The Partisan Divide on Issues

[David Horn]

(01-08-2021, 02:01 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: With the recent capitol riots, the dangers of people spreading lies have become clearly an important issue.  This has been going on for quite some time.  Fox News has been doing it through much of the unraveling, especially their opinion show hosts.  The question is, what can be done about it?  Assuming in the never again phase, at the end of the crisis, what could be done to present a false collection of lies from being pressed on the people?

One answer could be censorship.  Fox transmits over the air and uses internet domains.  What if these were pulled if someone was clearly disseminating lies?  China does it all the time, I assume.  

The problem would be free speech.  Traditionally, no matter how whacko the position, you have a right to present it.

But as many have pointed out, there are limits on rights too.  The major limit is that possessing a right to do something does not give the right to harm others.  The recent capitol riots count.

A compromise might be fines.  If harm is done, the organization is responsible for recompense.  The problem is that Trump’s ‘massive voter fraud’ lie didn’t lead to immediate harm, until it did.  Does Fox and the other folks who spread that lie assume financial responsibility in part for that harm?

And would you trust any federal organization to enforce censorship, be it true censorship or financial.  Would a leader like Trump put a loyalist in charge of whatever organization, declare his partisan lies truth, then try to censor the main line press?

Still thinking it through.  Anyone have any other ideas?

Here's a non-Federal option. It comes in two parts: 

• First, drastically reduce the protective bubble enjoyed by corporations and their executives.  This is hard, because some of those protections need to continue, but it's obvious that accepting corporate fines is often a strategy in support of profitable wrong-doing.  Corporate fines should grow and include the surrender of voting stock, and people need to be held responsible for corporate actions they control.  That applies to media empires in spades.
  
• Second, make it easier to sue for slander. Right now, public figures have virtually no ability to do that. The only successful suit by a public figure was Carol Burnette's suit against the National Enquirer.
  

Try those and see what happens.