny be considered a public figure in the light of of a suit against that what I'm asking specifically is if someone were to read like the destiny report that Mr girl released or see some of lav's accusations and then spread that believing what they read believing what they heard right and saying oh wow Destiny did this and started talking and just spreading it to all Corners uh would they uh be liable uh under uh the law uh to be considered defaming or because Destiny's kind of a public figure they wouldn't really be able to be targeted that way I'm just I'm just curious my guess would be because that report deals with me utilizing a large platform in that case I would almost de facto be like a public figure because it's writing report around a public person using a platform that like reaches a lot of people that we might guess that'd be pretty easy to argue uh should right uh social media companies be enforcing standards to definition so if someone is engaged in what could reasonably be assumed to be defamation good uh corporate media companies uh build that into their toss should honesty be built into toss so if someone is purposely spreading misinformation should toss put a stop to that or should it be allowed what are we thinking well I don't think lacto can answer that question because fundamentally once again this is up to human interpretation someone's going to be making an inference that this claim is untrue or that this claim is defamatory this claim is being made in in a misleading fashion so even like the asking of certain kinds of questions for example can imply like a certain statement and that can have like serious social effects individually or broadly and so it's going to be up to some persons hopefully some person's judgment whether or not that that passes muster I think in the case where it's been determined by law I think it's trivial at that point like obviously they shouldn't allow that kind of thing to be spread if it's been determined legally to be defamation but otherwise you ask the question one more time Wick sure um should honesty be built into TOS should you should if you were found to be lying about someone or something be subject to moderation by a social media company if you're found to be like willingly lying for example right uh you knew it was false but you said that lactoid is stinky yes super stinky feet and you just continually uh told that lie to one and all right uh should uh corporate media a social media company say we're gonna we're gonna pull your account we're gonna stop you we're gonna block you um if you can demonstrate that this person was like new that they were lying then you have text uh texts shown yeah yeah I'm way I'm way more sympathetic I'm way more sympathetic to like that uh to like regulation of bad stuff and remove all that stuff that I am about somebody genuinely believing that this is the like a truth truth statement and then making that statement and the powers that be don't agree that it's actually the true state wait I don't think social media company should have anything to do with defamatory claims that's not if you want to settle defamatory stuff then you go because otherwise like what is the burden of of research put on social media companies to figure out like if a statement is true or false like hey John said that like I shut myself in school like I want to ban him because I think that statement is like uh do we really want social media companies in the business of trying to determine the how true people gossiping about each other is yeah that's that's fair I don't know how much like I don't think I would put a lot of like I guess 102 seconds 230 I wouldn't put like a ton of like wait like responsibility on social media companies to like affirmatively do this but like I can imagine a scenario of which like oh hey it was determined by a court this was false or hey like like even though we didn't do like we did like a minor investigation and we found out like it was a lie like this person how about this how about this here's a good one I guess I'd be okay with it here's a good question what if an account in Pakistan accuses somebody of urinating on the Quran see that that can that can uh culminate in an actual uh an actual immediate violence against that person if they're identifiable right I just don't think social it's just not something I would care for that'd be like saying like do we think should should social media companies ban you if you've got like three felonies like I don't know I don't think like if you murder someone should you get banned from Facebook no sure but like in the event that defamation or or something sort of in the broad category of defamation results in immediate extra legal harm to an individual or can be predicted to resolve the immediate extra legal harm to an individual this can go from like the example I just gave to like accusations of somebody engaging in child grooming for instance um would there is there not an argument then um for a social media platform that becomes aware of this as a pattern like again we can set like a certain threshold of awareness here where they're aware this is a pattern they're aware that this can have like serious consequences um however of course given who they are and how they're operating and where they're situated they don't have a way to actually determine the truthfulness of the statement or in the case of the person who pissed on the Quran if whether or not the statement is true um arguably like like it seems to me that it's it's fairly trivial like the the value of of curtailing that is is greater than so to be clear you would be okay with with Banning uh false accusations like that right I think it's a gray area where I would allow some level of flexibility what if I did what if I did this in the Grand and this is like the one guy that saw it and then he accuses me and I just deny it well what I'm getting at with this is that it really depends on on where you're situated so you where you are that will result in nothing happening to you maybe a couple of Muslims will get mad at you online if you're for example a woman in Pakistan who is accused of this that might result in your death so it's different Stakes again though should the social media company right be responsible for moderating that and I don't know if they should right well it's like there's a different question of responsibility versus do they retain the right to do so hmm fair right like but we're I rather than asking can they uh I'm asking should they well I only asked the question of can they because I think it's only going to cut it's going to come down to a matter of size like like truth social right isn't this like a much smaller like kind of rip-off of Twitter or am I wrong I think truth social is this but like it looks very close right it's a much smaller version of that so if the Creator and CEO of troop social comes out and they say I don't want as far as I can reasonably no I don't want to assess or like I don't want to host uh like convicted felons on my platform or um you know liberals or people who I identify to be part of like XYZ faction and stuff like that um I don't think people would really care people would be like well you know truth social is their platform they can't be compelled by the state or really even socially encouraged to host just anybody they have freedom of Association too um and people wouldn't care but if it came to Twitter you know and suddenly the CEO like the boardroom of Twitter is starting to say that we don't want convicted felons on our platform or we don't want conservatives just now it's just a matter of like practicality and size where previously people would be defending like well as an owner of you know and CEO of a social media company you don't have to host anybody who you don't want to but when it comes to Twitter people are much more like no Twitter should basically be compelled to like host these people or not de-platform them so frivolously we're taking 230 protection so it makes sense some extent right okay do a pragmatic question moral I don't know why 230 I mean you can't ban whatever uses you want to ban well no I'm saying like you no not right now I'm saying you could wrap it up in the obligation right so once you become like a social media company in which hey you're like distancing yourself from the statements that people make from like a liability perspective as opposed to smaller organization um I think you could all you know work from that into section 230 where we're giving you that liability shield in exchange you know you're also the Public Square now you've got to be pretty transparent about your TOs and you can't just like act arbitrarily and remove people without explaining to them what they did I don't understand I've never understood the 230 arguments it just seems insane to me if I host a forum and I want to host a forum for like people that love cats and people step in and start posting dog pictures am I not allowed to ban them now because because I'm gonna lose my section 230.
protection I've never I think the section 230 arguments I've never heard a good one in favor of that what that lady shoe to be descriptive these or you're like all of a sudden not allowed to moderate your platform like I think section 230 very explicitly applies to Publishers I don't think moderating your platform all of a sudden makes you a publisher that seems weird to me non-publishers right because if you're a publisher or non-publishers I mean yeah right so I don't know Kobe one I'll be one second if you're a publisher you don't get the 230 protections I I don't know the the like the off topic example I think there's an interesting one where like hey this is a cat form please keep it to cats um you know perhaps that's something where uh there needs to be maybe some other form of like uh uh section involved I don't know maybe exactly what kind of scheme they'll look like I do know that when you have something like Twitter which is a public forum of politics where certain political views are repressed and certain other ones aren't and we also existed uh not a couple not just a couple years ago we existed at a time in which uh off like a bunch of public places that a lot of these people would normally congregate was shut down by the government right where are you going to go if like if your was shut down by the government and you don't let's say you're uneducated with tech you don't have a lot of uh you don't know of much many Alternatives you just know about Facebook so I'm going to create my own little Facebook thing I mean the government technically is pushing you into a private space at that point that benefits from 230 protections I don't know I don't think it's that unreasonable to expect Facebook to like accommodate that and to not just like ban the Boomers because they you know put the color on the you know so I'm not allowed then I can't host a social media site that says like Progressive Circle or I can't host a social media that says like you know Mega for Trump you're essentially saying you're not allowed to do that anymore you ban