Recently, big tech, FB, Google, Netflix, Visa, Mastercard and so many others stepped in and banned the russian state media, affiliated channels, their payment cards etc Twitter, FB, Youtube are also actively suppressing russian media from search results. Gpay, venmo, visa stopped working. Play store is not letting RT and sputnik apps to work/download. Now, I know all of you are very emotional right now and support this behavior against russia. Please try to keep thay aside for a second. But for a second imagine that instead of Russia this was a friend of US lets say UK invading a small country, would big tech do this to UK? That small country can be yemen, libya or Iraq. We are mostly tech workers here and I want to get a sense from folks if they support this universally? Disclaimer: All my thoughts and prayers are with people of ukraine and I support the cause. But this censoring is not going to help them and sets a wrong precedent for future cases so my concern. Please dont take it the wrong way.
OP, you brought up a valid point.
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A restaurant has the right to kick out a yelling customer for abuse, so I believe the media platforms also have the right to kick out sources of propaganda. Yes, I realize it's harder to determine and it's more controversial, but obviously a business shouldn't be forced to not kick out absolutely nobody.
I think the point of OP is to bring some reflection about this: why is everyone banning Russia but when another country invaded or actively affects the rights of other countries / people the reaction is not the same? Is a pretty valid point. Russia propaganda has been here since years ago, why is big tech only acting now? Feels performative and hypocritical
Of course, it's performative, but that doesn't mean it's ineffective. There are many social media channels that go bankrupt or fall out of favor once the algorithm changes. It takes years to build up, but it takes much shorter to ruin something. As far as hypocrisy goes, I'm not sure. The law enforcement acts when a husband murders their wife, but they might not take any action for years of domestic abuse. For me, it's more of an instance of "too late".
Why have they not exited Russia already?
Businesses are free to refuse content that they disagree with, especially when that content is government produced. I do not support government compelled speech.
This is it precisely. This has nothing to do with companies “limiting free speech”. The companies are businesses and should have no obligation to host content they don’t agree with. People painting it as the rights of platform users are assuming that online platforms are public domain of some kind. It’s ignorant of property rights. Ironically, most who I’ve met who are loudest about this are conservatives who ostensibly used to be pro business/ property rights until it became inconvenient because platforms started kicking off some of their favorite mouthpieces.
I do not support this behavior against Russia, I think is quite hypocritical. But I suppose I should not be surprised given the fact that nobody wants to be against the US. Tech companies are another pawn on the game
explain, why you do not support this?
if the UK will lie like Russia did in the last 2 months. Russia is stupid, they lost in diplomacy, so they decided to use a power.
I think it is bullshit and will just create Russian terrorists that hate the west.
I would think that the disinformation campaign in Russia is really more the culprit here than tech companies if that were to happen.
State media was telling Ukrainians will welcome Russian troops. What sort of garbage is that and yet people believe in it.
Well question number one is if there is really a monopoly. If there is, then it’s up to each country to set up public services. For example some countries realized during the pandemic that they were importing critical goods from other countries and needed to build internal manufacturing to be self sufficient. If you are importing any product, you are subject to losing access when there is a geopolitical conflict.
Big tech flexing their power into politics is such a dangerous and recent thing we have to accept