> because people really don’t like it when you attempt to police their individual political speech
I'm not sure that I buy that when people's health are at stake. When things are objectively false, and spreading that information will actively harm people, you have a responsibility and duty of care to point out falsities. But that's just me.
It isn’t just you, but it also isn’t everybody. Dissent is always present, and the 1st amendment ensures that people have the right to speak their mind. Having the government lean on private platforms to pressure them into censorship, especially in a coordinated fashion, violates that right. Even if the government attempts to launder that pressure through a maze of domestic and foreign NGOs.
I'm not from the U.S so I'll only say that the 1st amendment doesn't apply here, the government is not going to arrest people for sharing false information. The government has a responsibility to its citizens and so should act in the interests of their safety.
> Having the government lean on private platforms to pressure them into censorship, especially in a coordinated fashion, violates that right.
Even as a non US, this isn't true. A private company can decide to ban you for whatever reason they like. If they align with government health experts or not. It has nothing to do with your first amendment. It WOULD violate your rights if they arrested you for it.
Sorry, but you’re wrong. Government pressure makes it into a first amendment issue. The government recently settled a lawsuit about this (Murthy v. Missouri, originally filed as Missouri v. Biden) that includes a consent decree preventing the agencies involved from engaging in any future pressure campaigns as they did during COVID.
Absent government pressure, of course it’s not a free speech issue, but a violation of rights happened here.
The government can’t just evade the first amendment by cleverly outsourcing censorship, especially if they have people sitting in Slack channels and the like passing on names! And even more so if they are simultaneously applying pressure and vague threats through Congressional hearings.
It’s unfortunate that the government has not yet learned its lesson on this, because this kind of pressure is still ongoing with speech related to ICE and Israel/Palestine. Hopefully someone wins a big lawsuit soon.
In the US we are citizens with rights, not subjects.
That statement was censored as "objectively false", but our best information says it's probably true, and it was probably true then, too. Censorship is a dangerous walk. I totally agree with you that harmful misinformation is a problem, and that we have a duty of care. The problem is "who fact-checks the fact checkers?", and what happens when political leaders can request certain topics "fact checked".
I'm not sure that I buy that when people's health are at stake. When things are objectively false, and spreading that information will actively harm people, you have a responsibility and duty of care to point out falsities. But that's just me.