The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has said he hopes the crisis surrounding the social network X in Brazil might teach the world that “it isn’t obliged to put up with [Elon] Musk’s far-right free-for-all just because he is rich”.
Lula’s comments to the network CNN Brasil came after the supreme court voted unanimously on Monday to uphold the ban on X, which is now largely inaccessible in one of its biggest global markets.
The suspension was first ordered on Friday as a result of the company’s refusal to obey court orders requiring the removal of profiles accused of spreading disinformation and for the social network to name a local legal representative.
Media Bias/Fact Check - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for Media Bias/Fact Check:
MBFC: Least Biased - Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: Very High - United States of America
Wikipedia about this source
The Guardian - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for The Guardian:
MBFC: Left-Center - Credibility: Medium - Factual Reporting: Mixed - United Kingdom
Wikipedia about this source
Except it does. Money = speech = power and he has the most of any human.
Downvote this all you want, it won’t change the reality that Musk is more powerful than any other human currently alive on earth. I hate him too, but you can’t deny his power.
I’m sure he’ll cry about it a lot while wiping his tears away with bills worth more than you or I will ever make in a lifetime.
Uhh okay? He’s so powerful his website (which he didn’t want to buy in the first place) is blocked in a whole country.
The three most powerful people on earth are the US President, the President of the Russian Federation, and any Captain of an Ohio class submarine
By that logic musk would be president right now so doesnt make much sense. Its less about money and more about your family and friends. Almost all presidents of the United states have been descendants from the same british family. Including Obama yes.
I would like to see some evidence that Elon Musk can choose who is captain of an Ohio class submarine.
The assesment that he’s the wealthiest person on earth is pretty dubious, actually. The analyses which list the worlds wealthiest people always are, because they have to decide what counts as wealth and how to count it.
Normally that’s fairly easy, but for very powerful people (who, as you point out, the people at the top of those lists are) it gets murky because of things like stocks and options which they could liquidate in theory, but which would crash in value if they tried to actually do so. Does it still count as wealth if it only exists so long as you don’t spend it?
There are also people who’s wealth isn’t held in any currency, or gold, or stocks. How do you measure the wealth or power of a sovereign king, or any other kind of dictator? You certainly can’t neatly put it in a scale alongside people who just have a dragon’s horde of cash somewhere, that wouldn’t be comparing like for like
How do you measure the wealth or power of a sovereign king, or any other kind of dictator?
This is also borne out in practice as you watch the purportedly “most powerful man on Earth” constantly tap dance for Putin in lockstep with the GOP. As a kleptocratic dictator, he informally adds the entire country’s economy to his personal net worth.
The GOP is foaming at the mouth to form a right-wing dictatorship in this country for precisely the reason you are addressing here. A person with powers of complete dictatorship over the world’s biggest economy would definitively make them the most powerful man on Earth without a second even deserving mention.
Money = Speech = Power
Maybe in the US it is so, but the Citizens United decision does not apply outside of there. Some countries value the power of democracy more than money.
I mean what are we looking at right now?
Another example: Unions don’t cave to Tesla in Sweden, this dispute appears to be still ongoing even after another 9 months.
More like Far-right-free fall
Lula is so fucking great. He’s literally just backing up the courts that are applying the law fairly and as-written, which is more than I can say for most leaders.
Don’t get me wrong, Lula is correct on this. But he’s still a scummy politician who has a questionable past
Raising 20 million Brazilians out of poverty, while making his country the 8th largest economy in the world? I’m sure he’s as corrupt as any Brazilian politician, but none of them have anything that comes even close to that to show for it.
He also got arrested for one of the largest corruption scandals in the history of Brazil. It’s a complex person. We can criticize his vices and praise his virtues at the same time.
Listen, Musk is an asshole who has created large problems at Xitter. There is absolutely no debate on that.
HOWEVER I have to wonder if most of the people cheering what’s happening in Brazil actually know what’s going on?
Did you know that one single Judge has been given the power the censor the Internet? Do you know that no justification needs to be released to the public about WHY a person, account, or post is being censored, removed, or banned? Do you know that this Judge actually banned Apple and Google from distributing any VPN Software before they were forced to change the order due to public outcry? Do you know that the fines this Judge is issuing have no basis in the law?
Even prominent Brazilian Attorneys, like Thiago Amparo, who previously supported this Judge and their work are now saying that it’s going too far.
