SAO PAULO (AP) — Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service provider Starlink backtracked Tuesday and said it will comply with a Brazilian Supreme Court justice’s order to block the billionaire’s social media platform, X.
Starlink said in a statement posted on X that it will heed Justice Alexandre de Moraes’ order despite him having frozen the company’s assets. Previously, it informally told the telecommunications regulator that it would not comply until de Moraes reversed course.
“Regardless of the illegal treatment of Starlink in freezing our assets, we are complying with the order to block access to X in Brazil,” the company statement said. “We continue to pursue all legal avenues, as are others who agree that @alexandre’s recent order violate the Brazilian constitution.”
The government absolutely has the right to cut people off of certain information. If you disagree, try to share some classified secrets, or some child porn and see how well it goes down. The disagreement here is on where the line is drawn on what information falls under that umbrella, and as a sovereign democratic nation, that is Brazil’s call to make, not musk’s or yours. You might have an argument if this was a dictatorship/one party state, but it is not. Still, I’m sure you were equally vocal when Musk was censoring for those.
Doesn’t sound very democratic, but that word gets misused pretty often. Agree to disagree.
Democratic doesn’t mean libertarian. Democratic means that everyone gets a voice in deciding the direction things go. The people made their choice at the ballot box, and that was Lula, and Lula seems to be on board with the court’s decision and isn’t inclined to push legislation or executive action to change it. If people decide they don’t like the decision that’s been made, their government will adjust or it will be replaced by another at the ballot box. That’s exactly how it’s supposed to work.
“Supposed to work”
You’re correct—but…
Sure, it’s not as neat and clean as that and I acknowledge that, but at the end of the day, a tautological approach to either free speech or censorship is detrimental in either direction. Worries about censorship going too far ARE justified, but there ARE situations where it is necessary, and more exacting and precise public discussions about and decisions on what is fair game for censorship and what isn’t is the solution, not the understandably visceral reaction to censorship in general.
If there are concerns about the speech that is being used on a network, then the government should find the person talking and ask them to stop. They should not be able to take away everyone’s voice because a select few are abusing it
…which is a dangerous violation of the freedom of privacy and has resulted in the imprisonment of government critics in many countries like Saudi Arabia, where X has happily given user identifying information on request.
Also, nobody’s voice is taken away. The government isn’t making people stop talking. The originally requested deplatformed users were more than welcome to go to another platform. And the shutting down of X in general? They’ve shut down a platform that was blatantly and flagrantly violating the law. There are hundreds of others platforms to choose from. Heck, you can still go outside, go to the park, and yell. Always could. Do not conflate freedom of speech with the entitlement to a particular audience.
Why don’t they shut down those hundreds of other platforms?
If they flout the law of those countries, they will. And they should.
Social media companies do not get to be above government because they are social media companies. The government’s actions are the actions taken by the representatives chosen by the people in free and fair elections. THAT is where the people’s voice matters. Not on an opaque social media platform. If a car company decides they think a government safety restriction is wrong, they don’t get to NOT implement it. If they do, they get shut down. Social media companies are NO different.
No company with no accountability to anyone but its shareholders should EVER be above a government of the people. Do you want a dystopia? Because that’s how you get a dystopia.
“Your rights stop were other people’s rights start” is Democracy.
The concept you have in mind were some people’s rights are endless and unhindered by other people’s rights - in other words, are supreme - is called Authoritarianism.
Authoritarianism is telling me I can’t go to a website.
– Lenin, State and Revolution
Can’t sell me on communism. Socialism, yes. Maybe if there were actual examples of communism ever working I’d be more open to it.
Sounds familiar?
Yep. They can go door to door and put people in jail. See how long that works out for that government.
But there should be an internet that operates in a space that cannot be blocked by a government. That prevents authoritarian control of communications they deem to be against their government.
Sound familiar?
Sorry… you think the democratic thing would be to legalize child porn?
If the internet is being used to distribute child porn would you ban the internet?
You can’t just keep banning everything that is used to commit a crime, because criminals will find a way to use everything to commit crimes.
Yeah, that telegram porn accusation is pretty disappointing, but let’s not pretend for a moment that any government actually gives a shit about it. It’s being used to have conversations they can’t see, and that’s why they are using child porn—the silver bullet—to take them down.
You would ban the site, and any company refusing to ban the site (FREE SPEECH!!!) would then also be banned.
But that doesn’t fix the issue. They switch sites. You have to ban the internet.
And yet, somehow, governments do manage to block it without banning the internet. It’s a miracle! Governments must be magic!
And yet, even after being blocked, the issue persists elsewhere. Nothing is solved! Go go government bullshit!
“It’s everywhere you look! I can’t open a single folder on my computer without finding more of it!”
What was your location again?
isp’s
and even governmentsshould not be in charge of censoring content. child porn and state secrets and even twitter can be illegal without forcing an isp to censor peoples internet. for years I’ve seen lemmy and reddit fight for net neutrality and common carrier status, but as soon as elon is involved the hate boner takes over. lemmy is so weird.How exactly do you take down child porn without censoring it?
you deal with the people doing it and not with the people who control the pipes.
edit. I see the part of my comment that was confusing and I edited it without removing it. i still have more nuance to that part of the statement but its more than I’m willing to type and just muddys my point.
And if the people doing it are from another country?
I really don’t understand what Yall are talking about. ISPs don’t host childporn. In fact they host nothing, and should not be responsable or even aware of what goes through their pipes. It should be illegal for them to snoop. Starlink is an isp. Even if starlink starts blocking x, or anything else, which they shouldn’t be able to, people can vpn around that. People shouldn’t have to though. This is a net neutrality issue. ISPs shouldn’t be allowed to block or alter or selectively slow or disable content on the net.
So if a website in another country is distributing child porn everyone should just shrug their shoulders and say “there’s nothing we can do”? Despite the fact that there is very clearly something we can do?
Again, how do you take down the child porn without the ISP helping?