[balls187]

> Should they have that right though?

Yes.

Free speech does not grant the right for anyone to say whatever they want. The US Surpreme court has, as a matter of case law, ruled in specific areas to restrict free speech.

These two doctors, under the pretense of medical expertise, provided false information, and used Youtube to do it.

Google being a large massive publicly traded entity does not have any bearing as to it's responsibility to guard against violations on it's platform.

[lucio]

Free speech DOES grant the right for anyone express opinions without interference from the government. SCOTUS limitations for freedom of speech are very narrow, and being wrong or against the mainstream opinion is not one of them.

[dependenttypes]

> SCOTUS limitations for freedom of speech are very narrow

Are they though? I can think of all kinds of limitations of the freedom of speech in both the US and in Europe. Copyright, gag orders, company and military secrets, illegal numbers, etc.

[skuthus]

>without interference from the government.

Exactly. Youtube isn't the government.

[balls187]

> and being wrong or against the mainstream opinion is not one of them.

False statement of Fact is absolutely an Exception to Free Speech.

[Gibbon1]

The way I think of it is. Say my company makes high voltage transformers. And I get wind that one customer is using them to manufacture interrogation devices. I sure as shit can tell them to take their business elsewhere.

[Dylan16807]

But if you're selling electricity you generally don't get to refuse service to anyone.

[balls187]

Google doesn't sell ip packets.

[Gibbon1]

Also much of the world right now is operating under a state of emergency.

[JackFr]

> These two doctors, under the pretense of medical expertise, provided false information, and used Youtube to do it.

Not according to the article. The local TV station interviewed them and the local TV station put the video on YouTube.

Presumably as they are licensed to practice medicine in the State of California they do have some expertise greater than those of us without MDs so it's hardly 'pretense'. Is wearing scrubs on camera a ridiculous rhetorical device? Yes. Were these guys wrong on some facts? Absolutely. Were they wrong on policy recommendations? Much, much harder to say.

What's astonishing though is the ease with which people seem to be willing to turn over their civil liberties and place themselves under house arrest.

We have to sit through three years of the echo chamber telling us Donald Trump is a fascist, and then finally when our freedom to assemble is literally stripped from us by the police power of the state, people are complaining that he's not fascist enough. Geez.

[balls187]

> Not according to the article. The local TV station interviewed them and the local TV station put the video on YouTube.

As noted in another comment, the article does not touch on the veracity of the claims of these two doctors.

"In a rare statement late today, the American College of Emergency Physicians and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine declared they “emphatically condemn the recent opinions released by Dr. Daniel Erickson and Dr. Artin Messihi. These reckless and untested musings do not speak for medical societies and are inconsistent with current science and epidemiology regarding COVID-19. As owners of local urgent care clinics, it appears these two individuals are releasing biased, non-peer reviewed data to advance their personal financial interests without regard for the public’s health.”"

Source: https://www.dailynews.com/2020/04/28/california-doctors-with...

> We have to sit through three years of the echo chamber telling us Donald Trump is a fascist, and then finally when our freedom to assemble is literally stripped from us by the police power of the state, people are complaining that he's not fascist enough. Geez.

You're making a false analogy; US Government in times of emergency has used it's authority to curtail civil liberties; I'm sure you are well aware of the gist of the War Times Power Act. And perhaps most famously (and more controversialy) when Habeas Corpus was suspended.

That said, I think it's our responsibility (duty) as citizens to continually challenge attacks on the 1st Amendment, and other curtails of constitutional protected freedoms, but it's also on us to hold accountable those who seek to use the rights granted by the Bill of Rights in ways that harm the public.

It is my pov that the opinions, presented as medical facts by these two doctors, were harmful to the public, and should be censored.