- cross-posted to:
- news
- apple_enthusiast
- technology
- cross-posted to:
- news
- apple_enthusiast
- technology
Apple removes app created by Andrew Tate::Legal firm had said Real World Portal encouraged misogyny and there was evidence to suggest it is an illegal pyramid scheme
A business is not a government and people need to start recognizing the boundaries of what you are actually entitled to as a basic versus what is extra.
If you walked into my printshop and used MY photocopier to routinely print Nazi fliers and this is something that I become aware of I should have the right to veto what use my photocopier is being put to. They are free to say what they want but I do not need to provide them service to assist them in it. They do not have the right to my compliance or my passive participation through use of my business to spread their garbage.
Companies can say no. Freedom of speech protects you from the government it doesn’t entitle you to use of a privately owned platform to serve as your personal megaphone.
Your printshop isn’t a de-facto public town square. Apple, Google, Twitter, and other large companies have inserted themselves into that position.
People like you that just go “government vs private business” miss the entire context, history, and nuance because why that distinction even ever mattered in the past and how it came to be.
In the past, almost every business was closer in practice to being an individual. Your local print shop. Your local hardware store, etc. And for businesses like that, I agree with you 100% , they should get the right to do what they want.
However, private mega-corporations nowadays have more power than most governments at the time the Constitution was signed. When a company has the power to decide what more than half the country can put on their own phone, that’s national level power, companies can seriously oppreess people, discriminate, etc, at this scale. Sure, this is a case of stopping a bad person, but there have also been cases of apple censoring apps critical of apple or other awful governmental atrocities in other countries. I’d rather apple not be able to censor anything, than be able to censor things like that.
And your last paragraph is flat out wrong. Freedom of Speech is a concept, that means you are free to say what you want. You might be thinking of the first amendment to the United States Constitution, which is just one thing the US government promises to do.
The thing is that that concept of business having different responsibilities that scale with size isn’t a thing. It doesn’t matter if they are a print shop or own half the god damn world they operate on the same principles. That is what make these giant conglomerates scary and why anti trust options and breaking businesses into more smaller options is a good idea. But applying your ideas of government to a business is stupid. If you want a town square get the town to build a square where those rights are protected - don’t go down to the Mall owned by a management group and then crow freedom of speech when they throw you out for yelling obnoxious shit in the food court.
Freedom of Speech is a concept - but there are two distinct ones. The actual legal protection and this fictional cootie shot bullshit of “I should be able to say whatever I want and no private citzen or group of private citizens should be able to challenge me in any way”. Honestly the second part is just entitlement half the time because last I checked those who usually advocate for the latter are usually the most willing to remove the former from entire groups of people. Personal consequences and social accountability should be and are part of that freedom. There are countries all over the world that have the freedom of speech enshrined in law but every single one places limitations of some sort of how it is protected and exercised . The US for instance has obscenity law, protected classes for whom services cannot be denied and people have the right to sue for defamation or libel. What counts as a legitimate protest (or exercise of free speech) and what gets the unruly unlawful mob treatment is also governed by a web of concepts and law. Free Speech is not an access card that removes all barriers, it’s a protection from your government and if you want your government to properly protect you from it you need to increase the space, services and property the government runs on where those rules are protected. You privatize a library you lose a lot of protections immediately because a federal or state institution has to play ball and businesses are closer to autocratic rule.
Freedom of Speech is nebulous and nuanced but in all cases, every single country that protects expression, the responsibility, rights and restrictions given to businesses work on private citizen rules and the right for a private entity to refuse or withdraw participation is just as enshrined.