As of this writing, journalist Ford Fischer is still completely demonetized on YouTube as the result of a new set of rules that were put in place because of some doofy Twitter drama between some unfunny asshole named Steven Crowder and some infantile narcissist who thinks the world revolves around his opinions named Carlos Maza. It remains an unknown if Fischer will ever be restored to an important source of income around which he has built his livelihood.
Fischer often covers white supremacist rallies and counter-protests, and his channel was demonetized within minutes of YouTube’s new rules against hate speech going into effect because some of his content, as you’d expect, includes white supremacists saying and doing white supremacist things. Maza, a Vox reporter who launched a viral Twitter campaign to have Crowder removed from YouTube for making homophobic and bigoted comments about him on his channel, expressed concern over Fischer’s financial censorship.
“What’s happening to Ford is fucking awful,” Maza tweeted yesterday. “He’s a good journalist doing important work. I don’t understand how YouTube is still so bad at this. How can they not differentiate between white supremacist content and good faith reporting on white supremacy?”
https://twitter.com/gaywonk/status/1136425011970019329
I say that Maza is an infantile narcissist who thinks the world revolves around his opinions because it genuinely seems to have surprised him that good people would get harmed in the crossfire of his censorship campaign.
I mean, what did he think was going to happen? Did he think some soulless, multibillion-dollar Silicon Valley corporation was going to display company-wide wisdom and woke insightfulness while implementing his agenda to censor obnoxious voices? Did he imagine that YouTube executives were going to sit down with him over a cup of coffee and go down a list with him to get his personal opinion of who should and should not be censored?
Think about it. How narcissistic do you have to be to assume that a vast corporation is going to use your exact personal perceptual filters while determining who should and should not be censored for oafish behavior? How incapable of understanding the existence of other points of view must you be to believe it’s reasonable to expect that a giant, sweeping censorship campaign will exercise surgical precision which aligns perfectly with your own exact personal values system? How arrogant and self-centered must you be to demand pro-censorship reforms throughout an enormous Google-owned platform, then whine that they’re not implementing your censorship desires correctly?
This is the same staggering degree of cloistered, dim-eyed narcissism that leads people to support Julian Assange’s persecution on the grounds that he’s “not a journalist”. These egocentric dolts sincerely seem to believe that the US government is going to prosecute Assange for unauthorized publications about US war crimes, then when it comes time to imprison the next Assange the US Attorney General is going to show up on their doorstep to ask them for their opinion as to whether the next target is or is not a real journalist. Obviously the power-serving agenda that you are helping to manufacture consent for is not going to be guided by your personal set of opinions, you fucking moron.
The fact that other people aren’t going to see and interpret information the same way as you do is something Carlos Maza and the thousands of people who’ve supported his pro-censorship campaign should have learned as small children. Understanding that the world doesn’t revolve around you and your wants and desires is a basic stage in childhood development. People who believe Silicon Valley tech giants can implement censorship in a way that is wise and beneficent are still basically toddlers in this respect. One wonders if they still interrupt their mother’s important conversations with demands for attention and apple juice.
Youtube's new censorship escalation could easily see them removing videos which question the legitimacy of possible legit false flags, like the Douma incident in Syria, or any other attempt to manufacture consent for military interventionism.https://t.co/KrvscxKiS4 pic.twitter.com/EzDPfnSO8A
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) June 5, 2019
Ford Fischer was not the first good guy to get caught in the crossfire of internet censorship, and he will not be the last. In addition to the way unexpected interpretations of what constitutes hate speech can lead to important voices losing their platforms or being unable to make a living doing what they do, the new rules appear to contain a troubling new escalation that could see skeptics of legitimate military false flags completely censored.
“Finally, we will remove content denying that well-documented violent events, like the Holocaust or the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, took place,” reads a single sentence in the official YouTube blog about its new rules.
The sentence appears almost as an aside, without any elaboration or further information added, and at first glance it reads innocuously enough. No Holocaust deniers or Sandy Hook false flag videos? Okay, got it. I personally am not a denier of either of those events, so this couldn’t possibly affect me personally, right?
Wrong. YouTube does not say that it will just be censoring Holocaust deniers and Sandy Hook shooting deniers, it says it will “remove content denying that well-documented violent events, like the Holocaust or the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, took place.”
So what does this mean? Where exactly is the line drawn? If you are not an infantilized narcissist, you will not assume that YouTube intends to implement this guideline in the same way you would. It is very possible that it will include skeptics of violent events which the entire political/media class agrees were perpetrated by enemies of the US-centralized power alliance, which just so happen to manufacture support for increased aggressions against those nations.
