Silent or Silenced: The Business of Online Speech
Over half the world's population uses some form of social media. The prevalence of these online platforms and the sheer volume of users has crowned social media giants the new arbiters of free speech regulation. What responsibilities do these arbiters have? How are the rules of speech on social media formed? What are the implications on rhetoric in our politics, business, and society overall? The debate surrounding free speech on social media has become increasingly contentious in recent years. Social media platforms have allowed people to express their opinions to a global audience, facilitating an unprecedented spread of information and ideas. However, the power of these companies to control what content is allowed on their platforms has raised concerns about censorship and the suppression of certain viewpoints and modes of expression. The societal structure and orientation that has enabled prominent individuals to leverage their wealth and manipulate the media present important questions that demand answers.
Social media corporations assert that they are private entities with the right to regulate content on their platforms however they see fit. This includes the ability to remove content that violates their terms of service or community guidelines, such as hate speech, incitement to violence, or harassment. Yet, others argue that these companies have become so powerful and influential that their decisions about acceptable speech have far-reaching consequences. For example, suppose a social media platform decides to ban a particular political viewpoint or a type of speech. In that case, it could effectively silence that voice and prevent it from being heard by a wider audience.
The United States supreme court has already weighed in on how they approach a drowning out. "The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true," Former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the United States vs. Alverez (Hudson 2017). The court had just struck down the Stolen Valour Act, which attempted to prohibit false speech about military honors. This decision, championed by the Counter Speech Doctrine, supports Justice Kennedy’s sentiment towards true speech in society. In America, the First Amendment protects the "marketplace of ideas," a societal concept that allows free speech without government or corporate intervention. Like a free market economy, participants in the marketplace of ideas can produce and share beliefs freely, resulting in the popularization of ideas that the market (or society) has collectively agreed upon.
In theory, the marketplace of ideas permits all types of speech in hopes that what society deems harmful or destructive will be pushed out of circulation due to its nature. Nevertheless, it is questionable if this theory could have reverse effects. After all, in an ever-connected and changing world, amplifying values and beliefs reinforced by the social media echo chamber is hardly a challenge. One can see how dangerous this feedback loop can be in a multitude of situations, from false information during elections to online harassment. With everything at the tips of our fingers, who is responsible for the power we hold?
One thing remains true: the ownership of social media companies remains limited to select individuals with large sums of money. With Elon Musk's recent acquisition of Twitter, many are concerned about the over-concentration of power into just a handful of individuals' hands. Even the ability to purchase such an influential platform worries many who see a deep discrepancy between the structure of in-person and online speech. With the introduction of an abundance of wealth, it is inevitable that the direction of these companies will begin to permeate into the social fabric. In fact, it already has. With just a few tech billionaires controlling the world's largest social media platforms, the potential for abuse of this power is significant. The decisions made by these individuals about what content is allowed on their platforms can have far-reaching consequences for political discourse, social movements, and the public sphere as a whole.
In particular, social media companies can exacerbate existing inequalities and societal power imbalances. Conglomerated power can harm a singular single community when impacted by hate speech. While users may hope social media companies would be more inclined to remove that speech to protect individuals, they are hardly required to do so. This complicates the precedent for protecting specific individuals on platforms aligned with the owner's ideology.
Musk, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai now together see billions of users worldwide, with well over 50% of the market share of social media users (Statista 2023). The implications of discourse on these apps are massive, considering the sheer number of users and ease of interaction. Before acquiring the platform, Musk’s Twitter had operated on a transparent guideline system with a more willing attitude toward banning accounts. Under Musk, over 60,000 accounts have been reinstated in an act to “[start clean,] internally called the ‘Big Bang’” (Wituschek 2022). As the company put it: "Our approach to policy enforcement will rely more heavily on de-amplification of violative content: freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach" (Twitter 2022).