all of that so anything any standard that I'd apply to Twitter I would also play like true social yeah but I'm saying that that I wouldn't be a lot I couldn't host like a conservative Message Board you'd ban that effectively in your world because that's what section 230 protects you should have the right to moderate your platform however you want I don't yeah I I don't know maybe maybe this would be a compromise here like you can do that but like I think there's a there's a from like a fraud perspective I guess there's a difference here when you are saying okay this is a conservative space we are going to censor left-wing opinions just flat up we're gonna Shadow ban you we're going to actually ban you we're not lying to you okay as opposed to Twitter we're not Shadow Banning you we're unbiased we're this we're this platform where everyone can express themselves well and then because Twitter present themselves as unbiased I feel like a TOs and everything is like pretty I think any reading I would say yeah because servers I'm probably gonna get banned by this more like they're misinformation balls they tell you don't like tell you like what kinds of misinformation they've got like Community notes and everything I haven't read the full Twitter TOS let me uh that's a good question do uh or should social media companies right and corporations have to open source their algorithm like should should people and consumers have the right to know on the social media side that they're on what's going to get promoted and what's going to get demoted in the algorithm hey should that be a thing that that is required say that again Sunday I'm sorry I didn't hear you I I didn't I didn't or or what about shut up and Lockwood I said or if they're gonna Shadow band that should probably like be transparent right before people spend a lot of time on a platform well I think I think Twitter is is Hinkle flat outline I've never got it offered to debate Hinkle in Vegas I don't know what the he's talking about I think a long time ago I said that I wouldn't debate Hinkle anymore so maybe maybe he asked to debate me and somebody was like oh Destiny says he doesn't want to debate you and now he's going to say I'm running is he gonna say I'm running every single time in the future if somebody says like oh Destiny said he's not going to be I don't know I haven't been offered to debate in Vegas I don't even know what event he's talking about I have no idea who's talking about on Twitter right now what do you think Sunday should should uh companies be required social media companies specifically be required to um open source their algorithm or at least well I think I think what you what you asked initially was do people have a right to to know what their algorithms are yes and it seems like there's there's like the question itself is a little bit circular you're asking if people have a right to know what they have a right to or if they if they don't have a right to it should they divulge that information anyway so that doesn't seem to follow to me what I'm asking is do people right do individuals right who go on to these social media companies in order to promote sometimes their businesses sometimes they're political beliefs sometimes their ideas whatever they want to say do they have a right or should they have a right right to know what sort of information is going to be promoted and what is going to be emoted I mean I would say that I would like to have the ability to see that but I don't think businesses are going to be likely to turn over algorithms even under like I guess duress technically by the state because they're not going to want to disclose like business Secrets now well the reason why I'm happy it is then users could just game it to their advantage then you've just given somebody the framework like if you're a propagandist here's the exact algorithm that you need to manipulate in order to actually effectively promote your message that's really well put out here that's my initial worry but then the other one is if you're asking like should they um it depends on how serious they want to take your question by reference to what like by reference to what's best for the consumer what's best for their user or by reference to some like higher normal or or legal but like I just I just don't know I mean like objectively not there's no judge that's going to say that they have to as of right now okay uh fair enough I I don't know if I agree personally I think that yeah the algorithm now so when you buy a product right when you buy a car and something right uh you have a right to know about or you should right uh do a thorough check to make sure that the the person who is selling you that car isn't lying to you right so if you go on a social media something believing that your information your business is going to be promoted and you will you will uh have your voice um as long as you don't break the the moderation or whatever um and then because you haven't broken moderation but you've done such things that the algorithm demotes you right like isn't that the same as buying a car where someone's been tampering with the odometer the mirror of that though is that the algorithm promotes other people and it's always going to be at the unpromoted person's expense does that count as demotion well the the question I'm asking is should you know like should everyone be given the rules right everyone be giving a clear rule so whether you you take the time to look through the algorithm and to monopolize or to um we're also just very quickly to interject that we're also presuming that the effects of the algorithms are even known specifically to the people who are employing it right like they don't know they didn't know specifically or they at least had no answer as to why um conservative viewpoints are being magnified over over left-wing ones um this was this was treated as like a surprise so right that's the other thing is that like unless you can intimate from the algorithms that are made public unless there's going to be some way to determine like explicit coding directions that'll that are like that have bigotry built into them you could have this transparency but that doesn't mean you're gonna have people who could tell you whether or not the algorithm is is fair right I mean if I may just just very quickly sorry I just want to jump this before I forget it um the very fact that we're even talking about any kind of algorithm affecting the outcomes of discussions or or of magnifying or demagnifying certain voices directly contradicts the very idea that something like Twitter can even function as a Town Square because at this point it's not even just people who are now having to say it's automated processes that are whose activities may be beyond the understanding of even the people who made them beyond the understanding of the people who made them okay I want to reset a little bit I don't think anyone's biting on this question um does deplatforming and censorship even work yes also what do you mean by that well if you're playing a specifically media game and you're trying to Garner sympathy and followers over a vast expanse of space and your sole medium for doing so is via your social media account removing the social media account neuters your reach that's that seems well pretty intuitive studies what do you mean by work by work because in terms of like whether or not it's like effective obviously it is but whether or not you should be doing it or like whether or not it's moral would be a different question altogether uh I think both right uh so for example um they have the platformed many people on the Mana sphere many conservative voices have been de-platformed four times the rate right but these ideas haven't gone away if anything they have been gotten stronger right it's fed into this kind of a a presser narrative that they have right well it seems what it seems a situation you're dealing with there is not that deep platforming hasn't worked it's that deep platforming hasn't actually taken place someone has been removed or limited on some platform and as a meanwhile held an extreme amount of influence on another platform and so they've been able to rhetorically deploy the Deep platforming here over here is as a propaganda tool so what you're you actually can't tell if the d-platform worked at all because it never actually took place they were removed from one medium but they weren't actually depersoned in the way we typically tend to think of when we talk about like total de-platforming so the issue here is is of like once again because there is no Public Square these are different mediums controlled by different people whose motives we do not fully understand um because of that uh nobody is actually getting fully de-platformed at all so there's actually no commitment to a policy of de-platforming any one party across the board and this speaks again to the international state of things because even if somebody is totally de-platformed and this is where for example like this actually becomes a positive if someone is deep platformed unjustly by the state they can nonetheless have an international voice from somewhere else so I don't know I want to agree with state right straight away with the idea of like what do you mean by work does it are you silencing a whole bunch of people yeah right are you preventing people from hearing they want to hearing whatever they want to hear yes you are but I think there's like a smaller subset of people who you know maybe they're a little bit more engaged they take a little bit more time to research they take a little bit more time to like be skeptical and they find out that like yeah you've banned this and that makes them more skeptical right because when somebody's hiding the ball at least for me right when I'm when I'm reading an article and I notice that like paragraph your paragraph they're not saying something right that's like the natural like the natural implication of what I'm looking for um they're just not saying it and then I get to the end and it wasn't set at all wow um my intuition is that's true my intuition is that's true because they're not saying it and they don't want to say that because they that that truth is counter to the actual uh intention of the article and so um yeah so so I think for like a smaller group of people it might radicalize them even further right so I mean there there are like there are examples of topics where I am incredibly skeptical uh primarily because there was so much censorship uh regarding uh certain things surrounding certain events that I don't even but the censorship is known to you though the censorship is is like a fact in your world so they clearly haven't been totally censored because you're aware of the party that has been censored you're aware of what they have been saying that they are not allowed to say somehow because of their inefficiency because of their inefficiency right like oh like I see somebody like posting some and then all of a sudden tomorrow exactly but but what I'm saying though is that the social consequences of that when