An argument that conservatives often make against libertarianism is that libertarians are insufficiently concerned about virtue and good behavior. That argument isn’t empty. Conservatives can probably point to instances of libertarians thinking that certain behaviors should be legal but concluding, on that basis alone, that there’s nothing wrong with such behaviors.
I’m a libertarian who thinks that, in Leonard Read’s famous words “anything that’s peaceful” should be allowed, but I can think of many peaceful things people do that I find disgusting and/or wrong. No, I’m not going to name them here because I guarantee that if I do, much of the discussion will be about whether those behaviors are indeed disgusting and/or wrong.
Because I find some behaviors disgusting or wrong, I like having non-coercive mediating institutions that give people incentives to behave well. I won’t always agree with the people who run these institutions about what is good and bad behavior. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have institutions making such judgments.
When Facebook or YouTube’s owner, Google, limit what various people may do on their sites, they are enforcing norms of behavior. One of the latest instances is the case of Steven Crowder. According to Kevin D. Williamson of National Review, Crowder mocked Carlos Maza as a “lisping queer.” YouTube at first looked at its guidelines and decided that however disgusting Crowder’s statements were, he did not violate the guidelines. But then Maza, according to Williamson, bullied YouTube into “deplatforming” Crowder. In other words, Crowder is allowed to post his content on YouTube but he can’t use it to make money. I don’t know enough about Crowder’s sources of income, but I can certainly imagine that this action is a big hit to his livelihood.
Williamson argues that “Steven Crowder is a lot of things, but a genuine threat to public safety is not one of them.” Williamson is absolutely right. But should public safety be the threshold? Facebook and Google are privately owned businesses. Not only, therefore, do they have the right to ban whoever they please but also it makes sense for them to enforce standards. And I’m disappointed that conservatives, given their traditional objection that libertarians don’t care about virtue, are not pointing that out.
It is true, of course, as Williamson points out in his article, that YouTube tends to discriminate against even mild-mannered conservatives such Dennis Prager. That’s awful. And I’m betting that people on Williamson’s side of the issue can point to left-wing people who are at least as disgusting as Crowder but who are not deplatformed.
But that’s separate from the issue about whether it’s legitimate for Facebook and YouTube to enforce norms.
READER COMMENTS
Jon Murphy
Jun 9 2019 at 3:48pm
I think this is a good example to distinguish between (how I understand) jurisprudence and ethics.
Jurisprudence is rules for how a sovereign should behave, which inherently means what things should be illegal (ie, punished through a coercive state behavior).
Ethics, on the other hand, are the rules for the good life.
Jurisprudence rules are inherently precise and accurate (like the rules of grammar). Ethical rules are more loose.
Libertarians tend to conflate jurisprudence with ethics, and as such they tend to make the state the arbiter of morality (despite their frequent objection to such). An example of this is some of these disgusting behaviors; some libertarians will argue that any behavior that discourages these actions, even when done by private individuals, is bad. The logic is since these actions do not violate jurisprudence rules, then they must be tolerated (I think Murray Rothbard makes an argument along the lines I put forth here, that any private discouragement is inherently bad, but I am going off memory and I am away from my library to check).
But I do think we need to make a distinction here, that we can frown on something for ethical reasons, want to discourage it, but also not think coercion is the proper way to do so.
David Henderson
Jun 9 2019 at 5:38pm
Thanks, Jon. Well said.
Re Murray Rothbard, I recall him being someone who “encouraged discouragement.” That is, he thought it made sense for people to non-coercively give others incentives for good behavior. It’s possible, I guess, that at other times he said things at odds with this.
Jon Murphy
Jun 10 2019 at 1:11am
Re Rothbard:
You’re probably right. I’m going off memory and I can’t verify, so I’ll defer to you.
Lawrence Ludlow
Jun 10 2019 at 8:45am
In all fairness, there also are conservatives who confuse jurisprudence with ethics. Think of the many times you hear conservatives who seem to take their ethical cues from the law by saying things like: “But it’s against the law!” Or they sometimes will support continued arrests for consensual behaviors and ignore the deeper, ethical level of analysis — saying you must first change the law without addressing the deeper issue. Prohibition-era legislation (perhaps more of a progressive movement) comes to mind. I think there’s a shared spectrum of expression among those who identify as libertarians or as conservatives and even liberals. Among both, there are those who confuse legal status with the stamp of ethical approval. Likewise, there are those who — like you and David and me — don’t.
