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January 9, 2021 - 12:15pm
The un-personing of Donald Trump by Twitter presents a strange paradox: the most powerful man in the world is simultaneously a nobody; Trump can still (we presume) destroy the entire world many times over, but he cannot speak to the nation he still leads on his chosen platform, a development he likely finds more personally catastrophic than losing the actual election.
There’s no point American conservatives whining about free speech or unfairness or hypocrisy: American politics has moved beyond such abstractions, whatever anyone involved claims to think. It’s as pointless as complaining about the dissonance between the policing and reporting of one side’s riots versus the other: each side wants their riots supported by the state, and the other side’s quashed; their own rioters handled with kid gloves, and the other side’s shot: there’s nothing deeper to it. There are now two popular factions, who hate each other and wish for the other’s total destruction: Trump and Biden are just the avatars in wrinkled flesh of the two opposing popular wills.
This Schmittian political landscape has urgent lessons for us in Europe: we need to disentangle ourselves from America’s political chaos as urgently as we do from China’s industrial and economic stranglehold. The result of the free-market ideology trading under the name ‘conservatism’ is that we have handed control of information to California’s tech oligarchs just as we have handed control of industry to the Chinese Communist Party. As America’s disorder deepens, and as the listing global hegemon enters into a deepened confrontation with its rising challenger, this dangerous and unsustainable situation will have profound and negative effects for every one of us in Europe — unless we act fast.
To this end, an important point was made by the EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell Fontelles this week. The debate about European strategic autonomy has hitherto focussed on the EU’s adoption of independent military capacity from the US, but its true ramifications are far deeper. First urging the return of strategic and medical industrial capacity to Europe from China, Borrell goes on to urge the avoidance of “excessive dependence on external suppliers” in the “strategic sectors” of “digital networks and cloud computing,” a clear reference to Europe’s dependence on the political whims of Silicon Valley oligarchs. As he states, “the aim is not to embrace autarky or protectionism, but to safeguard our political independence so that we remain masters of our own choices and future.”
Is this the beginning of a European, civilisational internet? After all, Russia and China are already proceeding at full steam with creating their own national internets — though I would argue they are better understood as the internets of civilisation states rather than nations, and may eventually extend beyond their current national borders. Just as a process of deglobalisation is already underway for industry, so will a deglobalisation of the internet likely be a result of an increasingly multipolar world, and the contested space for information flowing from it. British politicians need to start thinking about these questions ahead of time, for once, instead of being swept along by events outside their control once again.
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SubscribeIn principle this looks a good strategy and certainly we should long since have been decoupling from Globalisation, which makes most countries far too dependent on suppliers who are either unreliable or mischievous (cf China).
We should be all-in for as much self-sufficiency in medecine, industry, farming as physically possible.
But why does this author suppose that anything good can come from present-day Europe, so dominated as that is by the EU?
If the EU did not exist, then the various nation-states of our local Continent, including the UK, could make all sorts of healthy arrangements for NOT being dominated by Silicon Valley dictatorial barons, not needing to get all our steel supplies from the Far East and so forth.
In the EU, however, everything is subordinated to the personal careers of today’s awful Occidental ruling caste – the ‘meritocrats’ without merit, the ‘elite’ who have little competence. What THEY want – an Empire which they rule without accountability, ministries where they can take highly remunerative refuge from the public – has priority over every policy-consideration.
This has been shown in spades by the fiasco of the vaccination [non-]rollout across much of Europe. Germany had the means to order millions of doses of the very vaccine its own scientists have made (the Pfizer specific) long months ago.
Empress Merkel, who always subordinates national to EU considerations, blocked this on the ground that everything should be done EU-wide simultaneously; and not until then.
In consequence, little of the vaccines – Pfizer or Oxford or other – have been ordered by Germany to date (and not only in that country, in other EU states the provision is worse); hardly any are available till March; and thousands will die who otherwise would not have done.
So it will always be with the EU on every policy front; especially foreign policy – no co-ordinated collective response which is timely; because imperialising matters more to the rulers than civilization.
