Re: @AC and @ Author Thank god
Sedition is never protected speech
You are completely wrong, at least as far as the US is concerned. Brandenburg and Yates set the current standard, which greatly limits the (outrageous) anti-sedition laws Congress had been gleefully emitting.
The Brandenburg test means speech can be as seditious as you like, unless it contains an incitement to break the law and is likely to succeed in producing lawless action.
Of course, the post you're responding to is equally wrong about how freedom-of-expression law works in the US. Amazon is perfectly free to kick anyone they like off their infrastructure.
The First Amendment does apply to private parties, not just the government (contra what other people have posted here). As White explains in the second link, the courts have agreed that it forbids the use of the power of the state by private parties to suppress speech; this is what supports Anti-SLAPP laws. But Amazon isn't using the power of the government here. It's using its own power, in the form of its control over its resources.
So Skokie doesn't apply here because Amazon isn't a government entity, and Times v Sullivan doesn't apply because Amazon is not using the government as a proxy.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
