Brazil Blocks X (apnews.com) 161
Longtime Slashdot reader mmell writes: Regular Slashdot users will certainly be aware of the saga unfolding between the country of Brazil and X. Reuters has already reported that what I have to relay here will come as no surprise to Elon Musk, but reporting on CNN confirms that Brazilian Justice Alexandre de Moraes has ordered X to suspend operations in Brazil until X names a representative to appear on X's behalf in Brazilian Courts.
Is this the end of X or some brilliant Machiavellian ploy on the part of Elon Musk? Only time and the informed and spirited debate of the users here at /. can be sure. Here's a recap of the saga, as told by X's Grok-2 chatbot: The Beginning: Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Court Justice with a reputation for tackling misinformation, especially around elections, found himself at odds with Elon Musk, the space-faring, electric-car magnate turned social media mogul. The conflict kicked off when Moraes ordered X to block certain accounts in Brazil, part of his broader crackdown on what he deemed as misinformation.
The Escalation: Musk, never one to shy away from a fight, especially when it involves what he perceives as free speech issues, declared on X that he would not comply with Moraes' orders. This defiance wasn't just a tweet; it was a digital declaration of war. Musk accused Moraes of overstepping his bounds, betraying the constitution, and even likened him to Darth Vader in a less than flattering comparison. Moraes, not amused, opened an investigation into Musk for obstruction of justice, accusing him of inciting disobedience and disrespecting Brazil's sovereignty. The stakes were raised with fines of around $20,000 per day for each reactivated account, and threats of arresting X employees in Brazil.
The Drama Unfolds: The internet, as it does, had a field day. Posts on X ranged from Musk supporters calling Moraes a dictator to others backing Moraes, arguing he was defending democracy against foreign billionaires. The conflict became a global spectacle, with Musk's posts drawing international attention, comparing the situation to a battle for free speech versus censorship. Musk, in true Musk fashion, didn't just stop at defiance. He shared all of Moraes' demands publicly, suggesting users use VPNs, and even hinted at closing X's operations in Brazil, which eventually happened, citing the need to protect staff safety.
The Latest Chapter: Recently, X announced the closure of its operations in Brazil, a move seen as the culmination of this legal and ideological battle. Musk framed it as a stand against what he saw as an assault on free speech, while critics viewed it as an overreaction or a strategic retreat.
Is this the end of X or some brilliant Machiavellian ploy on the part of Elon Musk? Only time and the informed and spirited debate of the users here at /. can be sure. Here's a recap of the saga, as told by X's Grok-2 chatbot: The Beginning: Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Court Justice with a reputation for tackling misinformation, especially around elections, found himself at odds with Elon Musk, the space-faring, electric-car magnate turned social media mogul. The conflict kicked off when Moraes ordered X to block certain accounts in Brazil, part of his broader crackdown on what he deemed as misinformation.
The Escalation: Musk, never one to shy away from a fight, especially when it involves what he perceives as free speech issues, declared on X that he would not comply with Moraes' orders. This defiance wasn't just a tweet; it was a digital declaration of war. Musk accused Moraes of overstepping his bounds, betraying the constitution, and even likened him to Darth Vader in a less than flattering comparison. Moraes, not amused, opened an investigation into Musk for obstruction of justice, accusing him of inciting disobedience and disrespecting Brazil's sovereignty. The stakes were raised with fines of around $20,000 per day for each reactivated account, and threats of arresting X employees in Brazil.
The Drama Unfolds: The internet, as it does, had a field day. Posts on X ranged from Musk supporters calling Moraes a dictator to others backing Moraes, arguing he was defending democracy against foreign billionaires. The conflict became a global spectacle, with Musk's posts drawing international attention, comparing the situation to a battle for free speech versus censorship. Musk, in true Musk fashion, didn't just stop at defiance. He shared all of Moraes' demands publicly, suggesting users use VPNs, and even hinted at closing X's operations in Brazil, which eventually happened, citing the need to protect staff safety.