So far as social media are concerned, the totalitarians in Brussels would clamp down at least as hard as those in the United States are doing.
This places the UK in a particular dilema, though, doesn’t it? While agreeing with the Author’s assessment of the state of play in THE COMMISSION, we are left in the state of being between two stools regarding them and the USA. I could suppose it was always thus, but it has been brought into sharp relief by Brexit. I do wish that the rejoin movement could weigh up the idea in totality, for ‘rejoining’ will happen only with the most monumental ‘spanking,’ for our temerity in leaving.
It could be supposed a Keynesian type National spend may yield true independence, for HTML for instance, is written in English, and digital infrastructure of independence from both USA and the EU could be construed as an ‘ interface between those blocks.
An interesting factoid is the British postal stamps are the world’s only ones without a country named, just a picture of the monarch, Because Britian invented the Postal system,. USA invented the internet, and so they have the only addresses without a country (like .co.uk) code, just com, gov, edu, org.
But the silicon 4, they need flattening, they are becoming a force for evil. Time to do something even if it is the terrible way of making them ‘Publishers’ and so libel for content if they wish to be publishers by editorializing content to meet their own, twisted, agenda.
Yes but the people in power are financed and therefore owned by them; indeed, by Big Money generally.
As yet there is no Teddy Roosevelt to break their monopolies.
I did enjoy reading up on Schmitism, the ‘Friend – Enemy’ base of man who without an enemy is political Nihilism, and thus will be conquered by those who maintain the natural order of friend/enemy.
Liberalism is the wish to end the friend/enemy and be passive with all. (‘when the lust for domination is suppressed one allows ones self to be dominated by others for the promise of peace and prosperity.’) and thus is political nihilism and societal death.
And the concept of ‘Civilization States’ (states originating from antiquity that are still of the civilization which is unique, China, Russia) is also great. USA has none, UK not either now, as the Liberal is anathema to such. Liberals go for multiculturalism, the destroying of a Civilization State by importing foreign people and culture till it no longer is a continuum of its past civilization ( like what once was the Anglo-sphere)
So Liberalism is social death of any civilization. It does not defend its self (Gave the world to China) and also destroys its own civilization by adopting many other ways till it is divided and disunited, and ready to sell all for peace and prosperity, thus ultimately getting neither..
And there it is: Trump or Biden. Civilization State, or disunited and weak. Strong to fight the enemy, or desiring appease and pacify the enemy for peace and prosperity.
I see it as Manichaeism, light/dark. Trump the light, fight, patriotism, friend/enemy, civilization State (Wall). and Biden, the dark, surrendering the world, destroying ones Civilization State intentionally. Biden is the sure route to being conquered.
The Trump supporters feel this naturally, and so back him completely, as to lose to Bidenism (Liberalism) is to lose ones Civilization and ultimately ones freedom and prosperity.
The ‘Donor Class’, the guys who fund campaigns for elections, are the
gate keepers for the political Parties by controlling the funding –
They own every politician who climbed up the slippery pole from
university party member to high office. Every step of the way they had
to sell a little more of their soul to the Donor Elites Class, till they
are owned completely.
Democrat, Labour,
Conservative, Republican, Christian Democrat, it does not matter, if it
is a Party based office their soul is sold to the elites as it would be
to the devil if they were Faust. The same global elite own the far left,
right, and all else. They own you, and we all know they own the MSM.
Trump was the one exception to this, he rose without selling his soul, and so from day one the elites plotted his demise.
100%
And indeed drew the fruits of their labour. They do say though: ‘Be careful for what it is you wish for’
This might be true but Trump is still a narcissistic maniac with no real grasp of anything but his own self interest.
.
Like most other people then.
I absolutely agree with this, and nobody seems to get it. Trump is not a politician and that’s what his “followers” like about him. Some, including myself, find his personality gruff, but I stood for all of his policies and believe his intentions were/are good. He genuinely cares about saving America from globalism and China, and giving people their jobs, safety, rights and freedoms back.