Jon Murphy
Jun 10 2019 at 9:10am
Yup, good point
TMC
Jun 10 2019 at 1:12pm
True, but “But it’s against the law!” is usually a pretty good reason. I tend to ignore some laws that I don’t agree with as long as no one gets hurt (speed limits mostly), but by just disregarding laws you open behavior up to anything goes.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 1:45pm
People are sometimes hurt by speeders.
Mark Z
Jun 10 2019 at 10:35am
Though I’m sure confusion occurs and is a common thing, I think it may well be that the main factor isn’t confusion but a simple correlation of dispositions. That is, I think people who view fewer things as egregiously immoral are more likely to favor fewer laws, and people who view more things as immoral favor more laws. I think libertarians tend to disproportionately be in the former category. This is certainly the case with me (e.g., I don’t think drug dealing or prostitution or price gouging are immoral, in addition to thinking they should be legal). As such, I think people who favor broad legality of human behavior also tend to favor broad social acceptability.
I may just be pessimistic about the willingness of people to tolerate what they view as immoral (I don’t doubt it’s possible and there are plenty of examples of moral puritans who are political libertarians, I just don’t think this virtue is widespread).
MarkW
Jun 9 2019 at 6:37pm
Of course, the thing about Google (Youtube) and Facebook is that they dominate their markets (search, online video, and social media) in a way that ‘robber-baron monopolists’ never did AND the markets they are in are related to speech itself (rather than oil, steel, or railroads). Given that high level of market dominance, I am not sure that ‘they are private businesses and should be able to do as they see fit’ is the right approach here (though I am open to being convinced). How would we feel about an organization that owned 80-90% of all newspapers or TV and radio stations in the country? Would laissez-faire still be the right approach? Is there any point of market-dominance in media and communications where a libertarian should think that a different approach might be warranted?
David Henderson
Jun 9 2019 at 7:27pm
They do dominate their markets and to the extent they remove content that many of us think shouldn’t be removed, such as Nazi speeches uploaded by historians, they will leave the market a little more open for other entrants.
Here’s a bet that I’m willing to give even odds on, if we can figure out the right measure: In 5 years, YouTube and Facebook won’t be nearly as dominant as they are now. I’m always willing to give 3 to 1 odds that in 5 years the federal government will be at least as dominant as it is now. I raise that issue because you mention laissez-faire. Laissez-faire may not be perfect, but it’s much better than trusting government.
MarkW
Jun 10 2019 at 11:24am
I’m not pushing for government intervention or any particular solution at this point, just wondering if we’re facing a new kind of problem. Unlike with old industries, market dominance in these cases was built around (and is sustained by) network effects. Everybody wants to be on <i>Facebook</i> because everybody else is on <i>Facebook</i>. Google tried to compete (with Google+) but eventually threw in the towel. I do expect the dominance of <i>Facebook</i> and <i>Youtube</i> to diminish eventually, but due more to boredom, changing tastes and a sense that these are ‘legacy’ service for old people, but not through competitors seizing the opportunity to offer platforms for those banned by the dominant services. And it’s not even clear that the market is open to that possibility. Gab.ai is a service that accepted users banned from Twitter. But Gab, itself, has had its apps banned from both the Apple and Google app stores. Effectively, the alternative platform has itself been deplatformed. And that seems the likely fate of any service that tries to compete by offering refuge to those banned by the dominant services — any such upstart will be left with a roster consisting mostly controversial characters and hardly anybody else and will be tarred as an extremist site. I wouldn’t be surprised if even ISPs and cloud service companies refused to support the upstarts’ web and app services (and, oops, a Google search shows I’m behind the times. Gab’s host provider did suspend them as did Paypal — though obviously they did find other providers, since they are online presently).
We’re almost talking about a situation where a new newspaper couldn’t enter a the market and challenge the dominant firms because it struggles to find anybody willing to sell it newsprint or ink or to process payments from subscribers and advertisers.
Hazel Meade
Jun 12 2019 at 5:01pm
I don’t know what else Crowder has written about Maza, but it’s possible that Crowder has been waging a kind of harassment campaign against him, with followers for instance doxxing Maza and sending him death threats. There’s a lot of this stuff going around, and content providers like YouTube havn’t quite figured out how to handle it. Maza might not be totally unjustified in finding Crowder’s speech physically threatening (having been a victim of anti-gay violence in the past). If you’re a semi public figure and someone else decides to fixate on you and write all sorts of stuff denouncing you in vile language, you might reasonably find that pretty creepy and scary. I’m not sure that’s what’s going on here, but it’s possible to imagine a broader context that would make YouTube’s decision make more sense.
