No one has a right to a social media platform. Brand does have a right to fair treatment under the law. It won't surprise me if he finds a way to monetize the accusations against him.
If you don't see the hypocrisy of celebrities leveraging social media to their advantage and profit, then whining and complaining about "free speech" when they cross the line or break the terms of service or otherwise run afoul of the rules, I don't know what to say.
Harvey Weinstein got tried in the press because the police and Weinstein's enablers failed to do anything about him. I don't see that as a bad thing. The media have a role to play in society, and that sometimes includes penalizing or ostracizing people for their behavior before the slow legal system slogs around. In some countries the government and police are too inefficient or corrupt and the media is all people have. Why do we celebrate social media for things like the Arab Spring, but not for warning us about a possible rapist? Those are flip sides of the same bargain we've all made to some degree.
It's easy enough to ignore social media and not participate in it. Lots of people do it. Russell Brand made a different choice, turning himself into a social media (and TV) fixture, for fame and fortune, and sometimes that bull throws you off.
The corporations that own social media platforms respond to profit and threats to profit. If they keep Brand on YouTube he might make $X dollars for YouTube but cost them $5x dollars in advertising revenue, lost reputation and publicity black eye, and so on. Part of the media corporation standing (except for Twitter) comes from their apparent -- possibly insincere -- commitment to social issues, which includes #MeToo. So they err on the side of caution and try to keep the largest possible audience and pool of advertisers that they can.
Social media may represent "fundamentally new things," but not to Russell Brand. He adapted to social media, signed the contract, lives on the platforms, and makes lots of money. He knew the rules, or should have -- there's no way he's not aware of #MeToo and the consequences, fair or not, of reputational damage. He must know that Andrew Tate got the same treatment just a few months ago. We can debate the right or wrong of how YouTube demonetizes people, though I don't think "right" and "wrong" come into it with corporations that only respond to profit and their carefully groomed reputation. The social media celebrity game has rules, one of which is that you can't get credibly accused of rape or sexual assault all over British television. Brand signed up for that game and those rules. He's not a victim any more than I can call myself a victim when I lose at a Vegas casino.
Right, Google is much bigger, more impactful and more monopolistic than many governments. We should apply way stricter standards to it than we do to most governments. It is easier to change your citizenship than to cut Google off your life.
“Private company” is not a magic phrase that makes you unaccountable for your actions. And governments already spend everyone’s time, money and resources to require companies to unwillingly serve protected classes.
> Is that really a standard you want to set?
Yes. What is the standard you want to set? Do you want to allow monopolies to discriminate you because you are of wrong ethnicity, gender or nationality? Do you want to live in a world where you are unable to connect your house to utilities because you are Indian or a woman?
> Am I required now to host your articles on my personal blog?
No, nobody cares about your private blog. It is not a monopoly whose market cap is comparable to the combined market cap of all domestic companies in Netherlands.
In the US we already have a standard that companies cannot refuse to do business or discriminate against some protected classes - but that is actually a rather limited set of circumstances - and based on the wedding cake cases doesn't apply to LGBT people. But accused rapist isn't a protected class the last time I checked.
You said it yourself: “in the US we already have a standard that companies cannot refuse to do business or discriminate against some protected classes”. Yet we don’t see a constant stream of porn and penis pills on YouTube.
Just say that you want accused rapists to suffer. Why do you come up with those weird roundabout arguments about penis pills?
The government shouldn't require big tech companies to carry all posts regardless of content because (1) that's an overstep of the governments ability to regulate speech (2) a taking of resources from a private company to force them to carry someone else's speech (3) impractical because tech companies would not be able to separate spam from political speech.
In sum, it's like the government telling newspapers that they are required to print every letter to the editor no matter how many are received and how obscene they are.
And in case of employment in many countries you can’t be fired unless there is a just cause. The same thing with important services that cannot be denied at will, eg buying drugs at a pharmacy. There are many protections in many countries in many spheres of life that go beyond the color of your skin and your pronouns; and those countries are doing okay.
> The government shouldn't require big tech companies to carry all posts regardless of content
> In sum, it's like the government telling newspapers that they are required to print every letter to the editor no matter how many are received and how obscene they are.
What about the government deciding who should be published on YouTube or in a newspaper? What about the government deciding who should be able to watch or read stuff? Wouldn’t it be scary? Why? Isn’t because the government is a huge powerful monopole? I don’t want my life to be governed by a will of a huge powerful monopoly, even if it’s democratically governed and especially if it’s not even that.
