[Buddahaid]

Originally Posted by Aktungbby

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/ar...lation/617827/

The concluding paragraphs are worth posting.

"All of which is to say that the debate about free speech on social media should not be viewed primarily as a debate about whether the social-media companies violated Trump’s freedom of speech when they banned him, or whether they violate anyone else’s freedom of speech when they make thousands of similar decisions every day. Instead, it should be viewed primarily as a debate about what freedom of speech means on social media, and, perhaps most importantly, about who gets to decide—courts, corporations, or legislatures. That liberals and conservatives have switched perspectives on these questions in recent years reflects the extraordinary political fluidity, and perhaps possibility, of the current moment.

However the political alignments work out, Trump’s deplatforming illuminated a basic insight worth keeping in mind: Private companies not only participate in the marketplace of ideas but also determine to a significant extent who else can participate in it. We should not take comfort in the fact that the speech-regulating decisions by Big Tech companies do not and cannot violate the First Amendment as it is currently understood. Conservatives are correct to be worried about the threat that the private platforms pose to freedom of speech, even if this makes them more like big-government liberals than they might be willing to acknowledge. Those big-government liberals should realize as much, and act accordingly."