Hazel Meade
Jun 12 2019 at 5:02pm
That was meant to be a new comment, I don’t know how it ended up here.
Mark Brady
Jun 9 2019 at 7:18pm
“In reality, this power to censor was not one they wanted,” The Intercept co-founder also added. “It was one that was foisted upon them largely by journalists who demanded they remove voices from the internet. Imagine going into journalism and begging corporations to silence people.”
Glenn Greenwald interviewed by Carlson Tucker, June 6, 2019.
Glenn Greenwald defends ‘contemptuous cretin’ Crowder: ‘YouTube caved in defense of the powerful’
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/447421-glenn-greenwald-defends-contemptuous-cretin-crowder-youtube-caved-in-defense
zeke5123
Jun 10 2019 at 12:23am
Funny (don’t know if it is the right word) thing is that the complainant has called for light assault against his political adversaries, yet Crowder is the one harmed by YT, etc. Arguably an important frame for the discussion. Also, would like to say that I enjoy your articles and have commented before, but I don’t think you have the better take this go around.
Set aside the hypocrisy above, what Google / YT is doing is immoral. First, there is a norm behind free speech that is being diminished by de monetizing Crowder. Protecting that norm is important. It is all the more important when it is the leading town square eroding the culture of free speech.
Second, Crowder helped (by adding some drops to the YT pool) YT gain its position today. If Crowder didn’t really break YT’s guidelines, and it was only after a second-review due to a concern-troll hypocrite, Crowder wouldn’t have been harmed. The equities are on behalf of Crowder; not YT.
Which brings me to my final point — you are I believe making the error you claim others often make. It is likely legally for YT to de monetize Crowder, but I don’t think it is moral.
Mark Z
Jun 10 2019 at 10:45am
I don’t think the enforcement of the standard itself is immoral, even in the ‘spirit of free speech.’ There are different kinds of fora – in real life and online – with different behavioral standards. Some of them aspire to create a polite, civil atmosphere (econlog being an example of such a place) and thus moderate content accordingly. Others aspire to be free and open, anything goes (4chan being an example). Of course, some people – including some libertarians – want the whole world to be a place where a strict set of social norms are rigidly enforced. I disagree with that position, and think having some purely free and open fora are useful and desirable, but not every site needs to be such a place. If Youtube wants to be a ‘polite society’ that’s fine.
That said, Youtube’s tendency to enforce its rules more harshly for people they disagree with politically (I think it’s well established Google’s leadership and workforce lean heavily to the left) is unsettling.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 11:14am
I agree with all of your comment.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 11:17am
Thanks for your compliments on my earlier work.
I agree with you that YouTube did a bad job. I think it should limit the other guy too.
But YouTube is NOT “eroding the culture of free speech.” There is no free speech issue here.
Mark Z
Jun 10 2019 at 2:02pm
Thanks, it’s a good sign I might be correct 🙂
Mark Brady
Jun 10 2019 at 1:12am
“As is to be expected with such a wide-ranging definition of ‘hate’, obnoxious shock jocks like Crowder were not the only ones caught up in it. For instance, Ford Fischer who runs the news channel News2Share, received an email from YouTube telling him that his channel had been demonetised under the new rules. He started his channel in 2014, uploading raw footage of the Black Lives Matter movement. But his channel was demonetised and his revenue was cut for hosting footage of the Charlottesville Unite the Right rally. Fischer told Newsweek that he had no intention of promoting the alt-right: ‘The work is meant as raw footage, so people can critique and analyse the tactics and things being said.’
“Another account to be terminated was that of the award-winning history teacher, Scott Allsopp. Allsopp’s channel violated the new rules because his GCSE tutorials on the Second World War featured clips of Adolf Hitler’s speeches and other Nazi propaganda. YouTube has since reinstated Allsopp’s channel, but its initial action shows that in future it is likely to censor first and ask questions later.”
YouTube vs free speech: Steven Crowder’s pathetic spat with Carlos Maza is fuelling a new round of online censorship.
https://www.spiked-online.com/2019/06/10/youtube-vs-free-speech/
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 9:33am
Mark,
See my answer to MarkW above. There’s no doubt that they are doing a lousy job of it. I think that probably reflects how ignorant they are. My argument is with people who think they shouldn’t do anything to monitor their site for bad behavior.
Mark Brady
Jun 10 2019 at 12:46pm
David,
You write, “There’s no doubt that they are doing a lousy job of it. I think that probably reflects how ignorant they are.” The second example that I provide in my previous post is an example of YouTube doing a lousy job. But can we expect them ever to get it approximately “right” in the absence of competition?
