Alleged lies and "misinformation" are protected speech under the First Amendment in the United States. The government secretly contacting social media companies and demanding that that speech be removed is a clear violation of the speaker's constitutional rights.
No "emergency" is justification for suspending the bill of rights. That is when those rights are needed the most. The burgeoning Censorship Industrial Complex that has A LOT riding on this case. The author here also seems passionate about censorship. For the sake of our democracy, I hope you guys lose.
Misinformation is destroying whatever “common ground” we have left with the people we disagree with. The pandemic physically and ideologically divided us further. Instead of connecting with neighbors and people in our community, we measure everyone for signs of Trumpism. As soon as they mention politics, or reference a culture war talking point, we’ve identified a likely MAGA, and we are wary of them. It’s sad, really. We will never all agree on many things, but feeling suspicious of people is like ideological open-carry. Everyone giving side-eye to each other. True unifiers are rare, but they do exist. And we won’t unite around politics, it will be other things people hold dear that will inspire us to find some sense of unity again. If we can. Edit- I shouldn’t say “we” so much or speak for other people. I find myself doing it, but I suspect I’m not alone.
I was at a candidate forum the other night for a county supervisor election, which is non-partisan. Not hard to figure out the leanings of the two candidates. The MAGA candidate is the incumbent, and has the wind at her back. Her people in the audience weren't hard to spot.
Imagine an alternative reality, where instead of the proven rapist Defendant "Vermin" Trump, we had a president who was proud of America? Who started the pandemic with a call for us to work together, who champion the strength of our country and our medical and scientific communities and said that if we all worked together, take a few, simple, easy steps to protect each other, we will be just fine.
We know that worked in the blue states, who after being hit hardest by COVID when it first arrived, came out the other side in far better shape than the red states.
And imagine if Ol' Swampy Trump could stand before us all talking about how we came together and defeated the virus by working together and putting our faith in science and America.
Instead, Ol' Swampy Trump was caught between calm experts and the insanity that makes up his party. As usual, he went with insanity, and we are so much the worse because of that.
The misinformation is bad enough, but these people are literally advocating actual real world harm to my family and myself. I am a single mother on SSDI which they would love to take away, food stamps that they resent being used for even the most basic nutritional needs of my children, I pay my rent with HUD, which I'm sure is a program that that find to be overly generous. I have an 11 year old trans son, whom they would like to legislate right into a conversion camp, probably after jailing me for child abuse for encouraging what they consider to be child abuse. I have a uterus and the ability to get pregnant, as does my trans son, and they have already made it so that if we were living in many states, getting abortion care and even reproductive care is impossible. This goes beyond pure political differences into actual malice towards myself and my children. 🤷
That sounds good! It's good to see you, dude. I've been wondering about you. Also, been waiting for you to come back because I've started writing again and I finally made myself a substack and got most of my earlier stories moved over to it from dailykos where I used to write on the community blog. Also have written a few brand new ones so far.
I’m sure that’s very hard. We are all one health crisis or injury away from not being able to work, and we are a better, more advanced and compassionate nation because of programs like SSDI, HUD and others that help people live with some measure of quality and hope that things can get better. Democrats are people too and therefore flawed and fallible, but they believe we can all contribute and help prevent poverty and misery. Capitalism allows the 1% to enjoy wealth beyond any reasonable expectation, and it should come with a requirement that we who are well off help our fellow citizens with some basic needs and not accept a society that simply ignores those who have more challenges or different circumstances. Republicans want to make things better for the wealthy and the well-connected, and worse for the people who are already struggling. It’s shameful.
It's not just misinformation. It's blatant lying using outlandish claims to support those lies. That is what led to 1/6, despite every turd flung at the wall by MAGA idiots being proven false after being investigated. Including Italian space lasers and involvement by dead Hugo Chavez in districts that did not even use the software that company made. Often investigated by Republican state or local officials who would surely report any credible claims of fraud that would help a Republican candidate.
So the government shouldn't be allowed to even suggest that claims vaccines have tracking and monitoring microchips and that sticking a UV light up your butt would cure Covid. The government does not have free speech. This is not even an order that they remove the information, just a notice to readers that the lie is affecting public health and should be countered with facts, or even just a link to facts.
War on a global scale (and the inevitable draft that goes with it)
Contact by aliens
The equivalent of the race to the moon (this one is weaker than the other three - I can see there being a BUNCH of people who would rail against this claiming e should be fixing our own country or planet instead).
