[deno]

> You can absolutely run a company that allows users to communicate in interesting ways, and say you support freedom but also refuse to show content you don't want to.

You can say you support free speech and ban free speech you don’t like. What?

[cpncrunch]

>You can say you support free speech and ban free speech you don’t like. What?

Actually most countries that have free speech do actually ban certain things that fall under hate speech laws.

Some of the things in the parent comment aren't hate speech. However I think it's certainly possible for a company or government to decide between what should be allowed or not allowed, and to do that in a way that isn't morally objectionable.

Your argument seems to be something along the lines that companies and governments cannot possibly censor free speech in a morally acceptable way. It's a slippery slope argument: "ban ISIS and you'll eventually ban Trump supporters" (that seems to be jimmywanger's argument).

[jimmywanger]

No, no slippery slope argument here. My argument is that hate speech is in the eye of the beholder, and is not well defined.

If we had well defined guidelines, such as pedophilia defined as nude people under 18 years old, that would be one thing. Although ridiculous (see all the teenagers who are put on registries for sending naked pictures to each other), at least it can't be twisted to make something else illegal.

Go ahead, define "hate speech". And if the laws already ban hate speech, why wouldn't we just punish the people who violate laws instead of censoring them?

And since hate speech laws vary from society to society, do we have to create a separate site for each country, where the allowable videos shown differ, and the comments are pruned differently?

[CamperBob2]

It's a slippery slope argument: "ban ISIS and you'll eventually ban Trump supporters" (that seems to be jimmywanger's argument).

The same moral authority would be at work in both cases, so there's no fallacy in play, IMHO. It's a very valid concern.

[VikingCoder]

(1) I support your ability to speak.

(2) I have a forum.

(3) I do not need to allow you to speak your awful, disgusting crap in my forum.

Is there a part of this that's complicated?

[jimmywanger]

Yes. You're missing:

(4) I will pretend to champion free speech and reap the good publicity, while simultaneously not allowing you to speak things I think are awful and disgusting.

That's the last point. If you're running a SF Giants' forum, you have the right to ban LA Dodgers' fans. However, you should not say that you're a bastion of freedom and upholding free speech at the same time you're doing it.

[iofj]

(5) Extend "awful and disgusting" to anything that -however mildly- goes against your commercial interests or personal interests of anyone placed high enough in the organization.

(6) Still claim you're a bastion of free speech.

and -lately-

(7) Monetize other's expressions of correct free speech.

Ironically people actually seem to think this is worth doing. Compare youtube comments and people's opinions of them with, say reddit or wikipedia, both of which boast political moderators.