Cool - but you didn't propose anything? Are you calling Russel Brand an employee of YouTube who deserves labor protection? Does YouTube get to fire Russel if he doesn't get enough views or stars? Does YouTube have to employ everyone? Do they pay FICA taxes on his earnings?
> What about the government deciding who should be published on YouTube or in a newspaper? What about the government deciding who should be able to watch or read stuff? Wouldn’t it be scary? Why? Isn’t because the government is a huge powerful monopole? I don’t want my life to be governed by a will of a huge powerful monopoly, even if it’s democratically governed and especially if it’s not even that.
That's my point - I don't want the government making speech decisions - and it's expressly forbidden by the 1st amendment. Google isn't a government entity and I don't want them to be one. They don't have police powers - and I'm certainly not giving it to them. The government does have police powers and if not restrained can not only fire you, but throw you in jail and worse.
If they're a monopoly engaging in anti-competitive behavior, beat them up over that. If you think there's a better way, build a competitor. But don't go giving the government more power to regulate speech.
Indeed, I didn’t. I just said that we should treat Google with at least the same scrutiny we treat the government. I didn’t say that porn should be allowed on YouTube. I didn’t say that Russel Brand is a YouTube employee. That’s all your weird imagination.
Employers and clients of private companies are protected all over the world for various reasons and it doesn’t result in weird problems you come up with. Should black people be Google employees to not get racially discriminated for using YouTube? No. It is a protected class. Should Germans be employed at a pharmacy to get the right to buy drugs? No. It’s a law that they can get it without any discrimination. I am talking about very basic things that already exist and we can’t even get past that in our discussion.
> Google isn't a government entity and I don't want them to be one.
> They don't have police powers
I really can’t see much difference between Google banning me on monopolistic YouTube or the government banning me on monopolistic StateTube. You aren’t getting in jail in either case. Actually, there is one difference: StateTube would at least be governed by a democratically elected body.
I hope we both at least can agree that having StateTube as a de facto monopoly would be bad. So why should YouTube, that seems clearly worse, be considered good?
No one forces me or Russell Brand to watch or post on YouTube. I don’t have social media accounts because I don’t want to give up my privacy or get subjected to their whims. Russell Brand made different choices.
"We” are human beings who are born free and equal in dignity and rights.
> How does that work? Nationalize Google?
Social expectations, social awareness, legal means. It would work like all other customs and laws work: you get socially shunned and get legal trouble for your actions that don’t meet social expectations. Try to open a bar that doesn’t allow black people to enter it to see how those mechanisms work in practice.
The only way to change the behavior of big corps like Google is not to give them money, and to get other people to do the same. I wouldn’t count on getting enough people worked up, though.
Russell Brand has his rights intact for now. Any damage to his dignity he did himself. He doesn’t have the right to post on YouTube, and YT has every right to decide who and what gets on their platform. Don’t like it? Don’t use it.
Yeah, LGBT rights and defunding police are more trendy issues to care about than the techno dystopia of tomorrow; but one doesn’t exclude the other. And hopefully the public sentiment will get there before it’s too late.
Google is free for most users. If they block someone from their services that's their prerogative. I doubt they do it randomly for "no reason," just like I doubt someone who says they got fired for "no reason." It might happen but more likely Google had a reason, just not one the blocked person agrees with or wants to tell anyone about.
What happens on YouTube with the advertising policies hardly seems to rise to "techno dystopia of tomorrow." Russell Brand didn't have his Google or YouTube accounts blocked. His videos are still there. YouTube de-monetized his channel, which means they won't run ads on his videos, and Brand won't make money on YouTube. YouTube has obligations beyond Russell Brand's ego and income -- they have contractual obligations to their advertisers and all of their users. No one has to watch or post on YouTube, and we don't descend into a dystopian hellscape if YouTube does one thing or another -- if it disappeared tomorrow most people in the world would barely notice, and a few wealthy celebrities living parasitically off of attention and advertising would have to get real jobs.
No, but the question is on what basis dominant platforms _should_ be allowed to terminate someone's account.
>If you don't see the hypocrisy of celebrities leveraging social media to their advantage and profit, then whining and complaining about "free speech" when they cross the line or break the terms of service or otherwise run afoul of the rules, I don't know what to say.
If the only rule he has broken and the only line he has crossed is to be accused of a crime by others then hypocrisy is entirely irrelevant. Terminating an account on this basis should be illegal because it undermines the rule of law.
Rule of law means the laws apply to everyone the same. It doesn’t mean private companies have to follow legal rules of evidence and procedure. Companies terminate accounts on the “basis” they can — in this case for violating terms of service. Celebrity or not, YouTube can kick people off when they have credible allegations of serious misconduct.
