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Are Facebook and Twitter Finally Paying the Price for Censorship of Conservatives?

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Screen grab of Sen. Rand Paul’s Parler account.

Has the dam broken following the build-up of conservative frustration over one-sided censorship against them by Facebook and Twitter?

Evidence of that – which had built up for weeks – turned into a flood over the last ten days.

What had been a quiet trend of sign-ups by publicly known conservatives – including many elected officials – turned into an out-and-out campaign to urge followers to join them in social media alternative platform Parler (originally “Par-lay” per the French spelling; apparently the English literal pronunciation is acceptable now too). According to report by Business Insider, tech data trackers said Parler reached No. 2 for Top News apps on the App Store.

“According to data Sensor Tower has provided to Business Insider, Parler has seen a 246% increase in US downloads this week compared with a week prior,” the site … Read More ➡

Tech Giants Bankroll Extremists; Fuel False Narrative

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Jack Dorsey/PHOTO: jdlasica (CC)

Following the death of George Floyd at the hands of an out-of-control Minneapolis police officer, and demonstrations mixed with riots across the country, many American corporations weighed in with official statements or financial support for causes – or both.

Unfortunately the involvement of some put them more on the side of divisiveness than unity, at a time when the country needs the latter the most.

Ultimately many of the companies and/or their top-ranking officers got behind (again) the dubious narrative that there is “systemic racism” in law enforcement, and that minorities are disproportionately treated as suspects – or singled out for violent police tactics – more than whites. As Manhattan Institute fellow Heather Mac Donald and former US Attorney Andrew McCarthy explained earlier this week, citing very convincing statistics, the idea there is structural bias in policing is a myth.

“However sickening the video of Floyd’s … Read More ➡

COVID Empowers Google, Facebook & Twitter Censors

Posted on by Paul Chesser
PHOTO: The National Guard (CC)

The Wuhan virus has presented the left-leaning Big Tech companies yet another opportunity to burnish their reputations for censorship of conservatives and independent thinkers.

They have seized that opportunity.

To be sure, Google/YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have allowed much speech and activity on their platforms that dissents from official government advisories and loyal liberal orthodoxy to such. But whatever the techs’ standards are, they are applied inconsistently.

The latest, largest, and likely most egregious example is a video interview with two Bakersfield, Calif. physicians, Drs. Dan Erickson and Artin Massihi, by KERO-TV, in which the medical professionals expressed skepticism about the threat of the virus to the public, following their own experiences and analysis of various data about the disease. After earning more than 5 million views in just a few days, and getting the broader attention of the national media, Google-owned … Read More ➡

Zuckerberg Quashes Dissent About Social Distancing on Facebook

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Mark Zuckerberg

If you are among the thousands of Americans who advocate for the reopening of the economy of your state from lockdown measures by governors, and you also believe social distancing guidelines are not the best health policy to attack the Chinese coronavirus, then Mark Zuckerberg thinks you should be censored on Facebook.

That’s what came out of an interview the social media CEO gave George Stephanopoulos of ABC News on Monday’s “Good Morning America,” in which Zuckerberg said he had an army of “fact-checkers” at the ready to censor what his teams deem as “harmful misinformation.”

“How do you deal with the fact that Facebook is now being used to organize a lot of these protests to defy social distancing, and defy the social distancing guidelines in the states?” Stephanopoulos asked. “If someone is trying to organize something like that, does that qualify as harmful information?”

“Certainly, … Read More ➡

Trump & Biden Go to War Over Twitter’s Biased ‘Manipulation’ Labeling

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Joe Biden/IMAGE: via Twitter

With the first implementation of a new policy that purports to promote transparency in labeling videos that have been edited in ways that could be deceptive or misleading, Twitter couldn’t have succeeded better in making transparent its own liberal bias.

Last weekend the social media platform marked a video posted by White House social media director Dan Scavino, and retweeted by President Trump, as “manipulated media.” The label had never before been used, although Twitter warned that it was coming.

The video showed a clip of a speech by Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden in his own stumbling words, which were cropped to make it appear he was endorsing Trump. The Democratic National Committee called attention to Twitter that the video was “manipulated,” according to The Daily Beast, and Twitter immediately slapped the label on it.

“This is an example of our ongoing disinformation work, … Read More ➡

Hypocritical CNN Overseer Blasts Facebook’s Lack of ‘Editorial Integrity’

Posted on by Paul Chesser
John Stankey/IMAGE: YouTube

The knock against Facebook that is getting the most attention right now is that CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said the platform will not act as arbiters of truth and falsehood for political candidates’ posts and ads.

