Court Laughs Off OAN Conspiracy Network’s Claim It Was ‘Censored’ By DirecTV
from the opiate-of-the-very-gullible-masses dept
When last we checked in with One America News (OAN), it was trying (with the help of numerous Republican AGs) to pretend that DirecTV’s decision to boot the barely watched conspiracy network from its cable lineup was part of a vast, diabolical cabal to censor conservatives. The AG lawsuit filed last March pulls out the traditional “Conservatives are being censored” victimization complex:
“This is an action to redress the unchecked influence and power that Defendants have wielded in an attempt to unlawfully destroy an independent, family-run business and impede the right of American television viewers to watch the news media channels and programs of their choice.”
In reality, DirecTV executives simply didn’t think the channel was worth the trouble, so they didn’t renew OAN when the carriage agreement expired. Cable executives would air no limit of dangerous and unhinged gibberish if it made them money. But OAN’s viewership to headache and liability ratio was never a good mix for the already struggling satellite TV provider
A preliminary ruling by Judge John Meyer of California Superior Court in San Diego County shot down OAN’s breach of contract allegations, setting the stage for what’s expected to be a case dismissal. DirecTV filed an anti-SLAPP motion to strike the Herring Networks (OAN’s parent company) complaint, and DirecTV’s motion was granted in part and denied in part:
“As to the breach of the implied covenant claim, to the extent it is based on the non-renewal of the Affiliation Agreement, the claim fails because the agreement contains a fixed expiration date and no provision entitling Herring to a renewal.”
Despite making a lot of headlines for dangerous bullshit (like the idea COVID was crafted in a North Carolina lab), the news channel never really saw all that many actual viewers. One estimate pegged daily viewership at around 14,000 a few years ago, and that was before the channel got kicked off of DirecTV and Verizon, its biggest distributors.
Without its two major cable distributors, OAN’s now mired in a scrum for attention with an endless sea of far right wing conspiracy influencers and grifters on the Internet. While also fending off other much more notable lawsuits, including Smartmatic’s defamation lawsuit against One America News for spreading baseless election-fraud conspiracy theories.
Filed Under: anti-slapp, anti-slapp laws, conspiracy theories, election conspiracy, political propaganda, propaganda, right wing
Companies: directv, oan
Comments on “Court Laughs Off OAN Conspiracy Network’s Claim It Was ‘Censored’ By DirecTV”
Almost as though they only use the words for their own ends...
Strange, I thought conservatives were big on the free market determining winners and losers and letting companies make their own decisions, demanding that a company keep paying for a failed product certainly seems to be at odds with both of those.
Ah well, I’m sure all the real conservatives will be lining up to roast OAN for their gross contempt for both the free market and free speech any day now.
Any day now…
Re:
Election deniers are pretty much the poster child demanding that voters keep paying for a failed product. So that’s quite in line with what is called “conservatives” these days. And any “strange, I thought conservatives were …” is posturing since it pretends that the term “conservatives” is still commonly employed in a dictionary sense instead of unironically for reactionaries.
Re: Re:
And any “strange, I thought conservatives were …” is posturing since it pretends that the term “conservatives” is still commonly employed in a dictionary sense instead of unironically for reactionaries.
How words are used and what they mean changes by use, that ‘conservative’ as it applies in US politics may have little if anything to do with the dictionary definition of the word doesn’t stop if from being the label they give themselves and what they’re known as.
Re: Re: Re:
As I said. Any “strange, I thought conservatives were …” is posturing, exactly because everyone knows that the term “conservatives” is not used in its dictionary sense in common usage any more.
Re: Re: Re:2
Is it posturing for a conservative to proudly proclaim what they stand for?
Because folks are just repeated what they were told, “strange, I thought conservatives were …”
Bottom line .. bunch of liars, that’s what.
Re: Cool, I can use this now.
Conservatives: LET THE FREE MARKET DECIDE
Free market: decides
Conservatives: this is outRAGEOUS
(All credit to Twitter user @nhbaptiste.)
Re: Re: Exactly what happens with minimum wage
“Conservatives: LET THE FREE MARKET DECIDE
Free market: decides
Conservatives: this is outRAGEOUS”
Yep..This is exactly the conversation on local talk radio over the years…
Conservatives in 2012: “There shouldn’t be a minimum wage, let the market decide wages”
Market: needs to pay fast food workers $15/hour to find enough help to stay open
Conservatives in 2019: “I say McDonald offering $15/hour, You can’t pay burger flippers that much”
Re:
One of my (minor, given everything else, but it’s constant) gripes with the evolution of U.S. politics (and, consequently and more importantly, Canadian politics), has been the steady perversion of conservative thinking, spaces, organizations etc. by bullshit reactionary stuff. Almost nobody who calls themselves, or who is called, a “conservative” these days is actually worth the name.
There’s no interest in keeping the society we have working, nothing in keeping the environment around, nothing about not changing stuff without good reason, and while there’s occasional hot air about individual responsibility and such when your avatars are people like Mr. Trump, the insincerity of such mouth noises is very apparent.
If your entire personality revolves around “do the opposite of those people, just to make them mad” (aka, “own the libs”), that is almost definitionally reactionary. You have no integrity or thoughts of your own, and you’re not a conservative.
And, w.r.t OAN specifically, they are free to say their garbage under American law, but anyone of principle would refuse to do business with them.
Re: Re:
For all of it,
come down to a strange think/thing.
How many Lawyers are in politics, which is a Very Word specific vocation?
