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If 230 worked the way some conservatives think it does, it would be unconstitutional. It would require government to define what speech, *though constitutionally protected*, is objectively “lewd” or “excessively violent” or “otherwise objectionable” & subject to moderation.
On Dennis Prager’s imaginary version of 230, the government has divided speech that is, by its own terms, “constitutionally protected” into an “OK to restrict” bucket and a “not OK to restrict” bucket, with the courts presumably responsible for deciding what’s in which bucket.
No literate person can honestly believe that’s how 230 is supposed to work, but if it did, it would pretty obviously violate the First Amendment.
Here’s how I understand Dennis Prager’s vision of how things should work: If platforms only moderate constitutionally protected speech the government agrees is “really” objectionable, they’re fine. If the government disagrees with their policy, they incur ruinous liability.
So the government will effectively decide what constitutuonally protected expression platforms are allowed to restrict, and what they must publish. This, we are expected to believe, is the “free speech” position. I believe that’s called “chutzpah.”
Prager literally argues that YouTube should run afoul of the law because The Daily Show content they restrict is REALLY inappropriate, whereas his own content REALLY isn’t. And the government should, in effect, punish YouTube for getting this supposedly objective fact wrong.
