Court Rejects Facebook User's Lawsuit Demanding $10 Million Per Day In Damages For Having His Posts Removed

from the all-things-in-moderation...-except-these-monetary-demands dept

How many constitutional rights can Facebook violate? To paraphrase Nigel Tufnel, the answer is none. None rights can be violated.

That won't stop people from suing social media platforms for having their posts/accounts moderated. Do a bit of deletion and all of sudden some people feel they have a federal case. Mandela Brock, d/b/a Mandel El'Shabazz on Facebook, got on the wrong side of some moderation and decided to sue about it.

The complaint [PDF] alleges a whole host of constitutional violations on the part of Facebook, which had removed some posts that violated the site's Community Guidelines. This is what Brock alleged:

As of the time that Plaintiff, Mandela Brock, was unconstitutionally subjected to censorship, without "just cause," and stripped of his rights, privileges, and immunities guaranteed by the United States Constitution, the New York State Constitution, along with federal and state law, there continues to be a pervasive and high-handed unwillingness of the defendants to obey the laws that govern them or to ensure the individual defendants, who they are mandated by law to supervise, follow the laws that govern them in particular the United States Constitution.

Moving beyond that, there are accusations that Facebook violated Brock's free speech, subjected him to psychological torture, "denial of his right to protest in a public square," and otherwise angered him to the point of litigation. According to Brock, Facebook violated his First, Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. There's also a RICO allegation (because of course there is). That allegation surfaced after Facebook tried to relocate the lawsuit to its native California. (I'm sorry, I'm just reporting the facts. I cannot actually explain that part to you.)

Here's an indicative sample of the posts Brock created that Facebook removed:

If you can't see the embeds, perhaps you should feel grateful.

Brock's lawsuit asked for compensatory damages of $1 million "per account restriction" and $250,000 a day per "individual restriction violation of rights" as well as punitive damages of $10 million per day (plus $500,000/day) for the same thing. Also attorney fees, despite representing himself.

The complaint is signed Mandela Brock, Belligerent Complainant, Sui Juris Prose, In Propia Persona.

So, how much does Facebook owe for taking down Brock's n-word-loaded posts? None. None of the above. (via Eric Goldman)

Despite the plaintiff's citation of cases that don't actually help him (like Pruneyard and a case involving a labor union protest in front of a business{??}) [oh, and the California Constitution for some reason, which isn't going to help in New York], the court (performing the charitable reading of the complaint required in pro se cases) says there are no rights violations here. Just a private company doing private company stuff.

From the decision [PDF]:

Plaintiff’s claims based on the First Amendment, as well as on the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments, therefore fail at the threshold because Facebook is not a state actor. Plaintiff contends that Facebook’s status as a “state actor” is “immaterial” because Facebook is performing a function “traditionally” performed by the government. The relevant function that Facebook provides is an online platform for speech. Plaintiff also analogizes Facebook’s provision of an online messaging service to the government’s traditional provision of mail services through the United States Postal Service. However, “[i]t is ‘not enough’ that the relevant function is something that a government has ‘exercised . . . in the past, or still does’ or ‘that the function serves the public good.’” Prager Univ., 951 F.3d at 998 (quoting Halleck, 139 S. Ct. at 1928-29). The government must have performed the function in question exclusively as well. Halleck, 139 S. Ct. at 1929. Facilitating the exchange of communication or hosting a platform for discussion are not activities “that only governmental entities have traditionally performed.” Prager Univ., 951 F.3d at 998...

At least the plaintiff can now proudly claim he got shot down just like Prager U, which also wastes a lot of everyone's time (including that of courts) attempting to portray social media companies as public utilities or public squares in order to advance its theory that its rights have been violated every time its content gets moderated.

The same goes for Brock's "new town square" argument.

The Supreme Court held in Marsh v. State of Alabama, 326 U.S. 501, 506 (1946) that citizens in a company-owned town were guaranteed constitutional protections against the deprivation of their First Amendment rights by the company, but courts have refused to extend Marsh’s holding to social media cases.

Brock also claimed that moderation of his content violated Section 230. Nope.

Facebook is immune under Section 230(c)(1) from claims related to its removal of objectionable content.

That's it for Brock. If Brock still wants to avail himself of the use of private property, he'll have to follow the owner's rules. It's that simple.

Filed Under: 1st amendment, content moderation, mandela brock, section 230
Companies: facebook