Inventing a meaning for a Word that Already has a meaning, only to HIDE what it means to those that use it, is only trying to confuse the issue, problem, What the hell they are trying to do.
Someone needs to PULL the rabbit out of the HAT, and show people WHAT they mean by using the word.
Its like using the words, socialism and communism, and expressing AND OPINION of what they MAY BE. Where if you look at most any country that are blamed for using these concepts, ARNT Either.
Re: Re: Re:
I have no idea what you’re trying to say here.
Randian free market extremists asking the government to make people buy their product. What a crazy world!
As far as I know, DirectTV is a private business.
DirectTV is considered a private business as opposed to a government agency/entity. A government entity is restricted by the first amendment to the Constitution whereas a private business is not.
During “peace time” (aka this is not a war) the US government is not allowed (AFAIK) to force private business to do anything other than pay taxes, not pollute and don’t discriminate. These things are easily avoided for large private interests as their friends in regulatory agencies will look the other way.
Anyways, why are these lawyers not sanctioned for their frivolous waste of the court’s time and resources? Perhaps court filing fees should double each time you bring back the same old tired bullshit arguments.
Re:
I mean, laws tell businesses to do and not do lots of things. It’s the point of laws. The courts as well force businesses to adhere to contractual agreements. All the time. The issue here being trying to use the courts to force compliance with behavior not mandated by law nor precident nor required by private contractual agreement.
Re: Re:
Ummm, ok.
So, why are these frivolous litigators not sanctioned?
Re: Re: Re: See: Prenda
Because for better or worse those involved in the legal system are extremely hesitant to bring the hammer down on their own, such that someone has to go well past above and beyond in abusing the system for that to even possibly be a risk they need to worry about.
“Despite making a lot of headlines for dangerous bullshit (like the idea COVID was crafted in a North Carolina lab), the news channel never really saw all that many actual viewers.”
Part of the problem is that one of those viewers was Donald Trump, and he was heavily promoting them on Twitter after Fox decided that they had to at least pay lip service to the truth on certain issues. Accurate viewership is difficult to obtain because they weren’t monitored by Nielsen, IIRC, but I can’t imagine his promotion didn’t have a positive effect. I wouldn’t like to guess at the actual numbers when DirecTV ended their relationship, but I have a feeling it was much larger than 14k, and if the sitting president was taking notes from them then the influence is far greater than just the numbers of other people watching.
Either way, this seems to be happening as it should. DirecTV did the right thing and decided not to renew their contract after its stated expiry date, so there’s little to be concerned about outside a normal business agreement and avoids conspiracy talk from anyone one at least speaking terms with reality (I know…). Then, the court has explained that normal business was done, and there’s nothing they can really do since the contracts they had signed have been honoured.
Unless the right really want to argue that the government should force private companies to have business contracts with people they don’t wish to do business with, there’s no problem here. In the mean time, OANN haven’t been “censored”, they’ve just not been able to maintain a working relationship with a large supplier, and have to do what all businesses do in that circumstance – change suppliers or change business model. That the other options might be less directly profitable than their old one is neither here nor there.
I look forward to the usual suspects wailing and moaning with half-baked fantasy version of the truth, but unless they actually want to argue for government enforced business relationships (i.e. actual fascism/communism, not the other stuff they claim looks like it), I don’t see that there’s much to argue here. OANN still has freedom of speech and freedom to do business, they just can’t force others to take part with them.
Re:
Having someone add commentary to your speech is ‘censorship’…
Not being able to use someone else’s property to speak from is ‘censorship’…
Someone telling the property owner that you might be violating their rules is ‘censorship’…
And now someone deciding that they don’t want to continue a business relationship that’s financially and reputationally bad for them is ‘censorship’.
Honestly the people screaming about how they’re being ‘censored’ just need to cut to the chase and admit that ‘not being able to say whatever you want, wherever you want, with no consequences’ is how they’re using the word.
Re: Re:
It’s hilarious that these “conservatives” like to imply violence towards those they don’t like but are afraid of said violence being dished to them when it’s stated…
Remember kids, Conservatives play by spoiled toddler rules and if you don’t just roll over and let them do or take whatever they want, that’s censorship. If you let other people have things, that’s communism. You have the freedom to support giving them what they want, when they want it with a smile on your face, because they’ll scream if you don’t.
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Re:
Unless you’ve met and interacted with every single person who claims to be conservative, you can’t say anything about them as a group, because everyone is different. People aren’t monolithic blocks. Qualify your statements with words like “some” or “many” if you want to be accurate in any way. So with that in mind, it’s time for… the Generalization Song!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
We don’t care if we’re right
We don’t care if we’re wrong
We don’t care what they say
We just gripe the day away
Don’t matter we’ve not seen much
Don’t matter what we hear
Don’t matter what we know
Our minds ain’t gonna change
Stuck like tires in the snow
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Stubborn pride is our way
Quick assumptions make our day
Bein’ wrong we can’t bear
We’ve got biases to spare
Don’t matter we’ve not seen much
Don’t matter what we hear
Don’t matter what we know
Our minds ain’t gonna change
Stuck like tires in the snow
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Generalize! Let’s generalize!
Re: Re:
The above illiterate post brought to you by BDAC.
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It is hilarious that woke ideologues are cheering this (correct) decision when they have never stopped complaining about the removal of the “Fairness Doctrine”, which required private companies to submit to exactly this sort of forced broadcasting, based on the fiction that use of allocated spectrum gives the government the right to dictate what is said on it.
Re:
Yeah, except that isn’t a fiction, and hardly anyone modern enough to be “woke” even cares about it.
