Thread by @ErrataRob

This is why I feel like Winston Smith in the opening of Nineteen Eighty Four, I remember a time when this issue meant something different.

https://twitter.com/mmasnick/status/1350260216823128066

Here's is the "censorship episode" of the show "WKRP in Cincinnati", where you see Andy (radio station program director) argue "free enterprise" against preacher "Dr. Bob Hallier" who is using boycotts to get them to remove music from the radio:

Or, if you prefer a transcript of that scene:
subslikescript.com/series/WKRP_in…

Now which side is "free enterprise" has reversed itself. Now when Amazon/Twitter/Facebook cave to outside pressure, it's okay, because it's not the government forcing them, just private groups.

But logically, it's not "free enterprise". Twitter suspended @realDonaldTrump not because it was best for profits, maximizing shareholder returns. They did it because they caved to outside pressure. Same with Amazon canceling Parler.

That's been the argument against Facebook for a couple of years: they aren't doing the "right thing" censoring right-wing content because they are capitalists concerned about profits.

It's like the change in fighting Eurasia and East Asia in 1984. Here, the change is how "censorship" was defined in the 1980s and 1990s when it was Christians pressuring radio stations and MTV. Now it's somehow no longer "censorship" when people pressure Twitter/Facebook.