{"id":13256,"date":"2024-03-31T03:01:30","date_gmt":"2024-03-31T03:01:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=13256"},"modified":"2024-03-31T03:01:31","modified_gmt":"2024-03-31T03:01:31","slug":"the-supreme-court-appeared-lost-in-a-massive-case-about-free-speech-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=13256","title":{"rendered":"The Supreme Court appeared lost in a massive case about free speech online"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Texas and Florida\u2019s Republican legislatures both passed similar, but not identical, laws that would effectively seize control of content moderation<\/a> at the \u201cbig three\u201d social media platforms: Facebook<\/a>, YouTube<\/a>, and Twitter<\/a> (the platform that Elon Musk<\/a> insists on calling \u201cX\u201d).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These laws\u2019 advocates are quite proud of the fact that they were enacted to prevent moderation of conservative speech online, even if the big three platforms deem some of that content (such as insurrectionist or anti-vax content) offensive or harmful. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis<\/a> (R) said his state\u2019s law exists to fight supposedly \u201cbiased silencing\u201d of \u201cour freedom of speech as conservatives … by the \u2018big tech\u2019 oligarchs in Silicon Valley<\/a>.\u201d Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) said his state\u2019s law targets a \u201cdangerous movement by social media companies<\/a> to silence conservative viewpoints and ideas<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At least five justices \u2014 Chief Justice John Roberts, plus Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett<\/a> \u2014 all seemed to agree that the First Amendment does not permit this kind of government takeover of social media moderation. There is a long line of Supreme Court cases, stretching back at least as far as Miami Herald v. Tornillo<\/em><\/a> (1974), holding that the government may not force newspapers and the like to publish content they do not wish to publish. And these five justices appeared to believe that cases like Tornillo<\/em> should also apply to social media companies.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“the Supreme Court appears likely to reinstate the Texas and Florida laws. This is not because the Court thinks they are constitutional, and not because the Court thinks that they are constitutional with respect to the three companies that Texas and Florida actually wanted to regulate. But the ham-handedly drafted laws<\/a> at issue in the NetChoice<\/em> cases sweep so broadly that they may have some ancillary effects that are permitted by the First Amendment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s probably the right outcome under existing law, but good Lord, it\u2019s an unsatisfying one. This litigation has been ongoing for a very long time, and the Texas law already reached the Supreme Court once in 2022, when a majority of the Court voted to temporarily block it<\/a>. A decision reinstating the laws because they are not vulnerable to a facial challenge would start that process all over again. And it would create at least some risk that, should the personnel of the Court change while this case is being relitigated, that these clearly unconstitutional laws<\/a> could actually be upheld.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/scotus\/2024\/2\/26\/24083652\/supreme-court-netchoice-paxton-moody-texas-florida-first-amendment-social-media-facebook-youtube<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Texas and Florida\u2019s Republican legislatures both passed similar, but not identical, laws that would effectively seize control of content moderation at the \u201cbig three\u201d social media platforms: Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter (the platform that Elon Musk insists on calling \u201cX\u201d).
\nThese laws\u2019 advocates are quite proud of the fact that they were enacted to prevent moderation of conservative speech online, even if the big three platforms deem some of that content (such as insurrectionist or anti-vax content) offensive or harmful. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said his state\u2019s law exists to fight supposedly \u201cbiased silencing\u201d of \u201cour freedom of speech as conservatives … by the \u2018big tech\u2019 oligarchs in Silicon Valley.\u201d Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) said his state\u2019s law targets a \u201cdangerous movement by social media companies to silence conservative viewpoints and ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n

At least five justices \u2014 Chief Justice John Roberts, plus Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett \u2014 all seemed to agree that the First Amendment does not permit this kind of government takeover of social media moderation. There is a long line of Supreme Court cases, stretching back at least as far as Miami Herald v. Tornillo (1974), holding that the government may not force newspapers and the like to publish content they do not wish to publish. And these five justices appeared to believe that cases like Tornillo should also apply to social media companies.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“the Supreme Court appears likely to reinstate the Texas and Florida laws. This is not because the Court thinks they are constitutional, and not because the Court thinks that they are constitutional with respect to the three companies that Texas and Florida actually wanted to regulate. But the ham-handedly drafted laws at issue in the NetChoice cases sweep so broadly that they may have some ancillary effects that are permitted by the First Amendment.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s probably the right outcome under existing law, but good Lord, it\u2019s an unsatisfying one. This litigation has been ongoing for a very long time, and the Texas law already reached the Supreme Court once in 2022, when a majority of the Court voted to temporarily block it. A decision reinstating the laws because they are not vulnerable to a facial challenge would start that process all over again. And it would create at least some risk that, should the personnel of the Court change while this case is being relitigated, that these clearly unconstitutional laws could actually be upheld.”<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/scotus\/2024\/2\/26\/24083652\/supreme-court-netchoice-paxton-moody-texas-florida-first-amendment-social-media-facebook-youtube<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1736,875,528],"class_list":["post-13256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-first-amendment","tag-free-speech","tag-supreme-court"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13256"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13256\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13257,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13256\/revisions\/13257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}