The chief prosecutor for Germany has stood up this week and said 'yes, we will move forward' on Twitter violations of German law on hate crimes. The amount of the fine they are discussing? 50-billion Euro (yeah, more than the value of the company).
What this amounts to?
Well....first, you start with Article 5 of the Basic Law which say: “Every person shall have the right freely to express and disseminate his opinions in speech, writing and pictures, and to inform himself without hindrance from generally accessible sources."
Then you go back to 2017 when a special new law was put up....NetzDG was the title of this effort, which is aimed only the 'big' social media companies. It basically implies that you have to go and monitor content, and remove toxic content when warranted.
The general problem with NetzDG? You have to readily define hate-speech....so various complaints will flow in, and in the bulk of them....after a review....the 'bad-boys' are no longer 'bad-boys'. It's not a perfect system.
The other issue....the Germans wanted this to apply beyond the border....meaning an American in Iowa....might be dragged into the NetzDG business.
What happens if Elon's Twitter is dragged into a German court? I would imagine they will bluntly want a clear definition on hate-speech, and this might not be possible.
If things get really heated? Well...Elon would just turn off Twitter to Germany.....saying it's too much for the typical German to handle.
Why all this hype? Well...Germans believe (at least the intellectuals believe this) that their society is very prone to hate-speech, and you have to tie the social media stuff down, and limit commentary or criticism. I might agree....they are prone to being 'blunt' and wanting you to agree to their criticism of the problem (whatever it was).
So, you might be wondering....if Elon turned it off...wouldn't people just resort to VPNs, and continue on? I would imagine for 30 days....Germans would grumble about the loss of Twitter, and the news media would talk about this a good bit....then wake up to realize that the bulk of German Twitter users are still there....just by VPN use. Outlawing that next? Maybe.
As for how each 'crime' here....equals a fine of 50-million Euro? They simply picked the sum out of the air, and said x equals y. If this goes up to the EU court system? They probably will ask how this sum ever got invented.
The driving force behind NetzDG? Well....the law says that any content is considered illegal.....if it incites people to hatred, insult or threat. If you really pushed on this....I'd say a quarter of everything spoken on Twitter....even comments by politicians, might be considered this way.
I guess it would help if you made a comment on Twitter....if when you hit 'publish'....it went to a German gov't official who'd have 7 days to review your 2-line comment and allow it to be published or to deny it. This would resolve all the issues, and lessen content by a fair amount. If you didn't like it? Well...you'd up and move to another country.
2 comments:
I'd make it a 50 billion fine for leaving dog feces on the ground.
Hate speech? Meh.
The problem I see here...once you get into a court and suggest 300-odd hate-speech episodes...the Elon-lawyers then ask for each one to be examined, with one single episode requiring five days of court time for experts to define true hate-speech, and whether this really meets the definition.
In my head, having watched German terror trials and neo-Nazi cases...this is a court episode designed to consume 18 months minimum...maybe even 30 months.
Chief prosecutor walks around and tries to select his crew for this one episode....say three young lawyers, and most will shake their heads. They don't want to be tied down for two years on one single case, where defeat is a 50-50 situation.
Even from German judges....I would imagine this is not case that you'd like to participate in. It won't wrap up in 2024, and it might even go to the end of 2025. Election in the fall of 2025? You might end up with a totally different prosecutor in the final three months, and some desire to just end the mess.
Post a Comment