The Latest Chapter: Recently, X announced the closure of its operations in Brazil, a move seen as the culmination of this legal and ideological battle. Musk framed it as a stand against what he saw as an assault on free speech, while critics viewed it as an overreaction or a strategic retreat.
Lie All You Want (Score:4, Insightful)
They don't care about lying or misinformation.
They have Binnie, Assange, and Snowden locked away or exiled for telling the truth.
"Malinformation" as they call it.
The other social media centralized platforms have agreed to censor 'malinformation' for Brazil.
That's why they're threatening their citizens if they use a VPN to access Twitter.
This seems like a sign that their grip on power is extremely tenuous. A popular, just, and transparent government doesn't need any of this.
Re:Lie All You Want (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
I bet it's people that disagree with him.
Brazil is an interesting case in point. Whatever is wrong with the country, I think it's hard not to trace it to various external sources. Most of them thinking about the money the way Musk thinks.
As for the cesspool formerly known as Twitter, why does it continue to exist? I never figured out the point and nuked my account soon after Musk proved that it could actually become worse. Hard to believe that was possible. (Replacements? Looked at Mastodon and Bluesky, but
Re: (Score:2)
So . . . the Justice ISN'T banning X in Brazil? (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I'm glad we've got you here to clear that up. Who'd have guessed that sources like CNN and the New York Times are apparently no more trustworthy than, say, Twitter or Fox News?
Or are you going from an alternative set of facts of which the rest of us here are blissfully unaware? If so, please share with the rest of us. Is this some sort of international conspiracy, perhaps the machination of an international cabal? Financial elitists? Orange baby-men from Mars? Please, if there's something we're missing here, please, please tell us.
And I still distrust Brazil less than Musk. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That is a gross mischaracterization of the issue.
This is NOT Brazil v Musk, this is a ROGUE Justice, blatantly violating Brazilian law to pursue his own corrupt agenda within Brazil. It is Moraes who goes against the people and laws of Brazil to pursue his own agenda.
As always (Score:5, Insightful)
The "free speech" liar had no problem blocking accounts of opposition candidates in Turkey [imgur.com] when ordered to do so, even whining to someone who critizied the move that not doing so would mean shutting down in the entire country. You will note he explicitly says, "In response to legal process".
And yet, here we are. Apparently where lies are concerned, the legal proces means nothing. That's where that pedo guy draws the line, not with censoring people.
Mod above up (Score:5, Informative)
Mod the above post up please. I have no mod points.
Musk is happy to cater to all sorts of government censorship https://www.forbes.com/sites/k... [forbes.com] despite his utter nonsense claims of being a "free speech absolutist". Brazil's left wing government is some how a major problem for him though? Gee, I wonder why.
Re: As always (Score:2)
Ok, now do a non-Grok article (Score:5, Insightful)
News: AI can still write while washing Musk's sack (Score:5, Insightful)
Musk, never one to shy away from a fight, especially when it involves what he perceives as free speech issues
Are you kidding me with this?
Don't be a lazy asshole and copy-paste some AI garbage fawning over the guy who owns it as a recap to previous related events. I literally stopped reading when this hallucination came up.
That "free speech warrior" is the same guy who marks NPR articles as spam, and bans accounts that tweet public-domain information that just so happens to be about him and his private jet travel.
Fuck Musk, Fuck Twitter, Fuck his sycophantic AI.
Re: (Score:2)
Didn't he notably shy away from that fight with Zuckerberg?
Re: News: AI can still write while washing Musk's (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Lol, you are completely wrong. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/08/1... [cnbc.com]
Re: News: AI can still write while washing Musk's (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Musk, never one to shy away from a fight, especially when it involves what he perceives as free speech issues
Are you kidding me with this?
Don't be a lazy asshole and copy-paste some AI garbage fawning over the guy who owns it as a recap to previous related events. I literally stopped reading when this hallucination came up.
I dunno, I read "what he perceives as free speech issues" as meaning things that he thinks are free speech issues but really aren't. Or alternatively, he only perceives free speech issues when he agrees with what's being said.
Re: (Score:3)
Musk said he would fight Zuckerberg and then pussied out.
