Social media is becoming the U.S. “Ministry of Truth”
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
YouTube just announced that they will be “removing content that contains hacked information, the disclosure of which may interfere with democratic processes, such as elections and censuses.” This is only the latest in a series of acts of censorship by social media companies. Some of these previous examples show a trend, as Caitlin Johnstone points out:
“We already know from experience that social media giants tend to follow in each other’s footsteps whenever there’s a significant step in the direction of censorship, like their coordinated cross-platform removals of alternative media outlets, accounts from US-targeted nations, and people who have been labeled ‘conspiracy theorists.’”
That’s one point that leads somewhere troubling. No dissenting voices.
Of course, as some have pointed out, they are perfectly within their rights to remove content according to the rules of their terms of service. However, as others have also pointed out, often the enforcement of those terms is selective. That might sound like a good thing to you when it’s Alex Jones going down the memory hole, but what about when it’s CopWatch?
There’s something that seems especially insidious about this to me. These companies are becoming something almost worse than state media. For one thing, they aren’t necessarily just pawns of the state, they’re pawns of whoever’s team they’re on, or whichever intelligence agency is using them for an op (read Snowden’s book). At the same time, in the minds of many, probably most, they are perceived as independent. While I would generally consider it a good thing that young people don’t trust the media, social media is becoming untrustworthy for the same reasons, on top of the problems it already had.
I know I won’t be the first to point this out, but I feel the need to say it anyway: if Watergate had happened in the modern age, Deep Throat would’ve been publishing through WikiLeaks.
I’ll leave you with some links:
Glenn Greenwald on security and liberty + The NSA files
The Government Is Trying to Influence Speech on Social Media — But How?
Most Americans say social media companies have too much power, influence in politics
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