... there aren't a great many things that might be unifying on a country-wide scale ... and sadly, most of them are bad. Which is human nature.
Ummm… so social media companies must do everything they can to “protect children”, or face serious penalty from the right wing nut cases in the House of Representatives, but it cannot agree to a non-binding request from the White House to protect Americans from deadly health misinformation. Mmm-Kay.
Well, I've had sex with not one, but two demons. But that was a long time ago, and no way does Covid have that kind of lag time. Unless it was the dreaded Sleeper Cell Covid. Anyway, never got the bug. Clean living and cursing is the secret.
"...giving the Government a green light to use heavy-handed tactics to skew the presentation of views on the medium that increasingly dominates the dissemination of news.”
News?
Tell me you don't understand the current media landscape without telling me you don't understand the current media landscape.
So these politicians seeking to limit the government's ability to interfere with dangerous nonsense on social media are also going to quit holding hearings to complain about social media companies not promoting bullshit, right? No more "FACEBOOK IS BIASSSS BECAUSE PEOPLE MOCKED DOGBUTT69's STATEMENT OF FACK THAT (((JEWS!))) GAVE HIM HERPES!!!!!111!!!1!"
I wonder what percentage of these sick fucks honestly “enjoy” that their lies actually get people killed? It’s like SWATing people then laughing when the result is the innocent person is gunned down in cold blood by Feds.
Honestly, I think if the founding fathers could have seen what was coming down the pike as far as mass media and communications technology, they would have seriously put some limits on the first amendment.
That was just the cover story. The real purpose was to give the Southern states partial credit for their Black population without actually letting them vote. It still serves that purpose.
Once again, with rights come responsibilities. The US Constitution allows considerable latitude in regard to the exercise of individual liberties in most contexts. However, in order to continue to enjoy such individual choice it is necessary to respect the rights of OTHER human beings.
The bottom line here is that civil rights command civil behavior.
Misinformation will continue to pull apart the informed from the misinformed, and fracture reality. It’s one of the reasons Trump was able to infect the White House somehow. Alternate facts.
I used to think the bidness class didn’t want all this chaos because bad for bidness but I’m thinking they just want to pick our pockets while we’re fighting one another.
I never would have thought in a million years that *this* is what I would have to look forward to for my final 20 or so years on this planet.
It's just fucking ridiculous. And it has taught me to hate people, which is the worst thing of all, b/c I feel like I can't trust my fellow human to the extent I previously did, and I have a very dim view of people, which I didn't have to the same extent prior to the advent of fucking Trumpism.
I feel that. I try to ignore those signals and remind myself that people with ludicrous views existed long before Trump and before the internet. Only now, their voices are heard far more easily. Another problem is Trump made America far more political than ever before, because misinformation and bad actors conspired to inject a deeply flawed game show con artist into our highest leadership. It trivialized how important our democracy is. And misinformation will pull us further and further apart until we are hopelessly isolated from each other.
I know exactly what you mean. This place, among others, helps me remember that there are a lot of Us. (Hey, I just noticed that's like "U.S.", get it?)
And is likely to destroy this country, IMHO, as has already been demonstrated by these damnable chuds refusing to accept the truth about things, and continuing to perpetuate their ridiculous, dangerous lies. :(
A democracy can't function with such a critical mass of people literally not participating in objective reality.
Alleged lies and "misinformation" are protected speech under the First Amendment in the United States. The government secretly contacting social media companies and demanding that that speech be removed is a clear violation of the speaker's constitutional rights.
No "emergency" is justification for suspending the bill of rights. That is when those rights are needed the most. The burgeoning Censorship Industrial Complex that has A LOT riding on this case. The author here also seems passionate about censorship. For the sake of our democracy, I hope you guys lose.
Because if media can't lie without consequences who's going to pay for those fancy vacations that the Supremes get?
these fucking fuckers and their monetised lying for profit and or enemies of the state should be [redacted] [redacted] without votes!!
OMG. Can't wait to see this decision.
Misinformation is destroying whatever “common ground” we have left with the people we disagree with. The pandemic physically and ideologically divided us further. Instead of connecting with neighbors and people in our community, we measure everyone for signs of Trumpism. As soon as they mention politics, or reference a culture war talking point, we’ve identified a likely MAGA, and we are wary of them. It’s sad, really. We will never all agree on many things, but feeling suspicious of people is like ideological open-carry. Everyone giving side-eye to each other. True unifiers are rare, but they do exist. And we won’t unite around politics, it will be other things people hold dear that will inspire us to find some sense of unity again. If we can. Edit- I shouldn’t say “we” so much or speak for other people. I find myself doing it, but I suspect I’m not alone.