it's radicalizing people a little bit further that's directly the consequence of deep platforming not having been carried out well no I think we don't have to have an absolutist point of de-platforming like if somebody's been banned from Facebook but they haven't been banned from like Twitter or YouTube they've been de-platform but not completely right well sure but I mean the question of deep platforming working sort of assumes that it's not being undermined by some other equal platform lifting them up if you want to actually judge whether or not the platform Community platform could work um you know like it's it's function which is to remove the platform from the person it has to be fulfilled to some extent and I don't I don't see much of a strong distinction between someone's been banned off twitch but not off YouTube well I mean in that case you have audiences into each other yeah but our definition of deep platform that basically has to be like is somebody getting killed or not right because unless you're actually murdering somebody you're not going to completely remove them like everybody's gonna be able to make some kind of account on gab well how about how much the fun how about Stefan mullinger so he's been removed from like a wide variety of things simultaneously and his his influence is dead yeah but he could probably still make an account of Rumble I don't think he's been there right you have a rumbled is a recent thing right that's so once again like once again right I'm saying that like so he's not really so in your definition he's not truly a d platform because he could make an account elsewhere he just hasn't right but the issue is like with these manosphere types that have been de-platformed they there's always obfuscation so like Stephen Crowder for example so he went around saying calling Carlos Mazza like uh Elizabeth queer and maybe even like the essler um but he would make it sound like oh I was de-platformed or whatever because of like dangerous ideas or something like that and it was like no I mean you were deep platform because you were harassing somebody on the basis of their uh sexual orientation or like sneako for example I think the thing that got him on YouTube was not because he was talking about pickup Artistry or like red pill ideas wasn't it because he made a rape joke basically like it's another like female content creator like regardless I think for it was a covered misinformation that eventually got him or or election denialism or something is one of those things left right-like studies so early a few months ago we actually did a bit of a research dive into a bunch of studies that were looking at the effects of de-platforming on radicalization and uh so here's the thing one of the side consequences of de-platforming in this otherwise neuter sense where they're off one platform like a general a general culture of if you say X Y and Z in this particular manner you will be demagnified or you will be removed that kind of thing one of the consequences of that is that uh people who have ideas or who have arguments that would otherwise want to follow the sensors now are forced to pad them out so they either have to couch them in in more acceptable terms they have to limit the extent of their claims and they have to like remove language uh like slurs for example which would have the efficient effect of depersoning like certain groups or of helping people sort of Target their anger on specific okay let me be more more specific because I think we're all missing it um I understand that you can hurt someone individually you can no no there was I was I was getting I was getting to a point with this though so what they actually found with the studies is that as a consequence of this um the actual growth of uh monitored extremist spaces online was stunted entirely they became more extremist because less dilute because fewer moderates were finding them but as a consequence of them having to sanitize their rhetoric in order to stay on these mainstream platforms their efficacy and and bringing together a bunch of people and of radicalizing them in Mass was sharply diminished even though they have like the talking point now of like they're coming for us because that's all I see for like from the people pretty much anywhere who have been like the platform right you have like tape just ranting about like how the Matrix is coming to get them and I mean Crowder talked about it too oh that's been around forever right but like there must be some I don't know there must be some kind of uh yep good reason for pointing that out they don't like I mean I feel like again I'm more principled that like just because they personally don't follow the spirit of it themselves I don't think that they should be frivolously de-platformed but fresh and fit was going around I'm pretty sure just spamming copyright claims to all of these channels that they didn't want to engage with the criticism of I've been preach was one of them they hit them they attempted to hit them with like 20 frivolous copyright claims in an attempt to like quell criticism but then they turn around say like oh people are trying to cancel us or whatever so it's not even like they have some principled opposition to like cancellation or whatever they just as soon do it themselves if if they could you know that I think that's a separate uh issue right like I don't think anyone I don't believe almost anyone is is actually for uh free speech I think they're for their free speech and their enemies need to be silenced um that's not completely true um so there was recently a poll that just came out and now we're controlling for students right so let's I understand it's like a different demographic but at least in my state among my public university system um the disparities between uh political beliefs and like which political demographics were okay with people of the opposite political demographics uh speaking their mind and talking about what they believed and uh whether or not their ideas were dangerous and whether or not those ideas shouldn't even be allowed in the first place or whether or not administrators should step in if they say things that push forward this particular agenda um the the differences were Stark right like generally speaking it appears at least in my state but I think I would be confident enough to save us across from All America that like the right tends to be a little bit more tolerant here when it comes to like accepting other people saying their as long as they get to say their own as well because absolutely not true um I think that the right is just as if not worse than the left when it comes to censoring speech the only problem is right now they're losing so of course on the far right or like just normal stock conservatives so just to add to that very quickly let's assume that you're right okay is there a commence is there an equivalent study that also shows like how many of those people also actively advocate for the marginalizing of entire groups of people well even ignoring that I mean just real quick on the on the freedom of fish thing conservatives when they have the ability to censor like it's funny because we can say like well here's a poll conservatives right now are actually more tolerant of other points of view than um that then than progressors are I think it's just because conservatives on the losing side of if you look at where they do have power like what are they trying to do throughout States ban medical treatment for adults related to trans stuff ban books from different schools um Matt Walsh and I think Ben Shapiro was retweeting that somebody lizzo should be arrested for having performers on stage fully clothed in drag right that's like more authoritarian than most left-leaning stuff I've heard recently so I think when conservatives do have the power they will Flex it in highly um and highly censorship prone ways they just right now they don't so I think I think you've made a lot of context behind some of the things that were just said we're talking about like the Banning uh books in where kids are like Elementary School libraries I think that's completely different like controlling why what's the difference well because the difference is when we mandate that children go to education or are educated right you can force that as a law um like it is a public school education it would make sense that the public gets to have a little bit of a say as to what the kids are being educated on yeah that's fine this is this is not like a freedom of expression like issue when we're like dictating what books get to go like in an elementary school library necessarily compared to what a college campus system which is supposed to be the like where ideas are challenged where you have the vast majority of left-wing people who think that writing right-wing people should not be able to say their ideas or if they do kicked off campus right okay totally different uh magnitudes what I was going to say actually uh thank you Destiny for that that dovetails very nicely with the point I was trying to make um it may be the case that they appear on paper to be more accepting of other people espousing their ideas but because they're presuming the depersoning of most of the people they actually care about in the first place so once again they're as Stephen adequately put like immediately once in power their immediate go-to is Ban the books ban discussion of X Y and Z terminate these University departments and so on and so forth they say they say like Hey we're for the the equalizing of the University we want more diversity of thought but in practice that's just because they only view diversity of thought as being between a few liberal professors on campus and Tucker Carlson no and conservatives conservatives totally dug their own grave with this one because if you are championing like deregulation right the thing that would actually keep more conservatives on social media would be more regulation would be more of an incentive or compulsion for these private media groups to host them so you know you can't have that one both ways and then didn't Trump by executive action attempt to revoke 230 right I know it wasn't enforced he was he was threatening and he was threatening it unless like the social media companies didn't um like didn't what he believed to be like be fair right start being yeah but like wait he doesn't even they couldn't even enforce it because they didn't know how to go about Trump also said he wanted to open up libel laws to sue mainstream media he also tweeted that you wanted to put people in jail for or revoke their citizenship for um burning a flag so I don't know I don't know I I don't just like a trump but I would consider him to be like a little bit further right um I'm just going off of like you're one of the middle conservatives compared to like your run-of-the-mill uh liberals or left-wingers I don't know um for some reason lefties don't like to be called liberals because of the classic publication um but you I I think what I see is that yes there seems to be like a pretty like milk toast