pulsewidth

I guess there's a post for every lurker where they go 'ok i'll finally make an account so i can make a comment' and for me it was a large body of people calling the ProtonMail founder a Nazi because he posted praise of Trumps pick for Assistant AG for the DoJ Antitrust Division that may actually take action on the big four tech companies to break up their monopolies. This is a guy and a business that I have no connection to other than using Proton for a few years now. However, I thought it was worthwile to post his words that had been declared by the vast majority of commenters to be utterly unnacceptable to the point of people uprooting themselves from Proton and swearing off the service.

Perhaps the famously left-leaning media source Medium are sock puppet shills too? Because they just came out with an article defending the guy also. https://archive.ph/xoleo (archive version to avoid the Medium paywall / ads).

I will not be responding to more messages calling me a sock puppet because the only way I could prove it to you people is to go back in time and make some posts about Pokemon or DeepSeek or some crap before I made a post about something important (the wild political polarization of our era that has everyone pitchforks-ready at all times).

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check it out

I've messaged a mod on the News channel first to see if they can help, someone suggested to me that this could have even been an automatic moderation (since it was my first comment and it was long maybe?). The mod log is not clear as it's obfuscated/private. If i still have no luck i'll try their discord, thanks for the suggestion.

Thats fine, i get it was long. Apprecitate the advice. If it doesn't get restored i will move on from @lemmy.world entirely tbh. I dont feel like i posted something incredibly challenging, and it certainly broke none of the rules on that comm - so i was quite surprised at the ban and deletion as a 'welcome to lemmy' after lurking for a year or so.

While I agree with you for the most part, actually none of that is the point of this post - the point was is it valid to delete my post as 'spam' and ban me.

A sock puppet account is a false account made for deceptive purposes - this is a flat mischaracterization of my account. What would be my deception? I made it clear I'm a proton user of many years, made it clear i'm posting my opinion, made it clear it's my first post, and quoted from the source instead of going off on an extreme take.. like, say, presuming the CEO to be a Nazi defender and profiteer because he posted a single comment to thank Trump for a cabinet appointment. A cabinet appointment btw that has been widely cautiously praised by left-wing progressives. Only 'cautiously' because it's Trump. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-antitrust-agenda-nominees_n_6771d727e4b094f547727973

A broken clock is right twice a day - even Trump sometimes does things that are helpful. Probably by accident or because they align with some other goal he has - but good nonetheless. Go on though, continue the personal attacks for me having a perfectly valid opinion - without researching one of your own.

Modlog

Wow. There's a whole lot of people here reacting to the headline, and not actually reading the story. That's important, because the journalist's headline is (shocker) a huge overstatement.

I was concerned as I'm a Proton user and have been for years, and hard left politically, and despise Trump. But maybe lets just read it before reacting?

Here's what the CEO posted on Xitter:

10 years ago, Republicans were the party of big business and Dems stood for the little guys, but today the tables have completely turned.

Yep. That's a bad look. Doesn't make a lot of sense either because the Republicans are very much the party of big business and corporate handouts and deregulation in oil, gas, energy, mining, manufacture, industrial farming etc.

Then here's what Proton's team said on Reddit as an explanation and expansion of the CEO's post (and then later deleted):

Here is our official response, also available on the Mastodon post in the screenshot:

Corporate capture of Dems is real. In 2022, we campaigned extensively in the US for anti-trust legislation.

Two bills were ready, with bipartisan support. Chuck Schumer (who coincidentally has two daughters working as big tech lobbyists) refused to bring the bills for a vote.

At a 2024 event covering antitrust remedies, out of all the invited senators, just a single one showed up - JD Vance.

By working on the front lines of many policy issues, we have seen the shift between Dems and Republicans over the past decade first hand.

Dems had a choice between the progressive wing (Bernie Sanders, etc), versus corporate Dems, but in the end money won and constituents lost.

Until corporate Dems are thrown out, the reality is that Republicans remain more likely to tackle Big Tech abuses.

First off, I feel like I've read from hundreds of Lemmy users total agreement that the Democratic party is captured by corporate interests, so I really doubt any disagreement with that section of Proton's post. My reaction to the remainder is that it's not at all praise for the Republican party, just the factual statement of the sad reality that Republicans with their very hard-on-Silicon-Valley rhetoric are more likely to actually reign in the big tech companies than the Democratic party - and Proton is in a good position to have seen this first hand. Zero of the statement praises Trump or praises Republicans, and there is in fact lament that the Democrats didn't stick harder with their left-wing candidates, even highlighting Bernie. I can see why they deleted it though, it's office chatter than never should have left the cubicle.

TL;DR: storm in a teacup, I'll be keeping my Proton mail account.

p.s. yes this is my first Lemmy post. I'm a longtime lurker though. I felt strongly enough about this to make an account to post, as nobody seemed to be actually posting the content of the article - just reacting. Edit: typos & formatting of the quote.