[RickSanchez2600]

Gab allows Free Speech and does not have a code of conduct or ban or censor anyone. They claim this is freedom and the code of conduct is fascism.

Anyone who writes a racist comment usually gets called out on it and called an idiot and mocked anyway on Gab.

You cannot have both free speech and a code of conduct at the same time. You either allow everything or censor and ban things to a degree.

Most of these racist comments are made by teenagers who think the N-word is funny and trolling people. So they post it over and over again.

[phoe-krk]

Gab, via their free speech and unwillingness to take down content in general, promotes content that is racist, misogynyst, antifeminist, islamophobic, xenophobic, homophobic, transphobic, classist, ableist, authoritariant, supremacist, and pretty much anti-intellectual. This is why I oppose that platform.

Of course you can have free speech as a person and a code of conduct for your service. You are free to say anything, and your platform has a right to not want to hear or spread anything.

[smsm42]

> promotes content that is racist

There's worlds of difference between hosting content and promoting content. The first is act of broad tolerance, the second is act of encouragement and agreement. This distinction is so important that the very first Amendment of US Constitution is based on it - the US government is obliged to tolerate any religion, but is explicitly forbidden to promote any.

> and your platform has a right to not want to hear or spread anything.

Once platform takes control over the right to hear, it ceases to be a neutral platform and becomes an editorial force. With private companies, it's usually not a problem - even if an unpopular opinion is suppressed and censored on one platform, it can be published on another. With growing monopolization of social networking, and with low-level infrastructure providers being slowly roped into facilitating censorship, this is becoming less and less true. And then we have to remind ourselves - why exactly do we have that First Amendment? If censorship is so good, why not let the government do it - after all, they are the ones that can do it best! Obviously, there are some bad downsides to it. We should remind ourselves from time to time what are those.

[probably_wrong]

> You cannot have both free speech and a code of conduct at the same time.

I feel I should point out that this is a point of view that's very popular in the US, but not universal. F-Droids' website makes me belive that they are somewhere in Europe, where the rules for "Free Speech" are different.

Also, I'm admittedly not familiar with the nuances of freedom of speech in the USA, but I would believe that your statement is not entirely correct in there either.

[smsm42]

Free speech with complex government-dictated rules is not a free speech, it's government-approved speech. The government can be very tolerant or very strict, but the very fact of control and the very possibility that the government can, if it wanted to, ban the speech it doesn't like, merely based on its content, is the absence of free speech. If I can tell you what to do anytime I want, and prevent you from doing something anytime I want, you are not free - even if I'm not ordering you around right now.

[probably_wrong]

I feel you are missing the same point that the commenter I replied to.

You are applying a US-centric definition of "free", in which "freedom" means roughly "no one can tell me what I should or should't do". Under this definition, you are free because no one is forcing you to do anything.

However! Other countries apply a different definition of "free", meaning roughly "the most vulnerable members of our society cannot be truly free if we let those with the bigger clubs do whatever they want". Under this definition, curtailing the "freedom" of some increases the average "freedom" of society at large, and is therefore more free.

Both definitions have problems, and I feel plenty of discussions speak past each other because two people use the same word for two different things. I understand your point of view, but once it leads(like other commenter says) into "Europe doesn't have free speech" I get suspicious.

[smsm42]

> You are applying a US-centric definition of "free"

There's no other sensible definition of "free". Of course one can say word "free" and mean something having nothing to do with freedom, but that would be just an Orwellian perversion of language, not substantial discussion. Words are means of communicating ideas, and the only idea of freedom of speech that makes sense is one where government can not dictate what can and can not be spoken.

> Other countries apply a different definition of "free"

They are subverting the language in hopes that not talking about censorship would mean citizenship are not aware they they live under a censorious regime. However, whether you talk about it or not, the fact censorship is there and there is substantial and qualitative difference between having and not having government censorship of speech. Saying "we just have different definition of 'free'" is like alcoholic saying "I just have a different definition of 'sober'" - he can have any definition he wants, but that doesn't change the fact he's drunk.

> curtailing the "freedom" of some increases the average "freedom" of society at large, and is therefore more free

It's just sophistry, these word do not signify any real things or events behind them. There's no such thing as "freedom of society at large", not combined of freedoms of the people. Of course, you can talk about it - you can talk about anything, words are malleable - but these words would be just simulacrum, motivated reasoning, juggling words. You can say "freedom is slavery, the true freedom is embracing the state control of everything" - but these words are not defining the idea of freedom, they're just perverting the word for propaganda purposes.

> "Europe doesn't have free speech"

It doesn't, for most countries and virtually any sensible definition of "free speech" that does not hollow the term out to make it mean "whatever the state censorship wants to be spoken, can be spoken".

[s9w]

Europe does not have free speech. But that cocs conflict with free speech is true independent of national laws I think.

[zaarn]

Europe has a different free speech, the definitions and laws differ. Saying "Europe has no free speech" is only correct from a very US-centric PoV. In Europe, we have learned the danger that true free speech poses.

[s9w]

Free speech is a pretty easy and clear concept. Europe definitely does not fulfill that. Also "we" (I'm German) do not (all) like the extremely limited range of things we can say.

[zaarn]

Free speech in Germany is not based on the same definition as free speech in the US. The constitution and the BGB/StGB outline fairly clearly what is and isn't illegal hate speech and what is free speech. You have a right to free speech but no right to hate speech, simple as that. Here Gab is in clear violation of NetzDG and Hatespeech Laws with no Provider Privilege. (I'm also German and I recently visited a law course for a semester at my Uni, so I'm familiar with the basics)

The only people that seem to really have an issue with our current hatespeech laws are the AfD fraction in the Bundestag.

[s9w]

I think free speech is usually seen in a non-national context in a sense of "you can say whatever you want. No exceptions". So Germany does not have that at all.

"Hatespeech" on top of the "legal"/national definitions for what is sometimes also called free speech (but isn't at all) are just contraptions to censor people, usually the political opposition.

[panpanna]

Well, would you like to allow that kind of comments on HN?

I mean it's just teenagers using the N word...