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Social Networks Crime

Parler Referred Violent Content to the FBI 50 Times, Angering Users (msn.com) 175

Parler confirmed Saturday that it had referred dozens of violent posts to America's Federal Bureau of Investigation, reports Newsweek. But even after a blog post explaining its reasons, "some of the platform's users were less than impressed." Parler, which faced significant backlash in the wake of the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by former President Donald Trump's supporters, referred violent content to the FBI at least 50 times prior to the pro-Trump riot, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. The social media site shared a link to the article, drawing backlash from some members of the online platform. Parler has built its platform by positioning itself as being opposed to censorship and staunchly in favor of free speech.

"In reaction to yesterday's news stories, some users have raised questions about the practice of referring violent or inciting content to law enforcement. The First Amendment does not protect violence inciting speech, nor the planning of violent acts. Such content violates Parler's TOS. Any violent content shared with law enforcement was posted publicly and brought to our attention primarily via user reporting. And, as it is posted publicly, it can properly be referred to law enforcement by anyone. Parler remains steadfast in protecting your right to free speech," Parler posted on Saturday in response to criticism.

But some users of the site were still unhappy with Parler's decision.

"I don't like snitches," user MelodySuarez wrote in response to the explanation.

Users "vented their fury at the site's apparent willingness to report its users despite its pitch of protecting free speech," Newsweek reported in an earlier article.

"Parler is a fraud," one user had complained.
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Parler Referred Violent Content to the FBI 50 Times, Angering Users

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  • No surprise there (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Todd Knarr ( 15451 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @08:41PM (#61210714) Homepage

    No surprise, Parler users have in general always confused the right to free speech with the right to break the law and not suffer any consequences for it.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 28, 2021 @08:54PM (#61210738)
      Most Americans in general don't understand that free speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences. They seem to think Free Speech is some catch all that makes them immune other laws.
      • Re:No surprise there (Score:4, Informative)

        by Powercntrl ( 458442 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @10:09PM (#61210968) Homepage

        Most Americans in general don't understand that free speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences.

        I'd also add that it's also fairly common for the same sort of folks to not understand that the "free" part doesn't mean gratis, either. You don't have a right to jump up on stage and use Taylor Swift's microphone, barge into your local TV affiliate and get in front of their camera, or start canvassing the other patrons inside Walmart. Perhaps as a less dramatic example, you also don't have any sort of God-given right to force someone else to host your message on their webserver, for free.

        I've said it before, it works the same as the 2nd amendment: you have a right to own a gun, but Smith and Wesson is under no obligation to provide you with one free of charge. In the same way people with more money can buy and own more guns, if you've got more money you can afford to broadcast your speech to a wider audience. Welcome to capitalism.

        • "As long as you can shout it in an abandoned basement in Wyoming once every second Saturday of the month you're not TRULY silenced!"

          • There is no "freedom to not by silenced by the people who you wish would listen to you."

            None at all. There is no freedom to be heard; only freedom to speak.

      • by jeff4747 ( 256583 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @11:25AM (#61213288)

        The ones complaining about "Free Speech" want to strip it away from everyone else.

        They argue from the perspective that they have the right to speak, and no one else has the right to speak or react in response.

        "Cancel culture" is free speech in action - it's the speech of other people who do not like what you are saying. It's also not remotely new. There's a long history [theoutline.com] of conservatives "canceling" things.

    • So funny. Where in the first amendment does it state about freedom of speech does not allow reporting crimes to the feds? Anyone complaining about snitches clearly is not on the up and up, especially when snitching to a democratic government as opposed to a dictatorship (oh wait, we were on the road to becoming a dictatorship, so maybe that was their concern...).

      • I do not understand why everyone on Parlor got upset.
        Parlor was just using its' freedom of speech to report the threats.

    • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

      I actually read TFA because I was curious what they were actually saying and...curiously, slashdot doesn't mention that there were people on parler who spoke in support of reporting it, even though TFA does.

      Though this whole thing is just another one of those lame articles reporting on stupid shit that happened on social media because they don't have any real news to report.

      • by cusco ( 717999 )

        If one wants the entire story one would RTFA. A summary is not meant to deliver the entire content of the article, it's a summary of what the editor thought were the salient points.

    • I just observed recently that someone wanting the right to free speech much too often just wants the right to freely insult others, spread racism, and so on.

      And as for the consequences: Go to a bar in Texas, filled with Texans, and tell them that people only carry guns because they have problems with their dicks being too small, and they think having a gun makes up for a small dick. Most people will _know_ that kind of speech will have consequences.
  • Funny how criminals definition of free speech is I can say whatever I like but don't you dare tell anyone.
    • Hmmm, so does this mean everyone's fear of neighbors snitching on them to the government isn't really going to happen for...reasons?

      • That's hardly anything, in America we're more worried about self styled neighborhood watch shooting us for looking like we don't belong there.

  • Fraud (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Sebby ( 238625 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @09:26PM (#61210802)

    "Parler is a fraud," one user had complained.

    When you call everything and everyone else a fraud because they no longer fit your world view, maybe you’re the fraud.

