Censorship by Moderation, Biased Crack Down On Free Speech & The Demise of American Democracy.

Censorship by Moderation, Biased Crack Down On Free Speech & The Demise of American Democracy.

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Democracy can not survive without freedom of speech. In order for people to be able to elect the government they want they must have freedom of information exchange and freedom of expression to publicly debate about important social issues, to challenge bad government policies or bad leaders.

When freedom of speech is suppressed either by the government or by powerful private companies, people lose the ability to contribute to public discourse by expressing their opinions and lose access to the opinions of others and important information. Without access to information and self-expression channels, without the ability to communicate with other like-minded individuals and vent, people may get very angry, and desperate, make wrong irrational decisions, and even get violent and destructive.

Suppressing information and speech doesn’t make people more obedient, peaceful, or cooperative.

Therefore, the founding fathers who opposed the British monarchy’s censorship over the colonies, intentionally drafted the most important Amendment to the Constitution which became the First Amendment in recognition of its importance.  In the 18th century, it was inconceivable that some private companies would acquire the power to suppress speech, so the founding fathers only prohibited the government from suppressing free speech but never addressed private behavior leading to restrictions on free speech.

Today, with big social media companies’ monopoly online, the protection of free speech online has become crucial for the preservation of our public discourse and consequently our democracy. It is not enough that the Government is limited by the 1st Amendment in how it can regulate speech- we need new protection of free speech from interference and suppression by private actors and we do not have it yet.

Social media giants say they are concerned about speech that can cause actual harm to people because it may lead to physical violence or hurt people’s feelings insulting certain groups or individuals making them feel unsafe and causing mental anguish. In addition, social media giants are concerned about what they call “misinformation” and exposing children to adult content. To remedy these and other concerns about certain types of speech, social media generated guidelines regulating speech online. To enforce these guidelines social media companies hire moderators and use special algorithms to detect “hate speech,” “offensive speech,” or “disinformation,” and any other form of speech that may violate the guidelines. 

Hate Speech Calling For Violence

What if malicious individuals who are not interested in public discourse or civilized debates, but are interested in inciting violence use social media platforms to cause chaos and destruction, to spread angry messages calling for violence, and use social media outlets to organize it? Today’s legal system doesn’t prevent social media companies from classifying such speech as hate speech that violates the guidelines and therefore is banned.

The question arises: how direct and unambiguous should calls for violence be to be classified as prohibited hate speech and how specific and well organized should the incitement of violence be to pose a real danger of violence and justify banning such speech and blocking the accounts of those trying to express it?

How do algorithms distinguish between the passionate expression of anger, frustration, and discontent against government or some groups of people as opposed to specific coordination of an attack on them?

How do human moderators decide what type of speech is so incendiary and offensive that it should be suppressed and what type of speech is controversial but still not incendiary enough to cause violence or offend people? 

The overbroad guidelines that ban any content that mentions certain words are likely to unintentionally suppress legitimate speech, and overly narrow application of guidelines may let something sinister slip through.

There was a reason why the founding fathers decided to broadly prevent the government from suppressing almost any speech: they recognized that political speech suppression would definitely be used by the sitting government to prevent the opposition from competing in elections.  Proceeding on the premise that the government should have limited powers and should not become a tyranny of one party, the founding fathers made sure the government was powerless to suppress speech no matter what party ran it.

Unfortunately, they could not foresee that there would be a time like today when private social media companies will have all the power they need to suppress any speech they deem inappropriate without any constitutional restraint on that power.

As a result, we ended up in a situation where moderators and algorithms can arbitrarily set the guidelines and restrictions to ban any speech they don’t like for a variety of reasons – some legitimate and some not so legitimate.

Consequently, conservatives and republicans are complaining that left-leaning moderators and left-leaning algorithms actively suppress right-wing or conservative content in social media while promoting a liberal agenda.  Because of the lack of transparency and the arbitrary nature of decisions made by AI algorithms, this point of view gained support among the opposition while social media platforms flatly deny this as yet another “right-wing conspiracy theory”.

One of the best examples of how futile any guidelines banning free speech could be is the incident with Trump’s Twitter account. 

In January 2021 Twitter shut down former president Trump’s account with 80 million followers claiming that Trump was calling for violence and repeating the “I told you so” argument after the January 6th takeover of the Capitol by Trump supporters and (depending on where you get your news) undercover FBI agents.

Social media platforms claimed that Trump tried to directly organize the insurrection using Twitter and other social media and then it actually happened but would have been much worse had they not intervened to exclude Trump from public discourse.  Democrat-run January 6 committee concluded that Jan 6 events should be classified as violent insurrection so the “ hate speech” Trump used to organize it had to clearly be banned to avoid or reduce violence.

On the other hand, tens of millions of people that belong to the opposition along with MAGA Republicans and Trump himself deny that any insurrection was ever planned or even happened. They point to the fact that the Jan 6th events started off as a very peaceful and lawful protest protected by the Constitution and that violence and trespass into the Capitol that happened was never planned and most likely was provoked by the FBI as a sort of “burning of Reichstag” pretext to crack down on them subsequently. Opposition would also point out that Trump never directly called for violence and that real insurrection necessarily includes army and police switching sides to help the insurrectionists and includes a much broader scale of violence so whatever happened on Jan 6, 2021, doesn’t meet the criteria of what insurrection is.