Brazil now has an Internet Censor who obviously doesn’t understand the technology who is issuing censorship orders that require no justification and to the surprise of no one his orders are helpful almost entirely to the current President specifically and the ruling party in general.
Here’s an archive link to the New York Times giving more details.
So yeah, screw Musk but also screw whatever unholy state censorship is going on down in Brazil too.
The initial ruling was by a single judge but it was upheld yesterday by a panel of five supreme court justices:
Members of Brazil’s supreme court have unanimously voted to uphold the ban on X, after Elon Musk’s refusal to comply with local laws led to the social network being blocked in one of its biggest markets.
They didn’t approve the “Initial Ruling”. They approved the amended version that didn’t bar Apple and Google from distributing VPN Software and didn’t create a 5 day deadline.
Do you know WHY Xitter doesn’t just appoint a legal representative and sidestep this mess? It’s because this same Judge threatened to imprison the last one and pre-emptively froze her bank accounts!
https://time.com/7016537/brazil-blocks-elon-musk-x-twitter-company-refuses-comply-judge/
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y3rnl5qv3o
This is not how a legal system is supposed to behave.
Can you share where you saw “threatening to arrest and froze bank account”? Twitter made a post on their own page about something along the line. Other than that I couldn’t find any.
The resignation of the legal representative has more nuance than what you said here. His (not her) name is Diego de Lima Gualda, an attorney in Brazil. After a series of non compliance from Twitter, the Twitter Brazil filed a request arguing that the Twitter international is responsible for compliance and Twitter Brazil does not have authority. The judge dismissed this request for obvious reasons, and the next day he resigned from the position.
The non compliance led to resignation. This is crucial because the actions of Twitter are the reason why the legal representative faced the consequences. Not that the judge ordered something out of the blue. I think you are missing the key point here.
Obviously censorship is bad. There is no contention in that. My point is this order is the last one in the long standing feud between Musk and Moraes. Musk has been so aggressive in personally attacking the judge. So portraying the judge as someone going on a power trip is not the accurate picture.
Edit: Adding more info here. The entire information on the freezing bank account and arrest of the legal representative of Twitter Brazil, is from the Twitter Global Affairs handle. They published a “secret order” from the judge. A few things I noticed are these looks like cherry picked pages of a bigger document due to lack of continuity between page 1 and 2. Usually court orders will include the full context of the petition. Second point is the obvious circumventing strategy the Global Affairs of Twitter also states. They reiterate that only “Twitter International” is responsible for compliance, and not “Twitter Brazil”. This absurd argument introduces the problem of jurisdiction. This is just Twitter trying to fly above the law.
Earlier I said the legal representative was Diego de Lima Gualda, after his resignation they informed that Rachel de Oliveira Vila Nova Conceição will be the new representative. The order says:
indicates that the representative of the company X BRASIL INTERNET LTDA., RACHEL DE OLIVEIRA VILLA NOVA CONCEIÇÃO, acting in bad faith, is trying to avoid the regular notification of the decision handed down in the proceedings, including by electronic means, of which she has already demonstrated knowledge, with the aim of frustrating its compliance.
Therefore, given the negative ruling of the summons and the reported impossibility of contacting the legal representative of the aforementioned company, I DETERMINE THAT the lawyers legally appointed by X BRASIL INTERNET LTDA. be IMMEDIATELY INTIMATED, including electronic means, so that they adopt the necessary measures to comply with the order, within 24 (twenty-four) hours, under penalty of:
(1) DAILY FINE OF R$20,000.00 (twenty thousand reais) to company administrator, RACHEL DE OLIVEIRA VILLA NOVA CONCEIÇÃO (CPF 255.747.418-57), CUMULATIVE THAT IMPOSED ON THE COMPANY, as well as DECREE OF PRISON for disobeying a court order;
I think these words are self explanatory. Twitter tried to delay the compliance just by making the legal representative unreachable. This along with the argument that Twitter Brazil is not responsible shows a clearer picture of what Twitter was trying to do and what actually happened. Again I don’t see where the “bank account freezing” is written.
Edit 2: I forgot to state the obvious. The representative who resigned is not the one who faced fines or “decree of prison”. These are two different representatives. Again the representative is facing this because of the actions of Twitter. This is not a case of judicial activism.
Did you know that one single Judge has been given the power the censor the Internet? Do you know that no justification needs to be released to the public about WHY a person, account, or post is being censored, removed, or banned?
