Radical ruling lets Texas ban social media moderation based on viewpoint

“Radical” ruling lets Texas ban social media moderation based on “viewpoint”

“Radical” ruling lets Texas ban social media moderation based on “viewpoint” | Ars Technica

5th Circuit reinstates Texas law that was previously found to violate 1st Amendment.

A federal appeals court has reinstated a Texas state law that bans "censorship" on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, allowing Texas to enforce the law while litigation continues.

A US District Court judge had granted a preliminary injunction blocking the law in December, ruling that it violates the social networks' First Amendment right to moderate user-submitted content. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton appealed the injunction to the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and a panel of three judges issued a ruling Wednesday that stayed the preliminary injunction.

The ruling did not explain the judges' reasoning. "It is ordered that appellant's opposed motion to stay preliminary injunction pending appeal is granted," the ruling said. The panel ruling was not unanimous, but it didn't say how each judge voted.

The ruling is "startlingly radical," said Corbin Barthold, Internet policy counsel at TechFreedom, a libertarian think tank that filed a brief in the court case. "Social media companies now face the prospect of liability for making distinctions based on 'viewpoint.' (For instance, treating pro-ISIS content differently than anti-ISIS content.) But there are many other difficulties to applying this law. No one—not lawyers, not judges, not experts in the field, not even the law's own sponsors—knows what compliance with this law looks like," Barthold said.

Judges “struggle with basic tech concepts”

Oral arguments were held on Monday this week, and the judges "seemed to struggle with basic tech concepts," Protocol reported. Judges were skeptical of arguments made by tech industry groups NetChoice and the Computer & Communications & Industry Association (CCIA), which sued Texas to block the law. "[O]ne judge suggested that Twitter isn't even a website, and another wondered if phone companies have a First Amendment right to kick people off their services," Protocol wrote.

"Your clients are Internet providers," Judge Edith Jones reportedly told the lawyer for NetChoice and CCIA. "They are not websites." The two groups' members are in fact almost entirely websites and online services rather than Internet service providers—see NetChoice's members here and CCIA's here. Amazon, eBay, Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Yahoo are all members of both groups.

LOL wtf? What a bunch of loons and idiots. They don't even seem to get tech, and at times basics of the constitution.

A court just blew up internet law because it thinks YouTube isn’t a website - The Verge

😆

Old people are literally going to kill this country and take all the young people with them.

They are completley inept when it comes to anything science or tech related lol.

verge lol

My first and main link was Ars Technica. I mostly found the Verge title funny lol and didn't quote the contents.

Do you agree this ruling/law is insanity?

Tech groups ask Supreme Court to throw out Texas social media law - The Washington Post

I agree with this logic,

The law “strips private online businesses of their speech rights, forbids them from making constitutionally protected editorial decisions, and forces them to publish and promote objectionable content,” NetChoice counsel Chris Marchese said in a statement. “Left standing, [the Texas law] will turn the First Amendment on its head — to violate free speech, the government need only claim to be ‘protecting’ it.”

I have not found a single rational defense of this. Hopefully the SCOTUS has a bit more understanding in basic tech and constitution.

Maybe I am too stupid or maybe the ruling is dumb but could someone please sum it up for me and maybe provide a really nice example?

Explain it to me like I'm 10 years old 🤣

I think this lays it out simply,

The Texas law prohibits a social media platform “that functionally has more than 50 million active users in the United States in a calendar month” from banning a user — or even from regulating or restricting a user’s content or altering the algorithms that surface content to other users — because of that user’s “viewpoint.”

The law applies broadly, moreover, to all forms of viewpoint discrimination, regardless of whether that viewpoint is political.

For these reasons, even setting aside the fact that this law is unconstitutional, it imposes a completely unworkable standard on social media platforms.

The law permits any user who believes that a social media platform has violated the Texas law, as well as the state’s attorney general, to sue that platform in order to force compliance. A victorious plaintiff is entitled to an injunction requiring the platform to comply with the state law, as well as attorney’s fees. Courts may also “hold the social media platform in contempt” and “use all lawful measures to secure immediate compliance” if a social media company resists an unconstitutional court order requiring it to involuntarily publish content.