“I offered a real date. [UFC president] Dana White offered to make this a legit competition for charity,” Zuckerberg posted on Threads, the Twitter rival whose creation started the beef in the first place.
“Elon won’t confirm a date, then says he needs surgery, and now asks to do a practice round in my backyard instead,” he continued. “If Elon ever gets serious about a real date and official event, he knows how to re
Re: (Score:2)
Uh, say what? (Score:2)
"End of X?" "Brilliant Machiavellian ploy?"
How about "tempest in a teapot"? How about "two deeply flawed, unlikable humans having a pissing match"?
Re:Uh, say what? (Score:4, Insightful)
Considering that the judge declared that SpaceX is to be cut off from being able to paid for its services in Brazil over this, and the fact that Starlink is one of the key reasons why remote locations across Brazil actually have emergency services of any functional kind at all, this depends on how much you think human lives are worth.
If you think they're worthless, then this is indeed a tempest in a teapot. And if you think building up such novel services makes someone "deeply flawed and unlikable", may I suggest that this says nothing about the person in question, but it says a lot about what you have to see in the mirror daily?
Re: (Score:2)
*Citation needed.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If you provide a valuable service, the law doesn't apply to you?
The fault lies entirely with Elon Musk.
Musk has a complicated legacy and serious missteps (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
And if you think building up such novel services makes someone "deeply flawed and unlikable", may I suggest that this says nothing about the person in question, but it says a lot about what you have to see in the mirror daily?
No, that phrase there says everything about you though. Of course no one dislikes Musk for that specific reason, they dislike him for a ton of other reasons though. Things like his far right beliefs and his blatant hypocrisy (as illustrated in this story here) are a good start in understanding why a lot of people don't like him.
You though, you'll make up any kind of negative characterization you can to make anyone you disagree with look bad.
One out of two ain't bad. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
It's amazing that people are trying to turn this into a free speech issue. As if "promoting a coup" is "free speech".
Brazil literally had a (very bungled) coup attempt, organized on social media. OMG, stop the presses, it's not legal in Brazil to try to start a coup!
Re: One out of two ain't bad. (Score:2)
"OMG, stop the presses, it's not legal in Brazil to try to start a coup!"
Well, you can see how that might be confusing for an American audience though, right?
Re: (Score:2)
Touché ;)
Good for Brazil (Score:3, Insightful)
Twitter has become a cesspool of Neo-Nazis and porn bots. It's surviving entirely on inertia alone at this point and it's an active threat to any democracy that hosts it.
This isn't to say I think the United States should shut down Twitter. The blowback from that would not be worth it. But it means you should stop using it as soon as possible. Installing ad block if you're going to use it at all so at least they're not getting revenue from you. Maybe use a VPN so they can't track you and sell your data. If you absolutely have to use it at least be a leech that costs them money
Re: (Score:2)
NPR and journalistic integrity in the same sentence?
Uri Berliner might have something to say about that. [npr.org]
Of course, they fired him.
Re: (Score:2)
"...click on a link to NPR on Twitter you get a message telling you the website you're going to is known for misinformation."
Rsilvergun is, as often is the case, lying. I, at least, see no such "warning". I think there was a community note on the Arlington case that there are several examples of Biden being photographed by White House and other non-Arlington photographers which have been used in political contexts as well, that nobody seemed to get upset about. Different rules, I guess.
https://t.co/tc07 [t.co]
Bias isn't misinformation (Score:2, Insightful)
I know I'm comparing extremes here but that's for clarity and effect. NPR is a lot of things but misinformation isn't one of them and Twitter flagging it as such
Re: Good for Brazil (Score:2)
Love your handle. (Score:2)
He always did electric cars FOR THE RICH. (Score:2)
BTW, My daughter's got a Tesla paperweight in her driveway. She can't afford to replace the bad battery. She's still paying off the car loan and the resale value of the thing's *zero* if it isn't self-propelled.
I never trusted SpaceX (and I really am embarrassed at how badly Boeing is dropping the ball, turns out we have to rely on SpaceX a while longer at least).
