Mediaboss Marketing

Donald TrumpDonald TrumpUS, South Korea can bury the trade barrier hatchet this week OPINION: Trump's right GOP health bill is mean, mean, mean Pelosi on criticism of leadership: 'This is such a small item, it isn't about me' MOREs Twitter account manages to create controversy even when hes not tweeting. Over the last few weeks, many legal academics haveaccusedthe President of violating the First Amendment by blocking some critics from posting on @realDonaldTrumps timeline. Their argument and a recent Supreme Court decision on free speech and social media create an even stronger case that all government accounts on social media with companies with discriminatory speech codes are unconstitutional.

Earlier this month, attorneys with the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia Universitywroteto the president on behalf of two Twitter users who were blocked by Trumps account.They argued the account is a designated public forum for citizens to respond to the President. Knight Institute director Jameel Jaffer explained, Having opened this forum to all comers, the president cant exclude people from it merely because he dislikes what theyre saying.

Last week, The Supreme Court unanimously invalidated a state law barring registered sex offenders from social media inPackingham v. North Carolina. The case strengthens the concept that social media is a public forum. Justice Anthony Kennedys opinion noted that a fundamental principle of the First Amendment is that all persons have access to places where they can speak and listen. He described "social media in particular" as one of the most "important places" for Americans to express these rights.His opinion emphasizes how citizens can interact with their public officials on social media,noting on Twitter, users can petition their elected representatives and otherwise engage with them in a direct manner.

This ruling does not necessarily prohibit President Trump from blocking his Twitter antagonists.UCLA law professor and Washington Post legal blogger Eugene Volokharguesthat the Trump is not acting as a government official with his private account, as opposed to the official @POTUS handle. However, he acknowledges it is unsettled law and ultimately the question is whether Trump is acting as Trump-the-man and not Trump-the-government-official in running.

Whether or not the @realDonaldTrump can block accounts is an interesting, but relatively trivial, issue. However, these recent cases could have a far more consequences for Twitter and Facebooks speech policies. Both companies prohibit hate speech, even when not accompanied with harassment or threats. These policies would be unconstitutional if enforced by the government.

While Twitter and Facebook are private companies, the state effectively adopts their unconstitutional speech restrictions when government agencies and public employees conduct official business on the platforms. Conservatives have accused Facebook and Twitter of suspending accounts for taking merely taking strong stances against refugee admissions and illegal immigration. Congressmen haveheldTwitter town halls on these very topics, which effectively excluded citizens who Twitter kicked off. Even if these complaints are unfounded and the platforms only censored extremist and Alt-Right accounts, those users still have the constitutional right to interact with their government officials.

While the First Amendment rarely applies to non-state actors, the government cannot delegate censorship to a private party. For example, a church or private club have the right to kick out its members for advocating legalized abortion. However, if a city council rented a church or clubhouse for a town hall, the city could not prohibit the pro-choicer from attending the meeting and advocating his policies on the grounds that it is just following a private organizations policies. Either everyone would be allowed to attend the town hall, or the city would have to find another venue.

Mark Epstein is an attorney and legal policy advisor forThe American Cause, a nonprofit conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

See the original post:
Should government 'outsource' censorship to Facebook and Twitter ... - The Hill (blog)

Singapores Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong offered a public apology last week for an embarrassing feud between him and his siblings over family matters,including the future of their late fathers home in central Singapore.

The spat is centered on the house at 38 Oxley Road, the residence of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapores founding father and the city-states former leader who had said in his will that he would like the property to be demolished after his death.

Premier Lee was accused by his two younger siblings of not honoring their fathers wishes and wanting to preserve the house.

The siblings accused the PM of misusing his power and trying to milk their fathers legacy for political gains.

However, Lee strongly denied all allegations and explained in a video that he was bequeathed the property by his father and he tried to transfer the house to his younger sister for a nominal price of S$1. However, his suggestion was rejected by his siblings.

As private family matters blew into public domain and developed into a soap opera, Lee apologized to Singapores citizens.

I deeply regret that this dispute has affected Singapores reputation and Singaporeans confidence in the government. As your Prime Minister, I apologize to you for this, Lee said in a video statement.

As the eldest of the siblings, it grieves me to think of the anguish that this would have caused our parents if they were still alive, Lee said in the statement.

