A federal judge has blocked a New York law attempting to regulate how social media companies filter “hateful conduct” on platforms, ruling that the law violates aspects of the First Amendment.
“U.S. District Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. on Tuesday, in Volokh v. James, sided with the Volokh Conspiracy legal blog and Peter Thiel-backed video site Rumble Inc., which claimed the law will hurt online services and silence disfavored viewpoints.”
Newsmax
New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed the legislation last June, supposedly to reduce bias on social media platforms and protect users from harmful content. Carter however, agreed with the social platform plaintiffs, stating the following:
“The First Amendment protects from state regulation speech that may be deemed “hateful” and generally disfavors regulation of speech based on its content unless it is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling governmental interest.”
U.S. District Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr.
Additionally, Carter referenced Supreme Court case Matal v. Tam, to further support his ruling.
“Speech that demeans on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or any other similar ground is hateful; but the proudest boast of our free speech jurisprudence is that we protect the freedom to express ‘the thought that we hate.’”
Volokh v. James
The Hateful Conduct Law required “social media networks to provide and maintain mechanisms for reporting hateful conduct on their platform.” Hateful conduct is described by the bill as “the use of a social media network to vilify, humiliate, or incite violence against a group or a class of persons on the basis of race, color, religion, ethnicity, national origin, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.”
Last year, Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Meta, revealed during an interview that the FBI would contact the social media giant to inform them about potentially harmful misinformation which should be censored on platforms. At the time, this was the magic bullet for conservatives — proof, directly from the source that they were being shadow banned and silenced. Then, Elon Musk coordinated the release of the Twitter Files, concrete evidence of government police institutions’ role in the censorship of its own citizens. After this bombshell, a document was leaked revealing collusion between Homeland Security, the FBI, and social media companies Twitter and Facebook to regulate information.
Eventually, the gatekeepers of thought and information decided to embrace their new role as speech suppression advocates. The Director of the FBI Christopher Wray even boasted about the wonderful “collaboration” between the Bureau and the private sector at the most recent World Economic Forum conference in Davos just last month.
The progressive left dreams of the day in which they will have the ability to monitor every platform and every outlet for ideas and opinions which are not on-brand with the regime.
U.S. District Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. has safeguarded the First Amendment in an incredible way, and has defended citizens’ speech and private companies in the process.
