Having never been elected governor, or indeed being known outside upstate Erie County, New York’s default governor, Kathy Hochul, is desperately trying to create the impression that she deserves the party’s nomination as the faux-incumbent in the upcoming gubernatorial primary by trying to turn Buffalo to her advantage.
First, there are the ten new anti-gun bills signed into law in reaction to the horrific Buffalo racist mass murder, as if New York’s gun laws weren’t already among the most restrictive in the nation and still failed to prevent the tragedy. Then this.
NOW – Gov. Hochul: "In the state of New York, we're now requiring social media networks to monitor and report 'hateful conduct' on their platforms."pic.twitter.com/5LctpfRuqo
— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) June 6, 2022
Notably, she calls it “hateful conduct” rather than Hate Speech, as if the conduct of putting speech on social media would somehow overcome the First Amendment, And then there’s the issue of defining “hate speech,” which is easily defined by those who support such a bastardized notion as speech they hate.
At Volokh Conspiracy, Eugene parsed the law itself.
N.Y. General Business Law § 394-ccc, just signed by the Governor yesterday (AB A7865A / SB S4511A) and scheduled to go into effect in six months, provides:
Social media networks; hateful conduct prohibited.
1.As used in this section, the following terms shall have the following meanings:
A. “hateful conduct” means the use of a social media network to vilify, humiliate, or incite violence against a group or a class of persons on the basis of race, color, religion, ethnicity, national origin, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.
B. “social media network” means service providers, which, for profit-making purposes, operate Internet platforms that are designed to enable users to share any content with other users or to make such content available to the public.
The putative definition of “hateful conduct” would seem as applicable to those who take issue with the demands of transgender activists as well as WaPo’s Felicia Sonmez’s attacks on male reporters who refuse to acquiesce to being humorless scolds. But either way you cut it, there is little question that this is a restriction of viewpoint in flagrant violation of the First Amendment.
As for what constitutes “social media networks,” even SJ with its comments would qualify, if it existed for profit-making purposes. This isn’t a law for twitter or Facebook, but for any site that allows the public to share content.
But to the extent this law isn’t doomed ab initio, like so many efforts to control the views, and hence speech, of people who say things that someone, somewhere, finds humiliating or vilifying, what does this law actually do?
2. A social media network that conducts business in the state, shall provide and maintain a clear and easily accessible mechanism for individual users to report incidents of hateful conduct. Such mechanism shall be clearly accessible to users of such network and easily accessed from both a social media networks’ application and website, and shall allow the social media network to provide a direct response to any individual reporting hateful conduct informing them of how the matter is being handled.
3. Each social media network shall have a clear and concise policy readily available and accessible on their website and application which includes how such social media network will respond and address the reports of incidents of hateful conduct on their platform.
Well then, I already have a clear and concise policy readily available and accessible. I will arbitrarily decide whether to post, edit or trash comments at will. Done. And I have a mechanism to report “hateful conduct” here, as reflected by the pink button on the sidebar. But what the law fails to do is require any particular policy, such as “hateful conduct” whatever that means, must be remove or else.
While this performative law is as ridiculous as it appears on its face, serving no purpose other than to fulfill the syllogism* for the benefit of those who demand that “something must be done,” it’s really just another example of the usual pointless goofiness designed to pacify the unduly passionate while accomplishing absolutely nothing.
As the law takes effect in six months, Eugene has undertaken some soul searching as to what he will do in response.
I therefore have six months to figure out whether to post a policy (which would be “you can complain about whatever you please by e-mailing me at this address, but I will respond and address the complaints entirely based on my own discretion”), or perhaps to challenge the law.
I hope Eugene challenges the law, although my butthurt complaint form will remain on the sidebar either way.
*The syllogism:
Something must be done.
This is something.
This must be done.
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