[throwaway_234]

While i didnt vote for red this year (independent) I totally agree and the sudden labeling of certain tweets is egregious towards free speech.

There is so much fake stuff on the Internet and tech companies suddenly labeling tweets of the president, but not others is disgusting and goes against free speech. No labeling is needed.. speech that doesn't cause physical harm should not be labeled!

Im speaking as a proponent of free speech only as I could not vote for that person and do not believe much of any political mumbo jumbo (to me it's two billionaires using their resources to do whatever and make up whatever to win).

[watwut]

Isn't labeling speech too?

[throwaway_234]

Yes, but if your labeling one viewpoint and not another then your stifling free speech/free thought ... you no longer are a neutral platform. Idiotic for them to go down such road as labeling only further riles up that persons base.

[tzs]

For many of the kinds of things that get labeled, I'm having some trouble figuring out how you would label both viewpoints.

If X says that the Pfizer and Moderna COVID vaccines are made using aborted fetal tissue and Y says that they are not, and I want to label X as false, what label should I put on Y to label the other viewpoint?

[tarboreus]

Don't label them seems like the obvious answer here. Twitter and Facebook simply can't be trusted to be arbiters of truth.

[watwut]

Isnt it opinion like any other then? Just from someone with better platform. You dont need to be general arbiter of truth ro be like "wait, election law is actually different".

Just like Trump have better platform then me.

[acdha]

You’re misrepresenting what’s being labeled. Trump doesn’t get labeled for stating his opinions or policies, he gets labeled for lying. If Biden starts flagrantly tweeting malicious lies he’ll get labeled, too. The difference is that the modern Republican Party is a couple decades into using their own propaganda supply it's easy to feel like their side is being singled out because the distribution of lying and threats of violence is so heavily skewed.

[tzs]

Who are the two billionaires? I had thought you were talking about the recent Presidential election in the US, but Biden is nowhere near a billionaire.

Almost all of his wealth came from his salary as a Senator (1973 until he became VP) and then his salary for 8 years as VP, plus Social Security starting in 2009 and also pensions. His net worth at the end of that was under half a million.

He's boosted that to somewhere in the $10-20 million range since leaving office, mostly from book deals for him and his wife ($8 million), speaking fees (basic fee is $100k, but it has ranged from $8k to $190k), and a professorship at the University of Pennsylvania's Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement ($540k).

There's an article that goes into detail [1].

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2020/10/22/how-t...

[throwaway_234]

Is the democratic and republican parties not two billionaire or more machines? So, pardon I should have been more clear.

If you choose to believe what your side tells is truth that's fine. I just have a different view and if i have money and want power i am going to use it either solo(ly) or collectively to get what I want. Look at what Peter Thiel did with his money cause of the axe he had to grind with Gawker. He paid for Hulk Hogan's legal defense to annihilate Gawker. I'm sure other money/power bags do similarly and lots in politics. So and for me that is why I believe all politics is mumbo jumbo spun up by billionaires to win; whatever it takes!

[daveevad]

> boosted that to somewhere in the $10-20 million range since leaving office

that right there is unacceptable to me.

[amanaplanacanal]

It’s unacceptable for a private citizen to make money writing books and giving speeches? Can you expand on this a bit? Why would this be a a problem?

[dlp211]

Why? Are people with deep technical knowledge, both soft and hard, not allowed to profit from that knowledge? Can you point to some conflict of interest in writing a book, speaking, and being a professor while a private citizen? Are you just against capitalism?

The man spent his entire adult life in service to this country and never profited from it while in the act of that service, which you can't say for many of his colleagues.

[greesil]

Not every Twitter account is equal. Some have more followers than others, have more each to other platforms, or are more central to current events.

[dlp211]

This, I think, is such an important point. We hold too many powerful people in our society less accountable then those with less power. We should be striving to achieve the opposite, the more powerful you are, the more accountable you are, the harsher the penalty is for abusing that power.

If I say something inflammatory on HN, it will get flagged, downvoted, potentially result in a temporary or permanent ban, but if the POTUS says something inflammatory on Twitter, we're all just supposed to let it go? It makes no sense, I am, in the grand scheme of things a nobody, and the POTUS, no matter who occupies that position, is one of, if not the, most powerful person(s) in the world. The current occupant is currently screaming "RIGGED ELECTION" on Twitter, and they're not supposed to put some context, note that it is false?