The rule of law requires that the law and the legal process is effective. If the consequences of accusations are no longer primarily decided in court, then the law becomes ineffective and even more unequal than it already is.
https://worldjusticeproject.org/about-us/overview/what-rule-...
What law would you change to force private companies to keep social pariahs and dangerous (but maybe not criminal) people on their platforms? Can I sell porn in your driveway?
Brand signed his rights to privacy away when he made himself a celebrity. This is what happens when celebrities screw up. Maybe not fair, but I don’t think it’s fair that Russell Brand makes $1M/mo on YouTube and I don’t.
Are you asking me what the consequences are for an entertainer to get removed from globally dominant distribution channels?
>Can I sell porn in your driveway?
This is getting silly. I'm not saying that every company has to publish everything. Google had a mutually profitable business relationship with Brand. They were more than happy to publish his content before these allegations were made.
Sure. I would be more than happy to hang out with Russell Brand too until I found out he might have raped three women. Then I'd think twice. Credible accusations of rape and sexual assault have a way of changing things.
Russell Brand will find a platform. He's been kicked off media platforms before -- he seems to invite controversy as part of his schtick. The people who want to pay to listen to Russell Brand can continue to do so, plenty of channels available not as sensitive to public opinion as Google.
Russell Brand is a smart guy. I assume he's heard of Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein, or Andrew Tate. He probably knows what happens in these situations. Getting knocked off of YouTube is the least of it. I'm willing to give Russell Brand the benefit of innocent until proven guilty, but YouTube has no obligation to risk their reputation or alienate a large number of their users, especially when everything we know about Russell Brand, from his own mouth, gives the impression that he probably did some things he was hoping wouldn't get made public. Celebrities always walk that line, their fame and income based on perception and reputation.
Why?
> The rule of law requires that the law and the legal process is effective.
Sure.
> If the consequences of accusations are no longer primarily decided in court, then the law becomes ineffective and even more unequal than it already is.
If the scope of the law is expanded so that every change in relations between two persons not resulting from a mutual agreement to change requires going to court, the resulting social friction will make the law more ineffective where it is.
If Brand wants to only enter into business agreeements that are framed so that the only behavioral reason for termination by the other side is a ruling by a court that he violated some law, he can insist on those terms, but that's a expensive proposition for the other party and society, and I see it as absolutely undesirable that such conditions be a legal default or, worse, effectively obligatory as a matter of law.
Not every relation between two persons is between a globally dominant platform or infrastructure provider and a user of such a platform. The threshold for global gatekeepers must be higher.
Public figures are of course subject to the court of public opinion. That's what they signed up for. But there has to be a limit to the _legal_ blast radius of accusations reflecting the uncertainty of any accusations being true.
Maybe there are some aspects of Google’s operations that ought to be public utilities, but I have a lot of trouble seeing YouTube as one of them. It may be dominant in its particular structure (or some aspects of it, since YouTube does lots of different things in one platform, many of which have many strong competitors), but I don’t really see the case that it is essential. There’s lots of channels for video distribution with slightly different models.
> But there has to be a limit to the _legal_ blast radius of accusations reflecting the uncertainty of any accusations being true.
There is, in that there are kinds of sanctions that private entities can not impose.
Russell Brand is not just a user of YouTube. He reportedly makes $1M/mo on that platform. He got demonetized, not kicked off or censored. Presumably his GMail account still works, and he can still upload to YouTube. The "dominant global platform" chose to not show ads on Brand's videos, which protects their advertisers from blowback and a bad look, and has the consequence of cutting into Russell Brand's income. Brand has a contractual relationship with YouTube that includes the possibility of demonetization (no ads on his videos) if he does something illegal or embarrassing to YouTube or their advertisers or other users. That's what happened. He's not the victim of a malign global infrastructure provider.
There's no "legal blast radius," just one celebrity who got his wings clipped because of credible accusations made in the British press -- a TV documentary ran about Brand's alleged sexual assaults. Piers Morgan tried to discuss this on his show (which you can watch on YouTube). This is not the first time Russell Brand has got into trouble with media , or with his treatment of women. He had to resign from his show on BBC 2 and left the BBC paying fines for his antics.
Edit: I just checked YouTube. Russell Brand's channel is still there, videos still available. His About page points to Rumble, where he presumably can still get paid by advertisements. He also has Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, locals.com channels running, and a book for sale on Amazon. Most of us, most content producers on YouTube, can only dream of Brand's level of exposure (and his income). And most of us won't have credible allegations of rape made by multiple women.
Russell Brand got accused, credibly, of sexual assault by multiple women. That makes him a pariah. Google/YouTube don’t want the reputation damage so they close him down on their platform.