I do it. All the time.
I was at a candidate forum the other night for a county supervisor election, which is non-partisan. Not hard to figure out the leanings of the two candidates. The MAGA candidate is the incumbent, and has the wind at her back. Her people in the audience weren't hard to spot.
Imagine an alternative reality, where instead of the proven rapist Defendant "Vermin" Trump, we had a president who was proud of America? Who started the pandemic with a call for us to work together, who champion the strength of our country and our medical and scientific communities and said that if we all worked together, take a few, simple, easy steps to protect each other, we will be just fine.
We know that worked in the blue states, who after being hit hardest by COVID when it first arrived, came out the other side in far better shape than the red states.
And imagine if Ol' Swampy Trump could stand before us all talking about how we came together and defeated the virus by working together and putting our faith in science and America.
Instead, Ol' Swampy Trump was caught between calm experts and the insanity that makes up his party. As usual, he went with insanity, and we are so much the worse because of that.
The misinformation is bad enough, but these people are literally advocating actual real world harm to my family and myself. I am a single mother on SSDI which they would love to take away, food stamps that they resent being used for even the most basic nutritional needs of my children, I pay my rent with HUD, which I'm sure is a program that that find to be overly generous. I have an 11 year old trans son, whom they would like to legislate right into a conversion camp, probably after jailing me for child abuse for encouraging what they consider to be child abuse. I have a uterus and the ability to get pregnant, as does my trans son, and they have already made it so that if we were living in many states, getting abortion care and even reproductive care is impossible. This goes beyond pure political differences into actual malice towards myself and my children. 🤷
To say the least. And I was *very* uncomfortable with the 'bothsides' tinge of the comment to which you responded.
So was I, which was why I felt the need for the impassioned reply. 😊 Also, hello to you! 😊
HEY. I'm thinking I might write an email today and include the text of that older one so you don't have to hunt it up, if that would be amenable? 😺
That sounds good! It's good to see you, dude. I've been wondering about you. Also, been waiting for you to come back because I've started writing again and I finally made myself a substack and got most of my earlier stories moved over to it from dailykos where I used to write on the community blog. Also have written a few brand new ones so far.
This is very cool. I shall peruse. Just sent the forwarded old email with a new one with lots of photos :D
I’m sure that’s very hard. We are all one health crisis or injury away from not being able to work, and we are a better, more advanced and compassionate nation because of programs like SSDI, HUD and others that help people live with some measure of quality and hope that things can get better. Democrats are people too and therefore flawed and fallible, but they believe we can all contribute and help prevent poverty and misery. Capitalism allows the 1% to enjoy wealth beyond any reasonable expectation, and it should come with a requirement that we who are well off help our fellow citizens with some basic needs and not accept a society that simply ignores those who have more challenges or different circumstances. Republicans want to make things better for the wealthy and the well-connected, and worse for the people who are already struggling. It’s shameful.
Comfort the comfortable, afflict the afflicted.
GOP in a nutshell.
It's not just misinformation. It's blatant lying using outlandish claims to support those lies. That is what led to 1/6, despite every turd flung at the wall by MAGA idiots being proven false after being investigated. Including Italian space lasers and involvement by dead Hugo Chavez in districts that did not even use the software that company made. Often investigated by Republican state or local officials who would surely report any credible claims of fraud that would help a Republican candidate.
So the government shouldn't be allowed to even suggest that claims vaccines have tracking and monitoring microchips and that sticking a UV light up your butt would cure Covid. The government does not have free speech. This is not even an order that they remove the information, just a notice to readers that the lie is affecting public health and should be countered with facts, or even just a link to facts.
Natural Disasters
War on a global scale (and the inevitable draft that goes with it)
Contact by aliens
The equivalent of the race to the moon (this one is weaker than the other three - I can see there being a BUNCH of people who would rail against this claiming e should be fixing our own country or planet instead).
... there aren't a great many things that might be unifying on a country-wide scale ... and sadly, most of them are bad. Which is human nature.
Natural disasters are already dividing us into those who say they are bad and those who deny they are even happening.
War on a global scale is dividing us into opposing sides.
Contact by aliens? I can see a lot of the MAGAs saying "I for one welcome our new overlords."
Ummm… so social media companies must do everything they can to “protect children”, or face serious penalty from the right wing nut cases in the House of Representatives, but it cannot agree to a non-binding request from the White House to protect Americans from deadly health misinformation. Mmm-Kay.