Current and former political candidates like Hillary Clinton and Sen. Elizabeth Warren have argued that it is irresponsible for the company to not be watchdogs for truth. For his part, Zuckerberg has said essentially that Facebook users are fully capable (through comments) of policing truth vs. fiction and that free speech, not censorship, should be paramount.

As the left’s attacks on Facebook get more hysterical – thanks to President Donald Trump’s smashing success in using the platform – critics are emerging seemingly everywhere, calling for increased accountability through government regulation, because the social media company has “too much power.”

Besides the politicians, a top corporate executive has also spoken out against … Read More ➡

Left Turns Against Facebook; Demands Censorship of Trump

Posted on by Paul Chesser

Donald Trump/PHOTO: Gage Skidmore via Creative Commons

If there was any doubt about why the political Left has suddenly turned against Facebook, it has become clear: It is because they think the social media behemoth is helping President Donald Trump.

Revelations last week by top executive Andrew Bosworth, a vice president who was in charge of advertising during the 2016 election season, won’t disabuse liberals of that. Bosworth, however, did not give Facebook credit for the Trump campaign’s success in 2016 – rather, he attributed it to where it belonged.

“He ran the single best digital ad campaign I’ve ever seen from any advertiser. Period,” Bosworth wrote in a private Facebook post that he later made public after the New York Times published a story about it.

“[Digital Director Brad] Parscale and Trump just did unbelievable work,” added Bosworth, a self-proclaimed liberal who is reportedly close to CEO … Read More ➡

Is Facebook’s Zuckerberg a Free-Speech Convert or Just Staving Off Regulation?

Posted on by Paul Chesser

Mark Zuckerberg

So has Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg suddenly become a free speech devotee?

If you observe how the political Left is reacting and obsessing over his decision last month to not police political advertisements, you’d think he might have.

His announcement was juxtaposed against the polar opposite move of social media rival Twitter, and its CEO Jack Dorsey, who in early November said his platform would completely ban political ads. The contrast between the two near-simultaneous declarations likely heightened the blowback against Facebook.

The policy means that Facebook won’t subject political ads placed by candidates or advocacy groups to the site’s fact-checking review, as it does with news articles. Nor will ads accused of being false be removed.

Specifically, Zuckerberg said, “In a democracy, I don’t think it’s right for public companies to censor policies or the news.” He downplayed the speculation that he was allowing the ads … Read More ➡

Facebook Embraces Free Speech for 2020, While Twitter Wants Censorship

Posted on by Paul Chesser

Mark Zuckerberg

Last week’s polar opposite decisions on the handling of political advertisements by Facebook and Twitter have predictably exposed the anti-free speech tendencies of the Left.

The former announced it would allow candidate and issue ads and exempt them from the platform’s fact-checking operation that it employs for news reports.

The latter said it would ban political advertisements altogether.

Advertisers crave access to Facebook’s users far more than Twitter’s, mostly because it is easy to specify target audiences (for example, those who “Like” Donald Trump). But both social media operations are desirable for politicians and activists to get their messages out, even for Republicans who complain about Facebook’s admitted anti-conservative bias, because they are an effective tool to reach desired voters.

The rationale given by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey for his decision shows a mindset that helps explain why his business was not profitable until recently.

“We … Read More ➡

Facebook’s Zuckerberg Admits Bias Problem; Won’t Do Anything About It

Posted on by Paul Chesser

Facebook’s fact-checkers, like the legacy media’s predominant accountability sites like Politifact and FactCheck.org, are biased in favor of progressive causes.

And now even CEO Mark Zuckerberg has admitted it.

Four Republican Senators called out the social media powerhouse earlier this month over censorship of a pro-life group’s post and videos that claimed abortion is not medically necessary. The fact-check that led to restrictions to access of the posts was written b – you guessed it – abortionists.

The “offending” posts were separate videos published on Facebook by Live Action: one featuring the group’s president, Lila Rose, and the other featured by neonatologist Dr. Kendra Kolb. The women claimed in each video that abortion is “never medically necessary.”

To fact-check the claims, Facebook enlisted Robin Schickler, an OB-GYN and fellow at the pro-abortion Physicians for Reproductive Health, and Daniel Grossman, director of Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health … Read More ➡