conservative onus on controlling what ideas children get especially outside of the family unit um I think that's just when we're talking about children like with most things that's just fundamentally different when we're talking about expression of one's body or expression in one's mind or expression of any ideas that you want to share with somebody else and a college campus like a system um is just I think different again than like an elementary school classroom or like a drag show where children are you know in the audience which that seems to be like those are the rallying points in which conservatives are like getting pissed off so you think the flag thing the flag thing by the way that seems to be like I I don't disagree with you that that's a weird like despite believing the first amendment I think more strongly and being better in free speech generally for some reason that issue the conservatives are not as good as well so the better on just real quick I I don't I just don't believe it I don't buy it because it feels like conservatives will start with these things but they use it as a pretext to always go a little bit further so for instance you say it's just about kids okay fine well then why are states trying to ban hormone treatments for adults right or people say it's just about kids being exposed to drag okay fine well then why are some states like Texas trying to get the entire state to ban all drag performances like even without children in the audience like it feels like it's always a pretext to go further and it feels like oh you actually don't care about fruit of fish or even kids this is just the pretext you're using to start to like insert your anti-free speech ideas Sunday you'll get your turn I promise you you talk no I won't this is a far circuit so so that so what was just said is news to me I quick Google every single link is saying uh restricting sexual conduct and drag in front of minors like very consistently that seems to be every single um all right let me check I could be wrong on that yeah now you know if it's by the way if it is true Tennessee becomes first U.S state to ban public drag performances in front of miners or just generally um it says whether it drag does not appear on the bill it changes the definition of adult Cabaret and Tennessee's law I mean adult-oriented performances that are harmful to minors but I don't know if they're saying it it's only Banning them in front of mine yes no I've read that bill and that's like that that bill is like one of the most misrepresented like multiple times people ask me well doesn't this mean that no that's it's basically classifying like sexually explicit drag shows under a adult Cabaret performance so miners aren't allowed to be there okay it also says hold on to be clear it says it also says male or female impersonators now fall under adult Cabaret among topless dancers go-go dancers and exotic dancers the bill band's adult Cabaret from public property or anywhere miners might be present I don't even I don't even have the bill up but you're missing you're missing a sentence when you say uh like people performing as the other of the other gender or like crossdressing there is a section there which is I forget the exact word they use but the trans legal translation is in a sexualized manner right which is oh so you trust the government determine when address is is dressing up in a sexualized mode if someone's behaving in a sexualized manner it's the exact same like tests that we use what does that mean yes a trans woman in a belly shirt is that yeah sexualized manner you're right like what is ultimately like the sexuality like the sexual nature of like a strip club like like what what where is the line between like breastfeeding and stripping right there is like again like with the definition of pornography with the definition of sexuality there is like a gray area and it's it's very difficult right but like one of the concepts here is um and how this is going to be enforced uh I I guess I predict I can't know for sure but if it's enforced how would that word is enforced everywhere else in Tennessee it's going to be whether or not this is a sexualized performance if you're gyrating your hips like together in front of a bunch of like five-year-olds maybe that's a problem I don't think that's like on par with like restricting freedom of speech in terms of banning University like Republicans from like hosting ideas that left-wingers don't like wait what was the what was that important sentence that you said was missing hold on I'll bring up the actual bill okay while he does that right uh do we think like uh that um ideas or books should be banned for children like specifically is outside of the sexual realm let's remove sexuality from this so other than sexuality do you think we should be banning Concepts like uh teaching about the Holocaust or or anything like that um from children's libraries or schools under a certain age like kindergarten like should kindergarteners be learning about the Holocaust right is this a free speech issue though I feel like this is just going to come down well like like I I mean it's not necessarily A censorship issue though to say like for example we shouldn't be teaching like issues around sexual assault to people in grade one that doesn't necessarily mean that we should make like materials unavailable to for whatever reason like somebody in grade one who has reason to research this topic um but I don't think it would necessarily be appropriate as a part of a curriculum okay fair enough uh but as I understand it's the stopwoke ACT doesn't just remove it from the curriculum but removes it from school libraries and things like that is that incorrect I mean the removal from the library would be bad but I don't think that like um you know Educators making the determination that kindergarten is not the appropriate grade level for students to be learning about like certain historical events is tantamount to like censorship or book burning or anything like that I I think the minor status of the kids involved is kind of an issue can we move this up a couple grades because now we're talking about like traumatizing kids we're just curating what's appropriate for people to learn first well I think the orchard and I I would like to quickly if like just because I found I found the sentence right so it's about whether or not it appeals to a prurient interest which is a sexual interest whether or not it appeals to sexuality wait wait but is it but does it is it now classifying that men and women that cross-dress are essentially doing so can you link what you're looking at in the group chat yep absolutely we'll see this we get to find out together again I gotta do it on my own I mean learning with lactoid yeah I'll post it because again like it's kind of interesting though because uh let's just say I'm right let's just say I'm right technically you all just participated in misinformation maybe you should get banned this information right I think disinformation would be what you're promoting if you got this wrong well this is this is from the Tennessee website right did you wait you didn't make a group chat or I'm not part of it sorry I was looking for it I was like I had uh I had uh unfortunately uh again black code is the last minute replacement who's this Gideon person by the way um no I think he's just trolling I don't know why everybody thought he was serious about it I don't know what he'd have to add to this discussion but he'd be welcome to do so um I guess while we're getting that up and I think he just posted it there let me see if I can't share it with a this is a whole do you have a line or something I can go to yep so how this works is you have to this bill history amendments video and then click on summary you go to bill summary it explains what the bill is right so this bill creates an offense for a person who engages in an adult Cabaret performance on public property or in a location where the adult Cabaret performance could be viewed by a person who is not an adult but Bill defines okay go on sorry Bill defines an adult Cabaret performance to mean a performance in a location other than an adult Cabaret like a strip club that features topless dancers go-go dancers exotic dancers strippers male or female impersonators who provide entertainment that appeals to a prurient interest or similar entertainers regardless of whether or not performed for consideration so if a trans woman wears a slim fitting dress and sings on a stage outside of a cabaret environment would they run afoul of this no because the actual entertainment is not one that appeals to a prurient interest which is well that's a matter of judgment no like the reason why I say form-fitting outfit is precisely because a form-fitting outfit is one that shows off your form thus directly appealing to a prurient interest here's the thing if we want to play like ultimate skeptic there you could also read that technically anybody who wears a slim fitting dress then it goes to sing to technically be they're violating this and so therefore we can't have rules against strippers right no you're misunderstanding me you have an interest in in this being much more specific because your position is that it's a bad thing that for example along similarly ambiguous lines conservatives are being removed from social media oh hold on I want to fight over this for a second um go ahead sure I I I I I I disagree I think that I think that a republican would say that every drag so show is necessarily sexual I think that they would just say that well the question is what qualifies as a drag show so I wouldn't necessarily trust a republican to distinguish between people a person saying I'm gonna do a reading time in the Square dressed in drag because for any of these I don't know but the question the questions no no wait I want to put lactoid okay hold on lactoid there is no case that anybody in any of these outfits an exotic dancer a go-go dancer a stripper could go and do anything else and it wouldn't be considered something that appeals to prurient interests right they'd still consider it as such no that that's the disagreement we have so well in itself the entertainment itself has to appeal to purine interest so sure so let's say that a strippers let's say this if you're going to drag queen reading hour yeah like reading to kids is that like is that sexual entertainment what about strippers playing volleyball so strippers playing volleyball are they like I guess it depends like are they nude while they're playing volleyball no their dresses they're dressed as strippers sure they've got pasties or dressed as strippers that says strippers in the build they're dressed as strippers yeah would we allow this like in a public area now I'm asking you by the language of the bill the stripper is banned from doing so not because it's necessarily doing a strip show but because of the outfit what well also like the go-go dancer would probably be as well yeah right so again like this is one of the issues we run into when it comes to defining pornography or like