Does Roger Stone have a point?

[mjr]

I know many of you probably loathe Roger Stone. I honestly haven't been keeping up with his goings-on.

But he's apparently suing Twitter for his perma-ban.

His argument is that he's been harassed, threatened, etc. numerous times by numerous people, and those people haven't been banned. But he goes on a Twitter tirade against CNN's Don Lemon, and he's perma-banned.

I think what he's trying to argue is fair application of Twitter's TOS. I don't know.

[s_stabeler]

even if he's right- and there are some signs he's wrong- he'd fail in a lawsuit for a couple of reasons.
1. Twitter aren't part of the federal government, so freedom of speech doesn't apply, at least in the same way.
2. there's no legal requirement that twitter be consistent in exercising their ToS.

so the lawsuit will fail.

It's also worth noting that my impression- from some quick research- is that he's the kind of guy who may well see someone disagreeing with him as said person harassing him.

[Greenday]

First off, who?

He was profane and attacked people. He earned his ban. Cry some more, really.

[MadMike]

As someone who has been moderating here for the past decade and a half, he sounds a lot like some of the people we've had to ban for picking fights with the other members. We hear a lot of things like, "But why does (other member) get away with it? Why aren't you banning them? etc." And once in awhile we even get one trying to assert their "First Amendment Rights", which is funny because until fairly recently, the site and its owner were based out of the U.K.

[jackfaire]

Not even a little. It's a matter of degree really. Unless a person is following every single thing a person does online there is no way to know if they're behavior is the same.

His thinking is "If I do this they will let me come back" the more likely reaction would be "oh you're right we didn't notice these other people over here perma-banned boom"

Moderators on most sites do try to be fair unless the site is skewed.

[protege]

And once in awhile we even get one trying to assert their "First Amendment Rights", which is funny because until fairly recently, the site and its owner were based out of the U.K.

Even more hilarious, is that the 1st Amendment refers to the *government* taking away one's right to free speech. It doesn't apply to private enterprises--even those in the US--who choose to deal with assholes by banning them. They can scream all they want, but there's not a damn thing they can do about it.

[mjr]

Even more hilarious, is that the 1st Amendment refers to the *government* taking away one's right to free speech. It doesn't apply to private enterprises--even those in the US--who choose to deal with assholes by banning them. They can scream all they want, but there's not a damn thing they can do about it.

While that's true, protege, I've been on forums before (sports-related) where the guy who ran the forum did not apply the rules evenly and fairly. He would literally let ad-hominem and personal attacks against other members happen when the ones making the attacks agreed with his position. One guy fought back, and made personal attacks of his own (of the same nature) and was banned for it.

[protege]

While it's unfortunate that there are some message boards like that...there's very little that can be done about it. It sucks that some 'board owners don't apply the rules fairly and evenly, but there's no way to force them to do so. Their board, their rules, their application. Don't like it? All you can do is leave.