Twitter --> X, uh, yeah, the less said about that, the better. He wants his own private messaging platform so he can promote the values an
Re:You're joking, right? (Score:4, Informative)
NPR is the federal government's Democrat-party-aligned mouthpiece; it's a state propaganda outlet no different than Pravda or Isvestia. It's a taxpayer-funded plaything of the DNC. As a taxpayer, I'm annoyed I've had to fund this blatantly unconstitutional lie factory for decades.
Bullshit. NPR only gets 1-2% of it's funding from the government. https://www.forbes.com/sites/m... [forbes.com]
Ha ha ha (Score:2)
Man you guys are easily duped.
Every time some Republican politician answers this lie by saying "oh, well if it's only 1 to 2% then you can easily raise that from liberal donors, so let's cut-off those miniscule funds and set NPR free" there's a total meltdown on the left and the Democrats on capitol hill got insane. I watched that whole thing go down for the first time in the era when Newt Gingrich became the first Republican House Speaker in 40 years. The fresh new GOP majority needed to show its voters th
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
so while you understate the direct funding you totally omit the indirect funding.
If the funding isn't direct then they can't be a mouthpiece. Or does your conspiracy theory* extend to the government asking local stations to pass along messages of the content they want NPR to write for them?
* I called it a conspiracy theory but that was being kind, your comment is more of an unfiltered braindump of someone on shrooms at the RNC.
You are absolutely correct in one thing, sir. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
NPR left X,
But NPR most certainly shared false information here is one example. https://www.npr.org/2021/05/13... [npr.org]
In this Kennedy is labeled as part of the disinformation dozen even though now congressional testimony has actually shown all of the items he shared on COVId were true. Note I dont like Kennedy but vilification of people is a common tactic of sharing misinformation.
That's a nice bunch of bullshit ya got there. NPR provided direct evidence of the lies and "misinformation" being spouted about covid, and you're claiming it's false. Nice to know incontrovertible truth is now false.
Further, no. None of what Kennedy has said about covid is true. None. He's been lying about vaccines for decades and has caused untold deaths because of his lies.
It's not villification if the truth is told. It's called the truth.
Bad things are bad even when Musk is involved (Score:3)
With that said, I still don't like this. While I think X is a pretty awful place to discuss things, a lot of people clearly care about discussing stuff there and I think it's important that they be able to. I think any reduction of the spaces people have to discuss things that matter to them is a net negative for society. I think the Brazilian government would be morally wrong to block the website for pretty much any reason. And while I don't know a lot about the backstory, if Musk's claims of them requesting censorship are to be believed, that's a particularly bad reason for it.
I don't particularly empathize with Musk, I don't care when bad things happen to him, but I do care that some Brazilians will lose access to a space to discuss things they care about. I think that's bad, even if I don't think Musk is the champion of free speech he claims to be.
Yes, it is unfair to the citizenry of Brazil. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Dictator means a ruler unconstrained by law. A question here is, are the people saying X must follow Brazil's "laws" just referring to whatever the "dictator" says they want? And of course these things have to be judged by degrees. So who knows.
Re: Bad things are bad even when Musk is involved (Score:2)
Can we get it too? (Score:2)
Not an overreaction (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, the judge threatened to arrest X employees, so X ceasing all operations in Brazil is certainly not an overreaction. This is certainly a d!ck move by the judge, and Musk has no reason to think that Brazil courts operate by the highest standards of justice. Oops, seems that I shouldn't be visiting Brazil any time soon, lest they arrest me too.
I'm not a Musk fan at all, but in this debacle, he seems the less wrong side.
Re: Not an overreaction (Score:2)
Re: Not an overreaction (Score:2)
I vehemently disagree with this. Arresting random company employees for something done by the company is akin to taking hostages.
Re: (Score:2)
You are violating the 4th Nuremberg principle with your argument. Duh!
Re: Not an overreaction (Score:2)
When you're not doing business in country X, you're not in country X and you're not a citizen of country X, you're not under any obligation to respect orders of a judge in country X, or even to respect the judge himself The judge asking something from you is overreaching his authority, and you should put him in his place.
