This article is confusing, it doesn’t really go into detail on the example of content that was de-platformed (DistroTube, which is still on youtube).
But it does write this as the summary lol:
Summary: The old lie that freedom (including freedom of speech) would be facilitated by the Fediverse is repeatedly being debunked, even by recent and relatively high-profile examples
Fediverse gives you the ability to set up your own instance where you can post the content you like. It does not give you the ability to make other instances link to the content you like.
If all the other instances in the Fediverse don’t like you content, it says more about your content than it does about the Fediverse.
The article is a bit unhinged.
I had a look at distrotube’s video where he talks about being banned. Looks like it was because he got into an argument with someone because he was defending Trump, saying that he’s not a white supremacist. In his video, dt points out that the guy that banned him isn’t even black, as if you need to be black to denounce white supremacy.
This article side-steps that and tries to make it sound like it had something to do with making videos about software like LibreWolf.
The article also goes on to say “Controversial voices or dissenting views are often what drives change in society, sometimes progressively. We’ve seen over the years whose views get suppressed and by who…”
lol.
Yeah… I don’t think defenders of white supremacists are the controversial voices we need to advance society.
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Firefox is blocking this site for not having HTTPS but just the title alone seems nonsensical: the “fediverse” can’t “ban” or “deplatform” anyone or anything anymore than everyone in town can think you’re a douche bag and not talk to you. What is stopping this person from setting up his own instance of Mastodon or PeerTube or Pleroma or whatever thing hurt his feelings by blocking him for being a Nazi or whatever?
It’s always fun to get “Potential Security Risk Ahead”.
This article is dumb as hell. The best argument it can make is that distrotube was banned from one instance and then when they set up their own it was blocked by “several” others. Who the hell cares? Even if every instance in the fedi blocked it it wouldn’t stop people from joining distrotube’s instance, or setting up their own and federating with it if they cared enough to.
Only the dumbest possible conception of the principle of free-speech could think this was a major issue.deleted by creator
I’m not exactly surprised to see Roy Schestowitz taking this position. However, I think he’s making the classic mistake of assuming that centrally-issued censorship by an institution is the exact same thing as a bunch of people swinging ban hammers because they don’t like what somebody has to say.
An important component of Freedom of Speech (by extension, Freedom of Association) is the freedom of the individual to decide whether they have to listen (or in fact, associate with a person at all). I’ll be the first to admit that sometimes various parts of the fediverse can get a bit ban-happy…sometimes that sets up a toxic dynamic where the people making those kinds of announcements are at best loosely informed on what they’re spreading around. But, that’s also nothing new when it comes to online communities.
If you’re going to act like a repulsive human being, I reserve the right to cut you out of my feeds so that I don’t have to deal with you. In a sense, that puts power directly into the hands of the user.
They’re not even ban-happy, it actually just seems like another form of trolling I didn’t even know existed. I’ve started just insta-muting people that announce blocks or share their blocklists without being asked to. And I understand it’s hard not to take the bait when they’re spreading lies about you.