Then again, some call Joe Biden “woke”, so lmfao whatever.
And then there’s those woke ideologues who demand private companies host their speech.
Re:
There is nothing more hilarious than the term “liberal media”.
Re: Re:
Reminder: Roger Ailes created FOX because he thought the “liberal” media was pushing too many true facts, and thus there needed to exist a voice for the polar opposite of facts – the conservative agenda.
Re: Re: Re:
Then provide the documents that prove it. A claim without evidence is meritless. Oh and he didn’t create FOX, it already existed when he came to work there. I checked. If you can’t even get that right, everything else you say is suspect.
Re: Re: Re:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-roger-ailes-built-the-fox-news-fear-factory-244652/
Re:
Use of the airwaves cannot be run as a free market, as bandwidth is limited. A competitor cannot enter the market unless an existing player leaves the market, hence it is
more regulated.
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Re: Re:
Organizing who gets to use a limited resource is not the same as restricting the free speech of those who use it. You are simply and obviously wrong. Allocation can be run as an auction or as a lottery, both consistent with a free market.
Re: Re: Re:
DirecTV isn’t obliged to carry OANN past the length of any contract it once had with the network. OANN isn’t entitled to be carried by any cable or satellite provider that doesn’t want to carry it (which seems like…well, pretty much all of them at this point). OANN can continue to broadcast via the Internet (which it has) and neither DirecTV nor the U.S. government can prevent that. So the relevant question is as follows: Who is limiting OANN’s freedom of speech?
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Re: Re: Re:2
You really are an idiot, aren’t you? I said that this court decision was correct. I was also pointing out that when the shoe was on the other foot, woke ideologues bitterly complained about the end of the Fairness Doctrine.
Re:
What are woke ideologues? Can you also give any examples of them complaining about the removal of the fairness doctrine?
No, the government couldn’t dictate what was said at all – it dictated that due to the scarcity of allocated spectrum at the time, ie in essence it was government supported monopoly of a scarce resource, broadcasters had to allocate programming time for opposing views to serve the community in general – ie provide fair coverage of public issues and provide time for replies from citizens for previous mentioned public issues.
Re:
“woke ideologues” … what does this mean?
Wasn’t it conservatives who cheered removal of the fairness doctrine? Wasn’t that time preceding the internet? Why even bring this up? It was not forced broadcasting in that broadcasting the original piece was voluntary. Broadcasters were only required to broadcast the rebuttal if there was something to rebutt – no? Clearly not the same.
Re:
woke ideologues
Thank you for that donation to trans youth.
Re:
Please link to any BestNetTech post or comment complaining about the removal of the Fairness Doctrine.
Re:
Hey Hyman, since you keep calling us here at BestNetTech “woke ideologues” and we have spoken out explicitly against the fairness doctrine, can you explain what the fuck you think you mean here?
Or, can you just admit that you smear everyone with the claim of being a “woke ideologue” when they don’t support your bigotry and your obsession with what genitalia other people have?
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Re: Re:
Just as the 1st Amendment does not represent the totality of free speech, the writers and commenters on TD do not represent the totality of woke ideologues.
In general, it has been Democrats who supported the FD and Republican who opposed it: https://www.truthorfiction.com/the-fairness-doctrine-and-ronald-reagan/
Similarly, the woke organization FAIR wrote in favor of restoring it: https://fair.org/extra/the-fairness-doctrine/
Re: Re: Re:
“the 1st Amendment does not represent the totality of free speech”
Please, feel free to elucidate your understanding of the term “Free Speech”.
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Re: Re: Re:2
Free speech is the ability to state opinions on a platform without the owners of the platform silencing that speech when they disagree with its viewpoint.
Re: Re: Re:3
“Free speech is the ability to state opinions on a platform without the owners of the platform silencing that speech when they disagree with its viewpoint.”
You’re talking about a private business?
What if a private business refused to bake a cake?
Do you think the government should force a private business to do things only when you agree with it?
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Re: Re: Re:4
Once again, because you woke ideologues like the censorship that the private platforms provide(d) for you, you couch free speech in terns of force, by government or otherwise.
A platform may have the legal right to deprive its users of the ability to speak freely, but if it does so, then it is impeding their freedom of speech.
Re: Re: Re:5
… said no rational person, ever.
Re: Re: Re:5 Huh?
Tell me you have no idea what the 1st amendment covers without telling me you have no idea what the first amendment covers.
The 1st amendment (aka ‘Free Speech’) covers preventing the GOVERNMENT from blocking your rights of free speech.
A private organization has ZERO legal requirement to allow any side unfettered rights of speech. ZERO. Get that? none. Zero. Zilch. Nada.
Meanwhile, your position denies the platform’s rights of Free Speech if that were a legal requirement.
A platform can no more be forced to carry other peoples thoughts than you can be enforced to say things you do not want to say.
This information is horribly easy to look up – I have no idea why so many people remain totally ignorant of these FACTS.
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Re: Re: Re:6
Because you woke ideologues liked the censorship the large generic speech platforms were providing for you, you continue to couch freedom of speech in terms of rights and force. But freedom of speech is not solely about rights and force, nor about the government and the 1st Amendment.
Freedom of speech is the ability to speak on a platform without having that speech silenced by the owners of the platform based on the viewpoints of the opinions.
When it is the government doing the silencing or compelling the speech, force and rights and the 1st Amendment may indeed be involved. When it is a private platform doing so, then its own free speech means that it may choose to censor others. If it does so, it is still censorship, and still deprives the speakers of their own free speech. Not their right to free speech, which they don’t have on a private platform, but their ability to exercise it on that platform.