Would the new rules end up forbidding, for example, this excellent YouTube video animation explaining how a leaked OPCW report disputes the official narrative about an alleged chemical attack in Douma, Syria last year? If you are not making the assumption that YouTube will be implementing its censorship using your own personal values system, there is no reason to assume it wouldn’t. After all, the official narrative that dozens of civilians were killed by the Assad government dropping chlorine cylinders through rooftops is the mainstream consensus narrative maintained by all respected US officials and “authoritative” news outlets.
This is a perfect example of a very real possibility that could be a disastrous consequence of increased internet censorship. It is a known fact that the US government has an extensive history of using false flags to manufacture consent for war, from the USS Liberty to the Gulf of Tonkin to the false Nayirah testimony about removing babies from incubators to the WMD narrative in Iraq. These new rules could easily serve as a narrative control device preventing critical discussions about suspicious acts of violence which have already happened, and which happen in the future.
Consider the fact that Google, which owns YouTube, has had ties to the CIA and the NSA from its very inception, is known to have a cozy relationship with the NSA, and has served US intelligence community narrative control agendas by tweaking its algorithms to deliberately hide dissenting alternative media outlets. Consider this, then ask yourself this question: do you trust this company to make wise and beneficent distinctions when it comes to censoring public conversations?
In a corporatist system of government which draws no meaningful distinction between corporate power and state power, corporate censorship is state censorship. Only someone who believes that giant Silicon Valley corporations would implement censorship according to their own personal values system could ever support giving these oligarchic establishments that kind of power. And if you believe that, it’s because you never really grew up.
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25 responses to “People Who Support Internet Censorship Are Infantile Narcissists”
The hammer is now falling on free speech and free press. The technocrats have decided they’re going to run the planet no matter. It’s what they want whether it’s Suckerturd, Bezos or the little malignant megalomaniacs at Google crawling around their cubicals like cockroaches, they have become way too powerful.
I’ve tried to tall people, including my family, how evil Google is and it goes into one ear and out the other. They just don’t care. Furthermore, they have no clue of what’s going down. not a clue. Most of them are off on their own little planet somewhere and they don’t care.
The only answer is in the creation of alternative websites that supports freedom of speech.
What I learned long ago is that it is not a good idea to demand that people stop doing what you don’t like, especially when those actions do not harm others. Once society accepts the idea that it is ok to prohibit activities that you and people like you don’t like, then once those affected people come into power, you start losing the right to do the things you like to do. “Live and let live” and “if they aren’t hurting anyone by their actions, it’s none of your business” are the mottos we should live by.
Hmmm
The 1st Amendment does not contain any exception to free expression even if it is perceived to be “hateful” or “harmful”. Our founding Fathers foresaw the impossibility of drawing a line, let alone stop from being driven over the edge of the proverbial slippery slope. Hence, there are in fact NO exemptions, exceptions or limitations contained in the 1st Amendment or 2nd Amendment what so ever. The founding fathers were also keenly aware that any limitation on content could and would be used against the citizenry in precisely the manner that words like “Harm” and “hate” are used today to trample all over the Bill of Rights and slowly but surely destroy the Republic.
Caitlin, you leave the impression that Crowder made “homophobic and bigoted comments”. Did you watch Crowder’s rebuttal of Maza? He said he only used terms Maza had used about himself on social media. He proved this with screen shots from Maza’s posts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQbpbsY7qVQ&t=377s
This is not to take away from your main point, that even people you believe are “assholes” and “oafish” should not be censored. Mine is a minor correction.
Also, did you see that Maza got a direct response to his censorship campaign from YouTube on his Twitter feed? (It was in Crowder’s rebuttal video, linked above.) That is almost unheard of. Maybe that is where he got the impression they would sit down with him for a cup of coffee to get his opinion? (He is still a narcissist and infantile.)
and Caitlin, whoever does the “i’m not a robot” thingy is sabotaging your blog by forcing us to go thrugh so many hoops….
Excellent article, olf course. But one serious mistake: “false flags to manufacture consent for war, from the USS Liberty to the Gulf of Tonkin.” The USS Liberty was the very opposite of a “false flag”–it was a deliberate murderous aggression by the State of Israel against American seamen, which has for half a century been covered up by the Allied Governments in a falsification even more egregious than the Tonkin Gulf fraud. But if you had written “SS Lusitania” instead of “USS Liberty” you would have been entirely on target. Remember the Liberty!
Hmmm
I believe you are half right on the subject of the USS Liberty Shane. It was in fact a deliberate murderous aggression by the State of Israel against the US Navy and hence the Nation. In shor,t an act of war which the traitor Johnson should have responded to by leveling Tel Aviv on the spot.