defining like sexual grooming or any of this where like it does rely a little bit on like now you might just not trust like the uh the the Intuition or the common sense of problems no no hold on I'm just just going by the legally what you've said right so the amendment to this bill right the way that this particular bill was amended was the word male or female impersonators were added to this those weren't there before that was part of the amendment right so if they're adding that but you're telling me Oh no no no no it's only performances with sexual nature why would you need to add male or female impersonators there well I imagine it probably wouldn't matter whether they were doing a sexual performance or not regardless you I can ask you the exact same question Destiny right so uh if they just meant that male and female impersonators are just naturally doing everything sexualized then why did they have to include a sentence who provide entertainment that appeals to a brewery in interest right when people add little like modifiers like this is like statutory interpretation when people add modifiers to like things what that usually means is there's an intention behind that and when you have it appealing to a career interest appealing to a period interest could mean the difference between for example them having to wear like full Formal Wear or wearing bikinis while we're playing a volleyball the reason why like the reason why this the wick panels appeal to purion interests that could be argued right no because I would say um so the the reason why that that matters though is because like is it now simply the case that any trans woman who dresses in female get up is now going to be targeted as being a female impersonator who is feeling the period interests because it seems like the impersonating itself I I don't know like judging by how it's discussed it seems like that itself is equivocated with appealing to a program interest this is why Drag Queen Mary Poppins Garb May nonetheless be characterized as a like yeah children I'm sure is drag clothing even sexual in nature to you actually so I guess we don't know for sure how like with every single stat statute ever like with every statute against uh child molestation with every single uh statute against drug dealing with everything a little statute against anything ever we don't know exactly how it's going to be uh interpreted we don't know exactly how it's going to be enforced we don't know the specifics of everything you know how the jury's rule is going to like also have like an impact on how these things turn out practically I don't disagree right but I'm just going to tell you based on my reading of this right what is what's like the proper statutory interpretation here they're not just saying male and female impersonators that's part of like strippers and that's part of everybody who has to like go under an adult Cabernet performance they are specifically modifying that sentence with only if they're performing entertainment the entertainment being one of a sexual interest one of a sections yeah I understand what you're saying but it feels like that language is only there to say that they're like doing a show of some sort that's what it's there for so like a stripper walking in public maybe but my guess is going to be that the way that Republicans perceive drag as any type of show well so this is why originalism is the best legal philosophy we're not talking Originals I understand well I'll explain why I'll explain why because when they're interpreting this right the reasonable thing would do is why did they make this why did they include that little thing and what is the context of the time that they included well the context of the time was like a whole bunch of like controversy but the fact that you had like drag queen Christmas where you had like people literally wearing giant fake tits and grinding like their genitals in front of like small children which is like highly sexual this is my guess is going to be that stuff like that is probably already prosecutable there's probably already bills in Tennessee no it's not no I can go in Tennessee prior to this bill which by the way doesn't even account for that let's say prior to this I could walk up to a child start rubbing my dick in front of a kid and because oh you didn't put like the dick rubbing and sweatpants part claws in the bill I'm not gonna get in trouble for it so yeah if you did that specific thing I don't know I'm not an expert on Tennessee like the vet any specific anti-child molestation Tennessee statutes what I'm saying is that generally speaking in these states like drag queens going up on stage and like gyrating their genitals on each other and wearing these great big old fake tits and acting in an incredibly sexual nature and there was minors there I mean they haven't been prosecuted and so there has been like a little bit of a backlash for this well like oh we don't want this happening in our state or we don't want this happening in our seat again right this is DeSantis decertified the area that did that in Florida and then you have Tennessee he was like well we want that to happen here so we're going to pass this bill to make sure sure it doesn't happen I'd be interested in looking at that but I super I super don't think you're right I don't think so I think then why did they then why did they pass this why did they because they don't want it they don't want to have a sexual period or no no they didn't Focus so much on that that language was already there The Proven interest but look at what other classifications that are they're being compared to right these things are necessarily and inherently by their by what they are sexual topless dancers go-go dancers exotic dancers strippers and cross-dressers like that's being classified with all of those no matter what performance any of those other people are doing these people are probably going to get in trouble if they're doing a performance in a public area it's necessarily going to be prurian interest somebody dressed as a stripper what's a go-go dancer it's I don't know but it's probably some sexual what's up sandwich if it's a sandwich between topless dancer and exotic dancer is a stripper my guess is a go-go dancer probably wears incredibly sexually provocative clothing and so far as 10 to 60 so that's gonna be my guess oh she wears like a bikini and dances in front of people and if she's dancing sexually to like a sexual interest then that would be a problem right well how about this electorate electorate how about this I'm gonna give you two examples okay a volleyball tournament on a beach involving women in swimsuits the swimsuits are very us whatever they brought with them from home some were in bikinis some are in one pieces some have those weird frilly things from the 30s okay and interest public volleyball competition they're at the very least showing lower leg every single one of them said appealing to appropriate interest it doesn't matter if it's apparently interest because I don't think it's defined as an adult Cabaret performer that's the point right because yeah yeah well also well no you you would have to like prove that they like that they're the sexual intent here they're like they're appealing to a poor in interest and by the way it's a misdemeanor so like you would also prove that like they intend to do this right they intended to like appeal to a sexual nature no I I understand what you could do when you're like a great big old fake tits and you're gyrating your genitals in front of okay well this is this is where the other example is going from because we can imagine for example a sexy volleyball competition being displayed on a cabaret stage for the titillation of the audience what if we have the exact same scenario but they're trans women exact same variety of dress let me ask you as a sexy volleyball competition should kids be there uh well I'm not defining a volleyball competition at the beach as a sexy volleyball competition at the beach today was a wet t-shirt contest sexy volleyball they're gonna do the wet t-shirt thing with water and do that event is that event is coded sexually so by identity The Branding no but for example we wouldn't say that kids shouldn't go to the beach because they might encounter women with bikinis there or particular cheerleading performances at sporting events no because because those people aren't called out here the adult Cabaret performances um is is defined here at Tamina performance what that nothing could fall under go-go dancer because a go-go dancer is a very broad category of people who dance at like entertainment bins well the reason why I'm pushing back on this Stephen is because like adult Cadbury what's intended for an adult Cabaret is is endless because anything can be simulated for the titillation of an audience on such a stage it's it's there's like a massive massive scope for interpretation there yeah no you've got to take a step back for a second right and I I this is one of the difficult things like defining pornography or defining sexual like something sexualized is like you you do have to like take a step back and look at it like is this appealing to a primarily sexual interest is this appealing to a sec is this what is the purpose of them doing this is the purpose of them like gyrating their genitals on each other is there like something sexual about that are they like trying to be sexual to like the audience is that is that entertainment is the is the actual performance like built to appeal to somebody's sexual interest it's just the language added does different than like somebody with just a bikini okay because that's not how it's been defined before and that this bill doesn't change it to be defining them sure to find that way adding the crush dressing thing just doesn't make sense because they're trying to ban drag right so I'm linking you to another part of the Tennessee code okay this is 2021 I don't know if the language has been updated but like if we look down here right this defines um if we look at like how it's defining adult stuff or adult Cabaret or adult entertainment it seems like broadly what they're really talking about is stripping that's what it seems like they're really talking about you uh put on the group shot as well they included strippers no no no no no no broadly speaking they're talking about stripping right topless dancers go go dancers exotic dancers strippers and then they put in male or female impersonators and then adult entertainment means any exhibition of any adult oriented Motion Picture live performance display or dance of any type that has a as a significant or substantial portion of such performance any actual or simulated performance of specified sexual activities including the removal of articles of clothing are appearing unclothed so earlier you gave the example that somebody was rubbing their crotch in front of a child's place whatever this sounds like a simulated performance of a specified sexual activity so it would have been illegal before and removing articles of clothing sounds like things