Then you know them.

Stay strong, Elon !

You are going to get a lot of thumbs down for not hating on Elon.

He does seem to be mostly in favour of absolute free speech. Except absolutely not when it's doxxing him, or criticising him too harshly. Which does seem a bit hypocritical.

I'm getting the popcorn, this is going to be a fun cage match to watch.

no, make that a very thin skin just like his lord and master Donald J Trump....

The price of 'DJT' tanked again today. If you are a stockholder and wanna sue Donald?

Too bad, you're gonna have to move to Buenoa Aries, Argentina. Yep folks that is where that sort of litigation has to take place.

I'd expect that Elon has done something like that for Twatter and Tesla.

Elon should take his ball back to South Africa and go down that Sapphire mine for good.

Somehow it seems fitting that it be in a country known for harboring Nazi war criminals.

He's in favor of free speech except when

1) It's critical of him

2) It's critical of Tesla

3) It's critical of Xitter

4) It informs Xitter advertisers that their ads are being shown next to nazi, white nationalist, and various other dregs of society content

5) It's about his use of a private jet, which is incredibly polluting

6) People point out the bad actions of right-wing agitators

7) Probably a lot of other instances I'm forgetting off the top of my head

"Probably a lot of other instances I'm forgetting off the top of my head"

And various other things that haven't yet got under his skin.

And various other things that haven't yet got under his skin.

Fuck that, I'll stick to just listing the things that haven't gotten his drug addled brain agitated.

>It all depends where you fall on the political spectrum.

I'd argue it's less about the political spectrum and more about whether or not you are able to assess evidence and facts without zealotry. That extremists, in many cases religious zealots that comprise a large part of Bolsonaro's base, are unable to do so is more of a correlation; a fair amount of house-trained right-wingers (including governors, senators, and others) in Brazil are against the attacks on institutions; whether or not this will remain the case as the years go by is an open question.

As for the content of the article otherwise: twitter will likely be banned, just as WhatsApp and others have (temporarily) been in the past. Companies keep pretending that the rest of the world has to kowtow to their whims. Whether or not you agree with the US and its possible TikTok expropriation, China's rules for foreign companies, India's similar actions with social media, or anyone else, it is well within their prerogative to do regulate companies as they please. Companies are free to do their business elsewhere. Is it against freedom of expression or politics or whatever else? Quite likely. But it's a funny thing, that pesky ol' sovereignty.

I'd argue it's less about the political spectrum and more about whether or not you are able to assess evidence and facts without zealotry.

I'd further argue that this is what passes for politics in the current age. The Internet makes many wonderful things possible, but it also means people, who used to have a distribution list of maybe a dozen people in their local community for their conspiracy theory newsletter, can now reach hundreds of millions of people all over the world. And everyone self-selects what "news" they want to consume. So, Nazi sympathizers, white nationalists, antisemites, and various other dregs of humanity, will flock to Rupert Murdoch owned companies or outlets even further to the right and will come up with a whole litany of reasons why any other news source isn't to be trusted. You can go through each one of them, showing them how they're wrong, and they may accept each one, but when you get to the end of the list, they'll just start over at the top.

I hate the terms far-right and far-left. They are such ambiguous terms and are being bandied around at the same idiotic rate as "racist", "nazi", "commie", all now fairly meaningless terms due to their over-use in situations where they are clearly wrong.

Regardless of the merits of this particular case, as soon as I hear "far-right" and "far-left", it is fairly likely that what follows will be meaningless drivel.

Amen to that. It does seem that in Germany the AfD is being labelled as "far right" and the government is trying to get them banned. For wanting to control immigration a little more.

Likewise, it's a bit like saying Corbyn is far left. Although of course he's on the left side of Labour. (I don't think you could get a playing card between Sunak and Starmer)

Unless people are actual Nazis or Commies they generally aren't far-anything, they might just have some slightly stronger opinions.

This meme does sum the left/right thing recently, and humble apologies it's DM but they are free and the only other place I could find is Twitter/X, where I've lost my password and can't be bothered to recover it yet.

https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2022/04/28/21/57173481-10764647-image-a-19_1651177031468.jpg

I tried to find a "left-wing" funny meme, but there's none on the internet.

The challenge with left and right is that it's relative to what is normal in a country. Some viewpoints or proposals that are acceptable in Saudi Arabia or the United States would get you on a terrorist watch list in Europe. Some everyday centre-right policies in Europe would be branded Communist in the US.