Musk's approach to the social platform is ambitious. Still, it opens the inevitable discussion that our society needs to have if we want social platforms to be the constructive tool they are capable of being. An approach to this problem is to adopt a more nuanced understanding of what constitutes free speech online, thereby instituting proper enforcement on platforms. Moreover, social media corporations' stance on their understanding of free speech is reflected in their community standards and guidelines.
Technology conglomerate Meta, with subsidiaries Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp, is in a similar position to Twitter, searching for its place on the spectrum of free speech leniency. With increasingly blurred regulatory lines and an increase in online speech that tests limits, both Meta and Twitter have instituted in-company oversight boards for their prospective platforms. Suggested first to Facebook by Harvard Law professor Noah Feldman the need for an internal "supreme court" was predicated on CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg's desire to delegate management of high-profile to experts (Klonick 2021). Currently, the board is responsible for handling appeals from users who believe their content has been wrongfully removed or left up on the platform, as well as cases referred to by users.
These oversight boards are essential to improving transparency and accountability in social media content moderation. Corporations can protect arbitrary or biased moderation practices by having an independent body review content moderation decisions. The board's decisions are publicly available and can be used to set a precedent for future content moderation decisions. This transparency allows users to understand better how Facebook moderates content, which can help promote trust in the platform.
It also appears that the most unrestricted platforms in speech are not only among the most unsafe but comparatively the least profitable (Nott & Peters 2023). Users want security, safety and privacy, and the ability to filter content. In exchange, users give companies everlasting attention. Thus, the question is not whether social media companies should mimic the free speech model of our in-person society but if they will enforce the free speech model desired by the users.
While it will be difficult to point out extrinsic influences, one thing is sure: With growing global users, social media companies have a responsibility to ensure the safety, privacy, and legitimacy of their users. Social media platforms have the potential and opportunity to facilitate the free exchange of ideas and information, but this power has its dangers. The concentration of this power in the hands of a few billionaires raises pressing concerns about the potential for political bias and commercial interests to shape public discourse and undermine democratic governance. We have continuously operated under a system of fighting hate speech with other speech. Now, we must ask ourselves, is it free speech users want?
References
Baughman, Brent. 2018. “Free Speech vs. Hate Speech.” NPR, June 5, 2018. https://www.npr.org/2018/06/01/616085863/free-speech-vs-hate-speech.
Hudson, David L.. 2017. “Counterspeech Doctrine.” Counterspeech Doctrine, December 2017. https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/940/counterspeech-doctrine#:~:text=The%20remedy%20for%20speech%20that%20is%20false%20is%20speech%20that%20is%20true.
Iqbal, Mansoor. 2023. “Twitter Revenue and Usage Statistics (2023).” Business of Apps, January 31, 2023. https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/.
Klonick, Kate. 2021. “Inside the Making of Facebook's Supreme Court.” The New Yorker, February 12, 2021. https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/inside-the-making-of-facebooks-supreme-court.
Nott, Lata, and Brian Peters. 2023. “Free Speech on Social Media: The Complete Guide.” Freedom Forum, January 18, 2023. https://www.freedomforum.org/free-speech-on-social-media/#:~:text=The%20First%20Amendment%20protects%20individuals,exactly%20are%20their%20censorship%20policies%3F.
Statista. "Number of social media users worldwide from 2017 to 2027 (in billions)." Chart. June 15, 2022. Statista. Accessed April 06, 2023. https://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users/
Twitter Inc. “Twitter 2.0: Our Continued Commitment to the Public Conversation.” Twitter (blog). 30 November, 2022. https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2022/twitter-2-0-our-continued-commitment-to-the-public-conversation.
We Are Social, und DataReportal, und Meltwater. "Most popular social networks worldwide as of January 2023, ranked by number of monthly active users (in millions)." Chart. January 26, 2023. Statista. Accessed April 06, 2023. https://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-users/
Wituschek, Joe. “Elon Musk Begins Reinstating over 60,000 Previously Suspended Twitter Accounts.” BGR, December 21, 2022, https://bgr.com/tech/elon-musk-begins-reinstating-over-60000-previously-suspended-twitter-accounts/.