Thread by @BerinSzoka

Anyone sane wants to see less of the kind of content that led to the storming of the Capitol

#Section230 may be unsatisfying but it plays a vital role: protecting sites’ 1A right to take down content gov't can’t ban, eg misinformation & (most) incitement
protocol.com/we-need-sectio…

The storming of the Capitol should make clear once and for all why all major tech services ban hate speech, misinformation and talk of violence: Words can have serious consequences — in this case, five deaths (plus a Capitol officer’s suicide days later).

The MAGA crowd is crying "censorship," conveniently forgetting (or more likely disingenuously abandoning) all of the First Amendment and free market arguments it has wielded in the past against people who they don't agree with

Calls for a “fairness doctrine” for the Internet are a total about-face from the right's battles *against* the Fairness Doctrine (for broadcasting) & ignore the reality that the Court has rejected fairness-based compelled content regs in non-broadcast media—including the Internet

What MAGAs really want is a First Amendment right to speak on someone else's property; forcing companies to both associate with them and carry their speech—the very things they decried as a First Amendment violation when a baker didn't want to bake a gay wedding cake.

In service of their attempts to fool people into thinking that their First Amendment rights are at risk, MAGAs dishonestly co-opt First Amendment language, calling social media things like "the new public square"

They claim that because social media plays an outsized role in public discourse, that the First Amendment should *prevent* them, like gov’t agencies, from banning abhorrent speech, instead of *protecting* their right to do so

Justice Kavanaugh rejected such arguments in 2019

MAGAs blame #Section230 for “censorship.” But they fail to acknowledge that social media sites would have a First Amendment right to do these things even without 230—which makes it all the more clear that they just want to punish Twitter for its own editorial choices

When sites are sued for banning users or removing content, 230 merely ensures that courts will quickly dismiss lawsuits that would have been dismissed anyway on First Amendment grounds, preventing vexatious litigants from being able to run up the bill on frivolous suits.

Given the huge number of bogus lawsuits that might be brought over virtually limitless content, websites could be deterred from trying to moderate content altogether. It’s not just websites that would suffer; it’s their most vulnerable users — and our overall discourse

And that’s what MAGAs are trying to do: force websites to broadcast their speech, no matter how noxious. That’s why they’ve proposed ending 230’s liability shield for moderation of hate speech, misinformation, conspiracy theories, voter suppression, etc
techfreedom.org/wp-content/upl…

The First Amendment protects false speech—with only narrow exceptions—and makes it very difficult to prosecute incitement, even as outrageous as Trump’s

But social media sites have a First Amendment right to take down such speech & ban him for it

#Section230 protects that right

That’s why #Section230 is so vital. It enables private website operators to do what the First Amendment says the government may not: at least try to clean up the Internet

Yes, we should pressure websites to do more, but without 230, that won’t work

So we need 230 more than ever

For more on #Section230, read my latest op-ed in Protocol: protocol.com/we-need-sectio…