Night time Owls is a themed open thread showing at Every day Kos seven days every week.
These Machines Won’t Kill Fascism, by Nantina Vgontzas and Meredith Whittaker. Towards a Militant Progressive Imaginative and prescient for Tech The left should vie for management over the algorithms, knowledge, and infrastructure that form our lives:
The trendy fascist motion depends on Large Tech to breed—and it is aware of it.
Earlier than Twitter, Fb, Instagram, and even Pinterest banned Donald Trump, the then-president was taking intention at a wonkish goal: Part 230, a 1996 provision of the Communications Decency Act that shields tech firms from being sued for the content material they host. As he told his base within the lead-up to the fumbled coup try on January 6, “We now have to do away with Part 230, otherwise you’re not going to have a rustic.” Across the identical time, Trump vetoed the annual protection spending invoice as a result of it didn’t repeal 230, and pressured Republican then–Senate majority chief Mitch McConnell to make it a bargaining chip within the stimulus negotiations.
In pursuing their marketing campaign in opposition to 230 on the identical time that they’re searching for to guard companies from worker lawsuits related to Covid-19, conservatives have made their agenda painfully clear: Company legal responsibility is permissible within the tech trade solely if it helps them dominate the platforms and seize a sector that has lengthy been the darling of liberals.
