Louis Ingenthron @LouisIngenthron@social.cleverlibre.org

@admitsWrongIfProven @freemo @freepeoplesfreepress So long as the "thought police's" power extends only as far as their own property, and I'm free to not be on their property, they can exist all they want. 🤷‍♂️ Doesn't bother me how they rule their own slice of paradise.

@freemo @freepeoplesfreepress Well, no, the term is "public utility" because these services, being necessary to the public, are *heavily subsidized* by the same governments that heavily regulate them. The government funds them to ensure they are available to everyone.

None of that applies to social media.
It does, however, apply to the internet, because without government funding, the ISPs wouldn't find it profitable enough to run lines to rural areas.

@freepeoplesfreepress The first amendment binds only the government. Corporations cannot take it "too far" because it does not bind them at all.

@freemo @freepeoplesfreepress The difference is that phone lines and internet lines are the roads. MySpace and Facebook are endpoints on those roads.

I don't believe a private service operating on phones should be compelled to host speech any more than a private service hosted on the internet.

I just don't think the size or reach or "pervasiveness" of a company should be a factor in taking away their core rights. That's just punishing success.

@freepeoplesfreepress @freemo In America, the answer is the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

More abstractly, it's because you can choose to be a Democrat or Republican; you don't choose your neurochemistry.

@freemo @freepeoplesfreepress Eh, I still disagree with that. Fifteen years ago, people said the same thing about MySpace. That these companies are powerful now doesn't mean they're not ultimately ephemeral. Who knows; Elon Musk could buy Meta tomorrow and tank that too.

The internet itself must be free and open like a public street, but individual shops on the internet, both the walmarts and the lemonade stands, need to be free to develop their own culture, and that includes excluding those who choose not to fit into or abide that culture.

@freepeoplesfreepress @freemo Strongly disagree. Companies are just collectives of people, and they have the right to free speech as well. On their property, they should be able to control the narrative and tone; that's their speech right. Just as it's our right to leave their property if we don't like the way they run things.

Free speech doesn't mean a right to compel others to host your speech.

@freepeoplesfreepress @freemo You don't believe companies should be able to curate speech on their own property?

Should they also be restricted from cleaning graffiti off their walls to prevent harm to the freedom of speech of vandals?

@freemo Enough extremism either way is worth blocking, but viewpoint diversity in and of itself is a desirable trait in social media.

@aral It's times like these when I think back and laugh at the brits who call us Americans backwards for having a constitution that allows hate speech.

There's a reason behind that, guys.

@mentallyalex Interesting idea... seems pretty plausible. Not sure ActivityPub would be the best protocol for it (it's geared more towards text/media posts; that's not to say that it couldn't be twisted into working for this purpose, though).
The biggest concern I'd have with that design would be the question of what happens when someone forks the code and introduces a server that doesn't play by the same rules as others? The interactive options in others' spaces would need to be necessarily limited to prevent abuse.

@mentallyalex That's my lane. Can you expound on the idea?

@mloxton @koherecoWatchdog @itsOasus 15.5 million kids in this country attend schools that participate in the CEP program I mentioned above, providing free meals to them with no paperwork required. And that doesn't count the number of kids being given free lunch under normal NSLP individual qualification.

In the OP's story, that parent *had* completed the paperwork and had been given the "Reduced" status individually, which meant their family was better off financially than the kids who receive the "Free" status.

So, I don't think your characterization is entirely accurate. Could we do better? Sure, of course. But we *are* already feeding a lot of kids who would otherwise go hungry.