19 years ago, on a beach in Barbados, I embarked on a journey that has seen me grow and develop as a person. There is no perfect relationship. We’ve disagreed, we’ve argued but we tried to work it out before we went to sleep. We’ve been through good times and bad, we’ve handled some gracefully, some in sheer panic and desperation. Thank you for being there with me, thank you helping me to be better, thank you for giving me something to work towards, daily.
As Donald Trump is de-platformed and banned from internet spaces from Twitter to PornHub, there are two camps: those joyously celebrating and those screaming about a violation of 1st Amendment rights. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.
Donald Trump is being banned from a variety of online spaces, ostensibly for inciting insurrection on January 6 which appears to be in violation of various terms of service. This seems like bolting what remains of the barn doors after the horse has kicked it to splinters. My issue with de-platforming is the uneven enforcement of rules. It has taken Twitter more than four years to remove a large number of accounts from the service. On Facebook black and brown voices are more likely to be silenced for calling white people out than white people are for racist behavior. So while there are a number of people celebrating, it is worth remembering that this is the first time a number of personalities are facing consequences for TOS violations and it still isn’t being applied in a fair and equitable manner.
As many people are learning the hard way, the First Amendment to the Constitution protects your right to say whatever you want, but it doesn’t protect you from the consequences. The First Amendment applies specifically to government censorship, so private entities, as a matter of course, can decide what they want or do not want on their platforms, per their terms of service. Donald Trump, as of this writing, is still President of the United States, and while currently unable to post on any social media sites, he still has ready access to the White House press corps and the ability to preempt anything on television to address the nation. Additionally, the Supreme Court has ruled, on a number of different occasions, there are categories of speech that have little or no protections under the First Amendment. The most applicable, in these times, would probably be “speech integral to illegal conduct”, “speech that incites imminent lawless action”, and “true threats”. Arguing that First Amendment rights are being violated because you can’t post to social media is specious at best and deceitful at worse.
As a creator of content I made a decision to host what I write because a lot of internet companies terms of service give them ownership rights.
And yes Virginia, I do read the the Terms of Service, I almost flunked an online course because I was required to submit my work to Turnitin, who in their TOS said they could reproduce and use anything that was submitted to their service in whatever way they deemed, I refused. That is a story for another day.
The reason I bring this up, is while I host my own content, I don’t currently own the server on which it is hosted, meaning I am still governed by the TOS of my hosting provider and they, in turn, are governed by whatever rules and regulations are put in place by the companies that provide their bandwidth. Meaning, that should I violate the agreed to terms my website can and would be taken offline. Even if I were to run my own server out of my home, I would still be governed by the terms of my internet service provider and they too would be well within their rights to take it off-line for violation of those terms and unless the government told them to do it, my First Amendment rights would not be violated unless it was in the protected speech category.
After the attempted coup, by a right wing fascist mob, emboldened by Donald Trump, many people, mostly all white, were quick to claim this is not America. It is, in fact, America, writ large.
Let’s start with the fundamental reason all these people were there in the first place, to “Stop the Steal”. The primary reason they believed the election was stolen from their white supremacist candidate of choice, is because there was high voter turnout in black and brown communities. The GOP wins elections by suppressing voter turnout. This has been their playbook since they were Democrats. Let me put it another way that’s easy to understand, white supremacy in America is maintained by suppressing the votes of black and brown people. They have been doing it for a while, they are spectacularly good at it. Consider the fact the Constitution, you know the ‘all men are created equal’ document that held up as the shining exemplar, had to be amended twice to allow black people and women the vote. Land ownership, Poll Tax, Literacy tests, Jim Crow, purging voter rolls, limiting early voting, Vote ID Laws, redistricting, this is America.
People have been protesting injustice in America for decades but the only time we seem to get overwhelming uses of force is when white supremacy is being addressed. The Capitol police know for their excessive use for force were incredibly docile and well mannered around this mob. Protestors in wheelchairs, fear not, we will cuff and drag them out of here. People marching to protest systemic racism, don’t worry, we’ll get the military to back us up on that. There is no way I can be convinced that Capitol police were not deliberately unprepared for this. DC is one of the most policed cities in America and no one knew there were thousands of protestors coming, no one knew that there was a protest starting nearby shortly before both chambers assembled. I find that hard to believe. People stormed the Capitol building, destroyed property, removed the US flag (and replaced it with a Trump flag), trespassed in congressional offices, stole items, paraded with, and hung multiple white supremacists flags, but still had time pose for selfies with law enforcement and get assistance leaving the building, mostly uninjured and without penalty. Police attempting to de-escalate with white terrorists, police being passive and non-threatening with white terrorist, giving violent and often armed white protestors the benefit of the doubt, lack of mass arrest in the face of violence by white people, this is America.
The most American thing about this whole incident is the instigator in chief gets a slap on the wrist from social media and members of Congress get to pretend they haven’t been enabling this for years. All the flowery orations and pretty press releases are not going to change the fact that America is build on white supremacy and what happened at the Capitol on January 6, 2020 may have come as a surprise to some people but it shouldn’t have. Black and brown people have been asking the same questions for generations and getting the same platitudes. There will be no real consequences as a results of these events. Not listening to and marginalizing non-white voices talking about white supremacy, prioritizing white comfort over non-white lives, this is America.