Unfortunately I live in California, which due to local and state politicians, is run like the 3rd world, and what I fear now the rest of our country will turn into under the new administration. People in other states like Georgia and Arizona simply do not get what it is like here right now.
It’s become a state of elites and impoverished on welfare, homeless living on the streets, criminals Who have more rights then their victims, illegals, and the middle class come last. It will only get worse if the immigration policies Trump established which have helped so much, are revoked.
Our healthcare since Obamacare has skyrocketed in cost, and still difficult to get appointments. Many many people (legal or not in our state) get free healthcare on the backs of everyone else. California’s failed energy policies have lead to rolling blackouts during heatwaves and during fire season, because they have no interest in repairing or replacing an archaic infrastructure due to donor support and reliance on wind/solar, which is not enough for the state and mismanaged.
We are also taxed the highest in California, and progressive policies have lowered our quality of life. This is why our governor is being recalled.
My concern is any recall election will be rigged, financed by big tech, and nothing will change.
“The debate about European strategic autonomy has hitherto focused on the EU’s adoption of independent military capacity from the US,”
The Germans will be expected to pay for it and The French will demand that it be deployed in the interests of France.
The same problem will arise over the development of a “civilisational internet”
The EU cannot vaccinate its peoples without arguing like rats in a sack. Imagine letting it having its own guns and web browsers.
The internet will be a defunct antique by the time they get their buts into gear anyway, we’ll have all moved on.
The author writes as though it were six of one and half a dozen of the other. In most disputes, it is. Not in this one, however. This time, it’s good guys and bad guys and for all his faults, Trump is the good guy.
And the silicone info highway monsters are the bad guys, with the MSM, and Liberals in general. (in half jest I add: WWG1WGA)
Sometimes there really are good guys and bad guys. It doesn’t happen very often, but this actually is one of those times. Think of WWII. The Allied Powers bombed the wotsit out of Germany, killing thousands of civilians, but they were still the good guys compared to what they were fighting. Same story here. In that WWII sense, yes, Trump is the good guy.
He’s a narcissist with a cult-like following who just tried to overthrow the democratic process in the USA.
And you think he’s the *good* guy?
Sooner we wean ourselves off of all things America the better. Anyone and their dog can see it’s a collapsing country. The vast differences within it have become irreconcilable and the recent post-election shenanigans have only highlighted it.
Of course our supine Politicians will only be happy to suck-up to Biden invoking our “special relationship” (indeed about as “special” as it has been since the Suez Crisis) rather than chart our own course on what is best for Britain.
Yes, indeed, the US has always up until this point been totally united with everyone agreeing on everything. It’s only now that there are “vast differences within it.”
Seriously, do they not teach you anything about US history? You’d be hard pressed to name a country with more vast differences that have existed since 1776.
Sorry to burst your bubble but Biden won’t want a special relationship with you. He is Irish. Democrats generally do not favor a special relationship with the UK. Obama certainly did not and even threatened you when you held your referendum.
You did note that the bit about the “special relationship” was being ironic?
Yes, I noted that sometimes it doesn’t exist on the US side. Can you guess when those times are from my comment?
If you did understand irony, you would have also understood that your comment was redundant.
If you understood which side was never interested in a special relationship you would have also understood that your comment was redundant.
I take it English is not your first language, because no body here is actually making that claim.
If you understood English you’d know it’s me making claims.
This post is going to sound a tad abstract. Flatly disagree with the idea that Twitter was central to the rise of Trump, or that people imbibe opinions just because politicians put them forward. Although, people can certainly outwardly go along with a concensus once momentum gathers and not doing so will come at a cost – but that is a mere form of mass coercion, effective and indeed lethal for a period, but easy to break out of when the time is right and ultimately futile. People believe what they want to believe, true or false, contradictory or otherwise. What any individual human believes is a continually playing out internal monologue delivered to an audience of one. A kind of shadow solipsism. Exactly the same everywhere, even in authoritarian countries. Even the coercive platforms explicitly aimed at changing and controlling mass behaviour like the odious ‘Social Credit’ stuff in China – something that will eventually break down – because humans react counteractivly to what is fed to them – just takes a bit of time for humans to adapt. I have yet to actually see anyone change their mind because a politician or a government said something to them.