At the same time, social media never censored any of the Black Lives Matter or Antifa activists who planned and organized far more numerous incidents of widespread violence that happened in 2020 allowing them to carefully plan riots, looting, burning, attacks on police and innocent civilians and businesses.

In other words, there is clearly a difference of opinion on the issue. There is no way to objectively determine what is hate speech and what is not – everyone defines it according to their own point of view.

Liberal moderators refused to classify Black Lives Matter or Antifa speech as “hate speech” and used their own biased personal views to classify whatever Trump was saying on Twitter as prohibited hate speech in violation of Twitter guidelines that were also written by liberal intellectuals.

When facing criticism, Social media giants are not even trying to be transparent about their algorithms or identities and personal views of their moderators – instead, they are simply saying: “This is our privately run enterprise so we have the right to be completely arbitrary about what speech we allow and what speech we don’t’ allow! “

No matter how undemocratic it sounds, it might still not hurt democracy as profoundly as it does now if social media giants were not so monopolistic! Unfortunately, they are and so they have a lot more power to shape public opinion by censorship than the democratic process allows!

Consequently, it is the government that must ironically intervene here to protect free speech by not allowing social media to moderate any content while requiring it to provide warning labels such as “hate speech” or “if you post messages calling for and helping violence, you will be traced by the law enforcement and arrested”.  This on the one hand would stop the censorship of free speech and on the other hand, would still chill malicious actors trying to organize violence.

Misinformation

Again, this is in the eye of the beholder and subject to interpretation.  If a person who doesn’t trust their own doctors chooses to watch YouTube bloggers who claim to be medical professionals and follow their recommendations on how to treat COVID-19, cancer, or any other disease, that “YouTube patient” should be allowed to assume whatever risk they take. Moderators should not be acting as parents to adults and remove the content they deem “misinformation” to “protect” viewers from self-harm!  If “YouTube patients” like these hurt themselves by listening to the wrong advice and get even sicker, they should either pay for treatment by legitimate doctors or be denied treatment if they can’t afford it but should never be prevented from listening to whatever medical recommendations they like.

When it comes to political speech especially, moderators are too susceptible to their personal bias and algorithms are too susceptible to malicious manipulation by their creators to be allowed to decide what is misinformation and what is not.

Consumers of political information are adults (some mature and some not, but still adults) and have the right to decide for themselves what information they want to believe.

If one party has disproportionate influence on social media content it will cause social media outlets to classify everything the opposition says online as “misinformation” to censor it – this is the easiest way to silence the opposition and must not be allowed in a democracy.

Offensive Speech

Cowardly people seem to use foul language or insults online against people or groups they hate a lot less selectively than they would do in person.  Racial slurs, cussing, offensive remarks about various social groups, and fighting words would just be flying online in all directions but for strict moderation not in real life. Cowards sitting in front of the computer in the privacy of their own homes and using some anonymous pseudonyms do not hesitate to insult people they would be scared of insulting in person for fear of being severely beaten. In that sense, moderation of insults, foul language, and racial slurs that really contribute nothing to the intelligent public discourse can be appropriate.  If you are saying something so offensive to someone that you could get your ass kicked by that person in real life, perhaps you should not be allowed to say it online either – there is no dignity in hiding behind anonymity, barking from under the bed and then peeing in your pants out of fear when confronted by the recipient of your insults in person. Generally, people should be saying things online that they would not be afraid or ashamed to say in person!

 Perhaps only with one caveat:  when someone’s political views are not objectively offensive but are extreme enough to provoke harm or violence against them should be entitled to anonymous free speech online that contributes to public discourse without jeopardizing that person’s well-being.

Unfortunately, some people get so offended by perfectly legitimate critical statements that do not rise to the level of fighting words, that they can also get violent with inadequate provocation. The recipient “victim” of what he/she considers to be the insult may not be capable of objectively judging the “offender”. Victims’ personal idiosyncratic sensitivity to certain statements or words can not set the standard of what is truly offensive and what is not  – the standard must be reasonable and commonly accepted in the community to be construed as offensive.

Unfortunately, moderators tend to use their personal standards and personal views, and often not the reasonable community standards to determine what statements should be banned as offensive. As a result, some of the legitimate free speech gets banned as too offensive to certain groups that might feel “unsafe” online because of this speech.  This is wrong because neither the moderators nor the “offended” and not even the “offender” could ALONE judge objectively what is offensive and what is not. Allowing the  “offended” to be the sole judges of that gives them too much power to suppress legitimate free speech, and allowing moderators who “assume” that something is offensive while having even less stake in it than the “offended” is equally wrong.  If an objective community’s standards are to be applied, then let the community judge and allow its members to trade insults with the offender if they want but do not silence the offender solely based on the whim of the offended or moderator! 