The potential problematic results if it's not already obvious,

The Texas law, in other words, would effectively turn every single major social media platform into 4chan— a cesspool of racial slurs, misogyny, and targeted harassment that the platforms would be powerless to control, unless they wanted to enact such sweeping content moderation policies that their platforms would become unusable. (Admittedly, the Texas law does permit social media companies to remove some racist and sexist content, but only if that content “directly incites criminal activity or consists of specific threats of violence.”)

@zaryia: so basically we are cutting our noses off to spite our faces?

"Free speech", even if it destroys us!

Kind of sounds like they want to create safe spaces literally everywhere for the worst of humanity. Kind of sounds like another NRA type of deal, where they want guns in the hands of everyone because it's our "right", even if we are terrorist sympathizers.

You don't need old people you are doing a good job yourself.

Who do you thin invented all this science and tech.

Here you go, another right wing assault on the constitutional right to free speech. The fascist right isn't going to stop. We're watching the beginning of a loss of our rights.

So it stops social media sites from banning people?

How is a law that effects massive social media companies a loss on your rights?

Social media sites should have rights. As long as they aren't discriminating protected classes, they have a right to ban anyone who violates their ToS.

Not these conservative judges lmao....

This violates a corporations first amendment rights. As earlier ruled.

A US District Court judge had granted a preliminary injunctionblocking the law in December, ruling that it violates the social networks' First Amendment right to moderate user-submitted content.

The idiots on the right were the ones who waited the meaning and intent of the constitution to cover personhood on corporations, and as such they have constitutional rights. Would you want Texas telling you that you need to allow a bunch of terrorist seditionists the ability to write their stupid nonsense all over your business?

Not 60+ year old politicians, corporate leaders, and lobbyists...

I mean they made Zuckerberg look like a good guy. Do you know how hard that is to do? They made a guy--who created Facebook to rank hot girls and then have sex with them, and then evolved it into something that is partially responsible for genocide in various countries--that is arguably a sociopath look like a good guy.

I laughed. Should be fun when the beheading videos, non specific death threats, demands that all Texas women wear burkhas, rape fantasies involving allusion to female evangelist leaders, etc. all start becoming protected.

But mahhh free speech!

Land of idiots.

Of course they'll ban all of that. They're really just interested in being allowed to spread the faux patriotism and right wing propaganda.

Texas.

I hear after that fiasco with the winter electrical problems they're now having problems with their electric grid because it's TOO HOT.

https://www.ercot.com/news/release?id=8b772e9e-51d0-4c3c-e653-1e5079f28e89

With unseasonably hot weather driving record demand across Texas, ERCOT continues to work closely with the power industry to make sure Texans have the power they need. This afternoon, six power generation facilities tripped offline resulting in the loss of approximately 2,900 MW of electricity.

Hahaha Texas.

That likely won't survive further appeal. Much social media moderation seems centered around protecting the platform from potential liability or toxic content, not to mention they do have a say about where to draw lines of posting guidelines. This could also cost Texas lots of money for big tech to fight, basically much like when ESA fought restrictive game legislation and in the end the state had to pay back their legal costs every time.

Right wing platforms would also be subject to same policy and no doubt this would invite left of their audience members to flood their ranks and file their own lawsuits.

If such policies stick though big tech would mostly likely prohibit their platform the region and update a terms of service that protects the company from users that skirt any location roadblocks with VPNs.

This wasn't quite a strike down from looks of it just a decision to let the law be enforced while it is being appealed since previously the initial law was struck down on 1st Amendment grounds. No doubt an activist judge as there was no legal opinion offered in granting the ability for law being enforced while pending appeal. This would likely lead to potential lawsuits against the state should it be enforced then later struck down.

Reminds me of when our power in California was turned off because it was too windy. lol

Was that part of all that Enron shit?