he would do in regards to like a strip show an adult Cabaret so I don't know why you would add male or female impersonators here any types of these sexual performance happening before I can't think of any examples that wouldn't have already been caught under this bill it sounds like you're just trying to band drag the reason why and there could be like a specific intent there for sure but again like the reason why is because recently this has been happening more and I think it's but if somebody was doing that in front of a kid you would have already been able to charge them with a misdemeanor I'm positive of that there's no shot that I could go up in front of a kid as long as I'm dressed like a man I can do sexual activity simulated sexual activities in front of the child and be okay that's got to be that you can't have to pass an anti-drag amendment to existing legislation to make that illegal there's no shut up is your argument that it's redundant or is your argument that it's no no my again my argument is that in your world is pointless because your interpretation doesn't make sense in my world they're just trying to ban all public performance of drag in which case it makes perfect sense they're trying to ban drag otherwise why would you add like why would you add cross-dressers to topless dancers go-go dancers exotic dancers or strippers performing adult entertainment like simulated sexual acts or removing articles of clothing to appear on clothed sure that's that's one way of taking a look at it okay I just think the context of when this came out is very different right this is like right on the heels uh at the time like a number of incredibly sexualized and provocative drag performances in which there was children in the audience what number and people and people they had a whole tour to be clear I don't I don't right Queen Christmas I don't know if this happened I don't think I don't think this ever happened I don't think that there were I think that this is my guess it's gonna be there's pictures from the shows or different shows and there might have been kids in the audience and people were making sexuality other things but I don't think somebody's doing a highly sexually suggested thing right in front of a kid and there's not a misdemeanor stature that you couldn't charge that person I don't believe that sickness no no no they were doing it on a stage and there was children in the audience okay okay let's assume that that is completely true once again back to Steven's Point no no once again back to Steven's Point even if that's completely true the reason why that would be a problem is because they are engaging in simulated sexual activity in front of an audience the wording of what you just posted suggests that the bare fact of of dressing in the Garb traditionally associated with the opposite sex counts as cabaret-like cabaret-like performance it seems like not just you want to band drag it seems like you want to ban any male bodied person from appearing in public wearing a dress any cross-dressing person or at least doing any type of performance not just appearing there because it seems like a stripper could walk in public but when it comes to doing any sort of performance it feels like any performance relating to drag because this has been added inappropriately I'm at it it does because it doesn't it like if you read this if you read this section none of this sounds like it has anything to do with people Crush dressing has this bill been passed by the way uh it was an amendment to the bill and the first website that he linked is the updated uh Tennessee code uh criminal code so yes it is that is part of it has there been any prosecutions has there been any my understanding my understanding is that it's been it may have been temporarily blocked I don't know on what rounds uh okay but well there was only my question that's again like I think I've already said this ultimately we will need to see like exactly how this plays out like with all statutes but um when you look at like what is the inter what are they trying to Target what is the intent now I think one uh reading of this is well trans people just can't like be in public anymore no no can't do public don't feed charitable to my point can't do any public performances not just being okay yeah sure sure can't do any performance just because they happen to be in direct correct so while so while once again just real quick stop so while lizzo for example was called out by Matt Walsh and Ben Shapiro apparently right to and I saw the Matt Walsh one haven't seen the Ben Shapiro one saying you should arrest her because she's violating the Tennessee law right has any arrests been made has any action on this bill been taken by the the the um the enforcement mechanisms in the state because if this is just a a thing about as lactoid claims to stop sexual performances right um then you probably wouldn't see much but if it was to uh Sundays and Destiny's points simply an excuse to ban all drag performances surely we'd have seen some prosecution on that some action something right something no no reasonable person is going to read it that way that's the problem like when they're actually trying to enforce it what do you okay no I agree no resources or what I don't consider conservatives reasonable and I think it's pretty obvious what they're trying to do with the bills they're trying to ban all public performance of drag like that's what they're talking about over and over again like drag Story Hour and blah blah like these are the topics that are coming up over and over again and that was the onus under which this was added again if you read the outer category the other categories of people that are considered like performing these adult performances cross-dressing just doesn't fit every time my strippers go-go dancers doing sex highly sexual lessons why would you add cross-dressing that's so weird if it's when you look at like the context of what exactly what was that built in response to what was happening at the time that like they were like oh we gotta pass these bills it was a whole bunch of like highly sexualized drag performances and highly sexualized one that I'm thinking of the one that I'm thinking of in Florida right yeah like perhaps one of the reasons why they wanted to really specify this was the case in case like well we're gonna like get around some of the statues listen to absolutely like simulate sexual activity but we are going to have great big like paper mache tips those types of things probably would have already been illegal under Tennessee law okay hang on so it looks like the bill was only effective as of last month on the 22nd so there's like no time has transpired yet we I don't think we can really know one way or the other at this point I mean it's a whole month by this metric if they arrest like the drag queen Story Hour and like leader out and yeah I mean that would be I think a gross misunderstanding of the intent of this law and I don't think they should get found guilty or he would I don't know who directed okay I think we've uh we butted heads on this one a while it's a little tangential but you know what it was interesting I think I think different interpretations does play into the ultimate point right of of tech censorship um because it doesn't really matter what your toss or moderation policies are what matters is who is enforcing those moderation policies who is interpreting those moderation policies and given that that's the case right does the government have any interest in regulating uh what can and cannot be censored on a tech platform or on a social media platform and uh do you think they should uh step in and and as Texas I believe tried to do uh stop uh social media companies from Banning you or something over uh infractions what do you think we're looking we're licking these things in a weird way um like the immediate cases that come to mind when we talk about whether or not government has an interest in in interfering with the censorship of social media sites is is for example like China uh going through like Gmail accounts and and things of that sort and and censoring discussion of particular topics once again in the name of its National self-interest um these these often run contrary to each other like the the the the government interfering with social media is very rarely in defense of of citizens rights it's it's more often having to do with you know the control of information that it deems to be sensitive to its own interests aside from those rights I mean our own President Joe Biden has called for this back in 2019 when he was a candidate he was arguing for the revocation of section 230 I think it was on the basis that he said these companies are helping promote and propagate falsehoods that they know to be false is that something that you guys support the revocation of section 230 no of course not no but I'm saying there's already like uh like there are government officials right now currently even are like sitting president who think that there is a compelling interest for the government to step in and begin trying to like moderate these platforms I guess to promote in the interest of promoting truth I suppose um but that doesn't really capture the spirit of the first amendment I don't think the spirit of the first amendment is to promote truth necessarily interesting fair enough um okay we are kind of winding down a little bit I do have one more can I ask one question real quick please if you have something to to go for go ahead for you guys um and I love this example because it's like one that also like is very consistent with my strong capitalist beliefs if you have a situation in which let's say you had a large social media company that said that they were not Shadow Banning okay let's just say they came out and they said like they they advertised to their consumer base that they were not Shadow Banning and then later it came out uh that they were right it came out that actually behind the scenes when they're hiding in the shadows they were actually like Shadow Banning to certain uh people or or conservatives but let's just say generally speaking um and we just for clarification before you continue this is like well it's hypothetical yes but we're taking the shadow Banning to be not The Accidental consequence of algorithms you know insufficiently understood or monitored but like a deliberate policy we have emails exchanged that show hey we want to ban X Y and Z but not tell them it's idiots designating certain people as like having less amplification Shadow Banning right like reducing uh the visibility um if if this happens when they say when they promise that they're not doing it you agree that this would be some kind of Fraud and they should probably be liable to the people that they lied to no I think if it was a paid service maybe you can make an argument for that but I think Shadow Banning quote-unquote Shadow Banning is it's a very specific term and people like play around with these terms in terms of marketing all the time so I think it's kind of silly to try to pretend