I hear people calling the so-called "TikTok ban bill" authoritarian. Guys. You don't have a right to use someone else's computer. That's not speech. The only right an individual has on the Internet is to see up your own, private server, hosting a website, and publishing non-illegal things on it. That's the *full extent of online rights to speech.*
YT, FB, IG, TikTok? Companies cannot declare they are "free speech" platforms and therefore become impervious to all regulation and consequences.
@gardiner_bryant
The bill uses the force of law to prevent people from accessing information presented by free will of the publisher and accessed by free will of the consumer.
It is by definition authoritarian.
@jlcrawf so if I went out and made a website and claimed that the site was a "free speech platform," suddenly that would make my site 100% impervious to regulation? Nah, sorry bro.
Corporations are not people, do not have free speech, and platforms like TikTok should not have the ability to manipulate the political or social consciousness.
The first amendment isn't a get out of jail free card for enemy propaganda.
@jlcrawf furthermore, the law doesn't ban TikTok, it forces ByteDance to sell TikTok to an American firm. And if they fail to do so, the app would disallow app stores to continue distributing it. The app would still work. So it ain't even censorship. It's regulation.
@gardiner_bryant
1. I was simply arguing that the bill is authoritarian. Whether or not you agree with the bill does not change the fact that it is an authoritarian bill.
2. Disallowing app stores from distributing it is effectively banning it.
3. Saying that an app should not be banned is not the same as saying that it is 100% impervious to regulation. That is a completely bad faith argument on your part.
Authoritarianism: "Characterized by or favoring absolute obedience to authority, as against individual freedom."
I just don't see it as authoritarian in the slightest. TikTok isn't a free speech platform (it's run by the CCCP) and if TikTok were banned everyone would have exactly the same 1A rights they had before they started using TikTok.
@gardiner_bryant
Nobody that I know of is making the argument that TikTok is a free speech platform. That is a straw man argument.
1/3
@gardiner_bryant
Regulations are concise rules that apply equally across the board.
Porn cannot be posted on Social Media, would be a regulation.
All social media must implement age verification and cannot allow users under a specific age, would be a regulation.
@gardiner_bryant
This company is owned by a disfavored ethnic group with political leanings that I disagree with so must not be allowed on any application stores, is not a regulation, it is an authoritarian rule that will get expanded and abused.
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@jlcrawf This company is owned by a **hostile government and it's operatives** with **intent to do our political system harm** so must **not be allowed unfettered access to a vast portion of our citizens mass surveillance devices**.
Fixed that for you.
@gardiner_bryant
Now, we might possibly have reached a point where we might find some common ground and maybe even a good compromise.
Rather, than ban apps, why don't we instead regulate how much information all companies can gather on Americans?
@jlcrawf I would agree that there should be limits on the amount of data that can be collected on human beings. What that limit is? Ideally, zero bytes.
@gardiner_bryant
Honestly, I don't know exactly how best to limit it, though I agree that the less information the better.
I think that a good starting point would be, any information that they feel could be mishandled by a foreign government, should also be restricted from private businesses.
@jlcrawf well, how would regulation work from a free speech absolutist perspective? Clearly you believe it would be a violation of random internet user's 1A rights if the app was banned, but how would regulating TikTok (or Gplay or the App Store) not also violate those of random Internet user?
It's vulgar to me to say that a private app is able to grant end users "free speech rights" that then make government regulation of those privately apps a violation of those "rights."