There can no longer be any argument about the nature of Facebook, Twitter and the plethora of other, similar sites and services lumped into the basket called “social media” and owned by the Overlords of Silicon Valley. They are no longer forums for the free exchange of ideas. When one enters a true forum – and I’ve been in a few – and shouts at the top of one’s lungs that the Emperor has no clothes, and is an illegitimate, craven tool to boot, the stones of the forum do not rise and indignantly throw one out. They simply lie there and allow others to shout back that the accusation is best directed elsewhere, or should be a matter for self-examination rather than public debate.
No. When the so-called “forum” dictates who is allowed to speak, and what, it is no longer a forum. It is a publication, and those making the decisions are its editors, materially directing its content. All of “social media,” particularly the aforementioned Facebook, Twitter and their stepchildren like Snapchat, YouTube and WhatsApp have now become publishers. A such, their legal protections in section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 should be removed forthwith. Act as a publisher, be judged as one under the same provisions of law. It’s only fair.
Social media’s enablers like Google and Apple should also be examined very closely following their recent actions against competitors for their established clients Facebook and Twitter. Were they making and selling automobiles, dishwashers or drugs their actions would at a minimum look very much like restraint of trade, punishable under both Federal and state law.
There will be great political resistance to doing either of these things because the practical result is the effective, if temporary, erasure of Donald Trump, the Bad Orange Man, from public life. But cooler and perhaps wiser heads will realize that once the itch to create unpersons is scratched, it will become irresistible the next time the opportunity occurs. Sooner or later we will lift our heads and ask how it was, exactly, that America became a totalitarian Gulag.
Coordination between the state and media outlets is one of the most reliable markers for totalitarianism: control what people read, hear and see, and one can make “the people” believe anything. Ask any North Korean; they’ll tell you. So the easy collusion between the Democratic party and our major social media outlets – not to mention legacy outlets like the New York Times and Washington Post, now mere zombie journals obeying their silicon valley masters – is as troubling as can be for any who care for the future of the Republic.
There is another issue here, equally as problematic and more challenging for the incoming President who, when not berating his predecessor and those who voted for him, occasionally professes a desire for “healing.” This will not happen under present circumstances. More than 75 million Americans believe firmly that the past presidential election was rigged. Many witnessed irregularities. To simply tell them “Sit down and shut up, the game was square” will not convince them. Calling their leaders criminals for doing no more that Democrats did in 2001, 2005 and 2017 will not convince them. Actively working to silence them and to punish those who speak on their behalf will not convince them. It will rather enrage them.
And if the past four year have shown us anything, it is that blind rage is unhelpful, both to governance and to the Republic. We must find another way, before something happens we just can’t take back.