[smsm42]

I think when we have the government having regular meetings with major social networks, instructing them who to ban and which topics to exclude from discussion, and when we have the pipeline from foreign security services through the US government to the all major social networks which allow them to ban anybody without as little as cursory review - we are way, way beyond "family and friends" situation here.

[amanaplanacanal]

The owners of social networks have free speech rights too. They can take others suggestions as to who and what to block and decide for themselves. The constitutional law is settled on this question. I wouldn’t be so quick to infringe that.

[smsm42]

"Suggestions". Right. Regular meetings and demands from the government to shut down speech is just mere "suggestions". How stupid you think your target audience is?

[freejazz]

It's one thing to politely disagree with others, and it's another to pretend like they are "targeting an audience". Your comment is rude, disingenuous, and doesn't further reasonable discourse and a rethink of your approach would be wise for the benefit of the community.

[amanaplanacanal]

I don’t have a target audience. I’m just telling you the way it works. As far as I can tell the only place in the US that government is actually threatening private companies over their speech is Florida.

[smsm42]

No, you are telling the way you'd like to pretend it works, because your partisan biases make you blind to facts. They way is actually works, as evident from Facebook executives themselves, is that they were constantly pressured by the government to censor, and attacked when the government felt they ate not censoring enough.

[smsm42]

Quoting email to Zuckerberg:

We are facing continued pressure from external stakeholders, including the White House and the press, to remove more Covid-19 vaccine discouraging content.

This is not "suggestion". This is government coercing private business.