Link-banning Is Facebook’s Terrifying New Censorship Tool
Bokhari:
Link-banning Is Facebook’s Terrifying New Censorship Tool
ALLUM BOKHARI 2 May
2019
The banning of multiple political commentators from
Facebook and Instagram, including conservatives Paul Joseph Watson and Laura
Loomer, is an outrage against the ideals of an open Internet on its own. But
beyond the bans on individuals, Facebook has deployed an even more terrifying
tool of censorship — link-banning.
The
mainstream media were, of course, tipped off about the bans in advance,
and the Atlantic’s report
contains the following eye-opening detail. Not only has Alex Jones’ personal
account now been banned from Facebook, in addition to PrisonPlanet
editor-in-chief and YouTube star Paul Joseph Watson, but all links to Infowars
sites are now banned across the platform. Share Infowars too often, and you’ll
be banned too.
Via The Atlantic:
Infowars is subject to the
strictest ban. Facebook and Instagram will remove any content containing
Infowars videos, radio segments, or articles (unless the post is explicitly
condemning the content), and Facebook will also remove any groups set up to
share Infowars content and events promoting any of the banned extremist
figures, according to a company spokesperson. (Twitter, YouTube, and Apple have
also banned Jones and Infowars.)
This takes censorship on social media to altogether new levels.
If you post Infowars content on Facebook or Facebook-owned Instagram, your post
will be removed. If you post it repeatedly, you will be banned.
Note the
wording, too — you’ll be banned unless you’re condemning Infowars. Facebook
is now brazenly using its power to reward certain political positions and
punish others.
This isn’t censorship of an individual or a group over a
violation of terms of service. It’s the wholesale ban of an independent media
site, which for all the criticism levied against it, has had a major impact on
the politics of the United States.
And Facebook has made no pretense, as it has in other cases
where the pages of news sites have been banned, that the ban occurred because
of alleged “inauthentic behavior,” by which it means the use of multiple pages
or automated accounts to promote a site’s content.
That Facebook is dispensing with its previous excuses shows that
the social network has become emboldened to regulate the flow of news on its
platform, knowing that no consequences are headed its way from Republicans on
Capitol Hill or in the White House.
Through algorithm changes and the prioritization of so-called
“authoritative sources,” Facebook has spent the last two years positioning
itself to control the news you see on your feed. Now it’s taken control of the
news you share with your friends too. Post a link to a disapproved website?
It’ll be deleted. Post it again? You’ll likely be banned.
This is a formula not just for banning websites, commentators,
and political figures, but for banning all their supporters as well.
And because their bans nearly exclusively target the right,
potentially thousands of Republicans and Trump supporters won’t be able to use
Facebook to encourage their friends to vote on election day 2020 — a massive
advantage for the Democrats on one of the internet’s most politically influential
platforms.
President Donald Trump may have cooled on sources like Infowars
(unlike his campaign days, when he appeared on Alex Jones’ show). But this
isn’t just an attack on particular individuals or sources. Whatever your
criticisms of Infowars — and there are many — this is an attack on the
independent media as a whole. It’s an unprecedented tilting of the scales in
favor of Democrat-approved media, and it will have an enormous impact on the
2020 election.
That’s the point of course. Since Trump won in 2016, Silicon
Valley has been animated by a single mission — ensure it never happens again.
Beyond the
leaks showing that Facebook is deliberately deboosting conservative figures
(when it isn’t outright banning them), that YouTube and Google are pushing conservative content out of
their top search results, just look at the video-recorded weeping of Google executives on stage after
Trump won. They hate him, they hate his supporters, and they will do everything
they can to suppress them before election day. The only question is, what’s
Trump going to do about it?
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