Take a step back and there is something more fundamental. The US social media platforms are making money hand over fist right now but this is a point in time thing – it will pass – only to be replaced by something else. The so called ‘influence’ of the platforms is a mirage – as people will discover when ‘leaders’ arise who do so sans the platforms. The narrative belief is that ‘leaders’ arise, pantomime ‘good’ or pantomime ‘bad’ and ‘influence’ the mass of people. But it’s the other way around. ‘Life of Brian’ had it right. The ‘leaders’ are not their own product but instead projections of the socialisation of groupings of humanity. All of Brian, Corbyn and Trump, and other leaders, illustrate this. That is not to say the recipient individuals don’t have agency. They can and do try and control the flow of events. But the influence is minor.
…Borrell goes on to urge the avoidance of “excessive dependence on external suppliers” in the “strategic sectors” of “digital networks and cloud computing”…
It’s clear the Europeans are finally beginning to wake up to how exposed and vulnerable they are in tech – I’m seeing more and more of this sense of panic being expressed. But it’s late in the game, and Europe is going to need to take some short-cuts, and make some ‘Hail Mary passes’ to catch up. And this is the point: Europe can probably rescue itself if it acts immediately and ruthlessly, but in truth, the vehicle it wants to use to achieve this, the EU, is too much of a slow moving technocratic dinosaur with conflicting interests, to actually manage it.
History doesn’t repeat, but sometimes an epoch has endured such trauma that it’s screams of pain reverberate through the ages, and induce a sense of déjà vu many decades later. The current EU situation reminds me of the plight of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on the eve of WWI. There were many people in it who could see it was not equipped for a fist fight with modernity, but were prevented, by old generals and old bureaucracies, from putting reforms in place – then watching in helpless horror the dissolution with the Great War as the trigger.
By 2030 China’s economy will be substantially larger than America’s. By then it will be obviously unrealistic to regard the United States as no 1 in anything except gunshot killings. America’s decline is clear for all to see, and its collapse – brought about by a universal rejection of the once-mighty dollar as a store of value – may not be very far away. Take away America’s cheque-book, and the whole thing comes crashing down, and much of Western society with it. Which leaves us – where ?
Quietly independent – not pretending to be a world power.
Has a calming ring to it ….
Well obviously you’ll all immigrate to China. After all, if it has the largest economy, surely opportunity to innovate will abound. Think of all the start-ups that will pop up all over China.
I took a closer look at Borrell’s article, read “the EU has become more cohesive in 2020” (or words to that effect) in the first paragraph and stopped reading. This is wishful thinking to the point of delusion. Impossible to take seriously.
If we have now a very divided society in the western world, it is entirely owing to the extravagantly partisan self-serving conduct of the elites who now run that world.
The behaviour of the Daily Telegraph these past 3 days in the wake of the ‘storming’ of the Capitol building in Washington DC has decided me.
It seems pretty clear that the whole of the mainstream media in our country now is playing us, the population, with the deliberate aim of manipulating our opinions; and is no longer interested in equitable coverage of political and social issues, allowing us to think for ourselves.
One and all British mainstream newspapers (and of course the broadcasters!) take the line that there was a terrible assault on the very principle of Democracy committed three days ago in the U.S. capital, that this has no precedent since the war of 1812; that Trump is a monster who ought to be driven out of society &c.
These would be views worth pondering seriously if the same media had expressed no less outrage at the horrific violence which has gored American cities for months during 2020: riots, arson, destruction of businesses (some of them small businesses owned and run by and employing black people), random attacks (some of them fatal) on passers-by in the street: AND FEDERAL BUILDINGS, e.g. in Portland, Oregon. But they didn’t. And in the case of the Democratic Party, they actually endorsed and supported it in considerable measure.
