On Fri, Nov 18, 2016 at 11:30 PM, juan <[1]juan.g71@gmail.com> wrote:

             'Their' service exists only thanks to the users and the
     fascist
             government they work for.

   Twitter is entirely dependant on it's userbase, yes. If they feel that
   allowing that kind of speech is going to lead to users not feeling
   comfortable using the service (leading to a reduction of the userbase)
   the only sane commercial decision is to remove the problematic speech,
   no?
   Working for the government or not, they're hardly likely to stand and
   defend harassment when that'll cost them users. Especially given that
   it sounds like they do a terrible job of making money out of those
   users anyway

             What kind of sane 'cypherpunk' 'activist' would defend
     fascist
             corporations like twitter? Rhetorical question of course....

   It's not intended as a defence of Twitter per se.
   I'm not a fan of corporations by any stretch of the imagination, and
   certainly not of the American capitalism rules all mindset.
   But you know what, I believe in individual rights, and that includes
   the right not to be party to something like harassment. If you're being
   made to carry things you staunchly disagree with, in a world where
   people will associate them with you, that's - in effect- compelling
   speech which is just as bad (if not worse) than suppressing speech.
   A corporation actually take a stance to try and prevent some of the
   targeted abuse that flows online is a good thing. It might not (nay,
   doesn't) offset the myriad faults with the system, but it's a lean
   towards benefiting the userbase (even if driven primarily by
   self-interest). The world isn't black and white, even the truly evil
   can perform good acts from time to time.
   Don't forget these guys weren't banned for being right-wing, or for
   expressing "alt-right" views. Most (if not all) had a habit of directly
   harassing people for race, gender, whatever.
   They're still free to continue running websites promoting their views.
   I'd have a bigger issue with a hosting company refusing to host what
   amounts to a political (if extreme) opinion or news site.
   The line seems to be drawn at launching direct attacks, which doesn't
   seem unreasonable, especially given the reality is we live in a world
   where capitalism currently exists, and most of society doesn't want to
   have to deal with that type of bullshit.
   Course, there is the question of how direct attacks should be defined
   too, and there's no good way to do that definitively. I think
   encouraging hundreds, if not thousands, of followers to hurl abuse at
   one user is probably well over it though.

             The 'terms of service' of the corporate mafia are null and
             void, in case you never noticed.

   Not if you plan to use a service provided and controlled by that mafia.
   The (non-corporate) mafia, in fact, tend to be quite insistent that you
   abide by their terms
   I know you'll probably disagree with huge chunks of that, if not all of
   it, and it's probably a bit muddled where it's been rattled out.
   The TL:DR is, there isn't a good answer that works in the world we
   currently live in. Those that were banned (or at least those I've
   bothered to look up) were assholes. Not because of their speech, but of
   their actions.
   --
   Ben Tasker
   [2]https://www.bentasker.co.uk

References

   1. mailto:juan.g71@gmail.com
   2. https://www.bentasker.co.uk/