Just as last week Wednesday Texas appeals court reinstated a state law that imposes censorship on social media companies, NY Governor Kathy Hochul demanded that these platforms do more to combat racial hate speech.
Hochul expressed utmost disappointment about social media platforms failing to block content related to race discrimination. She found it unjustifiable that the live stream of the Buffalo shooting was not taken down “within a second.”
What had happened?
Payton Gendron, 18, was found to be racially motivated, killing ten and injuring three people in a local supermarket. The suspect allegedly live-streamed the whole shooting incident on the Amazon-owned platform Twitch.
Gov. Hochul’s reaction
Governor Hochul slammed social media companies for letting such graphic content go live. She also pledged to work harder to prevent any future acts saying, “And we’re going to continue to work on this and make sure that those who provide these platforms have a moral and ethical, and I hope to have a legal responsibility to ensure that such hate cannot populate these sites, because this is the result.”
Texas Internet Censorship Law
The law empowers aggrieved users to file a stream of lawsuits to combat content moderation. In a nutshell, it bans social media platforms from changing content.