that there's like a stringent definition or example of what shadow Banning means or what shadow Banning is I don't think there's a I don't think there should be some kind of obligation of people offering a free service to be transparent about about what's going on behind the scenes um I think when we're talking about people who are accepting a TOs um that maybe like as a as a part of their signing up process or because they pay for some kind of feature they're guaranteed access to some kind of like good whether that's like hey and we will boost your your profile against others that haven't paid for the service Link in that case you'd have a case for fraud but unless there's actually like some kind of explicit relationship like that this strikes me is no different than for example like somebody Banning people from a Discord server uh for for reasons of personal judgment we we call these things free right but that's only because we don't pay money for them it's not like as if they come at no cost I mean yeah but you're not you're not you're not buying you use our data they do use uh we are the product right we are the the cost like to ourselves in a sense but you are not selling your data as a currency for the thing you are agreeing to them being allowed to read your data while you're using their site that is and given that you well that doesn't fall under terms of service though that's a privacy policy which and these two things are distinct I think a privacy policy is just going to outline to you how a company is like interacting and like harvesting your user data but the terms of service is going to be this is something distinct from that now sure but when you say that like a free company like companies that are free uh have no obligation to be honest to their user base again the agreement is being made uh like a tacit agreement between both parties is being made known or not right you're agreeing to let them use your data and they are agreeing to um not uh just arbitrarily moderate you or arbitrarily ban you and things like that and at least in most cases as I move are they agreeing to them can't they ban you for whatever reason they want I don't know if they're agreeing anything well as far as like how the courts recognize it if a company outlines the rules and their terms and conditions and there's an affirmative like click or agreement that you have to do that says I agree to this or I've read this and then you proceed to use your site if there is within those rules something that says we can change this at any time that you want they can't actually enforce that as a meaningful contract because then you would be co-signing and affirming that you will like continue to agree like you're agreeing to a contract that you've not yet seen so those are null but if they are regularly updating them and having you affirmatively check I agree to that updates I agree to the updates then those are enforceable okay interesting I'm not sure the the law behind that um but to lacto is a larger point right like again if you because people use Twitter and people use uh twitch YouTube all these other streaming sites for their business like people's livelihoods are uh tied to this they go on to these sites and they become involved and creators on these sites and use these sites in order to make money in order to to live right um do the companies have no responsibility to be honest with the people using their services for this we were asking if they have an ethical if there's some kind of yeah it's like I'm not talking legal I'm talking ethical well so my question was like legal right and I think I think the answers are crazy right so I can imagine a scenario in which let's say I like I put out an ad uh where you get a free car um if you come and watch 50 hours of ads right and then at the end of the end of you dedicating dedicating a significant amount of time watching ads and like being in this space that I've created um then like I know you don't get the car actually what's the what's the free car that Twitter offered conservatives so when you come out and say we are not doing this like we are just not doing this but then like so what you this what this entices a bunch of people to come onto the platform and watch their ads right become like a money making device for the company and then it turns out they're doing it would seem to me that like there as it turned out that Twitter is Shadow Banning well here like yeah here's a question what did Twitter specifically say they're not doing well hold on real quick I asked the hypothetical and everyone's resounding answer was no but like my question is like in the hype I do want to hear an answer that though that's an interesting question oh I'll answer it but I'm just I'm not sure I got the answer that I was like at for the question I was asking which is uh I mean I guess maybe a reiteration if you really think that like if like any kind of one of these free social media companies can just flat out lie to like bring users into their platform and then not deliver on what they're saying I don't know is that is that at least kind of weird let's say on my website let's say that I say have you subscribed here too I'll give you a free hug if I see you or something and then let's say I'm like I'm not doing that at all that's just a total scam is that like things I'm sorry what if you come into my chat and I say like oh yeah if you sign up for a thing on my website you come chat I'll give you a hug advice to you and I was like I'm like no I just lied I totally just get more people to sign up is that is that illegal what is the loss I have no idea I'm not actually sure I don't think I don't think Twitter's saying they're not going to be but I think it should be but hang on I don't think Twitter's saying they're not Shadow Banning people um entails that they are promising that if you break TOS or you commit slurs or you engage like pernicious language that therefore they will they are obligated to promote you commensurately with other people you don't do well here this is what this is what I'm asking what he means by shadow man again Shadow ban is a contentious term right I think in the most strictest sense Shadow Banning means that you're removing somebody's access to the site almost completely without them knowing it so that means that nobody else could see their tweets nobody can go to their profile they have no idea and they've been basically completely delisted but it's a shadow band the person's not aware of it so for example so real quick but I think so Twitter does things like they de-boost people or they might de-prioritize people or hide them from certain people's feeds and it's arguable whether that constitutes Shadow Banning that's why I'm asking what specifically did Twitter say they didn't do and the comparison I'll always use is for cell phones cell phone companies today every single provider will not say that they're throttling they don't say they're throttling what they'll say is they de-prioritize you after you've used 21 gigabytes or whatever data it's essentially the exact same thing and if you're not wanting to get throttled you are going to get throttled but they call it deprioritization on the tower based on how much data you've consumed so that's like absolutely let me read the statement so if we want to move away from that medical and actually get to Twitter yes please obviously it's based on answer the question yeah this is the statement that was made right uh people are asking us if we shadow man we don't I think the real question behind the question is are we doing something according to political ideology or viewpoints we are not period we do not look at content with regards to political Viewpoint or ideology we look at Behavior okay is that wrong so from what I read from the Twitter files I only read those I guess only specific parts and I'm from what I read they were de-prioritizing people based on their political beliefs [Applause] just don't do you understand this topic I guess it I guess it depends on whether or not you consider someone for example like uh spreading uh untoward statements about say black communities to be a political belief or whether or not that's that's just like an aggression on a community that's that's that's not I want to hear the the back and forth a little bit more from Destiny yeah oh yeah no no that was that would have been the question I was gonna ask which president said I asked because there's the issue that consumers keep running into okay I'll go into a platform I'll spam the n-word and then get banned and I'll go they're censoring me because I'm concerted conservatives think you should have freedom of speech that's the issue my understanding is I've never seen somebody banned from Twitter for political ideology but you guys will say things like disagreeing with the covid narrative um that's part of my political ideology which I think is a fair to say I'm Banning conservatives like that statement seems to take on a different character versus saying I'm Banning somebody because they're political ideology versus like coveted misinformation or something right that's the issue I think so like I feel like I think you know it's identical right if you're if you're making like vaccine skeptical content and they specifically said we do not look at content then they're looking at content which they said they didn't do no no they said political content didn't they they're not going to say not liking any content they probably said political content I don't even look at the statement again with regards to political Viewpoint or ideology yes so then my question because here's my next question because if I read it how you're wrong well if I read it how you're reading it could I arguably say every single band on that site is due to some sort of political ideology every band on every site is due to some sort of underlying political ideology no if I think that freedom of speech is a principle thing yeah so it's right if you want to be like hyper pedantic but like well no no that's your point of view your point of view this once again goes back to like the spirit of like what were they saying when they say we do not do this we do not de-prioritize people um or like Shadow ban People based on like their political affiliation based on like their their what they're saying right I understand what you're saying necessarily the behavior I understand what you're saying and they were doing that let's let's look at the Spirit okay let's use our full brains okay Twitter is saying that they're not Banning People based on their political points of view and you're saying like oh that's not true because you guys are Banning for cover of course they're banning for cover misinformation they've already said that they're not hiding that they're not Banning you because you're conservative a liberal could go on and spread that quote-unquote misinformation or conservative could go on and spread the misinformation they're not Banning you basically a political point of view they're banning you based on what they have in their TOS as stuff that they