The only exception is if the country X is the USA; for some reason, American judges seem to think that American laws are something every citizen of Earth must comply with.
Re: (Score:2)
You are violating the fourth Nuremberg principle with your argument. Duh!
I'm conflicted - worlds-tiniest-violin.GIF or (Score:2)
There is no war (Score:2)
No Funny? (Score:2)
Story seems a rich target, yet no jokes?
Re: (Score:2)
Now, byronivs was a very busy body. "Who will establish the set up?" "Not I" said shanen. "Then, I will," said byronivs. Byronivs spent the morning scratching and clawing existential humor from the simulation and noticed the setup was ripe for a punchline. "Who will crack wise?" "Not I," said shanen, "I demand...macaroni pictures."
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I'm missing the joke again, but I don't associate the handle with Funny, for whatever that's worth. I'll check the main "Funny" tab to check for tardy jokes. (Should be a Dr Who joke lurking somewhere in there?)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting angle I hadn't thought of, but just checked the Funny tab again and still nothing.
But now I'm wondering if this story might be related to a large increase in Bluesky users over the last few days.
and nothing of any value (Score:2)
Brazil is nuts! (Score:2)
Re:What's different between this judge and Putin . (Score:5, Insightful)
What's different between this judge, Putin, or the CCP censoring social media.
Why don't you ask that pedo guy. He has no problem censoring accounts when directed to do so in other countries [imgur.com]. He bans accounts when they say anything mean about him [imgur.com], or when it might embarass the convicted criminal [businessinsider.com].
It is also interesting that even in the US we have censorship.
Yes, we do, and Musk is leading the charge.
Re: (Score:2)
You understand the difference between a private individual suppressing information on their own platform and the government doing so [or pressuring the individual to do so which amounts to the same thing as the government doing it]?
The NYT, CNN, MSNBC, etc all suppressed information on the attempted assassination of Trump including literally attempting to suppress calling the assassination attempt and assassination attempt. In one case they initially reported the shots as 'loud noises' as they desperately f
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:5, Informative)
X is vastly less censored than before, you just don't like what most people are saying.
Data suggests otherwise. https://www.forbes.com/sites/k... [forbes.com]
You can say n****r all day on twitter without repercussion but the word cisgender triggers automatic account limiting. https://www.advocate.com/news/... [advocate.com]
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:2)
Those were obvious lies. He bought it to push his own agenda.
It is his now, he can run it into the ground as he sees fit. Doesn't stop the rest of us for calling him out on it.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh but what happened to "this is a privately-owned platform, and they should be able to censor whatever they like" that you were oh-so-fond of saying BEFORE Musk bought it?
It IS a privately owned platform. He CAN censor whatever he likes. It's his RIGHT.
However, what is not his right is to expect people to have any respect for him when he claims to be a free speech absolutist, then engages in censorship as SOP.
What else is not his right is to expect people to believe him when he claims he is doing things for reasons of free speech, because he has conclusively proven that he does not actually believe in that.
I defend Musk's right to censor whatever he wants for any reason he w
Re: (Score:2)
Except that this is a false portrayal. People get censored for both n*gger and c*sgender and it remains the case that X has a the broadest and most permissive [despite partisian affiliation] popular platform on the internet.
There is certainly no shortage of socialist and Kamala spam filling my feed on there, almost to the exclusion of anything else.
Re: (Score:2)
"I've seen the screenshots over and over again"
Yes. You've also seen the fake images of practically empty or empty 30 minutes in Trump rallies as well. Those are fake too. There are also fake [and real] ones doing the same at Kamala rallies.
But even if they weren't X has billions of views a day, hundreds of millions of posts, and millions of accounts active every day. Whatever you are seeing is a meaningless anecdote at best. X undoubtedly bans people, wrongly and rightly by the hundreds every single day.
"W
Re: (Score:2)
Given your history, your casting of aspersions here tells me that you're one of the people promoting this bullshit. I know the accounts making the reports well enough to trust them. I know your output well enough not to trust you.
