Macron’s Fake News Solution Is a Problem – Foreign Policy

/macrons-fake-news-solution-is-a-problem

  • Macron’s Fake News Solution Is a Problem – Foreign Policy
    http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/05/29/macrons-fake-news-solution-is-a-problem

    point de vue d’une juriste doctorante à Toulouse, mis en avant dans FP
    la manchette d’appel dans la newsletter : #The_solution_is_the_problem (tout simplement)
    (la conclusion)

    France’s fake news law will most likely pass with flying colors, though it will almost certainly be challenged constitutionality by political opponents or private citizens. A better approach to the problem would have been to strengthen the formidable legal arsenal already in place. As there is no legal definition of fake news under French law, it remains unclear how magistrates will be able to judge what is false or true in political matters. Implementing such a law would require judges to be extremely creative and subjective in interpreting what exactly constitutes fake news. Second, such provisions could lead to self-censorship as online publishers, fearing legal action, might curtail what is perfectly legitimate speech. The questions remains: How would this law be implemented if, for example, a French politician goes too far in publicly deriding his or her opponents or a foreign leader, as British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson famously did when he published a poem insinuating that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan fornicated with goats?

    Macron’s proposed legislation has no answer. It will not solve the problem of fake news and may indeed amplify it.