Since depriving people of free speech runs counter to a foundational value of our society, private platforms who choose to censor should be encouraged, but not forced, to stop doing that.
Re: Re: Re:3
So, according to you, you can push a satanist agenda on a christian platform. That is not how freedom of association, or speech, for that matter works. You are not interested in freedom of speech, but rather the ability to dictate what others can say and think.
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Re: Re: Re:4
Not at all. There is no pushing involved. If a private platform wishes to deprive its users of the freedom to speak freely, nothing but public shaming should compel it to change its ways.
Re: Re: Re:5
“If a private platform wishes to deprive its users of the freedom to speak freely, nothing but public shaming should compel it to change its ways.”
So, what’s the problem here? OANN spoke. DirecTV opted not to be associated with that speech. Public opinion seems to be supporting DirecTV. OANN can still speak freely, they just can’t use DirecTV’s property to do it.
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Re: Re: Re:6
No problem with the OAN result. I was just pointing out that, in contradistinction, it was generally the political left who supported the Fairness Doctrine’s government-completed speech.
Re: Re: Re:7
Care to provide some evidence that would back up your assertion?
Or, as per usual, you just make shit up just so it helps your narrative.
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Re: Re: Re:8
Already posted. Simply find each flagged comment and supply the simple single click needed to show it, and you’ll see it. Remember, flagging is not suppression or censorship, so you should have no trouble.
Re: Re: Re:7
“it was generally the political left who supported the Fairness Doctrine’s government-completed speech”
That only applied to public property. There’s a slight difference.
Re: Re: Re:5
… is 100% impossible
Re: Re: Re:5
They’re not depriving anyone of the freedom to speak freely.
If Facebook feels it doesn’t want to carry the words of a White Supremacist then said bigot is totally free to find a platform that will – e.g. Truth Social, Gab, Parlar etc.
Facebook in that case have done NOTHING to prevent that.
There’s no requirement ANY private platform is required to carry anyone’s posts. Period.
Re: Re: Re:3
So you have zero understanding of free speech, got it.
Re: Re: Re:4
Zero? I think they’ve plunged into negative territory…
Re: Re: Re:3
So, show us the lawyer’s letters Mike sent you then.
Oh wait. Mike never sent any.
Re: Re: Re:3
I want to exercise my free speech and I am forcing you to host it, ok? So go put on this T-shirt that says “I’m an ignorant asshole” right now and don’t remove it until I say so.
Re: Re: Re:3
For someone who rails against “woke ideologues” and “the left,” you do realize that you’re describing communism, right? Where there is no such thing as private property rights?
This is way more communist and extreme leftist than basically anything anyone has ever stated in our comments.
Who knew Hyman was such a “woke ideologue”?
Re: Re: Re:4
As always, because you liked the censorship that the large generic speech platforms were providing for you, you continue to insist that I am speaking about forcing platforms not to deprive their users of free speech.
But of course I have never suggested such a thing. Private platforms, including the large generic ones, have the right to censor their users and deprive them of free speech. But because free speech is a foundational value of the US, those platforms should not do that, and if they do, they should be encouraged to stop, by marshaling popular opinion against them, or by having someone who supports free speech buy them out.
To repeat, as many times as necessary, free speech is the ability to speak freely on a platform without the owners of the platform silencing opinions based on their viewpoint. The ability to speak freely, not the right to speak freely. The right exists when compelled by law or constitution, but even when the right does not exist, the ability does, and when the platform deprives users of the ability, they are violating the principles of free speech. Free speech is not defined by the 1st Amendment. The 1st Amendment is a subset and an example of free speech, not its entirety.
Re: Re: Re:5
As always, you tapdance around the issue: which is your communistic belief that private property owners should give up their private property rights.
Hyman, your vision of “free speech” is not free speech at all. It’s nonsense. It’s an impossible fiction, in which you are insisting that private companies should eschew their own rights.
As for your false claim that I “liked the censorship” stop lying. I have regularly and repeatedly criticized the moderation (not censorship) choices of Twitter, Facebook and other companies. I have long argued that they go too far, and that’s why I proposed the whole “protocols not platforms” concept, so that those companies would not be the final arbiters.
But you can believe that those companies do a bad job while still recognizing that it is not just their right, but a necessity to do some moderation.
Even you know this. You have long said that companies SHOULD delete swearing, because it offends your pathetic sensibilities. Everyone has their own lines. Yours are particularly obnoxious: you want companies to “censor” (in your words) swearing, but that they should leave up insulting language that helps drive violence against marginalized communities.
It’s a choice. One that suggests your deep, deep insecurities. But even you know that moderation is necessary, and a core element of property rights.
But, at least just admit that you’re woker than woke in denying private entities their own property rights. You’re the biggest leftist we’ve had around here, dude.
Re: Re: Re:6
Apparently woke ideologues are so far gone that they believe that the only way to get people to behave properly is to stamp on their face with a boot heel until they comply (and it’s OK as long as it’s their boot heel, because they are good and just and know what’s right for everyone). You seem literally unable to comprehend that people can choose to behave properly or not, and that people can be encouraged or shamed into behaving properly without the application of force, when they have the right to behave improperly.
