(1) BLUF: Your Free Speech Offends Me

So fuck you, right? No. I’d never treat you like that. It is important to know that I respect your right to free speech, unequivocally. I sacrificed 18 years of my life for it. No one should ever lose their right to free speech in this world, in any country. I view it as a basic human right.

However, let’s also be under no misconception… I believe it’s common sense, supported by law sometimes, and most people have some direct experience with it: say what you want, but if you say the wrong thing you might get your ass whipped for it, regardless of your right.

Entitlement to free speech and life with no consequence are two different things. We’ve all got the legal right to put our foot right in our own mouth, and I support that right and the need for it absolutely. Whether you decide to say something that makes someone whoop your ass or not is on you, right or wrong.

#1 BLUF: NOOOO! Stand by Zuck! Fuck you, Bill, and fuck you Starbucks! SUPPORT FACEBOOK and FREE SPEECH!

Do not be fooled! I condemn hate speech as much as anyone. In real life I have definitely been guilty of punching people in the face for something they’ve said, more than once.

However, this strong arming of Facebook is bad bad bad for the people, and we need to stand on Facebook’s side in this fight. I will be doing my damndest not to support organizations that are boycotting Facebook because of its policy being open on content sharing. YOU SHOULD TOO!

Fuck Starbucks. Fuck Coca-Cola. Who else have I missed? Fuck Unilever. Fuck Verizon. Fuck Levi’s. I stand by Facebook on this one. Any more?

Facebook is the largest platform for us to share our real accounts of what’s going on between each other without any paid media filter on top of our voices. It gives the most reach. The restrictions that Facebook is being strong armed into are against OUR interests as people, and its users.

Beware any and ALL tactics that would inhibit individuals’ ability or motivation to broadcast their voice and story directly, unfiltered. Haven’t you seen The Great Hack and the story of Trinidad and Tobago? If not, check it out.

Don’t let corporate interests and major media retain exclusivity over content choices. THAT’s what’s at stake here. They LOSE money by our direct access to unfiltered information on Facebook. They are using hate speech as a lever to try and fool people into doing what’s in THEIR interest, not ours, people.

This is about money and control, not about what’s best for users from the people pushing the censorship narrative. If it’s about what people want, lets put it to a vote and make a law to protect it. If there’s things you don’t want to see, filter your own content.

Censorship on open sharing is a threat to us all. It takes beauty out of the eyes of would be beholders because we don’t get to judge.

Should there be restrictions on what people can post on Facebook? I vote NO. What’s your vote?

I don’t give a fuck how you feel about Mark Zuckerberg after watching “The Social Network”, or whatever. Maybe you think he’s a total douche. Maybe he is. I don’t know. However, I will say this: he has stayed true to the original mission to enable us all to connect and share our stories and point of view without much censorship or restriction on how we use the platform, so long as it is legal.

Zuck, I hope you have good standing to sue those advertisers for backing out on any existing contracts, and for besmirching your name to the public with punitive damages. They got the terms of service on your open platform when they signed up to do ads just like I did, right? Sue them to protect Facebook.

The head douche of Twitter has made his platform part of the story, and the media, and the politics, in it’s censorship policies in a way that supports its culture of enjoying the smell of its own farts, and points of view, in a bubble. He wants to control the hot air content on his platform, unlike The Zuck. Trust me when I say Twitter as an organization is as elitist and vapid as any of these Bay Area company cultures can be, in my personal experience with them IRL.

Maybe you see the Zuck as “one of them” too, but I think he’s not. Since the days Facebook was new born I’ve been a user. He’s always kept the platform itself unrestrictive to us as users, and focused on ENABLING us to communicate with those we never could as it’s only objective, without the platform being in our way.

Our feeds are what we make them. I’d rather have access to content (and my choice of how to respond to it) than not be allowed to access suppressed content at all.

Facebook is being forced to take that choice away from us. Don’t let them get hucklebucked!

Even Reddit has been under fire lately too. If Facebook loses this battle it sets them up to get fucked over even more in the future, and us too as a result, by these same kind of pressure tactics. It’s extortion right in front of us. There hasn’t been a USERS boycott on Facebook… so what’s the fucking problem? What’s all this backlash I’m hearing about? It’s a gimmick.

Like it or not, Facebook is the most powerful corporate entity right now fighting and losing money for free speech. We should have their back.

If they have no revenue from corporate sponsors, how much would you pay to sponsor your own posts? It’s the sponsors of Facebook that pay for it now… if they all leave in boycott of free speech, how much is it worth to you to have the Facebook platform and your history?

People with points of view like Bill Moyer above are the same people who decades ago would’ve wanted to outlaw rap, and rock and roll, and so on. Have you tried running Facebook ads? I have. I do it for this site. My post on June 19th (Juneteenth!) was delayed getting out on Facebook being held up for review of political content. A few others were too.

Should my writing be censored? Or the ideas you get to ingest?

The rules they are putting into place are not in our best interests, Facebook users. If they ban or restrict violent content or streaming of it, would it help or obstruct getting a voice to things we wouldn’t otherwise see… like George Floyd?

If I am ever being choked out I want it live streamed on every available platform. Word is bond. Perhaps someone might intervene in the last moments I am trying to survive.

Facebook is a platform for free speech. Twitter is a bubble. We the people should want to know exactly what the President or anyone else has to say even if it’s the worst kind of hate and evil there is, online and in our faces.

Facebook, history has shown you need to be smarter and more choosy about your customers and relationships…

… but keeping the bad shit out of our view doesn’t make it go away and it’s more of a threat to us lurking in the shadows. This strong arming of Facebook is about money and control. People, if all the big advertisers left Facebook we should pay affordable subscriptions if necessary to keep it alive.

Frankly, that would protect our space from advertisers and they’d lose all kinds of access to data they learn about us from advertising on Facebook which they need. As people if we see online hate that needs legal intervention we should get more savvy on how to get law enforcement on the case. We are enabled to organize as a people with ease thanks to Facebook.

Keeping Facebook free from censorship keeps control of our online reality in our own hands.

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