Russell Brand chose to live his life in public, as a celebrity. This is what happens to celebrities when their sponsors and fans and enablers lose confidence in them. That’s the game he signed up for. Part of the celebrity bargain is that public perception means more than truth, and that works both ways.
Brand can continue saying and posting whatever he wants. No one silenced him. He just can’t do it on YouTube anymore for money. I don’t get to keep a rental car because Hertz let me drive it for a weekend, because we had a contract. So did Russell Brand.
I want to bring up something else though. We don't actually know the reasons why Google has terminated his account (at least I don't). Perhaps the accusations and the reputational risk were not the only reasons.
Google could legitimately want to block Brand from using Youtube as a stage to attack his accusers and run his own media campaign related to the case. That would be an entirely different matter, but in my view this should be handled by more selective restrictions.
We may or may not disagree, but I'm not discussing what you or I think should happen (you used that word again). I only commented on what did happen, and why I don't think Google/YouTube did anything legally wrong, or even ethically objectionable, given that their interests differ from Russell Brand's interests and no longer intersect since Brand became a social pariah. Google has to cater to a lot more customers than Russell Brand and his audience, and has to consider public opinion about alleged celebrity rapists.
We all have our interpretations and ideas about how YouTube and the world at large should work. I try not to spend a lot of time and energy trying to reconcile reality with how I think things should work.
Well then we're really talking past each other because that's the only thing that interests me about this case. What actually happned is neither surprising nor particularly mysterious.
We are in a situation where a handful of globally dominant platforms and infrastructure providers can unilaterally shut people down for any reason whatsoever. Those of us whose livelihood depends on those platforms need more rights.
Google's interest to shield itself from reputational damage should not be permitted to outweigh all other considerations.
No one has a right to publish on a platform owned by a private entity. That is not freedom of speech. Brand was not de-monetized "for any reason whatsoever." He did not get censored by the government. He got kicked off YT for specific reasons stated by YouTube. They aren't just randomly booting people off or arbitrarily making up the rules as they go. Google absolutely has every right to protect their brand and their customers, and that does outweigh whatever rights you imagine Russell Brand has to continue posting on YouTube and profiting from it.
His management agent is not a globally dominant platform or infrastructure provider.
It may turn out that Brand got wrongfully accused, though I doubt it, given that multiple women who don't know each other doing that seems unlikely, especially given Brand's self-admitted promiscuity and sex addiction, and cringe behavior towards women you can easily find. But if he's not guilty then he'll get his YouTube monetization back, and thanks to the UK's libel laws he would make a small fortune suing the TV channel and newspapers and the accusers.
I’m not sure if that’s accurate, but maybe some lawyers here can enlighten me. As far as I know, if you run a business in a country’s jurisdiction, you need to follow their laws. It’s not anarchy/wild west. I can’t make a ToS for my bakery that only serves people of a certain race, for example. The same applies to online businesses. And don’t tell me this is an obvious discrimination but this case is different, so on and so forth. It’s because the law forbids it. And of course, big tech can’t ignore the law. They shouldn’t deprive anyone of their right to use their service to the fullest, especially if they are public companies.
No one has a right to use a private service like YouTube. They could close down tomorrow and block all of us and we’d have no case that they had violated our rights.
Accusing is something, guilty is another. And even if found guilty, how’s that a violation? Do you kick out an ex-convict from the grocery store? As long as no promotion for violence, you don’t get to deny them the service.
> No one has a right to use a private service like YouTube. They could close down tomorrow and block all of us and we’d have no case that they had violated our rights.
No, everyone has the right, just like you have the right to go to walmart. If they close, fair, it’s like bankruptcy for a company and no longer required to pay debt, your company legal entity doesn’t exist anymore, but as long as you are operating, whatever applies to grocery stores applies to big tech, I don’t know why some people think big tech are above the law, in fact, given how influential they are, a special restrictions should be applied to them, this is not some random IRC chat with nicknames back in the 90s and if you gat banned, you go to another room, social media is now people digital identities, imagine LinkedIn suddenly started banning people, and people are no longer able to look for jobs and the likes? Or a dating site mogul that owns most dating apps suddenly decided to ban your account and they use AI to recognize your face, you are basically out of the dating pool! Yeah, laws should be adjusted per how dependent we are on the digital world, this is not the 90s anymore.
Look at how Elon Musk arbitrarily treats people he doesn’t like, or who criticize him, on Twitter. He’s probably not breaking any laws. He owns the platform, he gets to make the rules. No one has to use it, and no one has a right to use it.