My “vision” of free speech is that people should be allowed to argue their opinions without being silenced by platform owners who disagree with their viewpoints. The vision is simple and straightforward, but, people being people, its implementation is not. Every platform must moderate to be useful, because there will always be people who spam, post off-topic, or violate decorum in ways that make the forum so noisy that intended discussions cannot take place. The difference between moderation and censorship is that moderation controls the form of speech while censorship controls its content. That’s easy enough to understand, if not to implement, but woke ideologues cannot accept that, because to them, dissent from their viewpoints must be silenced; they construe dissent as harm to their favored victim groups. That’s also why you keep insisting that moderation and censorship are the same thing. That way you can continue claiming that censorship is necessary by attempting to frighten the rubes into thinking that not censoring will lead to avalanches of spam.
How a platform chooses to moderate is up to the owners of that platform. You like cursing because it is the only way you have of responding to truths that you find unpleasant. That’s fine. Your platform, your rules. You pretend to support freedom of speech but allow flagging to be used to harass people whose viewpoints are correct but hateful to you. Your platform, your rules.
Between you, and Cushing, and Bode, BestNetTech had become a parody of itself. It isn’t even necessary to read the posts to know what the article will say. If it’s you, it’s another resentful complaint about Musk. If it’s Cushing, it’s another resentful complaint about law enforcement. If it’s Bode, it’s another resentful complaint about telecom companies. Basically, the articles have no value except as a place from which to make comments criticizing their errors and viewpoints.
Re: Re: Re:7
I have seen no evidence to support this claim. I do see this view from people like you, who seem to support a rather fascistic standard for how other people must act, say, and believe.
Since you continue to falsely accuse me of being “woke,” can you point to a single fucking example of where I do that?
No, I absolutely believe that and advocate for that every day here on BestNetTech. Which you would know if you weren’t blinded by your idiotic beliefs.
Right. You are advocating that private businesses should not exercise their own rights. Why? Why are you against those rights?
So you FUCKING ADMIT that every site must moderate. Which is all we’ve ever said.
This is something entirely made up in your head, dude. The people who ran moderation teams for Twitter and other sites are simply trying to make their sites safer and more useable. At a certain point, having people abuse and harass their users isn’t going to fly.
NO SITE moderates based on “viewpoint.” They moderate to stop abuse and harassment.
I don’t know why you can’t get this through your impenetrably thick skull, but it would help if you realized that.
No. I have never insisted that “moderation and censorship are the same thing.” I have, in fact, spent plenty of time explaining the difference to you.
You keep insisting otherwise, but go on…
No. I like cursing, because I believe in truth and honestly expressing myself. So if you’re a fucking asshole, I’m going to call you a fucking asshole, and not hide behind some lie.
No one is being “harassed” by the flagging. You, on the other hand, deliberately disrespected and harassed people because of your obnoxious, perverted obsession with what genitalia they had, something that is none of your fucking business.
The fact that our traffic, users, and interactions continue to grow suggests otherwise.
But all of this raises a big question: WHY THE FUCK do you stick around? Go the fuck away, already. You’re not useful. You’re not insightful. You’re a weird idiot pervert with confused views, a weird obsession with accusing anyone smarter and more compassionate than you with being a “woke ideologue.” Go live in a fucking hole somewhere.
Re: Re: Re:8
I am not against the rights. I believe that in a society that holds freedom of speech to be a foundational value, it is bad to censor people based on the viewpoint of their opinions, and therefore private businesses should choose not to do that, even though they have the right. It’s the same way that, even though men can never be women and Black people commit a disproportionately high share of crime, and I have the right to say that, you believe I should not exercise that right.
People here routinely flag posts they don’t like, or posts by people they don’t like, even though those posts are not abusive, trolling, or spam by a “reasonable person” criterion, as the flag button says it is meant to be used. They do that, and you support them doing that, as a way to harass those writers into going away or remaining silent, despite your much vaunted claims of being a supporter of free speech. That is because you only support free speech for ideas that you like, or for ideas that are so obviously wrong that stating them can only make them less popular (like Nazis marching in Skokie back in the day, especially since Jews don’t count https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews_Don%27t_Count ). When the free speech contains viewpoints that you hate but are popular, such as the Florida anti-wokeness agenda, that’s when you seek legalistic ways to have those views silenced, such as Twitter and Facebook once gave you.
I stick around because arguing with people who are dead set in their opinions and also desperately wrong about them is fun. That being so, I’m glad your site is continuing to do well, so I can continue my little hobby.
Re: Re: Re:9
Hyman NO ONE IS CENSORING PEOPLE BASED ON THEIR VIEWPOINT.
Stop pretending otherwise.
All they’re doing is EXACTLY what you said they NEEDED to do: moderating abusive assholes to make their platform useful.
I know you are so wedged up your own ignorance that you insist that your harassment and abuse is actually some brave “truth telling,” but you’re full of shit. You are harassing marginalized communities with little power, and a long history of facing violence from people who think like you.
I’m sorry that you’re a pathetic ignorant fool. I hope one day you realize what a shithead you’ve been.
Re: Re: Re:10
When you finally have no response, your solution is to eliminate the dissent, huh?
Here is the same response posted as AC, to avoid your harassing little moderation queue and bitbucket:
The flaw in this response is that even marginalized communities who have faced long histories of violence can be utterly wrong in their beliefs, and no amount of their history justifies affirming lies. So:
Men can never become women nor women men, no matter how poorly trans people have been treated by their societies.
Black people commit a disproportionately large share of crime in the US, no matter how poorly Black people have been treated by our society.
Illegal aliens have no right to be in the US, no matter how poor conditions are in their home countries.
Gods do not exist, no matter how badly religious minorities have been persecuted.
Re: Re: Re:11
… said nobody not on hallucinogens, ever.
Re: Re: Re:7
In the real world, that’s transphobes like Hyman.