Re: (Score:2)
Promoting what bullshit?
Cisgender is an explicitly banned slur on the platform because it has no non-slur usage. This isn't a secret, Musk has openly stated this and his it is part of a movement which has mutilated and destroyed hundreds of thousands of children at this point, including his own. It
N*gger is not an explicitly banned term because violation is contextual. It isn't a 'gotcha' for the former to always be shut down and later to have varied results.
The platform makes and corrects erroneous determi
Re: (Score:2)
Oh but what happened to "this is a privately-owned platform, and they should be able to censor whatever they like"
They can. You can support private owners restricting speech while at the same time calling out their hypocrisy (and the hypocrisy of others) when they claim to be a bastion of free speech themselves.
X can do what it wants, but if Elon or his brownnosers want to claim it's a platform for Free Speech (tm) they can fuck aaaaallllllll the way off until they actually provide free speech.
Re: (Score:2)
"But what you don't need is a term for the population of earth minutes 10k or so with that mental illness."
Says who?
The Inuit in Canada has over 50 words for snow. If the rest of the world has no need for that many words for snow, who are we to deny/prevent the use of those 50 words?
Same argument can be made against the naming of the wavelengths of light that are subjectively referred to as "blue".
"But what you don't need is a term for the colours minus the 10k or so with that shade or hue". --Yeah, it's c
Re: (Score:2)
Colours away from the blue part of the spectrum are also called "warm colours", and in fields like interior design and lighting it's very important to have a word for "colours that are not like blue".
Re: (Score:2)
Ok, then, what is the comparable function of "cisgender"? What additional technical precision does it add that is not adequately covered by "normal"?
It adds no precision, indeed, its purpose is the opposite. To define one condition as "normal" is to define any other condition as "abnormal". The only point of substituting cisgender is to obscure that fact.
The object of the word is not to add clarity to the condition, but to obfuscate it. Other than that, it serves no purpose.
Re: (Score:2)
You are playing the backwards game. Trans and breakdown terms within trans are your hues of blue or words for snow as various fine distinctions of one psychosis vs another. We don't need a word for not trans, not blue, or not snow because "not something" is an existing and pluggable system [along with others] in language.
This is not comparable to have more precise terms for variations of snow that most people have no use for. Calling people "cis" offers no additional specificity vs calling them normal or sa
Re: (Score:2)
Psychiatry and psychology are also medicine, so no, that's not the definition.
Hey everyone, Slashdot Doctor Shaitan is here to tell us about how all the medical community is wrong and how THEY really know the truth that all those so-called "medical professionals" are trying to hide! You go, Dr. Shaitan!
Re: (Score:2)
I mean, right in this thread, you're here calling being trans "a certain mental illness". Apparently in your book, "illness" is not the field of medicine. *EYEROLL*
Re: (Score:2)
Yes Rei, anyone can call something an illness and I think few would dispute that a delusional denial of the properties of your own physical body is a mental illness.
That doesn't mean every quack claiming to treat the same is engaging in the valid application of medical science.
Re: (Score:2)
1) The medical community doesn't consider being trans a mental illness. Only dysphoria where present. So you can check your doctorate from the University of Facebook School
Re: (Score:2)
"The medical community doesn't consider being trans a mental illness. Only dysphoria where present."
If you don't have a psychosis and believe your sex is inconsistent with that of your birth [have dysphoria] then you aren't trans. If you simply wish to dress and act in a manner that isn't typically associated with your gender culturally but understand that has nothing to do with gender and therefore are comfortable with who you are... that isn't trans. That's just a normal person with a colorful personality
Re:What's different between this judge and Putin . (Score:5, Insightful)
Unelected (or corruptly elected) strongmen are in style for a noticeable amount of American conservatives right now (like probably Musk) where as democratically elected leftists have always been the stuff of nightmares for them.
Re: (Score:2)
Unelected (or corruptly elected) strongmen are in style for a noticeable amount of American conservatives right now (like probably Musk) where as democratically elected leftists have always been the stuff of nightmares for them.