Also, Lee said he will allow all lawmakers, including the opposition, to examine the issue pertaining to his fathers house, and question the PM during a parliament session on July 3.

I urge all MPs, including the non-PAP MPs, to examine the issues thoroughly and question me and my Cabinet colleagues vigorously. I hope that this full, public airing in parliament will dispel any doubts that have been planted and strengthen confidence in our institutions and our system of government.

PAP refers to the Peoples Action Party, the ruling party in Singapore.

Premier Lee has taken an unusual step of lifting the party whip, allowing all lawmakers to engage in free vote. The unprecedented move is a sign that he fears the family feud, if it is not handled properly, could raise questions about governance in the city-state.

Singapore traditionally imposes tight control on free speech, and all media outlets are directly or indirectly controlled by the government. The restrictive approach has been largely successful over the years. Negative publicity against the government simply wont get covered by the mainstream media.

However, Premier Lees two siblings posted a six-page statement on their Facebook accounts, outlining their grievances against their brother. The spat has been widely discussed on social media and also drew wide coverage in international press. The younger Lees smartly utilized Facebook to get around the government control over mainstream media in Singapore.

As a result, the PM is left with two options, either shutting down Facebook in the city-state or just facing the music.

Competing with Hong Kong for the global financial hub status, Singapore will risk hurting its economy and image if it blocks access to Facebook or other social media. So, thats not a good option.

This could, in fact, be just the beginning. Life for Premier Lee and other top officials may never be the same in the era of social media.

This article appeared in the Hong Kong Economic Journal on June 23

Translation by Julie Zhu with additional reporting

[Chinese version ]

Contact us at [emailprotected]

RC

See the article here:
How social media is changing Singapore politics - EJ Insight

IQALUIT, Nunavut Social media plays a central role in a five-year plan aimed at reducing the number of suicides in Nunavut.

"Just about everyone up here has a Facebook account," said David Lawson, an RCMP officer who is president of the Embrace Life Council, which helped produce the plan along with the Nunavut government, RCMP and other organizations.

Lawson said the plan, outlined Monday at Facebook's Boost Your Community summit in Iqaluit, replaces a temporary one put in place last year.

A summit was held in Iqaluit in May 2016 with representatives from across Nunavut to share ideas on what was working and what else was needed, Lawson said.

"One of the things that we heard during the summit last year is that we need to make sure the work that we're doing reaches more Nunavummiut people of Nunavut and especially the youth, and one of the means that people suggested was social media," Lawson said.

"Collaborating with Facebook for this launch will allow us to reach out to them better."

The Canadian average suicide rate is 11 per 100,000 people, but Nunavut's rate is 117. For Inuit males between 15 and 29, the rate is almost 40 times the national figure.

But Facebook use in the North is also higher than the national average, said Kevin Chan, head of public policy for Facebook Canada.

"They are really using the platform as a primary way to communicate with each other. And we do see that in many communities that are more rural and more remote," said Chan, who was at Monday's summit.

"Up in the North, Facebook really is the platform for communication."

The social media platform already has ways a user can anonymously report a friend's distressing posts, but Chan said Facebook will now provide a link to a Health Canada wellness line that is culturally sensitive to indigenous people.

Lawson said the Nunavut summit last year also noted it was difficult for local groups with solutions to slog through the paperwork and proposals they needed to complete in order to secure funding.

He said the new five-year plan will address that with a fund for programs, large or small, that help prevent suicide anything from mental health services and pre-natal care to early childhood education.

"We've made it so it's easier for them to access, it's easier to do up their proposals," he said.

George Hickes, Nunavut's health minister, said communities know what they need and where they need to focus efforts to prevent suicide. Issues for communities range from lack of economic opportunities to overcrowded housing and the effects of residential schools.

"We're different from other jurisdictions. I'm one generation from being born on the land. My father was born out on the land. So now we're living a semi-urban lifestyle. It's an adjustment in identity," Hickes said.

"Our communities know what they need. We've just got to be able to give them the resources to deliver."