Extremism is much easier as you can focus on the chosen means of achieving a goal. If that involves overthrowing the democracy, mass-incarcerations, killing, violent deportations of people with a legal right to be in the country then that is certainly extremist, regardless of the political colour.

But, if you think the AfD wants to control immigration a little bit more then you need to learn to read. They are openly recycling Hitler's talking points, are openly racist, trying to overthrow democracy and advocating violent solution to reach their goals. Is ISIS an advocacy group for you? Was Timothy McVeigh a campaigner? Let me tell you, my grandfather during World War II would have had zero qualms about shooting AfD activists in the head (they had a different name back then). And I would agree with him. Germany has a history of these people murdering millions and they are certainly not allowing that to happen again. The German government is treating them in a much more dignified and restrained manner than I would have done. The US has put people in Guantanamo Bay for less.

I think you might have been reading some of the propaganda spread by the incumbents to try and discredit them. I understand there was some meeting in Potsdam where some pretty extreme views were suggested by some individual (s)!?

But I don't think that's party policy. Or the views of the vast majority of members.

They seem to be polling pretty high, so I guess a LOT of Germans agree with them. Make of that what you will.

I don't know, I'm no expert on German politics, but it smells like propaganda and misinformation to me. It was only an example, I could easily be wrong. Would Reform be a better example?

It feels weird to write this but ReformUK are considerably to the left of AfD. I haven't heard ReformUK talk about [1]forced deportations of British people. I haven't seen members of ReformUK [2]being arrested for coup attempts .

[1] https://www.dw.com/en/german-remigration-debate-fuels-push-to-ban-far-right-afd/a-67965896

[2] https://www.zeit.de/2023-05/reichsbuerger-coup-plans-prince-reuss-english

If you believe Correctiv, then they are indeed a tad on the extreme side. However [1]eugyppius labels them as "state-adjacent propagandists". It could be that the AfD are a massive thorn in the side of the incumbents and this is a smear campaign with a grain of truth. I don't know who's telling the truth here, the waters seem a bit muddy. Is it one or two bad apples, or is that their whole party?

[1] https://www.eugyppius.com/p/are-correctiv-and-the-institute-for

"state-adjacent propagandists" - and you thought "left" and "right" were problematic. What a load of plant based, bovine-originating naturally sourced fertiliser.

" their alleged plan included attacking politicians, storming the Bundestag (Germany’s parliament), overthrowing the federal government, dissolving the judiciary, and seizing the military ... Among those arrested were a judge who sat in the Bundestag for the AfD, former soldiers, aristocrats, and former members of the police force "

I have eschewed my usual Guardian source in favour of [1]https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/12/19/germany-reichsburger-raid-terrorism-right-wing-extremism/ , in the hope that a vaguely neocon-related source might get through to you. If that's "state adjacent" then so were the Red Army Faction. I appreciate this is the Reichsbürger faction not the AfD, but their relationship is like the National Front and the BNP.

[1] https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/12/19/germany-reichsburger-raid-terrorism-right-wing-extremism/

I'd have to subscribe to read the whole thing, but I get the idea.

That's the problem here though, because as the OP pointed out the terms far-right and far-left have been so abused that they have become meaningless.

When the Canadian truckers had a massive protest, they were labelled as far-right by the CBC of all people. As well as the Canadian prime minister! The BBC almost completely ignored the story whilst at the same time putting out new stories almost daily about whether Boris had eaten crisps or drank some wine FOR FIVE MONTHS. I guess on reflection this was punishment for Brexit.

Anyway my point is I'm now skeptical about what I hear and I tend to think there's more to a story than we're being told.

This is the damage that the media have done to themselves. There are many people who feel the same way. Also many who believe that everything is a conspiracy. Perhaps it was always like that.

I'd hate to think that Germans would actually feel like that, after what happened 80 years ago. When I went to school Germans were pretty embarrassed about what their grandparents had fallen for. I guess the next generation should ask for a refund from their history teacher.

Post truth society. Will lead to darker days. I blame the internet.

> Unless people are actual Nazis or Commies they generally aren't far-anything, they might just have some slightly stronger opinions.

Actually, it's kind of the other way around, people are saying far-left/far-right to imply people are Nazis or Commies, without coming right out and saying they're Nazis or Commies.