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What is a woke ideologue?
Sure, the Kennedy’s absolutely used it as a strategic weapon against the Republicans. But if you think about it just for a moment, how could they do that so successfully?
Oh, you found an 18 year old article that was written as a response to Sinclair Broadcast Group’s shenanigan’s. In 2017 SBG was up to some shit again which in turn led to that even Ajit Pai had to speak up about it in July 2018 and if it’s one thing I’m certain about it’s that Mr Pai isn’t a woke ideologue. You might think the two things are totally unrelated, but they aren’t because they both are based on SBG’s monopolistic behavior and how they try do end runs around broadcast-regulation.
Here’s the thing with you, anyone or anything that doesn’t agree with your twisted worldview gets labeled as woke. It’s your little comforter you use when the world and the people around you gets too “scary” for you to handle.
Another thing, if someone would be in favor of the fairness doctrine it would be you considering how you harp about “free speech is more than the 1A” and how social media shouldn’t moderate etc because at it’s core the reasoning is the same. Although, that would mean having understanding what is meant by “controversial issues of public importance”.
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Re: Re: Re:2
Free speech is more than the 1st Amendment. But it includes the 1st Amendment, so private platforms cannot be forced by the government to speak in the way the government wants, which is what the Fairness Doctrine did.
Platforms must absolutely moderate their content, because without moderation, any attempts at speech will be drowned out by noise. But moderation is not censorship. Moderation deals with the form of speech – spam, topicality, decorum – while censorship deals with the content of speech, picking viewpoints that will not be permitted to be spoken. Private platforms should then be encouraged not to censor, but should not be forced not to censor.
Wokeness is a constellation of hard-left false beliefs that have in common a rejection of reality in favor of ideology: Men can become women. Black crime must be ignored. Illegal aliens must stay. Unqualified people must be admitted based on race. Ability must not be tested for. Religious practice must be subordinated. The US was founded to perpetuate slavery.
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“Wokeness is a constellation of hard-left false beliefs”
That is not what Florida Man, Ron Desantis says it is.
What terminology do you prefer when making reference to Flat Earthers? Are they also false beliefs?
I’m quite certain there are folk of all political pov which hold false beliefs .. which ones are your pet peeve?
Looks like you listed some fav GOP talking points, anything in particular?
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Re: Re: Re:4
My favorite pet peeve is woke gender ideology, because its obvious falsehood can be demonstrated by nothing more than open eyes and rational thought. The lies of, say, critical race theory require some research to demonstrate.
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…projected nobody with open eyes and rational thought, ever.
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Said no student of humanity ever. All people are asking is to be left alone to live their lives, and they have difficulty doing that when people like you try to force then into a mold that does not fit them. Nobody is demanding they you become their friend, just that you use the pronouns and name they use if you have to interact with them, otherwise you are quite free to ignore them.
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Demanding pronouns is demanding affirmation of falsehood, so no, they do not get that. Politely stating pronouns is fine, and I have no problem using them in a social context where no affirmation is implied, rather like calling someone with an EdD “doctor”. They also do not get to force their way into single-sex spaces for which their bodies disqualify them against the wishes of the people already there.
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…said nobody mentally competent, ever.
Re: Re: Re:8
I am whatever gender the fuck I say I am and you’re going to like it!
Re: Re: Re:3
If people were trying to stop you speaking on a platform you own and control, you would have a claim of censorship, and a right to ask the government to protect your freedom of speech. That does not give you the right to speak on any platform where you and views are not welcome.
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Re: Re: Re:4
Censorship is the act of the censor, silencing speech based on viewpoint on platforms the censor controls. Censorship has nothing to do with rights of people to speak on a platform. When people do have such rights, they might be able to compel the censor to stop censoring, but that’s a different issue than whether censorship is taking place.
Re: Re: Re:5
“Censorship is the act of the censor, silencing speech based on viewpoint on platforms the censor controls.”
A.K.A. private property rights. That’s why there’s a difference made between public and private property in law.
You have the right to speak. You have the right to do so without the government controlling you. You do not have the right to use someone else’s private property to speak.
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Re: Re: Re:6
Correct. And when someone denies you the right to speak on their private property based on the viewpoint of your speech, they are censoring you.
Re: Re: Re:7
There is a difference between you can’t say that here, and you can’t say that anywhere. It is useful in discussion to use moderation and censorship for those two situations. Twitter banning you for attacking trans people is moderation, Devin Nunes using lawsuits to silence people is censorship, especially as by doing that he scares people unknown to remain silent because of the threat of lawsuits.
That is Twitter is not stopping you spouting your bile, they are just saying take you speech elsewhere. Devin Nunes of the other hand is telling people do not criticize me anywhere if you want to stay out of court.
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Re: Re: Re:8
No, those cases are not different. Censorship is the act of the censor, silencing speech based on viewpoint on platforms the censor controls. If Twitter silences speech that way, it is committing censorship. If the courts silence speech that way, they are committing censorship. The ability for people silenced on one platform to speak on another is irrelevant.
You woke ideologues would like to have it differently because you enjoyed the censorship that the large generic speech platforms were providing for you. But you screech loudly anyway when the Florida government, acting just as much within its rights as Twitter did, removes woke gender ideology and critical race theory from its public school curriculum.
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“But you screech loudly anyway when the Florida government, acting just as much within its rights as Twitter did, removes woke gender ideology and critical race theory from its public school curriculum.”
Gee, I wonder what the difference is between a private property owner exercising their rights and the government enforcing censorship is?
