His position is inconsistent, yes, and so is anyone who supports net neutrality but thinks Twitter should be able to block legal user content on their platform.
On many issues Democrats have the liberal position, but in a growing number of areas, Republicans have the liberal position. Neither is ideologically pure and both are self-serving.
I disagree with your first conclusion. It depends on how you view Twitter. If you view Twitter as a service provider, then net neutrality rules should be applied to them as well. But if you view them as a platform, they're distinct and ought to have greater control. Like a forum, should net neutrality proponents argue against moderators like dang here on HN to be consistent? That's absurd.
But Ted Cruz (and others) are trying to argue that Twitter should be considered closer to a service provider (and thus remain "neutral", whatever that means here) than a platform/publisher (which can control its content more). But Ted Cruz also argues that net neutrality proponents are "snowflakes" and net neutrality is wrong. It would be funnier if the consequences weren't so potentially severe.
Are there any examples of where the issues that fall under network neutrality have resulted in unavoidable censorship (higher charges would not apply, since the option to pay higher fees does exist, regardless of whether it is "fair" or not).
Censorship, not that I know of. But Twitter can't really censor anything, only their platform (same with Facebook). Content they block can be accessed through other means. Net neutrality, however, applies to the operators who can (effectively) bar access short of finding a separate provider.
Examples of things net neutrality would bar would be slowing/blocking Bittorrent connections (traffic shaping), slowing competitors (Netflix), etc. And those things have happened and likely will continue to happen without net neutrality legislation.
> Censorship, not that I know of. But Twitter can't really censor anything, only their platform (same with Facebook).
"Can't really censor anything", except what they can (and do, with a rather heavy lean to one political side) censor: arguably one of the top two "popular information" dissemination platforms on the planet. The same goes for Facebook, and YouTube, if to differing degrees. The same may also be happening within mainstream newspapers and TV news, but due to the nature of those businesses, any censorship that may be occurring is less discoverable (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence).
> Content they block can be accessed through other means.
Can be, in theory - whether it actually is (as compared to the alternate scenario of if it had not been censored on the major platforms), is unknown (due to the discoverability issue, difficulty in finding it (search engine "optimizations", deplatforming), additional effort, etc). It may seem like it isn't unknown (the sense of omniscience that comes with human consciousness), but it actually is unknown.
What I really enjoy about these types of conversations is the somewhat disingenuous ~"can't see the elephant in the room" nature. It is not complicated to realize that if censorship occurs on a platform, then therefore dissemination and consumption of the information will decrease (that's the whole point of it)...yet if one observes conversations on HN, I'd say at least a good third of the comments are written as if the reader genuinely doesn't realize this. That's perfectly fine of course, free speech and all that, but it's really fascinating to consider from a human psychology/neurology perspective. Even more fun is "breaking the 4th wall" of forums by pointing out this meta-pespective, and then observing replies that seem as if they literally hadn't seen that portion of the comment.
Isn't that circular reasoning? You descry "the left" and Democrats on the basis of this story, which is about a right-wing Republican, and when called out you say, yeah, but he's acting like a left-wing Democrat.
Well, no, he's acting like himself, a right-wing Republican, who is upset and trying to exert control over Twitter. This has nothing to do with Democrats.
You're using "Democratic" and "liberal" as synonymous terms when they're not; one is an ideology and one is a party. Just because a Democrat does something doesn't make it liberal -- and in fact, they've been moving away from liberalism for quite some time.
It's funny how in continental Europe, if you tell people you're a liberal they'll think you're a free-market, small-government, pro-civil-liberties type. That's because our definitions in America have changed as the parties have changed. We've entangled ideology (liberalism) with a party (Democratic) to the point where people will call anti-liberal positions liberal simply because the Democratic Party has espoused it. The same is true of "conservatism" and "Republican" of course.
Let's see, who has been mixing up political positions and parties, shall we?
> I agree with the left on so many issues -- and have voted for them consistently for a few decades -- but I'm really disgusted at how they have become the party of censorship and limits on free speech. It's telling that they are now the party that is overly cozy with the largest, most-powerful companies on the planet.
See that? "the left" has "become the party" of things not actually evident. They are "the party" that is somehow cozy with Twitter, although again, I don't see how a Republican yelling at a company's CEO necessarily means the other party supports that company.
You're on a thread about a United States Senator, a Republican who is consistently measured as very far to the right in the US, and you keep bringing up things like "liberal" and "Democrats" and talking about Europe.
Your insistence on labeling behaviors using terms that don't apply in the context in which those behaviors are taking place seems unhelpful to me.
Again, this is about a Republican US Senator shouting at the CEO of Twitter, a US company. No Democrats were involved at all until you started talking about them.