The screams of outrage from the politicians and their media-class conjoined twins, the ‘journalists’, would be worthy of respect if they had not spent four years trying to unseat the lawfully elected Donald Trump (a person I myself don’t care for) and neutralizing his administration with one hoax claim and impeachment-attempt after another. How was that not an attack upon the principle of Democracy?
The yells of horror might sound sincere if the ‘meritocrats’ who now govern us (without merit, either of wisdom or competence) had spent even five minutes asking themselves whether Mr Trump’s election or the Leave victory in our referendum or the solid progress of populist parties in Europe 2017/18 had any foundation in just grievances on the part of the populace.
But the rulers and movers, the awful ‘elites’ of today – who seem to possess not one scrap of virtue and self-knowledge more than the most blinkered aristocrats of 18th century France – have gone in for no self-doubt, no self-questioning at all in the wake of those developments.
So I am pretty sure that the Ruling Caste of the present time – which consists of the Political Class, the MSM class, Big Money, the senior bureaucrats and quangocrats – is essentially corrupt, damaging and heartless; and that the only journalism now worth reading is in sideline efforts on the Internet.
The Great European Firewall? No thanks! And neither Europe nor anyone else needs more purges.
The notion that the EU could organise its own internet is plainly absurd. They would have to outsource it to Russia or China. Equally absurd is the notion that the EU could operate an effective military or defence force. Perhaps this is something that could be outsourced to the UK, not that we are really any better these days.
Another absurdity is the notion that the EU will de-couple from China. Just look at the trade agreement that Merkel has just arranged with China. All she cares about is car sales, and having bankrupted much of the rest of the EU via the euro, those sales are not going to come from Italy, Spain, Greece and Portugal.
Interestingly, the EU parliament has, for the first time in its existence, demonstrated a degree of integrity by questioning the morality of Merkel’s agreement with China. Even the endlessly devious and demented Verhofstadt has questioned it. But it is Germany that pays for these people, so Germany will get its way.
Rather funny that, “outsourcing EU defense to the UK” – you know what they say about French soldiers….
Operating is one thing but the real reason that the EU will never have it’s own defense force is that no one wants to pay for it.
Re “Aris’s statement that: “Russia and China are already proceeding at full steam with creating their own national internets ” though I would argue they are better understood as the internets of civilisation states rather than nations, and may eventually extend beyond their current national borders.” This is a little too Arnold Toynbee for me. China, North Korea and Russia all have autocratic governments that are trying to create national internets to protect their undemocratic governments. China and North Korea would be part of the same Far Eastern civilization by the Toynbee definition, so these are state internets, not civilizational internets. Toynbee’s view of Russia as part of a distinct Orthodox Christian civilization no longer seems relevant when so many predominantly Orthodox countries are either in the EU or candidates to join. Nevertheless, it remains true, as English historian Geoffrey Hosking wrote, that for most Europeans “Russia is the great Other, understood yet not understood, the culture in whose measure we better appreciate our own.” While a separate Russian internet may not be desirable, I fervently hope that VK or some other Russian language platform will keep Facebook from dominating the Russophone market in Russia and abroad, and that it will not be an instrument of autocracy.
I’ve often wondered what the world would be like if the internet had become a set of country-specific resources, run by national governments as they used to run our telephone services. One suspects that if it had been rolled out a few years earlier, before the end of the Cold War, this is basically what would have happened. Would we have ended up with a bunch of clones of the French Minitel, most of them country- and language-specific? Presumably you’d pay a fee to access particular webpages; and I suppose you’d pay a supplement to reach websites from abroad. For both good and ill, most of the radical worldwide changes that the internet has wrought in the past quarter-century would never have happened.
Cooperative human-scale community (including, but not limited to “family” relations) is the political, social, and cultural root-source of civilization. Cooperative, human-scale community is also the primary political, social, and cultural condition that civilization tends to destroy. Therefore, the struggle to re-establish cooperative, human-scale community – and, in turn, to re-establish (within the larger political, social, and cultural order) the virtues characteristically associated with cooperative, human-scale community – is the constant necessity and the principal political, social, and cultural revolution whereby civilization can be purified of its negative effects, and whereby the integrity of civilization (and of civilized people) can re restored.