"reality is just a matter of opinion"
.
"reality is just a collective hunch"
- Lily Tomlin
"And if I say the 𝘌𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘴𝘦 is designed like a garbage scow, well that's my opinion too!"
Well, I've had sex with not one, but two demons. But that was a long time ago, and no way does Covid have that kind of lag time. Unless it was the dreaded Sleeper Cell Covid. Anyway, never got the bug. Clean living and cursing is the secret.
Hell, I had FUN with the demons I fucked. *g* Must be demonic myself?
"...giving the Government a green light to use heavy-handed tactics to skew the presentation of views on the medium that increasingly dominates the dissemination of news.”
News?
Tell me you don't understand the current media landscape without telling me you don't understand the current media landscape.
Why's the government gotta be so mean to alternative information?
So these politicians seeking to limit the government's ability to interfere with dangerous nonsense on social media are also going to quit holding hearings to complain about social media companies not promoting bullshit, right? No more "FACEBOOK IS BIASSSS BECAUSE PEOPLE MOCKED DOGBUTT69's STATEMENT OF FACK THAT (((JEWS!))) GAVE HIM HERPES!!!!!111!!!1!"
Won't somebody think of all the lost jobs if people can't spread disinformation? Their careers depend on it.
I've thought about it and come to the conclusion that they can fuck right off and keep fucking off into the horizon forever. Amen ❣️
Think of the poor Russian GRU troll farms!
Supreme Court: You have the sacred right to be an online asshole
I wonder what percentage of these sick fucks honestly “enjoy” that their lies actually get people killed? It’s like SWATing people then laughing when the result is the innocent person is gunned down in cold blood by Feds.
This.
Honestly, I think if the founding fathers could have seen what was coming down the pike as far as mass media and communications technology, they would have seriously put some limits on the first amendment.
The Electoral College was intended to prevent things like the PAB happened. Too bad it didn't work out. Abolish it.
That was just the cover story. The real purpose was to give the Southern states partial credit for their Black population without actually letting them vote. It still serves that purpose.
Yes. It was a miserable and craven sop to completely evil slave states.
Once again, with rights come responsibilities. The US Constitution allows considerable latitude in regard to the exercise of individual liberties in most contexts. However, in order to continue to enjoy such individual choice it is necessary to respect the rights of OTHER human beings.
The bottom line here is that civil rights command civil behavior.
It's a two way street that a lot of people don't realize. Like the fucking Bundys.
Also the "parental rights!" crowd.
Misinformation will continue to pull apart the informed from the misinformed, and fracture reality. It’s one of the reasons Trump was able to infect the White House somehow. Alternate facts.
I used to think the bidness class didn’t want all this chaos because bad for bidness but I’m thinking they just want to pick our pockets while we’re fighting one another.
Winner, winner, chicken dinner!
About 25-30% of Americans are not participating in objective reality.
And the fact that the first amendment protects that is pretty disgusting to me.
WEIRDEST TIMELINE
I hate it.
I never would have thought in a million years that *this* is what I would have to look forward to for my final 20 or so years on this planet.
It's just fucking ridiculous. And it has taught me to hate people, which is the worst thing of all, b/c I feel like I can't trust my fellow human to the extent I previously did, and I have a very dim view of people, which I didn't have to the same extent prior to the advent of fucking Trumpism.
I feel that. I try to ignore those signals and remind myself that people with ludicrous views existed long before Trump and before the internet. Only now, their voices are heard far more easily. Another problem is Trump made America far more political than ever before, because misinformation and bad actors conspired to inject a deeply flawed game show con artist into our highest leadership. It trivialized how important our democracy is. And misinformation will pull us further and further apart until we are hopelessly isolated from each other.
It's not just volume of their voices, but the sheer numerosity of those who are completely detached from reality which has grown.
THIS. Me f*ckin' too.
I know exactly what you mean. This place, among others, helps me remember that there are a lot of Us. (Hey, I just noticed that's like "U.S.", get it?)
Like Mr. Rogers said, look for the helpers.
And this what you speak of is one of the only things keeping me sane right now, LOL!
It's the trade and risk we take having those rights.
And is likely to destroy this country, IMHO, as has already been demonstrated by these damnable chuds refusing to accept the truth about things, and continuing to perpetuate their ridiculous, dangerous lies. :(
A democracy can't function with such a critical mass of people literally not participating in objective reality.
No argument. I don't have a solution.