Replace judge with CEO and ask the question again.
Replace judge with CEO and ask the question again.
The CEO can’t threaten to throw you in prison and freeze your bank accounts, two things that this Judge did. That’s why Xitter doesn’t have a Legal Representative in the country anymore. The last one resigned after being threatened by the Judge and Xitter won’t appointment a new one because of that.
But sure, a CEO has exactly the same power as a Supreme Court Justice. Literally no difference at all.
Actual discussion of the post: -1 score
Stupid play on words comment disparaging the right: highest score in comment section
Wish we could see how legitimate upvotes and downvotes are or if lemmy is a lot of teenagers who dont have the patience.
Im uneducated on the politics of brazil. I think censoring might be conducted without a fully evil intent, but people’s ability to reason about validity of information should be fostered instead of disallowing certain speech. Scary to think you’d be arrested for using a social media site. Thats not okay. And its brazils decisions regardless of musk.
Disinformation should be downvoted. Then corrected.
For example, you said you could be arrested for using a social media site. There’s nothing in that decision that implies this.
I guess im not sure what happens if you dont pay a fine. Probably getting arrested right? Because the fine is like 7.5k a day.
Scary to think you’d be arrested for using a social media site.
Scary to think conservatives have power anywhere on planet earth, given how they just make random shit up and then accuse people of that made up bullshit whenever they want. Scary to think how conservatism is the single biggest threat to humanity and should be eradicated. Scary to think.
Sorry are you memeing or did you want to talk about something? What are you suggesting be done?
Have you heard of the research showing conservativism is highly associated with Big Five personality traits (which are considered mostly immutable)?
I hope you understand the implications of that finding when paired with a statement like:
conservatism is the single biggest threat to humanity and should be eradicated
A. There’s an appeals process.
B. If we accept a Chinese version of Google then there’s no reason we can’t accept a Brazilian version of X.
Musk could have blocked those accounts from being visible in Brazil and then had his legal representative argue that’s compliance. That would put the ball back in Brazil’s court. Instead Tony Stark wannabe is trying to just go around the government, violating it’s sovereignty. Something most countries take pretty poorly.
So we actually don’t know if Brazil would have required X to ban them globally. Nobody tested that.
Sigh. I don’t know why I keep tilting at this windmill but…
A. There’s an appeals process.
The Brazilian Government has never released the details on who they asked Xitter to ban nor why they were banned. They also gagged Xitter so they couldn’t tell anyone either. So what good is an appeals process if you you can’t use it because you don’t know you’ve been banned?
Now Xitter TRIED to use it but…
Musk could have blocked those accounts from being visible in Brazil and then had his legal representative argue that’s compliance.
What you are suggesting is pretty much what Xitter did.
Notice that part about “threatened to arrest our employees”? That’s why Xitter doesn’t have the required “Legal Representative”. This Judge threatened to imprison the last one and pre-emptively froze their bank accounts. This is also why Xitter closed their office in Brazil.
There’s a LOT more going on here than “Elon Bad” but it can’t be discussed because of the volume of utter nonces who incapable of handling nuance.
B. If we accept a Chinese version of Google then there’s no reason we can’t accept a Brazilian version of X.
You understand Google is banned in China because they wouldn’t accept censure right?
You know that Twitter isn’t banned in Turkiye and India because they complied with their requests for censure, since you know, those are right wing governments run by strong men that the Apartheid beby likes? Funny how free speech becomes the issue just when the requests come from governments whose ideology don’t align with this particular clown’s. GTFO with the free speech posturing, if you’re defending the free speech of a platform where it’s fine to harass trans people but you’re banned if you correctly call someone cis gendered. Free speech my ass, Twitter is a right wing cess pool, not a beacon of free discourse.
You understand Google is banned in China because they wouldn’t accept censure right?
You understand that when people complain about that they argue that the law is bad, they don’t argue that Google should be allowed to ignore the law and keep operating anyway.
Don’t speak out against the mob on here, it’s honestly worse than Reddit. “Censorship of political opponents is bad actually” is an unpopular take on here
Its impossible to step outside of the pure hatred. If you arent saying conservatives need to die then you get downvoted.
No room for discussion. Its a bunch of kids and bots on here i think.
No room for discussion
If you arent saying conservatives need to die
Well you sure sound like you’re leaving plenty of room for discussion.
