[antris]

Sending death threats and yelling fire in a crowded theatre is also censored. It's pretty ridiculous to think that you can simply say anything you want regardless of how much damage it causes, without repercussions.

Covid misinformation currently kills people every day. And I have relatives who are on the clock, waiting if they are going to end up on ICU. Because some scumbags on the internet decided to bank on misinformation and tell them that the covid vaccine is dangerous.

[DuskStar]

In the US, both (most) death threats and "falsely shouting fire in a crowded theater" (actually protesting US involvement in the first world war; seriously look up the origin of that phrase) are both legal. Death threats have to be specific and timely in order to be illegal, IIRC.

[antris]

I wasn't making a legal argument. Just pointing out that crying about "censorship" or "freedom of speech" when YouTube doesn't platform misinformation is just as ridiculous as doing it when you get repercussions for yelling fire or making death threats.

[proc0]

> Covid misinformation currently kills people every day.

Part of the "misinformation" is how institutions are hiding the truth... so isn't censorship reinforcing people's distrust, therefore contributing to the deaths?

This isn't hyperbole, every time some censoring like this happens, it gets factored in as proof of many of the plethora of conspiracy theories. Are these big platforms and government really interesting in saving people, or playing politics? Because it's pretty obvious the main problem is lack of trust, and censorship makes that worse.

[antris]

Refusing to platform covid misinformation isn't hiding the truth. It's just refusing to platform dangerous misinformation.

[proc0]

I meant that becomes the perception of it. Platforms censor misinformation, and then that becomes evidence to those that want to believe in theories of how the truth is censored.

If the ultimate objective is compliance, censorship is at best incompetent and short-sighted.

[antris]

Sure, anyone can say anything about anything and believe in conspiracies without evidence. Letting misinformation spread further isn't a viable solution to that.