The events of yesterday evening are well within these companies rights and in keeping with both free market and conservative principles.
Why should I, as a business owner, be forced to do business with those I find repugnant? We see this all the time with the so-called 'evangelical' movement against those who they deem 'immoral'. It works the same way when going in the other direction.
If you're not happy with the terms these businesses operate under, you're free to go and make your own platform. Of course, considering how interconnected the world is, you may find yourself also having to replace other services who are making the same decision to not do business with you. But that's on you to figure out.
The world doesn't owe you a soapbox.
I'm already free from Zuckerberg, Dorsey, and their coterie of techbros nostalgic for the dominance of AOL over the internet ordinary people used. I have my own website, that I built myself on a domain I've registered, and my own email at my own domain. It's my HN username dot org, if you care.
The free internet is still here. There's nothing stopping you from building your own website, registering a domain, and renting a VPS to host it. Nor is there anything to stop you from rejecting GMail and Outlook for personal email and going with a provider that will let you use your domain. There's nothing stopping you from using RSS feeds to keep up with other people's blogs, or just bookmarking your favorites and visiting people's website's periodically.
All of the old tech is still here, waiting to be used. The only thing stopping you from taking advantage is you.
After all, Alex Jones still has infowars dot com. stormfront dot org is still online, offering a safe space for fascists. There's nothing stopping 45 from giving his kid a couple hundred a week in exchange for registering a domain and firing up a blog where he can say whatever he likes and nobody has to listen if the don't want to.
The problem is that the free/open internet isn't "good enough" for people who aren't content with free speech but think they're entitled to an audience. That's why the culture war has consumed social media. Right-wingers think they're entitled to an audience, and left-wingers think they have the right to set themselves as arbiters of who deserves to have their message distributed.
What neither side can agree on is that EVERYBODY has the right to speak and NOBODY is entitled to an audience. They don't understand that an individual's right to speak ends where everybody else's right to ignore him begins.
> What neither side can agree on is that EVERYBODY has the right to speak and NOBODY is entitled to an audience. They don't understand that an individual's right to speak ends where everybody else's right to ignore him begins.
This part I agree. Everyone should have freedom of speech, but you can't force someone to listen if they do not wish to do so. (Of course, it also mean, people have the right to criticize what someone else says, too, that is also important to have.)
I am not "right/left" wing, I think.
The right to criticize is part of the right to freedom of speech. However, you are not obligated to listen to your critics. You still have the right to ignore them, regardless of the merits of their criticism.