this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2023
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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
While I truly believe the dude and his app are bad, Apple shouldn't be able to both arbitrarily remove whatever apps they want from the store, but disallow loading apps from places other than the store.
In the USA (yes, there are other countries where Apple operates but anyways...) the 1st amendment, unfortunately, doesn't protect speech on social media, only from government persecution. We cannot read the minds of the framer of the constitution, but I firmly believe they are now rolling in their graves, as they couldn't have foreseen the internet and social media, and so didn't account for those.
Exactly because the 1st amendment is effectively neutered, freedom of speech in America is in grave danger and we shouldn't rejoice about it.
I expect that once he's convicted, not just accused, they should not only be allowed, but required to ban him ("innocent until proven guilty").
And yes, I believe once your platform get big enough to be effectively considered a public square, it should be protected by the 1st amendment.
I don't know if there are other countries where this is true (maybe some European country? not sure) I'm just saying in this thread I'm speaking only for the USA.
You're right and I'm not denying this. I'm just arguing that, for certain very large monopolistic corporations, maybe it should apply as well.
My point was simply "I speak for America as I'm not sure about other countries", but, I went googling around and it seems other countries (I looked mostly at Europe) are not much better, so I have to conclude freedom of speech is in grave danger pretty much everywhere in the world.
The US (or European) version isn't flawed, it's behind the times, as internet, mobile phones and social media didn't exist when it was written.
Let's say you have a cafe with an open mic night. One day, a guy comes up to the stage and starts yelling Nazi rhetoric and racist slogans. You can be a free speech absolutist like yourself and let the guy stay on stage, or you can keep your customers and kick the fucker out. The only difference between this and Apple is scale.
Bingo, that makes all the difference, and that there are a lot more than two open mic cafes to choose from.
Cafés can rightfully kick those guys out, but when you're as big and power as Apple, the law should (but doesn't as of yet) curtail that power a bit, as it lends itself for immense abuse.
Okay. What if it's the only cafe with an open mic night in town? It's not a big city. Should they allow the Nazi? Otherwise, it lends itself for abuse, right?
They can go the the next city over, or move, or heck, open their own cafe where all their nazi friends can hangout and not bother us. But, you cannot just open your 3rd party app store for iOS devices, or create your own OS for all your friends to use (well, you can, but ... you'd probably agree even opening your own cafe is much easier than taking on one of the largest corporations in America).
If that cafe (or chain) had a near monopoly on open mics, and somehow prevented others from having open mic nights, then yes, I'd say they should allow any protected free speech, but I should say they shouldn't be allow to get to that point.
Ah, so your solution to the supporting a human trafficker problem is to go somewhere else unless there's nowhere else to go. Not to stop the human trafficker from making money. Interesting.
The solution is to have a court of law convict him. Where the hell did you get those things you wrote? I never said them for sure.
If he's convicted, he can still make money off of his app. How about not allowing him to do that? Too anti-free speech?
If he's convicted, or if I judge orders it before he's convicted, then the app goes down. It shouldn't be up to Apple because of the monopoly / walled garden they created.
If they just allowed 3rd party apps and/or sideloading apps, none of this would be a concern and I'd be 100% ok with Apple taking it off their store.
You're leaving it up to Apple if he's convicted too. Either way it's up to Apple. They aren't legally required to get rid of an app of a convicted rapist and human trafficker. So what's the difference?
I'm arguing that they should be legally required to take it down in that case if ordered by a judge, and also, that they should be legally required to let users install whatever app they want on their device, either side loading, 3rd party stores, or whatever.
Currently these aren't true, but one can dream
So as long as the judge doesn't say he can't make money from his app, Apple should keep up the app making money for the convicted rapist and human trafficker. Got it.
Judges aren't perfect, and our justice system isn't perfecr, but it's the best we got... people do get away with murder sometimes, but that's a whole different story that I don't think belongs here
We're adults (I hope), let's behave like such and not put words in each other's mouth. I didn't say any of those words and you know it.
You very definitely did say that. I quoted you. You very clearly said that Apple should only take down a convicted rapist and human trafficker's app if a judge orders it.
reading comprehension...
Again, I quoted you. I have no idea why you're trying to gaslight now.
Here are my words above:
Once convicted the app should go down period. If deemed very dangerous, a judge could order it down even before while awaiting the verdict. Hopefully that clarifies it.
Instead of treating huge corporations that actively suppress competition like they're a de facto form of government, we should instead... prevent them from getting to the point where their size and market share grants them power over the lives of citizens comparable to that of the government.
Fully agree, and that's exactly what I'm arguing for here.
But the app itself has already been deemed inappropriate and harmful to the consumer, on its own merits and not related to Tate himself. Equating this to removal of free speech is a false equivalency, that right is not being infringed on and is the wrong argument to be having. Tate has plenty more platforms to freely spew his misogynistic BS.
But he is already guilty of hate speech. That's why he was banned on multiple platforms like YouTube and TikTok. On that issue alone Apple can cancel their contract with him.
He isn't just accused, he is ultra accused:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66581218
Did you read the article? Do you know what "alleged" means? There is a trial, let's wait till the verdict is out
Edit: to be clear, I hope he gets convicted, but let justice do its course.
Edit2: If the app was deemed dangerous, the judge in the trial should rule to ban the app waiting for the verdict, not Apple.