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The government of Florida is not committing censorship when it exercises its legal and constitutional right to set the curriculum of its public schools and universities and to curate the works offered by its public libraries, because it is controlling only its own speech, including that of its employees while they are on the job, not of anyone else who wants to speak freely. If the people of Florida want their government to use a different policy, they have the right to petition their government for change, and to vote their elected officials out of office.
If employees of the CDC and FDA wanted to speak against vaccines as part of their job, it would not be censorship for the agencies to prevent them from doing so. The government gets to speak for itself as it wishes, and its employees have no 1st Amendment right to speak differently as representatives of the government, only as private citizens.
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People have only have the rights on a private property that the owner grants them when it comes to speech, and if the owner tells them upfront that some speech wont be tolerated per their discretion they either agree to that or go somewhere else.
The above is something you don’t get because you don’t understand discretion in any shape or form.
Re: Re: Re:8 Prior Restraint
This is known as “prior restraint”. It’s unconstitutional when the government does it, and violates the principles of free speech when private platforms do it.
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“It’s unconstitutional when the government does it”
Yes. Such is the difference between government and private actors.
“violates the principles of free speech when private platforms do it”
No, it’s other people exercising their own free speech. One major principle of free speech is others getting to tell you to shut up. Another is free association, which is other people telling you they don’t want you associating with them.
This is the concept you don’t understand. If other people tell you that they don’t want to be near you, that’s not a violation of your rights. It would be a violation of everyone else’s rights to force them to associate with you. Maybe instead of whining about how it’s not fair that nobody likes you, it might occur to you to work out why that’s the case.
Re: Re: Re:10
It’s not a violation of your rights. It’s a violation of your ability to speak your opinions without being silenced for your viewpoint. In a society that has freedom of speech as a foundational value, large generic speech platforms should not be silencing opinions based on viewpoint, and if they do, they should be encouraged, shamed, or bought out to get them to change.
Re: Re: Re:7
They can’t control anything outside of their own property. If everyone else is telling you to GTFO their property, maybe the problem is not the platforms and maybe the solution is not to deny private property rights and rights to free association?
Re: Re: Re:3
The fairness doctrine never forced anyone to speak in the way the government wanted. The government didn’t give a rats ass about what was spoken.
I’ll just point out then that stopping someone from choosing who they want to associate with is a form of censorship and if we then also talk about an internet service its a form of deprivation of property.
Ah, so that is how it works. Well, that must mean you are a right-wing white supremacy nazi-terrorist bent on the cleansing of anyone not adhering to your political views or of your race. I mean, we have seen that constellation of beliefs from the right, haven’t we? So when are you going to start killing the woke people in terrorist attacks?
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Re: Re: Re:4
The government forcing speech, which is what the Fairness Doctrine was, should never have been permitted, the fig leaf of “the public owns the airwaves” notwithstanding.
I am certainly not demanding the ability to force anyone to associate with anyone else. Woke ideologues deliberately conflate moral suasion with use of force so that they can correctly state that such force is not permitted, while sidestepping the moral question altogether.
Re: Re: Re:5
“The government forcing speech, which is what the Fairness Doctrine was, should never have been permitted”
That only applied to channels broadcast on public property, which is why Fox and other propaganda channels weren’t bound by it, since they were on private property.
“the fig leaf of “the public owns the airwaves” notwithstanding”
Sure, if you ignore the thing that makes them different, they’re exactly the same!
“I am certainly not demanding the ability to force anyone to associate with anyone else.”
Yes, you are. You’re saying that if a private platform does not wish to be associated with something, they still have to allow it, even if it hurt them commercially.
Re: Re: Re:6
What you are saying is that if the government allows public parks or public school auditoriums to host speech programs, the government should be allowed to force each such program to offer a counterpoint to its presentation because “the public owns the facility”. No, that’s not how the 1st Amendment works. The government cannot, or at least should not be able to, compel speech from private parties just because it’s providing the venue.
But you do provide evidence for my point that it is woke ideologues who support the FD.
Re: Re: Re:7
You are going to get fucked by an Amazonian futa and you are going to like it.
You are nothing more than a wallet and sperm donor with legs, and your days in the spotlight are numbered.
Expect us.
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Re: Re: Re:4
Killing the woke is silly policy, even disregarding the fact that killing people for wrongthink is immoral. It’s far better to let the woke be hoist on their own petard. Woke ideology is so stupid, self-contradictory, and wrong that the most effective way to destroy it is to tell people exactly what the woke believe. Hence the popularity of things like LibsOfTikTok and its ability to drive the woke to apoplexy.
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No, Free Speech IS the first amendment.
Everything else is editorial control.
Meanwhile which party is banning lessons on race, demanding books be banned from PUBLIC libraries, ignoring MEDICAL advice and playing Doctors and now even wanting to prevent chosen pronouns to be used BY FINING PEOPLE WHO DO SO?
Yeah, you may call us “woke” be we’re not the ones who’re so scared of real life that they’re trying to silence it.
What you all afraid of? Words? They scare you THAT MUCH?
OMG – it’s a rainbow – let’s in-prison the artist.
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Re: Re: Re:4
Freedom of speech is the ability to speak freely without having opinions silenced based on their viewpoint. The US government may not deprive its citizens of free speech. Private entities may deprive people of free speech on platforms they control. But the fact that such censorship is legal is irrelevant to whether deprivation of free speech is occurring.
Whataboutism of idiocy perpetuated by conservatives does not render woke ideology any less false, evil, or stupid. Woke ideology centers on forcing people to affirm lies, about gender, about race, about crime, about ability, and has very real and damaging effects. Naturally woke ideologues would like to lie and say “it’s just words”, while also trying to use Orwellian control of language to use those words to propagate their lies.
