To the contrary… it’s a real concern. That’s why we shouldn’t falsely equivocate the CCP censorship apparatus to the haphazard moderation impulses of a childish social media CEO.

We’ve got a lot more to lose, especially with the long-emerging (and currently accelerating) conflux of state and social media.

For insurance, the pending KOSA bill opens a huge opportunity for future government censorship: https://www.techdirt.com/2024/12/09/new-kosa-same-as-old-kosa-but-now-with-elons-ignorant-endorsement/

Which of my statements do you disagree with? How would you characterize the state of freedom of speech in the PRC?

He wasted a decade plus of his life chasing a lost cause.

Metal detector enthusiast who found a hard drive in the landfill 12 years ago:

“Yeah, I should get around to seeing what’s on that.”

China censors all literature, film, music, and internet discourse employing advanced technologies and multiple tens of thousands of people while also running the world’s largest prison for journalist. VPNs are blocked. Apps like Signal are blocked. Online gaming for minors is limited to 3 hours per day on weekends and holidays only. People get harassed by police for what they post online. Many go to jail for criticizing the government, spreading pornography or health related sexual content (including anything LGBT), supporting Taiwanese independence, or casting doubt on Chinese folk legends. Then, in addition to that (which I have not even begun to do justice to), all media companies run their own internal censorship regimes so as not to get in trouble with the authorities. And this rolls downhill: you the individual self-censor to not get in trouble with your boss or worse.

That’s the logic of a witch hunt. I mean, obviously there are behaviors so suspicious you’d feel almost complicit not to report them. But a lot of the times all we have are the subtle impressions built up by our unconscious brain and it’s not until the answer is shown that it all clicks into place and what once was hidden is now so obvious.

Yes, but presumably with more back channel pressure on Netanyahu to tone it down and avoid expanding hostilities. Small consolation perhaps, but objectively better for Palestinian advocates.

This. I cannot conceive of a world where everyone peacefully coexists and nobody uses violence to extract advantage (or revenge) from others. That’s fantasy. A warlord will always arise and in time such authority legitimizes and becomes a state. The best we can do is to democratize that authority and spread power around as widely as possible.