As civilizations enlarge and universalize themselves, the circumstance of civilized life is progressively removed from the truly human and thereby humanizing context of cooperative, human-scale community. Therefore, as any civilization expands, the context of human living becomes progressively dissociated from the practices and virtues inherently associated with true cooperative and human-scale community, and becomes (instead) progressively individuated, alienated, altogether dehumanized, and (therefore) focused in egoic and, in general, grossly and negatively, or love-lessly, competitive efforts towards self and other destructive motives and behavior. behaviors.
That destructive anti-culture is of course exactly and in every precise detail the kind of “culture” that the Donald represents and promotes in every thing that he has ever done
Your premise re: ‘cooperative human scaling’ rings appropriate…but you’re totally off-base re: The Donald, not even close. Insert instead, “BLM” – on its platform was the “destruction of the nuclear family” – that is before they were criticized for it and supposedly removed it. But that is BLM’s intent – I’m guessing because it just reflects the total decimation of the USA black community today (75% illegitimate births, no fathers about, etc). BLM is about the ‘lowest common denominator and it wants to drag the rest of civilization with its destructive ways. Way to go liberals / Democrats!
Oh the irony, in order to read the comments on this article, and comment myself, I have to sign in with Google or Facebook some other so and so. I gave up my Disqus for a new year’s resolution and have been getting to grips with DuckDuckGo as a search engine. I am going to delete my Youtube channel when I’ve put my videos on Bitchute and close my Google blog down.
But if I feel the urge to comment on UnHerd I still need to rely on the services of the Devil, purveyor of paedo porn, messenger of extremist Jihad and champion of the CCP.
Get your house in order UnHerd. There must be alternative sites that host comments that aren’t mainstream censorious morons.
This might be more meaningful if the EU hadn’t concluded a rather important agreement with China. Also the EU has previously attempted to develop various technologies in opposition to those developed in the USA and indeed Japan. They’ve never worked
The level of “soft power” that the big platforms will increasingly provide to US governments (and individuals) is very worrying.
A UK “mediated” version would surely be welcomed if we are not to inexorably become the 5* state of the US.
Possibly the least-worst option available to us.
What makes you think the US would want you to become the 51st state?
I’m not sure that they would – except maybe for business purposes – but we seem to be culturally heading in that direction anyway.
Hmmm, not sure how business purposes would be a justification. In any case, you don’t hear any hankering from anyone in the US to make the UK a US state. With all the problems in the UK, it seems like something the US would not need. If you mean that the UK might want to be a US state, well, join the line. But I would not hold my breath.
I didn’t mean the U.K. population (including me) would remotely want to be – I’m saying that the MSM in the U.K. seem to be training the U.K. to be so … as they seem unhealthily obsessed by the US stories on US platforms.
Well, there has always been a British obsession with the US from a cultural perspective surely. Maybe it’s the colony that got away, who knows?
MSM writes what sells, they are businesspeople after all, so obviously this sells. If it didn’t sell, they wouldn’t do it which leads one to believe there must be a fair amount of interest. Brits have a remarkable tendency to hate themselves so I could easily see them wanting to join the US while bashing themselves for wanting it. It would be the British way, would it not? I mean this not as a criticism but merely an observation.
The question now is what are they going to write about. Joe Biden? I don’t think so. He has none of the racial cache of Barack Obama and none of the hysteria surrounding Trump.
This is how sad a state we have come to:
I welcome censorship, as long as Donald Trump gets censored. Seriously. I’m done even pretending to stand on principle here. I give up. Let’s have all opinions but the official ones suppressed – we tried to let each man have his say, but if that leads to Donald Trump having the loudest voice, then it’s officially not worth the cost.
The Donald Trumps of the world is why we can’t have nice things.
Months of lies about the election being stolen, stoking grievances.
“Every patriot come to DC, we’re having a big rally!”
