After years of being involved in administering different online communities, as well as developing the software for them, one thing never stops shocking me. When you get a user that crosses the line and you ban them, or take any action so they can no longer contribute to your online community, they start yelling that you are violating their constitutional right to freedom of speech.
The AP takes a good look at this today:
Say it on the Internet, and you'll find that free speech and other constitutional rights are anything but guaranteed.
Companies in charge of seemingly public spaces online wipe out content that's controversial but otherwise legal. Service providers write their own rules for users worldwide and set foreign policy when they cooperate with regimes like China. They serve as prosecutor, judge and jury in handling disputes behind closed doors.
When I hear people complain that a site is taking away from someones freedom of speech, I always point to shopping malls. Go into a shopping mall and start saying whatever you feel like. If the management of that mall doesn't like that, they will throw you out. It's private property and they have the right to. The same thing applies to websites. The owners of that website pay for hosting and have to adhere by the terms of a hosting company. That hosting company is also a private business, so in the end it's much like the mall scenario.
So next time you want to go on a rant in the comments section of a blog, just remember that the owner of that blog can stop you from posting, and it's not a "violation of freedom of speech". Instead they are exercising their rights as a business/site owner.
Comments
I've had a couple of censoring issues.
One of the first and I still don't know why, when google removed a post from my blog with no heads up or explanation. The title was "Peace, Propaganda & the Promised Land" and it is a video that was on google video. It is about Israel's occupation of Palestine. Anyway it is gone, deleted, whatever and the comments. I don't get much traffic and hardly any comments so you know I was disappointed when comments were removed even thought they were the predictable "antisemitic" accusations usually posted when anyone suggests Israel is at fault.
You have to wonder if google has my contact info from the blog, why did no one make an attempt to advise me content was removed?
The next time was on huffpo and I guess someone found it offensive when I suggested that McCain's delusional behavior, brain farts and flip flops was a sign of the early onset of Alzheimer's. Somebody has to ask these questions because the MSM certainly won't.
Anyway I was banned for a month or so.
The last time on mother jones I said Hillary was a "condescending bitch" because of the way she treated Obama when the race was getting tight and she all but spat on him. Then she turned around and got out the fake smiles with support after he got the votes. So they deleted "bitch".
Oh well, you can't please everybody.
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