You also write, “My argument is with people who think they shouldn’t do anything to monitor their site for bad behavior.” That brings us to Glenn Greenwald’s argument that the government foisted responsibility for content control onto social media. For sure this isn’t laissez-faire.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 1:33pm
I didn’t know that Greenwald made that argument. You mentioned his claim that journalists are foisting the responsibility onto YouTube. In which of the two links from him that you cite does he talk about government foisting responsibility onto YouTube?
Mark Brady
Jun 11 2019 at 1:20am
Glenn Greenwald featured in just one of the two links that I provided. For the interview between Tucker Carlson and Greenwald, I recommend that you click on the link below and either watch the video or scroll down to read the transcript.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/06/08/greenwald_steven_crowder_is_a_contemptuous_cretin_but_youtube_caved_to_mob_begging_for_censorship.html
David Henderson
Jun 11 2019 at 9:46am
Mark, I reread the whole real politics piece that you linked to and at no place in it does Greenwald say that the government foisted responsibility for content control onto YouTube. And, by the way, what would “foisted” in this context? Would it mean that the government said it’s YouTube’s responsibility and the government won’t play a role? If so, that actually IS laissez-faire.
Andrew_FL
Jun 10 2019 at 9:44am
I defy you to tell me where Williamson says YouTube/Google et al are not within their legal rights to discriminate against their users on the basis of ideology. I read the same article you did and he does no such thing.
Jon Murphy
Jun 10 2019 at 9:47am
To my point above, there’s far more to morality than legal rights.
Andrew_FL
Jun 10 2019 at 10:29am
Rothbard certainly believed in “private discouragement” for anyone who wanted to open a fractional reserve bank. Actually, he believed in shutting them down with straight up mobs.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 10:32am
You don’t need to defy me because I never said what you seem to think I was saying. I was challenging his view that YouTube should not deplatform Steven Crowder. Kevin and I agree that YouTube has the right to deplatform Steven Crowder. Our difference is about the threshold such companies should use to make their decisions.
Andrew_FL
Jun 10 2019 at 10:59am
It strikes me as odd to frame it as an ideological disagreement between conservatives and libertarians, then
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 11:13am
I didn’t frame it as an ideological disagreement. I stated that conservatives often criticize libertarians for not just wanting to allow certain behaviors but also for not being willing to judge certain behaviors negatively. Then the irony is that when some mediating institutions do try to judge and restrain certain behaviors on their sites, some conservatives are among the most outspoken at criticizing such measures. I’m assuming Kevin Williamson is a conservative. Isn’t he?
Andrew_FL
Jun 10 2019 at 11:44am
I think that it is fair to say that he is. But I think there’s a difference between agreeing that in principle it is desirable for private institutions to police bad behavior on their property and supporting every instance of this ostensibly being done in practice. Sometimes private actors deserve criticism for policing bad behavior overzealously, too.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 12:04pm
Andrew_FL,
I don’t think we’re that far apart. As others have pointed out in the comments, YouTube has done a very poor job of moderating. I was taking on two specific things: (1) the irony of conservatives criticizing libertarians for not having standards of non-coercive behavior, while criticizing those who have such standards, and (2) Kevin Williamson’s implicit idea that only those who are a threat to public safety should be reined in.
Andrew_FL
Jun 10 2019 at 12:10pm
I suspect that, if pressed, Williamson would probably be able to name a few other things than danger to public safety that he wouldn’t mind YouTube policing.
David Henderson
Jun 10 2019 at 1:43pm
I wonder. It would be interesting to see.
Phil H
Jun 11 2019 at 11:04am
1) I find it interesting that so many alt right voices are getting themselves banned. I genuinely can’t tell if the problem lies with them or with some bias in media channels, but it’s been so many now – Yannopolis, Alex Jones, Tommy Robinson, now this guy – that I am starting to thing the alt right are nothing but what the mainstream media says they are, an obnoxious gang. In which case, their ongoing popularity is truly a problem to be solved, not a part of the internet’s rich tapestry.
2) With hindsight, when media was opened up from a small number of highly professionalised outlets to basically anyone, the coarsening of public debate was kinda inevitable. It’s interesting how it’s happened though. Despite loving Colbert and disliking Trump, I still find it quite unsettling to watch a major mainstream TV host openly call the president a moron pretty much every night. I can’t quite see where this ends up.
Andrew_FL
Jun 12 2019 at 12:43pm
Crowder isn’t “Alt Right”
Comments are closed.