Questions for Jay & Aaron On SCOTUS Ruling In Missouri v. Murthy
Hi everyone,
and Jay will be recording an episode on the recent Missouri v. Murthy SCOTUS ruling.As promised to paid members of The Illusion of Consensus, we are fielding bonus questions for our podcast episodes.
Please leave any questions you have about this crucial free speech case in the comments below and Aaron and Jay will try to answer as many of them as possible!
— The Illusion of Consensus
As the opinion seemed to indicate that even assuming coercion by the government, plaintiffs did not have standing as they could not show evidence they were in some legal sense harmed. But what about all the social media users who were deprived of reading what the plaintiff's wrote on social media due to the government's ongoing coercion? Aren't millions harmed simply by being deprived from hearing arguments and facts that dissent from the government narrative? Isn't that the real harm?
As I understand it, SCOTUS didn't say people weren't being censored by Social Media, they were told that they didn't have standing because social media is not bound by the first amendment and they may have wanted to censor those people anyway. I feel like the case proved that the government paid and asked and that is enough. Clearly they are pressured to rule in favor of the government and allow them to violate the 1st amendment.
The reality is that social media monopolies like facebook are censoring experts that are speaking the truth and there is no recourse. You can't debate the issue. Social media fact checkers are claiming to be the arbiters of truth, but no one can tell them they are wrong. If experts could embarrass them for speaking foolishly, the problem would solve itself. Can we come at this from a different angle and say if they are a near monopoly that they should be bound by the 1st amendment as well. They are essentially able to gag the people and deprive them of speech. This has resulted in deaths which is when the government is supposed to act (to allow debate, not silence it).