Facebook to ban white nationalist content
I consider myself a free speech absolutist. Or very nearly so.<p>But that runs both ways. Not only do I think that almost all (to borrow a mathematical term) speech should be permitted, but also that the onus is on the speaker to make themselves heard or to find an audience. No company or platform owes them anything.<p>In earlier times, that meant that no newspaper or printing press was required to print everything sent their way. Today it&#x27;s the centralized websites that also don&#x27;t have this obligation.<p>If FB decides to ban bigots, or YouTube wants to kick anti-vaxxers off their site, so be it. You can host your own video if you&#x27;d like, or maintain a personal blog site.* You are <i>not</i> entitled to widespread distribution. Never have been.<p>* Which leads to a place where I&#x27;ll agree on obligations: root infrastructure like DNS or network connectivity. Those are the common carriers of our Internet.