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Comment by gruez | Hacker News Reader

>In the US we have this thing called free speech. Requiring non-disclosure in order to get a severance (or to get a settlement for abuse) is not an excuse for doing this.

As discussed umpteenth times in every free speech debate ever, "free speech" as enshrined in the legal system only offers protection from the government. There's a broader principle of free speech in general, but it's unclear whether that should be applicable in this case, where two private entities entered into an agreement where one side agreed to cease speech in exchange for money.

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None of that stands if one of the entities in a contract is breaking the law, and I'm guessing that colluding with China to break international human rights laws is not protected by a contract as it's illegal in the USA and likely illegal in the UK. If she falls under whistleblower laws it should protect her, that's evidently not happening.

>I'm guessing that colluding with China to break international human rights laws is not protected by a contract as it's illegal in the USA and likely illegal in the UK

The wikipedia article says facebook tried to appease chinese censors. That's bad, but so far as I can tell, isn't illegal under US or UK law. Microsoft complies with chinese censor demands for bing and they seem to be doing fine, for instance. The only plausible case for "they're breaking laws" is them breaking the UDHR, but that's an unenforceable document that's not worth the paper it's printed on.

We have a legal system that allows for private agreements of restricted speech, which can be and is frequently abused by the party in a position of power (in this case, a 2 trillion dollar company). And these agreements are enforced by the government. So it is in a round-about way the government infringing on rights, both by allowing it to happen and also enforcing it.

>which can be and is frequently abused by the party in a position of power (in this case, a 2 trillion dollar company).

Define "abuse"? Is it just because Meta is a trillion dollar company? Or that they offered a huge amount? Does that mean the courts should refuse to enforce any sort of agreement between Meta and any individual? If meta decides to offer me (no prior relationship to them) 50k to stop talking shit about them, and I accepted, am I being "abused"? What if I'm a vocal critic? Would that be abuse?

> Does that mean the courts should refuse to enforce any sort of agreement between Meta and any individual?

not any, but those which cover potential crimes.

Even with a NDA, you can still go to the authorities to report illegal acts. You just can't monetize your past employment in the form of a 500k book deal. Between the public's interest of crimes being prosecuted and the freedom of individuals being able to enter into agreements, I think that's already a pretty fair trade-off.

> you can still go to the authorities to report illegal acts

that authority could be birded by corp and report will go nowhere.

> You just can't monetize your past employment in the form of a 500k book deal.

sure, its reasonable to have non-monetization clause in contract, but it is unreasonable to have blanket statements to not ever talk about events during employments under any circumstances, which likely included into NDA.

the interesting part is that in this specific case, Meta allegedly was a tool to suppress free speech by government. Although, government was Chinese.

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