Last week in Japan, the subject of online harassment and libel posted online became a hot topic when an Internet bill reform aimed towards putting the onus of responsibility on social media providers to take down reputation-damaging posts as swiftly as possible was revealed.
The proposed reform will target platforms like Twitter and add support windows where people can apply to have online posts taken down, and if approved, would have the government directly contact the social media providers to take the offending posts down.
Japan’s Twitter has long turned into a toxic wasteland, with supporters of the reform showing off instances where targeted harassment via untrue hate posts has led to suicides in the past. Meanwhile, a gaggle of politicians opposed to the proposed changes discussed how having the government be the judge of what passes or not is exactly like turning Japan into a communist society.
People need to grow a fucking backbone, that’s all.
“a gaggle of politicians opposed to the proposed changes discussed how having the government be the judge of what passes or not is exactly like turning Japan into a communist society” – politicians who recognise that government overreach is a step towards authoritarianism and eventual collapse? What sorcery is this?
Every country is getting these online hate laws for more convenient population control.
I can totally see this fit perfectly for Japan. The just make the government accountable and deal with it 🤷♀️ seems like a very Japanese ⛩️ thing to do
Doesn’t Twitter already have community notes? As far as I’m aware, if you’re post gets noted, you can’t take it down so the proper information is given forced exposure.
Doesn’t that already help the issue?
I think Twitter/X is a wasteland of toxic behavior but I also don’t agree with a bill that allows posts to be taken down. That’s just censorship. It’s better to leave posts up for everyone to see how much of a fool they make themselves. I think censorship and curtailing of free speech is bad. Japan doesn’t have the same free speech laws as America does but they do have some limited freedom. However this bill just takes away another piece of the small amount of ability for speech that the Japanese have reducing it even more.