Regardless of whether or not you consider yourself Right or Left, the reality of the situation is that you have some ideas which could be called Right and some ideas which could be called Left. If you try to associate with either 'group' you can be excluded for your ideas which do not explicitly align with whomever is currently saying what Right or Left is. In other words, Right and Left are concepts that are used as a tool to divide us all. The fact that you continue worshipping at the Altar of Division is
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:5, Insightful)
If there was wide spread discontent amongst democrats you'd have a point. Given that near universal approval though, you're just parroting right wing news nonsense.
Re: (Score:2)
Good for you. Most folks I know are Democrats or are independents who typically vote Democrat and everyone is heaving a huge sigh of relief.
Let's put this to bed properly though. Harris has a 93% approval rate from Democrats https://news.gallup.com/poll/6... [gallup.com] . That's about as good as anyone is ever going to do.
Re: (Score:2)
that were aghast at how they took biden out.
No one took Biden out. The choice to withdraw was his.
Re: (Score:2)
The Justice isn't censoring social media. (Score:2)
As for US censorship - you seem to be able to post your thoughts here with impunity. Not afraid to wake up in the American Gulag or a People's Reeducation Camp somewhere? Good. Enjoy those freedoms that I and millions of other US Veterans and military personnel secured and continue to secure just for your safety and comfort.
Oh, and you're still not allowed to yell "movie!" in a crowded firehouse.
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Putin and the CCP create the laws they need - make no mistake, they follow their own laws.
This judge is forcing decisions that clearly contradicts the current laws.
I will say it again: this judge blatantly breaks the Country's Laws, he is not even trying to mold the laws to do what he wants.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
There's a huge market for reality deniers safe space. There's other, smaller forums but none of them have quite the reputation for banning opposing opinions in the name of free speech.
Re:What's different between this judge and Putin . (Score:4, Insightful)
There's a huge market for reality deniers safe space
They're becoming quite frustrated, though, because the audience for their lies is drying up.
Many people have fled Twitter for Threads, so now on Twitter you just have liars talking to liars, agreeing with every lie they Tweet.
When they dip their toe in Threads and start posting their lies there in the hopes of engagement they are immediately blocked or hammered with facts, so they cry and go back home to Twitter.
I suppose that's how it's supposed to work, but it doesn't make them happy.
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:2)
Because if there is one thing we as a society have proven that we are good at is the ability to construct ideological echo chambers because we are so infantile that we cannot bear to hear ideas and opinions that challenge our world view without foaming at the mouth and having a seizure.
Why do you even need Twitter? Or Threads? Or Mastodon? Or Instagram, Facebook, or any of these other dogshit social media platforms? The irony is that despite labeling them social media, we have arguably become less social as
Re: (Score:3)
Why do you even need Twitter? Or Threads? Or Mastodon? Or Instagram, Facebook, or any of these other dogshit social media platforms?
So I can easily stay in touch with friends and family, despite them being thousands of kilometers and many time zones apart.
So I can engage in discussion with other people who share my likes and interests - Collecting cigars, history, Science Fiction, James Bond...
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:2)
Would that all people only used it to those ends. Unfortunately that is not the case. The vast majority of people use it only to the extent that they have a soap box to preach from, denigrate anyone who does not agree with them, and insulate themselves from any and all things that do not conform to their narrow world view.
It is rather depressing that we have devolved so far as to be violently unwilling to even entertain the thought of hearing anything that runs counter our ideologies. Social media has only
Re: What's different between this judge and Putin (Score:2)
As long as the mainstream news media continues to report on Tweets like they're newsworthy, Twitter ain't going anywhere.
Re: (Score:2)
X has massively greater viewer counts than legacy media. Did you know of the legacy media outlets the lowest median viewership is well into retirement years?
Re: (Score:2)
The argument is that unpopular and only viewed by the elderly legacy media reporting on X when news is shared there was somehow keeping the platform alive. This is false, legacy media viewership is insignificant relative to a popular tweet on X.
Re: (Score:3)
You put on these same blinders when Hillary was running didn't you? Nobody wants Harris and MAGA doesn't end with Trump.