don't allow the platform which is covered misinformation election misinformation as they Define it right it's not based on your political point of view it's based on violating those parts of the TOs yeah vaccine disinformation is non-partisan anybody could perpetuate it also lacto do you think that the algorithms themselves are perpetuating bias what do you think themselves are perpetuating bias is that what like is against conservatives on Twitter and getting them disproportionately banned or Shadow banned or or targeted I I guess I wish the algorithms would be more transparent so I would like know for sure in what ways I mean it it certainly feels so um like um I I don't know I guess this one I have a little bit less this is more just like a gut feeling where it does appear that um people say well we're just gonna like we're gonna expand like the list of like words or phrases or like protected groups of people to like start including people who like especially when it comes to class for example um I think recently um like one of the new POS from Discord was like you can't uh you can't discriminate against somebody based on where their income is you know and now if where your income is we can't make poor jokes no no yeah well that's that's the thing right like well if your income is from like a like a government program well this is inherent like this is inherently going to put you on a direct Collision Course with conservatives who generally don't consider that to be like a legitimate form of income um like that's like what you're living off of your income I think I think they do actually like I think it does in effect have that effect where it does seem to cast platform yeah yeah it's obviously against conservatives I think I think that like your ability like the same skills that would make somebody like a good coder is not necessarily going to mean that they have the ability to like even detect or identify those sources of bias and like adjust their algorithms to exclude stuff like that hopefully they hopefully they would uh adjust their algorithms to not bias People based on or not bias well really the problem is that they're uh they're like Banning people or Shadow Banning people in the first place yeah the question here is an algorithmic error it's like this is like an intentional policy side right well I think Stephen to that point I think Steven's case was actually stronger than he articulated it so he was saying like they might de-prioritize people or might say they're de-prioritizing people my question following that from those by Deep prioritizing do we mean that they are actively putting like a marker on this account saying this one will get de-boosted relative to everybody else or are they simply neglecting to boost that one in addition and then the question becomes are social media platforms obligated to commensurately boost every single voice to to some to some part that seems like a difficult still for me I believe for some accounts they were explicitly marking them as not for but that would be like that would be like covert disinformation stuff like that yeah the black they were they weren't just removing content they were blacklisting accounts okay sure sure but let's limiting the visibility of entire accounts right sure but if that how is that not going back to like Shadow Banning if you're doing it based on an account because that's not true what shadow bending means sorry Shadow Banning is like on YouTube so for example I've got a bunch of people spamming the n-word in my chat briefly when I block them they can still type them on their end they will see it in their chat but it will not appear on my chat that's Shadow Banning so for them it appears as if they're not banned for me and everybody else they are bad that's what shadow Banning is so unless that's actually taking place Twitter isn't Shadow Banning people and that's the issue with the definitions I think um yeah okay I think I I maybe this sounds stupid but I think that's stupid I I think that when when you refer to Shadow Banning um in in my mind or most reasonable people I've spoken to maybe they're not reasonable um but with Shadow Banning to me is you have an account and uh without your knowledge right you are like you were put in a blacklist right you were marked and now the that you put out is like reduced visibility to the point of like severely restricting um what you believe you could do uh when you sign up for the service again with and you spend a lot of your time on the service um so apparently Charlie Kirk was also uh cattle band right I mean that's just one example that I've been like finding um sure and you have every right to be upset by that and you might think that's horrible but well I think I think it's wrong because like it feels like a lie we're not Shadow Banning but then we're gonna like create a black list of people where we're going to reduce our visibility to like dramatically limit their scope and so if I'm on Twitter and I'm like oh I'm fine they don't Shadow ban okay I guess I'm going to be treated fairly so I'm going to continue using the service instead of going to some other okay social media site and so that I spend hours or days or months on Twitter now okay because I don't believe I'm being Shadow banned but then it turns out that I am and I said that's a lie that's fraud ask you directly before you go it relates to this I promise okay okay and this and people are giving me money to ask questions and I want to make some money here as you said earlier uh the research shows that conservative voices by the algorithm are boosted four to five times I believe is the number you used I have no idea um I don't think I said a specific number significantly say you didn't say that I think straight raid might have had like a specific number for that I I don't have that I I don't know the specifically the point is that you claim the claim was in Twitter's research on the shows in 2021 that conservative ideology content is favored by the algorithm it gets boosted more right it seems to be yeah other seems to be so given that that's the case right if conservative content is being D boosted by the algorithm does that not imply that someone is putting their thumb on the scale because the algorithm would naturally favor that but for some reason it's not would that not imply at least an increased likelihood of someone intentional because these things aren't equivalent and account violating TOs and getting banned of a certain description we're not talking about banning we're talking about Shadow Banning we're talking about yeah no I I understand but the problem is there's no actual Shadow Banning taking place so equivocating between quote unquote debusting and Shadow Banning and my immediate wonder and everything colloquially wait wait I no no I understand but there's a reason why I'm making this distinction because if by de-boosting we simply mean they're not applying a positive boost to some parties then that would seem to imply that what what we're talking about here is some kind of obligation to actually positively boost these channels and that's a different that's a different question like it may be the case even if we agree that it's completely unethical for uh for for Twitter to be like demoting certain channels and I don't agree with that at all but even if we did agree with that um if all they're doing is simply not applying a boost to some channels that they're applying to others that's not demoting right that's not a that's not a positive action that they're taking with respect to those channels they're just neglecting them are they obligated to to improve the reach of those channels that does not seem reasonable to me right it's just a lack of promotion okay fair enough okay we circled the Train on this this has been an I found it was an interesting discussion I hope you all enjoyed it as well um we talked about tech censorship we talked about freedom of speech more in generally we went for whatever reason for 30 minutes on a specific line in a specific bill in a specific state which was fun I hope you all enjoyed that uh but are there any any other questions or thoughts before we kind of just wrap this up any anything that we haven't talked about that you think is important to bring up did we get to egg throwing I don't think we did but uh uh very very quickly so someone from my chat who's in the know um says that it was not de-boosting it was a do not amplify label so my description is just apparently accurate someone can disprove that if they have the wherewithal I don't know okay fair enough uh I'm gonna give everyone here a chance to tell people who they are shout themselves out and we're just going to close it out for the evening gang uh I am Wick TV you can find me on Twitch and YouTube both um twitch at twitch.tv Wick TV and YouTube at youtube.com Wick at Wick Dash TV uh check me out uh we do panels like this on occasion right and uh we have hopefully interesting discussions so if you guys want to give me money that's important to do too like subscribe if you're watching this uh straight rig what about you where can people find you I'm at straighter it on everything or straight raid underscore and at some point I'll eventually start streaming I don't bother doing it on my end so that's all I have to promote okay any closing thoughts that you want to add or you got no I'm good okay Sunday go ahead uh well first of all thank you for putting this on I think you did a wonderful moderation job as evidenced by the fact that a lot of you talk for roughly 75 of the time um I can be found on President's Sunday on YouTube and Twitter and I'm technically on Twitch but I have not used it at all and I have no immediate plans to okay well thank you for being here really appreciate you not running away this time this is great Jesus we stayed uh let's sell black toy go ahead you okay thanks Wick uh thank you all for talking to me if you like what I had to say if you find me at lactoit TV on Twitch Twitter and YouTube thanks simple to the point any closing thoughts Destiny anything you want to add all right nope I had so much fun I love you all very much I look forward to lactoid being the replacement for um who's the crazy conservative lawyer guy I thought Rob nor was it no no the guy who was like religious he was like I know what you're talking about but I'm not gonna say it because it's mean so how is it mean I'm crazy he's a kind man who is the kind man that you're talking about oh lecture fan that guy yeah I look forward to you stepping up is our new look galactoid I will stand like what he is my favorite conservative if I had to pick a conservative right I would pick like what lactoid is my favorite so thank you for being here thanks Destiny for being here um and thank you audience okay uh we're gonna close it out and yeah I don't want to do opens right now I'm I'm tired and I'm hungry so I know disappointing but I'll take questions on my channel I was upstairs in prison Sunday oh go go do that but for now I'll admit the y'all I do
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