Re: Re: Re:5
“Freedom of speech is the ability to speak freely without having opinions silenced based on their viewpoint.”
No, it’s not. What you people tend to ignore is the fact that other people also have freedom of speech. Me telling you to STFU and GTFO of my property is also free speech. You are free to speak, you are not free from consequences of said speech from other members of the public.
“Woke ideology centers on forcing people to affirm lies, about gender, about race, about crime, about ability”
No, it means that just because you claim the things other people believe are “lies”, that doesn’t shield you from consequences from anyone else other than the government.
“very real and damaging effects”
Such as mental distress and suicide, among other things, from bigoted hatemongers who tell people they shouldn’t have human rights?
No, of course, bullies don’t often think their bullying is wrong. Which is why decent people rally around to protect them.
Re: Re: Re:6
Yes, it is. Private platforms get to use their own freedom of speech to deprive other people of theirs on that platform, but that is exactly what they are doing – depriving those people of the ability to speak freely on that platform. And I am not suggesting that people be free from the consequences of their speech, except in contexts where such freedom is expected, such as in academic discourse, only that people not be prevented from speaking.
Woke ideologues have no trouble calling out the harms caused by lies from their opponents – climate change skepticism, vaccine denial, forced birth. But they will not see that their own lies are just as pernicious, including the much vaunted claim that it is necessary to tell men and women that they can become other than the sex of their bodies so that they do not kill themselves. It is the same as telling people who believe they’re birds that they can exit safely through windows.
Re: Re: Re:7
“Private platforms get to use their own freedom of speech to deprive other people of theirs on that platform, but that is exactly what they are doing – depriving those people of the ability to speak freely on that platform”
The only freedom you have the right to on someone else’s property is the freedom they grant you.
For example, if you’re a transphobic hateful prick, they will tell you to GTFO so that everyone else can discuss real issues without you injecting your half-baked distortions of the real world into conversations unrelated to it.
So far, the only complaint you still seem to have is “I get banned when I attack trans people, and I don’t like other people telling me to shut up”. Which is fine, but nobody else has to put up with you if they don’t wish to. I know you people hate that you are a minority with no power over the platforms that others use, but that’s life.
Re: Re: Re:8
Telling people to shut up is not the same as forcibly silencing them. And yes, I already know that woke ideologues want to silence their opponents everywhere they can. Fortunately, that is hardly working. LibsOfTikTok now has a very active feed on Twitter. The rioting and arson in Atlanta is similarly on view.
All you are doing is repeating that private platforms have the right to silence anyone, a fact that I never dispute. What you woke ideologues willfully fail to understand is that in a society that has freedom of speech as a foundational value, private platforms should, as a matter of morality, choose not to silence people, and if they do, they should be criticized and shamed into stopping.
Re: Re: Re:9
Can I offer you a femboy in this trying time?
I’m just waiting for the Texas AG to force DirecTV to carry OAN because of viewpoint discrimination and must carry laws.
I’m guessing it will happen any minute now, since OAN is basically on life support at this point.
Counter offer?
Idly musing-
I wonder about OAN’s reaction if DirecTV said “OK fine, we’ll carry your programming. The carrying charge is $150k/day; please pre-pay by the month.”
Ignorance is bliss
Ya know I had to pour bleach into the TV when I realized just what OAN was. Sheesh. What a bunch of maroons.
Reminder: AT$T created OAN
Re:
So who knows, Texas surely isn’t rational enough to not try to sue them for letting its non-viable offspring die a natural death under their fascistic anti-Abortion laws.
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Re: Re:
No abortion is natural. Unless you think dismemberment is somehow natural, that is. Why do are you against the preservation of life and the protection of the innocent?
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Miscarriages are natural abortions.
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… said nobody mentally competent, ever.
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Why do are you against the preservation of life and the protection of the innocent?
Texas also has the death penalty.
I fail to see how that preserves life.
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No medical procedure is natural, so if that’s your beef never seek medical help and die screaming.
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“No abortion is natural.”
Well, apart from miscarriages, the recipes for plants that can cause one (some listed in the Bible), etc.
You know what’s explicitly not natural? Being forced into a monogamous relationship with a rapist. Also “natural” isn’t always positive. It used to be natural to 10 kids because 5 of them didn’t make it to adulthood, and the diseases that killed them were part of nature..
“Why do are you against the preservation of life and the protection of the innocent?”
You appear to consider “the innocent” to solely be unborn fetuses and not women who were raped, etc. I’m sorry, but when the choice is between a “potential” life and the life of the woman who already exists, some are going to side with the person who is already here.
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Bet you’re one of those loonies that think that a woman with an ectopic pregnancy should be forced to carry the fetus to birth, right?
Why are YOU against the preservation of life?
Bet you’re also against the ability for women who’ve been raped – especially by a family member – from having an abortion.
Why are YOU against the protection of the innocent?
Drat! And here I was thinking that it stood for Odourous and Nasty!
Chozen and Matthew Bennett collectively losing their shit in each other’s twisted panties in 3, 2, 1…
Funny how “The First Amendment” is Mosaic law right up to the part where it grants “the freedom to associate”. That part always seems to be forgotten.
Re:
Just like how the first part of the 2A is forgotten.
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As evidenced by all the illiterate morons thinking it means it only apllies to members of established armed forces or banned by laws.
And now the free market had dumped ademanded-far-more-than-it’s-worth Newsmax as well.