Sir Lindsay Hoyle, speaker of the lower chamber of the British Parliament, has shared his thoughts about the dangers of “misinformation” during an interview with BBC Radio, at the same time coming up with some fairly unusual proposals on how to counter that – even by the standards of today’s political climate of a “misinformation witch-hunt.”
Opponents will easily ridicule – but also warn about – his proposals as yet another attempt to set up a real-world Ministry of Truth, but this one comes with a twist: Hoyle wants his country to enact more “anti-misinformation” laws, but the sort that would be valid outside the UK.
So, a Global Ministries of Truth, if you will; and while (actual) misinformation can indeed prove to be dangerous, as the speaker of the Commons underlines – so surely are out of-whack proposals coming from prominent politicians.
Hoyle laments that the degree of taking responsibility for what he says is misinformation and fake news has gone down lately.
Referring clearly to the era before Musk takeover (he at one point comments to say, “We have a better relationship with some (other sites)”) – Twitter was a platform that Hoyle said “we” (apparently referring to himself and his team) could just contact to get content deleted.
“Look, these things are up there. Can you take them down? Threats against MPs, you know, threatening to whatever,” Hoyle recounts his past communications with Twitter.
And back in the “good old days” only 8% of those “threatening to whatever” posts would remain up, the rest would get taken down – while now, the speaker complained, the reverse is true.
And now, for the solution: unless social media platforms go back to what, in the (roundabout) way he explains it, comes down to heavy censoring at the authorities’ request – then those authorities should enact new laws.
The UK authorities, that is, with a parliamentary bill. But, Hoyle reveals, “And I believe it should be across. It doesn’t matter what country you’re in.”
People – and governments – in those other countries might beg to differ, but in the meantime, Hoyle is engrossed in his own “war on misinformation” that includes advocating for monitoring what users are saying about members of the British parliament on social media.
Ministry of Truth, Police State – it’s hard to tell what the key push Sir Lindsay is trying to make here might be. But it doesn’t sound like anything that should be coming out of a “true democracy.”