Reality may not match how you or I would like the world to work, or what we think of as fair.
YouTube did not ban all Brits, or all comedians, or all white men with long hair. They demonetized one person. There's no sign out front that says "No White British Comedians With Long Hair." Russell Brand is not a victim. He doesn't have any right to get money from advertisers on a platform he chooses to publish on. That is hardly comparable to a restaurant excluding people based on their skin color.
As a company incorporated in the United States, Walmart has to abide by lots of laws, including laws that prohibit racial discrimination. That does not equate to anyone having a right to enter their stores. It means Walmart can't exclude people solely on the basis of race. They can refuse to let me in for any number of reasons, or no reason, but if they tell me it's because of my skin color or disability they have broken the law.
Every night when Walmart closes they refuse entry to everyone, for an obvious reason, imposed fairly on everyone, and none of us has a right to enter the store. Suppose I roll up in a wheelchair as they're locking the doors at night, and they won't let me in because the store is closed. They made up that closing time, no law tells them when to close. If I sue Walmart claiming they denied me entry because I have a disability, they will rightfully say I was denied entry because the store was closed to everyone. I think you can see how that plays out. That's the difference between not having any right to enter the store and having the right not to suffer discrimination as a protected minority.
And when the dust settles and I lose in court, Walmart can bar me from their stores if they want to because I sued them. But not because I have a disability.
They did stop running advertisements on his videos, called demonetization. YouTube has contractual obligations to their advertisers, and those reputations, and their own, to consider, along with the opinions of millions of other users.
https://kkoz.medium.com/youtube-frustration-reaching-a-boili...
That’s frustrating but not illegal or evidence of a conspiracy. Relying on YouTube or any social media platform for an income has some risks, just like most jobs that can lay you off or fire you for no reason.
Russell Brand was supposedly making $1M/mo on YouTube until a few days ago. That’s pretty good risk/reward to me, especially considering he has other platforms to move to.
The only part of this which is "trial by social media" is Brand's choice of venue to deny them. I'm not sure any principle of jurisprusdence involves social media being obliged to subsidise his denials by wrapping unwilling advertisers around them and sending him a cut.
I'm also not convinced that consent is quite as complex as commercial aviation...
Well - up to a point. I certainly don't think we should lock up Mr. Brand unless he's found guilty in a court of law.
However, there is quite reasonable circumstantial evidence that he's guilty - five or six serious allegations from independent women, which multiple news organisations have assessed and found credible.
There's also been a fresh look at his behaviour with activities which I don't believe have been contested - like having an affair with a 16-year old when he was 30. He doesn't need to be found guilty for advertisers to decide that kind of odious behaviour is something that they don't want to be associated with.
What's the alternative? Legally force YouTube to give him a platform and lose revenue?
I don’t get this part, so assuming he found guilty, and now we deny him work, the basic human rights?! He is a public figure, he lives on being public, deny him that is like denying a doctor or an engineer the right to work because he found guilty on something, you might only deny him working on an X hospital if the incident happened there, or not accessing YT if it was used as a platform for those allegations, remember, law is flawed too and full loopholes and not perfect, and there are so many cases of false court outcomes.
I don't believe any country guarantees a right to be given work.
> He is a public figure, he lives on being public, deny him that is like denying a doctor or an engineer the right to work
Yes, he's a public figure, but so what? No one is denying him a right to seek work, but equally organisations are free to decline to work with him.
Why should Brand have a right to millions of pounds of revenue from a Youtube channel? I don't.
> you might only deny him working on an X hospital if the incident happened there
You think if multiple credible witnesses accused a doctor of sexual abuse he should be free to carry on medical practice as long as he does it at a different hospital?
Russell Brand DOES have a legal right to bodily autonomy and freedom to walk around the world etc. So to take that away DOES take a legal trial and a jury etc.
Private entities get to make the call based on whatever they like whether someone gets to perform on their website or in their venue. If I think someone is "dodgy" or whatever, I can bar them from performing in my club and the same applies to Youtube.
In life sometimes there are consequences for behaving badly and Russell is finally facing some of them.
What makes matters worse is that comments get disabled aa does sharing. I can't even link to the problem. If I report the ad, it is there again tomorrow. It's almost as if that counts as interaction worthy of trying the ad again.
I personally don't like RB. I find the whole act to be off-putting. Though that is most often a sign of others liking the content.
I don't think letting the "reason" go unchallenged is responsible given the above.
Of all the people demonetised by YouTube, already rich man can't profit from allegations of sex offences unless he can find brands willing to pay him directly has to be one of the least sympathetic.
[0] https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-1333_6j7a.pdf
#MeToo