An hour of speeches about how “we have to fight!” including his lawyer rambling about trial by combat
“And now we’re going to march to the capitol!”
Then, when the invasion of congress was underway, he tweeted only that he preferred non-violence, then posted a video saying to please go home but that he loved them all.
Later, there was a clearly scripted speech that he’d been made to recite, uncomfortably (likely by his cabinet), condemning the actions he had previously seemed very pleased with. Then he started with the grievances again, and the rabble rousing.
Now, you may try to weasel away by saying “he didn’t directly *tell* them to invade congress! He just said go there!” but you’re basically arguing at that point that he’s an imbecile and couldn’t see the consequences of sending an angry mob.
So that’s what he’s done, used twitter to organise an angry mob that he sent to try to overturn the US democratic process. Seems legit to me.
Yes, their system is rigged – rigged to favour the lower population states, who overwhelmingly support the republicans.
Private companies can do what they want.
I would HAVE NOT BANNED Trump and the rest of his followers. There is a question about inciting violence but I think Trump came close enough to that.
The Kraken Squad is just stupid – let them talk.
In relation to Parlor there seem to be a group of people that are trying to organize the assassination of Biden. If Parlor can not moderate companies have a responsibility to remove it from their app store.
Who are you, Jack Dorsey? Parler has 230 protection in return for not interfering with what its contributors say. So does Twitter, but Twitter takes the 230 and interferes anyway. Which is the more honourable? If people are plotting an assassination, it’s a singularly odd way to do it, on a public forum, and it’s a matter for the police, not Parler. Since the evidence is all up on the board, even American cops should be able to prosecute this one.
They are private companies indeed. But then Twitter and Facebook were given protection from prosecution by the authorities on the explicit understanding that they were platforms, not publishers.
If I ring some people up on the phone and declare that Mr X is a bank-robber and his wife Mrs X an adulteress, the telephone company is not responsible for my conduct. The Xs (can and possibly should) sue me for libel, criminal or otherwise. The telephone company is guiltless. It is a platform, not a publisher.
If, however, I write a book or a newspaper article in which I claim that Mr X is a bank-robber and his wife an adulteress, then not only I am, but also the publisher of the book/article is, liable to be prosecuted because they did not have to allow and promulgate my scurrilous utterance.
Twitter and Facebook have broken the covenant under which they were allowed to set up and operate. They now routinely censor all manner of opinions their owners and survey-teams do not like, while still being treated by the authorities as blameless ‘platforms’, i.e. telephones.
They should be heavily penalized till they stop doing this; or shut down by law.
They are still further monopolistic tools of the current Ruling Class in the Occident; like most broadcasters now.
Peter, I believe this distinction between platform and publisher is long gone – and was always the turf if Lawyers anyway.
More relevant is the absence of a neutral source of news. And there is simply no basis for such source to exist, because we are no longer able to establish what is true and what is fake news.
In short, our vaunted “communication” industry’s corruption has moved us back to the standards of the pre-Guttenberg era: Our only chance of learning what is real is to witness it first hand, so our scope of knowledge is now calamitously limited for logistical reasons.
So private companies can do as thy want? Well not if it involves selling cakes, like the Oregon baker given a judgement against them for $135,000 for emotional suffering for refusing, on religious grounds, to make a gay wedding cake.
I bet if Twatter, Mootube and Farcebook were silencing those who promoted the unscientific ideology of multiple genders, we’d hear a very different story from you.
If a private company with a huge amount of influence over what we see and hear is behaving like judge and jury when it wants (Trump, Covid etc. ) yet abdicates real world responsibilities (ISIS videos etc.), then it needs to be held accountable.
Pity that we’re no longer part of that European discussion. Now that the USA has dumped Trump we will also be estranged from positive developments there too. Good job we’ve still got the Falklands to fall back on.
Brexitballs: On and on they go.
PS: Here is a subversive thought for you: You do not need to be part of that ramshackled crock of a dysfunctional toytown empire, laughingly called the European Union, to have a conversation with anyone.
Get over it now.
Poor you.