The significant problem in that cartoon is that it omits the movement of the political centre (the [1]Overton window ) ever-rightwards for decades.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

First I've heard of the Overton window, thank you - I like the concept. I'm not sure I totally agree with "decades" - I imagine if you're black, gay, or a career woman then society is a better place for you now than it was in the 70s due to society becoming less accepting of bigotry - I'd call that a "leftward' movement, and I guess Elon would too based on that cartoon. But If you'd said "decade" I'm totally with you.

I wonder how many people would not place themselves in the center in that cartoon? I'm sure even our resident codejunky would put himself in the middle somewhere, outflanked on the left by some and on the right by... uh... well, I'm sure it will come to me eventually. 80% of drivers think they're above average too.

There is some argument that the current movements (attacks on human rights, attacks on freedoms, attacks on equality, attacks on democracy etc.) are a response to some of those societal trends towards more freedoms and rights. Either because they are happening at all or because they are happening a bit too quickly for some people.

And optimist would say that this is actually a good sign that this is just a sign that the overall trend is heading in the right direction. A pessimist would say that we are heading for a dark ages again.

AfD *are* actual nazis though.

You make it sound like two AfD supporters asking each other " [1]are we the baddies? " and perhaps they're just misunderstood.

Yes, they are actual far right Nazis. Which I suspect you know.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToKcmnrE5oY

No, I didn't know. And I've only got a passing understanding of German politics. I've skim read a few articles. (see above).

I can't tell if it's propaganda by the current government, or if they are genuinely "the baddies". I guess we'll know for sure in about 20 years. Perhaps that was a bad example to choose. ( embarrassed smiley)

Either way thanks for the Mitchell and Webb (again - have watched many times), although I guess many on here would say it will go way over my head. Why can't we have actual funny comedy on TV any more?

One of the newer redefinitions from germanies "green" party is "disinformation" which, according to two of them, may be "correct information spread to cause dissent".

Whatever laws are made(up), maybe we should cast the word definitions in stone before making another mess with fluffy "definitions" that can be bent at will any time ?

How about "any terms used in these laws will have the defined meaning as laid down in the oxford dictionary/Duden/(general spelling and meaning reference of the affected country) from 1990".

Its a bit tedious to see the constant political abuse and mutation from words i thought to be precise (well, as precise as language may be), so laws that are referring to ever mutating words dont seem to be a good idea.

Even such seemingly precise words like the inflationary abused "antisemitism" have their history....

https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780199730049.001.0001/acref-9780199730049-e-0207

I think I've finally figured out what he meant by this: there's only one way to do free speech, and it's my way. Like an even more absurd version of moral absolutism.

Brazil dealt with Bolsonaro's coup plans. The famous American "justice" system, cf George Floyd, has failed to deal with The Orange One. Come November we'll see the consequences. God help us all. (And I'm a devout Atheist.)

Strange, isn't it? A country where you can easily become the subject of an extrajudicial killing for driving with a broken tail light doesn't seem to be able to deal with the perpetrators of a violent coup attempt. Curiouser and curiouser...

De Moraes has something of a reputation as a defender of democracy in some circles There you have it, that's enough to be a target for Apartheid Clyde. Musk will lose this.

Erm, the reason was that the groups that were blocked used twitter to encourage a mob to overturn the results of a democratic election. Which unsurprisingly is illegal. And is a rather more serious example of betraying "the constitution and people of Brazil" than not being allowed to tweet anymore. Musk is once again siding with those who think they should have the right to use free speech to incite crimes. The thought may not have crossed his mind yet that these kind of people might turn against him one day for some pathetic reason, and you can be sure he'll stop defending them very quickly and banning them from his platform if they do.

Thank you for the first comment about the article.

Elon seems to be under the impression that his own personal interpretations of the term "free speech" apply to every sovereign state in the world and override their laws. For a supposedly intelligent man, this is remarkably poor reasoning.

So is Elon stupid or just fucking arrogant?

I am leaning towards the latter opinion. There is a good chance that Elon's self-centred arrogance will eventually destroy Xitter and in five years from now, Xitter will just be a reference on Wikipedia. I hope it bankrupts him. Of all those who desperately need taking down a peg or 5000, he is close to the top of the queue. People who live under the illusion that they are invincible or untouchable tend to get their comeuppance in the end.

ELON! Try keeping your public gob shut for six months and stop micromanaging your companies. You might be able to pay off the loans you took to destroy Twitter!