I specifically didn't address YouTube's legal right to censor anything and everything they want. That is (most likely) their prerogative, although there are some pending legal challenges. I was talking about the cultural danger of censoring certain types of speech, particularly when the matters at play involve inalienable rights enshrined in our Constitution. Again, if it is considered socially acceptable to censor pro-2A speech, we are a social regime-change away from justifying the censorship of pro-4A or 1A speech, or practically anything else.
Did you not understand that? If you don't see the irony and danger here, it's only because you agree with the censors, but that only lasts as long as it lasts.
> Again, if it is considered socially acceptable to censor pro-2A speech, we are a social regime-change away from justifying the censorship of pro-4A or 1A speech, or practically anything else.
Let's say you run a discussion group in your home for recovering alcoholics, but open it to anyone who's passing by. A person enters and starts to try to convince everyone to drink more alcohol.
Do you have the right to invite this person to leave? Are you censoring this person if you did so?
Discussion groups in small private spaces are a somewhat related but clearly and justifiably different issue from huge kinda-sorta-maybe-public fora like YouTube. Trying to conflate the two will probably just lead to confusion and muddle the discussion.
To continue playing the analogy game, let's say you run a bible study group in your home. Somebody comes in and advocates for free (homosexual) love - do you have the right to ask this person to leave? Obviously. But what does that say about YouTube's rights? Or more importantly, half leaving aside the question of rights, about what they really should do in a robust free society?
False dichotomy. It obviously isn't like either one; not a purely public forum, and not an intimate private gathering.
The notion of semi-public space (shopping malls, sidewalks, right of way) has been around for a long time and is continuing to evolve. The laws and precedent on this are not fixed in place, nor should they be, especially as more of our public participation moves online.
The major difference between YouTube and a recovering alcoholics group in real life is that watching a YouTube video isn't compulsory. You don't have to watch it if you don't want to. If someone monopolizes the conversation at the alcoholics group - talks over others - you can't turn off your ears, or realistically physically remove them without serious effort. On YouTube, you can easily avoid videos you don't want to watch just by reading the title.
If someone incorrectly titles their video to mislead people of the opposite view to view their content, I imagine that censoring that video is not problematic to anyone.
Finally, it is probably a good thing that if you search a particular topic on YouTube, you will presumably get videos both in the 'pro' column and the 'con' column so you do not fall into an ideological bubble.
You can cover your ears, and you can leave the AA and go somewhere else.
But you didn't answer my question: if you create a private forum which is open to the public, can you keep out people who don't abide by the community guidelines?
What if I see it and I'm completely willing to accept that risk?
What if I'm willing to accept that the government suddenly turn into a dystopian authoritarian nightmare that tortures and murders my family in front of me, if we get rid of the right to own guns. I'm totally willing to accept that.
I'm sure you're aware that Ben Franklin was asking for more taxes to fund a stronger national defense against native American raids[0]. In other words, the "essential Liberty" he argued for was not liberty from the state, but the liberty of the state.
If you're going to use that quote to make some sort of anti-statist, pro revolutionary argument, fair enough, it's a good quote... that's just not at all what the person you're quoting was actually saying.
Did you not understand that? If you don't see the irony and danger here, it's only because you agree with the censors, but that only lasts as long as it lasts.