[rsj_hn]

> But as a matter of policy effectiveness, it would be useful to have examples of true statements which were banned, to see how effective the policy was, and see the types of misclassifications.

Show me the list of statements that twitter bans, with change history, and I can get you this info.

Until then, we are talking about an opaque censorship team that was coordinating with the government to (unlawfully) create mechanisms for the government to censor speech in the name of public health. There are plenty of examples of false statements being made by everyone from Biden on down to heads of CDC, mostly about vaccine effectiveness, but also about aspects of the virus itself. Claims that if you get the vaccine, you wont get the virus, then claims that if you get the vaccine, you might get the virus, but you are less likely to spread it, etc.

But as Twitter never published its official list of banable statements, you are asking for evidence that doesn't exist. If someone were to say "Twitter banned users for making statement X", you can respond with "prove to me that's why they were banned", and again Twitter has kept this information secret.

The idea of government agencies secretly censoring the public via twitter should be very concerning, and it certainly isn't justified by appealing to the needs of public health. Public health never requires censorship - if you think it does, you are doing public health the wrong way. Public health should work by earning people's trust and then publishing official recommendations that have a track record of accuracy and effectiveness, and thus are trusted by the public. Then, you don't need to censor people. Blaming the public for not trusting government pronouncements is exactly what you want to avoid, as now you are engaging in authoritarian behavior. The government exists to serve and listen to the public, not the other way around.

[eesmith]

> Show me the list of statements that twitter bans, with change history, and I can get you this info.

I agree that evidence is important. Khaine made a specific claim. I don't believe it's supported. I want to see the evidence too. Otherwise I don't believe the claim is correct.

> to (unlawfully) create mechanisms for the government to censor speech in the name of public health.

What do you have against the First Amendment's right of free association?

There is nothing inherently illegal about a company applying a moderation policy. There is nothing inherently illegal about a company voluntarily coordinating with the government.

The Comics Code of The Comics Code Authority was not unconstitutional.

> you are asking for evidence that doesn't exist.

Quite the opposite. Khaine says there is evidence that Twitter used to ban statements saying "wear[ing] a mask to protect yourself from COVID was a mistruth."

I want evidence that that specific event existed.

> The idea of government agencies secretly censoring the public

While the idea of a company voluntarily exercising its right of free association, with a public description of the policy guidelines, is much less concerning.

You come to a programming conference I'm organizing and start presenting public health BS and I will ask you to stop speaking, under threat of expelling you from the conference. That is my Constitutional right.

Just because the BS topic happens to be public health (vs. another sorts of expellable BS) doesn't give the BS presenter special privileges.

[Khaine]

On January 23, when the virus was starting to become important to Americans, The New York Times[1] asked the question, “do masks block Coronavirus?” No conclusive answer was offered, and it was just stressed that washing hands and general hygiene would be sufficient to block the virus. A similar perspective was also offered on January 24 by The Seattle Times[2] in saying, “public health officials say there’s no need to wear face masks in the United States.” Americans were told that masks do not help, and the number of cases in the U.S. was too few to justify the use of masks. In January, Americans understood that there was no need to use masks.

This continued in February when the numbers in the U.S. were just starting to go up, and COVID-19 was no longer just a problem in Asia and Europe. Using the words of Dr. Fauci, The US News and World Report[3] stated on February 17: “skip the masks unless you are contagious.”

Twitter's policy was not in place when the pandemic started, but after masks were mandated it came into effect. You would be blocked on twitter for repeating what was dogma only months before, that masks were not effective.

In the short history of the pandemic, Americans were never clearly told what Science[4] reported on March 28: That the benefit of the mask “comes not from shielding the mouths of the healthy but from covering the mouths of people already infected.” The unambiguous scientific message of communal responsibility never comes front and center in the media agenda.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/23/health/coronavirus-surgic...

[2]https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/coronavirus-spurs-...

[3] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/02/17/nih-di...

[4] https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/would-everyone-weari...

[eesmith]

> Twitter's policy was not in place when the pandemic started,

Which is exactly my point.

This is NOT "the policy that originally said that telling people to wear a mask to protect yourself from COVID was a mistruth" because Twitter never did that.

You are free to conjecture hypotheticals, but it would be just that - conjecture.