By Rob Drinkwater in Edmonton

More:
Nunavut's suicide strategy includes Facebook, giving communities more control - Times Colonist

Charlotte Observer (blog)

I detect a double standard on shootings, guns Charlotte Observer (blog) George Zimmerman could legally kill 17-year-old Trayvon Martin because of the concept of stand your ground, which has become the basis for laws in several states. His acquittal means a man can create a dangerous situation then cite that dangerous ... and more »

See the article here:
I detect a double standard on shootings, guns - Charlotte Observer (blog)

By Osamudia James The Washington Post

"He was very honest." That's how one juror explained the decision last week to acquit Philando Castile's killer, Jeronimo Yanez, formerly of the St. Anthony, Minn., police department, of second-degree manslaughter. The implication: That Castile, the man he shot, was not as honest, not as innocent and not as good. That Yanez's fear of Castile was reasonable.

Before Yanez's trial, we witnessed the immediate aftermath of Castile's shooting live-streamed on Facebook. It triggered outrage across the country, prompting Minnesota's governor to initially ask, "Would this have happened if those passengers, the driver, were white?" before going on to answer, "I don't think it would have." This week, the public saw the dashboard camera footage Yanez's jury saw. It highlights Castile's manifestly appropriate response after being pulled over by Yanez, but it also amplifies Yanez's instantaneous fear, helping the jury conclude that he acted lawfully.

All of which underscores the commitment, ingrained into our moral imagination, to perceiving police officers as good, honest and reasonable, while perceiving black civilians as bad, dishonest and dangerous - the problem at the heart of Castile's killing, Eric Garner's killing, Samuel DuBose's killing and Walter Scott's killing.

Each of these killings was caught on camera, reminding us that despite the public-policy argument for wider use of body and dashboard cameras, police video will not deliver justice.

Much has been made of the introduction of dashcam and bodycam technology. Here, advocates have said, are the tools that produce the evidence needed to help jurors and the public come to a consensus about when police killings are, and are not, justified. "Put body cameras on every cop," argued Mark O'Mara, who represented George Zimmerman in his trial for the killing of Trayvon Martin, to "hold cops accountable for unjustified actions against minorities."

In recent years, as police killings of unarmed African Americans have become widely publicized, polls have shown that Americans support the adoption of the technology. And there are certainly examples of police departments that have effectively implemented their use.

I'm skeptical, though, because of what cameras cannot do: They can't upend the perception that black people present a threat that justifies the use of deadly police force, even when victims are running away, as in Scott's case. Videos won't stop an officer from imagining himself as "a 5-year-old holding onto Hulk Hogan" when engaging a black teenager, or from approaching a 12-year-old black boy as if he were a grown man. The knowledge that he was being recorded did not temper the overreaction of Yanez, a trained, armed police officer. Instead, Yanez immediately reached for his gun after Castile calmly and responsibly informed Yanez that he was carrying a firearm, and within seconds Yanez fired seven rounds in rapid succession into a car where a 4-year-old sat in the back seat.

This irrational fear doesn't only operate in police encounters. Look around at America's segregated settings for evidence: Parents use race as a heuristic for school quality irrespective of test scores, prompting whites to not only avoid majority-minority schools, but to fight attempts at public school integration. Homeowners use race when evaluating neighborhoods, characterizing neighborhoods as significantly less desirable places to live when more black people are featured in pictures of those neighborhoods. Just this week, a viral video illustrated the phenomenon of white patients eschewing care from doctors and nurses of color.

These racial perceptions have other material and unjust consequences. One 2014 Stanford University study found that Americans support more punitive crime legislation when they closely associate criminality with blackness. In a bittersweet change to drug policy, now that the country's opioid crisis is associated with white Americans, greater empathy informs our conversations about drug trafficking and substance abuse. And in the tense moments of a police stop, irrational and racialized fear turns deadly.

What becomes of a society where race warps the functioning of the justice system, where juries, observing these horrors on video, nevertheless deem fear of blackness reasonable? What happens when the killing of unarmed black people consistently and despairingly results in acquittals that leave black victims' friends, families and entire communities convinced that the system is incapable of delivering justice? Faith in our democracy, in our institutions and in each other dies a steady and certain death. In the wake of that death, white supremacy grows, destroying not only black lives but the lives of everyone else complicit in, or benefiting from, that destruction.

Video can't save us from this. Only a reckoning with America's fear of blackness can take us beyond the place where cameras leave us. In that new place, Castile, like his killer, might - must - also be understood in the first instance as honest, good and deserving of life.

Osamudia James is a professor and vice dean at the University of Miami School of Law.

View post:
Opinion: Police video won't deliver justice - Port St. Joe Star