No, PG&E. Because every year with climate change/worsening drought conditions, the forest fires are getting exponentially worse. The paradise fire (the worst fire I've ever assisted on) shifted how they operate in terms of power and resource allocation.

So its windy? Dry conditions? Power off. Better hope you have a generator. lol Thanks California.

Do they not trim around their power lines? We have hills that go straight up here in East Tennessee with high tension lines on them, they still won't let shit grow anywhere near them.

@br0kenrabbit said:

Do they not trim around their power lines? We have hills that go straight up here in East Tennessee with high tension lines on them, they still won't let shit grow anywhere near them.

They do but there's a lot of smaller power lines through the rural areas in densely forested areas. I think PG&E is just overly cautious now because of the liabilities. The multi-billion dollar slap on the wrist was a bit of a sting for them.

@Stevo_the_gamer: the state of fl has that issue atm . never gets talk about. with fires and such. power line clearing..... ahahahaha . its let the load work do it.. lvl of stupdity

Same here. They keep that shit cleared even for the small lines. If your trees start to encroach, they'll trim it back without saying anything to you. Look how they keep the trees cut back:

Looks like something that was thrown together by the technically illiterate.

This is exactly what I was thinking. They want it all social media to be 8chan without knowing what 8chan is.

@xdude85 said:

@JimB said:

@xdude85 said:

Old people are literally going to kill this country and take all the young people with them.

You don't need old people you are doing a good job yourself.

You make a stupid statement and get called on it and you call it trolling. There is an old saying if you can't take the heat stay out of the kitchen.

@JimB said:

@xdude85 said:

@JimB said:

@xdude85 said:

Old people are literally going to kill this country and take all the young people with them.

You don't need old people you are doing a good job yourself.

You make a stupid statement and get called on it and you call it trolling. There is an old saying if you can't take the heat stay out of the kitchen.

Says the guy who has nothing but lame insults and offers no real thoughts or comments on the topic at hand.

Then again, you're as vapid as they come, so it's not surprising.

Right wing radicals really are on a set course to destroy the US.

LGBTQA+++ROFLMAO supremacy, i guess.

Did you click the wrong thread or are you having a stroke?

funny, act clueless.

I absolutely have no idea what this shit post:

Has to do with a TX ruling that violates the first amendment and is devoid of any technical knowledge.

I still think you clicked the wrong thread.

I think you are just a forum trollmaster who sucks at what one is trying to attempt.

spewing shit like rolling stone and vice....... yea.... bottom of the barrel.

Why not just out right say what you're talking about instead of continuing to make me scratch my head at this entirely off-topic quote chain?

I also cited Ars Technica (primary), Vox, and WaPo. Can you refute any of those articles? Can you specifically tell me what was wrong with any of the articles I linked? Do you have counter-citation?

Do you like this Texas law? If so how it, with legal citation, does not violate the first amendment as shown in December. Show, with citation, the analysis on these law makers not understanding tech concepts is wrong.

I have seen no logical fact based defense of this law.

BTW,

After your weird first post, you skipped this reply-post just to post another random one liner 5 days later.

Hit and run troll. Take the L.

linking wapo. automatic loss.

What was wrong in the Ars Technica, Vox, and WaPo articles I linked? Be specific and offer citation to any claims.

You're not offering a very good defense of this bizarre law so far.

In addition, I call Danth's law.

i'm wondering if a site could get around the law by simply keeping the content there but moving it to some sort of "shit bucket" location.

so all the idiotic stuff people like to post gets routed to a known location where other users can go and still see the idiocy, it just doesn't infect their usual stream.

they're not blocking anything, they're just moving it into a big pile with all the other garbage

Sites are still liable for anything on their site.

Honestly, I hope the courts rule that corporations aren't people and have no constitutional rights, which would effectively overturn Citizens United. It would have the added benefit of eliminating social media, too.

have users agree to a TOS style agreement indemnifying the service provider before they can view material in the shit bucket.