Yes, the level of public discourse online can be extremely low and disappointing, the people posting are often uncivilized and rude, but silencing them is not the answer!  Allowing people to trade insults online as long as they don’t meet in person to confront each other with weapons is much less evil than suppressing offensive speech which helps people vent and then NOT decide to confront people they hate in person or harm them in other ways.

The value of “venting” is certainly under-appreciated!  If the steam is not let out, it will explode the kettle – must allow people to vent. As to the offended – well – they are on notice not to go into forums where they know they will be trashed and insulted – they have the freedom not to engage with those who are trying to insult them; and they have the freedom to insult them back like in a kindergarten; this is the beauty of online communication!  The ‘offended” have the freedom not to go where they feel unsafe if they are too emotionally insecure to fight back and respond in kind and also have the freedom to expose the offender, to shame them, to curse them out and respond in kind if they feel strong enough to do that.  Unlike in the real world, where bullies might have full control over you in that school bathroom and you have no way out, there is always a way out online and bullies do not have any power over you. Unlike in a school bathroom setting, where it is very clear who the bully is and it is clear what they are trying to do to you, online bullies may only be bullies in your eyes because you just don’t agree with them or you don’t like what they are saying, but in the eyes of the community these “bullies” might be making a good point that contributes to public discourse and helps the democratic process! 

No matter who says what, bullies in the school bathroom by design cannot contribute to public discourse or help the democratic process by sticking your head into the toilet full of piss! 

There is a big difference between online bullying and actual physical or emotional bullying in person – so moderators can not treat both equally unless online bullying is actually done by your personal enemies planning real-life harassment against you.

Children & Adult Content

According to general community standards, and consensus among parents, educators, and government tick-tock, salacious materials online, porn, graphic depiction of cruelty, drug-related propaganda, and other adult content can irreparably harm children’s psyche and prematurely expose them to knowledge and emotions they are not ready to experience.  If you ask many adults today who suffer from bad habits or emotional problems and all kinds of dysfunctionality, they will tell you that premature exposure to all kinds of “vices” that life has to offer traumatized them into becoming self-destructive and dysfunctional today! Therefore, protecting children and young adults from all these “vices” that are being marketed to them online is a sensible thing to do and that is where moderators SHOULD BE in agreement with the community standards and should seemingly have the same views as parents, educators, and the government as to what content should be banned. However, even in this case, moderators can’t help but apply their own personal views that are often much less restrictive/conservative than educators, parents, or government when it comes to exposing children to “vices”

Moderators sitting somewhere in Oregon where magic mushrooms and other drugs are legalized might allow some content about magic mushrooms to be seen by teenagers under 21; or allow premature “education “ about transsexuality while banning content about legal firearm instructions or some religious criticism of the theory of evolution. Feminist moderators might ban posts glorifying anorexia while allowing body shaming of naturally thin girls and at the same time allow “body positivity” of masculine fitness freaks or overweight women while banning any criticism of these categories praising thin and delicate female images. 

Moderators could allow children to learn about Obama and his biography from content that glorifies the first black president but ban children’s books depicting Trump in a positive light.

Out of all other categories of free speech that should not be censored online, it seemed that at least when it comes to children and young adults there should be a general consensus on what content can be safely banned without hurting free speech and public discourse and children psyche, however, even in this area there is plenty of disagreement that even leads to more political firestorms than attempts to ban other types of speech.

Whereas with speech that is directed at adults, adults have the capacity to sort it through themselves, children and teenagers may lack the emotional and intellectual maturity to decide for themselves what is good for them and what is not – in fact, they usually gravitate to forbidden fruits that are bad for them solely because they are forbidden.

If they really want to get a hold of something like that, they will find a way to get it whether you ban it online or not, and all adults can do is just make it more difficult to do. Non-political speech like porn or premature sexual/drug education doesn’t help to promote democracy in any way, and there is a general consensus between parents, educators, the government, and the community at large that denying access to minors to such speech is appropriate. Therefore, this is the only type of speech, that social media moderators should focus on and in fact, expand moderation and restrictions on content that hurts minors. 

Summary

There is no democracy without free speech. Monopolistic social media companies use moderators and algorithms to restrict and censor free speech based on biased personal political views, personal moral values, and idiosyncratic personal sensitivities of the social media company owners. If democracy is to survive, any political speech censorship on social media and elsewhere must be strictly forbidden.  As to malicious actors using social media to incite violence, it should be law enforcement’s job, not social media’s job to go after them. It should be up to parents to deny their children access to content that corrupt and hurts children and up to law enforcement to prosecute criminals who are trying to hurt children using social media.  Social media’s job should be neutral and limited solely to providing free space for everyone to express themselves when it comes to political speech.  There are no independent and objective arbiters who can decide what is hate speech and what is not, what type of speech can be classified as calling for violence, and what type of speech is passionate and legitimate political speech, there is not even an independent arbiter who can judge what misinformation is or isn’t so any censorship inevitably bans and restricts free speech hurting our democracy. Therefore, the only type of speech that can and should be moderated, restricted, or censored completely would be non-political speech directed at minors.