In the aftermath of the Jan. 6 insurrection in which Donald Trump supporters who believed the election was stolen stormed the capital, Trump was banned from X, previously known as Twitter. The reason for his ban was not X having a political vendetta against him, but rather because Trump broke X’s terms of service by inciting violence. Throughout that fateful day, he made posts saying that the election was stolen and made threats against Mike Pence saying that he “didn’t have the courage to do what is right.”
Trump’s actions on that day clearly warranted a ban, but Trump and conservatives saw the ban as an attack on free speech and a political attack against them. They saw this action by X as the latest in a pattern of discrimination against conservatives on social media platforms. One of the most infamous conservatives, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, passed SB 7072, or “The Social Media Act” in 2021. This law stops social media platforms from “de-platforming a political candidate” and creates fines for social media platforms that ban local or statewide candidates. These fines range from $250,000 a day for statewide candidates and $25,000 a day for local candidates.
Social media companies have already challenged this new law, one that is potentially going to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court on the grounds that it breaks Americans’ First Amendment rights to free speech.
The Social Media Acts are just another example of conservative virtue, signaled by DeSantis and other conservative governors. Along with the massive amount of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and book banning in schools, the social media acts are part of a larger culture war conservatives in America are undertaking.
The social media law is just plainly anti-free speech. The First Amendment is not absolute; things like defamatory speech or calls to violence are not protected by it. Also, Americans’ First Amendment rights only apply to the government, and private corporations like Facebook or X can restrict people’s speech on their platforms. So, legally, states like Texas, which passed similar laws to Florida, do not have much ground to stand on.
But, should social media companies be allowed to ban certain speech? The answer is yes. A social media platform’s ability to regulate what is on its forum is the only way to allow for free speech. Not banning certain speech makes all speech harder to use. If a platform allows Nazis to comment on Jewish people’s tweets and say anti-semitic remarks and make calls to violence, then it scares Jewish people from using that platform, turning them away from using their free speech. By not banning the small minority who spreads hate and bigotry, it makes free speech harder for the majority of people.
Without the ability to moderate certain speech, platforms devolve into cesspools of misinformation and hate. With Elon Musk’s purchase of X, the platform has taken a sharp nose dive down into the abyss of awful social media platforms. The changes they made to moderation, in particular, have mid-factual information harder to figure out. Musk fired a massive part of the X moderation team, meaning that fewer individuals are looking out for questionable posts. Also, X making the blue checkmark available to everyone means it is harder to determine untrustworthy sources. A blue checkmark used to represent a reliable source, but now it means virtually nothing.
The misinformation on the site has become especially noticeable since the start of the war in Israel. Old videos of kids in cages from different countries are being spread as facts from the most recent conflict. It is now nearly impossible to find truthful information on the platform.
X is a perfect example of how to destroy the credibility of a social media platform. When the moderation is removed and fact becomes harder to figure, trust in the information on the platform goes down. It shows how without moderation, a platform can decay and become unusable to the average person.
The stated goal of the law is to stop the de-platforming of political candidates. However, just because a person is a political candidate does not make them any more privileged than the average person. If a politician posts a call to violence or spreads misinformation, they should be subject to the same punishments as everyone else. It is not discrimination to ban someone who breaks terms of service whether they are conservatives, fascists or Nazis.
The Florida social media law aims to set a precedent making it acceptable for the government to tell a social media platform what kind of speech is appropriate. This a dangerous precedent to set, and while it is currently being used to keep conservative political candidates who spread vial and untruthful things on platforms, in the future, it could be used to restrict anti-government protests or stop criticism of certain politicians. The same ruling that stops companies from banning people could also be used contrarily and force them to ban people. This is a slippery slope and is an attack on people’s ability to use social media platforms.
