Families of Buffalo massacre victims sue Meta, Reddit, and Google over conspiracy theories::The lawsuit seeks changes to the changes companies’ safety standards, with the plaintiffs calling the platforms “defective and unreasonably dangerous.”

  • fubo@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    This seems unlikely to succeed. “He wouldn’t have killed those people if he hadn’t read that book with those weird ideas in it!” is unlikely to ever justify finding the publisher of that book liable, under plain First Amendment jurisprudence.

    • c0c0c0@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      And yet, somehow, I feel like the lawyers who took this unwinnable case are going to come out okay.

    • Methylman@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Not sure that’s the best analogy since publishers do have an onus not to publish certain materials (example How would that work out for someone publishing something like the anarchists cookbook?)

      Conversely, its not considered feasible for content providers (who don’t generate or police the content BEFORE it’s public) to police the work of content generators (the users). That’s why s.230 of the CDA (imo) does more than the first amendment

  • Methylman@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Isn’t this doomed to fail in light of the SC’s guidance in Gonzalez v. Google and Twitter v Taamneh ??

    Edit: "The platforms’ failure to remove such content, Justice Thomas wrote, was not enough to establish liability for aiding and abetting, which he said required plausible allegations that they ‘gave such knowing and substantial assistance to ISIS that they culpably participated in the Reina attack.’” (copied from a NYT article)

    • jeffw@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      That was my first thought. And it’s not like it was a 5-4 ruling that’s teetering on the edge of being reversed

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.net
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    1 year ago

    Suing public spaces of discussion for what random-ass people talk about sounds pretty fucking stupid.

    If I told a friend about my conspiracy theories while having lunch at a Burger King, would Burger King be liable for the dumb bullshit that came out of my mouth in addition for the dumb bullshit I put in it? 🤔

    • NudistWardrobe@lemmynsfw.com
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      1 year ago

      It would if Burger King recommended that conspiracy theory to its other customers, which is what social networks are designed to do.

    • redditcunts@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I can’t wait for one of your fediverse tankie friends to get called out. Anyone saying good is clearly ignorant of the law and how insane it would be to allow liability to be laid in such a way.