Comment by csouzaf
1 year ago
Brazilian here. I find it very bad when someone from another country criticizes our Supreme Court, especially when it seems driven by ideological motivations. As others have pointed out, similar situations occur in other countries without bring Elon's comments
Brazil doesn't have an equivalent to the U.S. First Amendment, and that's not necessarily a problem. Our legal framework reflects our historical and cultural context. Why he feel the need to impose his vision of what's best for Brazil, without fully taking account our legal and social nuances?
> Brazil doesn't have an equivalent to the U.S. First Amendment, and that's not necessarily a problem.
That's an interesting perspective. The way I read our first amendment, it seems that the rights granted therein are a prerequisite for a free society.
If Brazil's leaders are unwilling to allow a speech platform go uncensored, why not ban X? Should X have to comply with every country's censorship requests? Elon alleged that Moraes requested private user information as well. Should X hand over any and all user data that governments ask for?
> If Brazil's leaders are unwilling to allow a speech platform go uncensored, why not ban X?
Because it’s not black and white
> Should X have to comply with every country's censorship requests?
X must comply with the laws of every country it’s operate. If it cannot, or not willing to do it, it must leave it. That’s exactly what Elon have done
> Elon alleged that Moraes requested private user information as well. Should X hand over any and all user data that governments ask for ?
If it’s done legally, yes.
This take is quite bizarre, honestly, given how personal data protection laws are subpar in the US. Even from the government (remember patriot act).
I'm being critical of laws that allow governments to censor and invade privacy of their citizens. "If it's legal then it's okay" is a non-existent standard. By the same logic one would support stoning homosexuals to death in Iran (it's done legally!).
Additionally, do you think I'm in favor of the Patriot Act? Does its existence invalidate any belief I hold that privacy is important? Being subject to unjust laws motivates my beliefs, not undermines them.
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Other countries like Australia rely on common law and statutory law.
Some of the orders were not just to prevent people in Brazil from viewing certain things, but to take down content and ban users globally. The court also wanted Twitter to provide personal information of overseas accounts.
The UN declaration of human rights speaks to free expression being fundamental to human flourishing. As an American, I'm not terribly inclined to accept cultural relativism when it comes to censorship. Governments banning political speech they dislike is always and everywhere tyrannical.
I don't think it's comments they dislike. I think it's accounts spreading fake news and feeding a narrative of 'current government bad' to impose what they think is the right way. I mean, there are limits, and they're being imposed by the force of law
It doesn't work that way. Any ability to ban "fake news" immediately becomes a vehicle for banning inconvenient news. It's part of human nature. I don't have to list the dozens recent examples of "fake" news turning out to be true. There's a reason that Orwell's censorship body was called the "ministry of truth".
Governments shouldn't touch censorship for the same reason alcoholics shouldn't touch booze.
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“Free speech” has limits. Spreading lies about people with the purpose of undermining someone’s reputation is defamation, which is a crime in the US.
In Brazil, it happens that lying about the democratic process with the intent of getting people to not vote or to get people to support your fascist coup is also a crime.
The Supreme Court ordered X to ban people who commit these crimes and subpoenaed it to reveal their identities so they can be arrested. Subpoenas happen all the time in the US.
Complying isn’t the problem here though. Twitter complies with similar requests all the time. The problem is that Twitter is failing to comply in time and is being hit with ever-increasing fines for it.
Musk could hire more people to deal with it or pay the fines, but he decided that firing everyone and leaving the country would be cheaper.
Unless of course that speech also incites lawlessness or is actually otherwise unlawful.
Your rights end where my nose begins, etc.
Plenty of Germans are fine with banning public praise of Nazis. You are free to spew the boring old pablum, but most people in the world aren't absolutist like you.
Besides, "political speech" isn't as easy to nail down as you seem to think it is. Child porn is political speech if I want it to be so you're opposed to banning child porn. Good to know.
So what you mean is that the nationality of a person makes it better or worse for them to criticize Brazil’s Supreme Court? It does not matter.
If people are driven by different ideologies, well this is just how it is.
I’m not saying Musk is right, but I want him to be able to criticize freely “our Supreme Court”, and also for him to be able to do with his business as he wishes. His vision might as well be for the best according to himself, who can decide if something is good or bad?