  • Fun fact (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @09:45PM (#61210864)
    the head of the Proud Boys has been an FBI informant for ages. Now that there's a Democrat in the Whitehouse again the party's over. The FBI isn't going to look the other way while violent extremists foment coups.

    I get that what I just wrote sounds extreme, like I'm trolling. I'm not. There's pretty clear evidence Trump, Sessions & Barr pulled back on investigating White Supremacist terrorist organizations despite the fact that they've quiet literally killed more Americans than Muslim extremists (and that's with 9/11's death toll).

    This is one of those "fuck around and find out" scenarios where we do *not* want to fuck around. Letting literal National Socialists (/. won't let me use the "N" word) swim is not going to end well for anyone.
  • I don't like 'Parler' or it's users in general, but I can at least respect that they have some principles, even if they're motivated by self-interest (i.e. not wanting to get sued by someone who got physically attacked, or shut down by law enforcement for not properly handling violent assholes on their site).
  • by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @09:59PM (#61210914)

    This is why no services like Parler should ever be shut down. Why would you turn off such a great pipeline of potential problem people that you can tell the FBI about?

    Now all the people that Parler might have warned about are doing whatever in a far more nondescript way, mostly undetectable.

    Any time subversive elements of a society speak out in public, your only reaction should be to let them speak and take notes, not shut them down and wonder in five years where in the hell all these subversives came from.

    • The events of Jan. 6 were planned on Facebook, much more so than Parler. Should facebook be shut down? Summer riots were also planned on facebook and twitter.

  • Notably absent (Score:4, Insightful)

    by LeeLynx ( 6219816 ) on Sunday March 28, 2021 @10:08PM (#61210964)
    For all of you folks hand-wringing about the death of free speech or whatever, I would point out that, aside from the fact that 50 is a pretty small number in this context, there is nothing in the linked article about anyone actually *doing* anything about what was reported. If I start calling the cops every time my neighbor says something mean to me, it's not some tragic collapse of our free and democratic republic unless those cops come and haul my neighbor away. It's just a thing a shitty neighbor does.

    More to the point, when you post calling for others to join you in going to the capital armed so you can shoot up the place when your guy loses the election, the problem being reported isn't your speech - it's the violent crime you have described your specific intent to commit. If I tell strangers on the street about my specific intent to rob the bank across the street at a specified time, I don't think anyone is going to be mad about them reporting it. Even an attorney, who has an almost absolute obligation not to reveal client communications, is allowed to disclose to law enforcement if their client is planning to commit a crime reasonably certain to result in serious injury or death.
    • It's Parler's house they're visiting, and they're not even neighbors.

  • You have the right to say stupid shit - and be held accountable for it.

  • "I don't like bitches," user Otis B Dilroy III wrote on 3/28/2021
  • 2. Complain when feds see it
    3. Profit!

    In 2018 I think, a pedestrian was run down on a crosswalk in Boston. The cops interviewed a kid they thought did it, but let him go since he didn't confess and they had no evidence to do anything.
    The kid gets out of the police station, sees a tv news crew, and flat out confesses to running the guy down because he didn't get out of the way of his car fast enough. The cops see the interview, and arrest him for murder.

    https://www.boston.com/news/lo... [boston.com]

  • Not that simple (Score:4, Informative)

    by PertinaxII ( 6264270 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @12:42AM (#61211262)

    US caselaw on the First Amendment defines a limit on the right incite violence. Speech that is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action, and is likely to incite or produce such action, is not protected but mere advocacy of violence is protected.

    Parler would have been reporting speech that their lawyers conculded would result in a clear and present danger, and so would be illegal. It is right that they should report this.

  • Some good advice that I got from someone with jail experience, and very hopefully I will never need to use it: When you go to jail and someone tells you that you never snitch on anybody, that someone will be the first one to snitch on you if it gets them any advantage.
  • The whole concept of ultimate free speech needs to end alright, like everything in life, free speech must have some sort of limit as to what a person says. It's just like how you can't yell fire in a crowded theater yet some of these shitheads would probably claim that that would be covered under free speech.

    Second, what these shit for brains don't get is that the whole concept of free speech doesn't pertain to those of private companies. The Constitution strictly says this about free speech under Bill of Rights, Amendment 1.

    "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

    At no point did Congress prevent you from saying a damn thing, Parlor did. They are not Congress, they are a private entity just like Facebook and Twitter and when it comes to telling you what you can and can't do on their site, they have every damn right to do so. It is their site, their community. Don't like the rules, tough shit. The Constitution doesn't protect you in this instance no matter how much you want to whine about it.

    And last but not least, the protests in Washington, DC were anything but peaceful. They were a violent and absolutely not covered under Bill of Rights, Amendment 1 since it specifically says "the right of the people peaceably to assemble" which what happened in DC isn't even within a galactic parsec of being peaceful.
    • The main thing they don't get is when they get "canceled", thats other people using free speech.

      They seem to believe that they should have free speech, but no one else should.

  • Actions require Consequences

  • Parlor has the responsibility to report any possible threat that seems to be real. If not, lawyers will have a nice payday if those threats become reality.

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