However, given the timing and circumstances of that day, it is abundantly clear that the idea behind the attack was to draw the US into the war by blaming the sinking of the ship on Egypt. Which also explains why the israeli pilots were trying to sink the life boats and were strafing sailors who had were in the sea. It would only work if there were no witnesses……
That would have happened had JFK not been murdered by the deep state/israhell.
I have no doubt Kennedy would have responded with a knockout punch to that rogue,lawless state, and the world would have been better off
as the state of Israhell would no longer exist.
“Consider the fact that Google, which owns YouTube, has had ties to the CIA and the NSA from its very inception, is known to have a cozy relationship with the NSA, and has served US intelligence community narrative control agendas by tweaking its algorithms to deliberately hide dissenting alternative media outlets.”
Absolutely true, but one could also substitute into this statement the names of any popular internet social network, IMHO. Such aspects of social engineering/mind control should by now be obvious to anyone having even a basic modicum of cognizance. These guys in charge of whipping us into shape apparently worship at the altar of Joseph Goebbels where there is usually some kind of owl statue or image thereof nearby, BWOE the National Press Club or that big concrete thing at Bohemian Grove.
I’ve noticed that YouTube is also apparently using an algorithm which pretty well blocks conflicting opinions from interaction with each other even within a given site, either that or everyone on the sites I visit are of like mind – in which case that is even more scary than putting up with the comments of “unenlightened” individuals and/or occasional trolls who might disagree with me. The corollary is that each differing mindset as profiled is effectively shadowbanned from each other and any comments are therefore just “preaching to the choir” so to speak, or in this case to not speak. We are being censored kind of like being grouped into separate sound proof cages.
Just remember, I am always right and everyone else is always wrong. 😉
Thank you, Caitlin, for being objective and for showing a deeper understanding of why the ongoing censorship campaign is so dangerous. We are in very dangerous territory right now, and the trend seems to be accelerating.
BTW, false flags are not limited to foreign actions; there are domestic false flags as well.
Hmmm
If the enemies of the first Amendment and the Constitution can keep citizens focusing on content rather than the basic tenet that censorship of any kind is a direct abridgement of their freedoms, the bad guys/girls will continue to win.
President Obama gave away government control of the “internet” in 2016 to a corporation for one reason and one reason only: to ensure that the ability of ALL CITIZENS to easily, openly and candidly exercise their freedom of expression without restraint, on any subject, at any time, could be denied or manipulated at a moment’s notice. This freedom, as specifically and directly proscribed by the Constitution, bestowed upon the citizens far too much power and control over their own lives and the fate of the Nation for the tiny cabal of bankers that took control of the Republic in the aftermath of the Federal Reserve Act and subsequent Federal Income Tax an who’s decedents control America today.
The simple solution for the ongoing manipulation of the internet is for the Federal government (the people) to just take it back and properly classify it as a utility. And in so doing, outlaw censorship of any kind. Remember, “corporations” exist only at the pleasure of the government. There is no unalienable right in the Constitution protecting corporations or their existence. (despite repeated attempts by the Supreme Court to usurp the Constitution to aid corporations in their battle against the citizenry) Ultimately therefore, corporations only exist at the pleasure of the people, given that the government only exists to serve and is answerable to the people, not the other way around as it is today.
America has sacrificed Millions of lives, spent Trillion dollars and literally leveled entire countries in the name of a fictitious threat of “terrorism” spanning decades in order to protect “our freedom”, surely we can revoke the charter and seize the assets of a handful of corporations which are in effect, trampling all over the Constitutional rights of ALL citizens and thereby directly threatening the safety and security of the Republic?
Tragically, the fruits of President Obama’s treason against the American people are now reverberating across the entire Planet. I say Treason because it was the zionists that forced this upon the American people in order to silence their growing objections to the wars in the Middle East, the war crimes, crimes against humanity and Genocide by Israel against the Palestinian and Syrian people as countries are turned to rubble. And to suppress the truth about the almost unimaginable and horrific price being extracted from them by the jewish/zionist/pro-israeli lobbies which have a stranglehold on the US government, the Media, the banks, Hollywood and the internet. For it is only recently that the majority of Americans have woken up the fact that these lobbies represent interests that are hell bent on destroying not just their freedoms and way of life but dictating the fate of the entire Nation.
If you don’t like Google’s and/or Youtube’s censorship policies, then don’t use them. I always use http://duckduckgo.com for searching, and http://vimeo.com for video streaming. There are lots of other alternatives. I don’t like the ultra-short message length on Facebook and Twitter, so I never go there. I run a web server with http://palloy.earth on it, so I don’t need a web hosting service. I also run a mail server, so I don’t need to use Gmail or any of the other “free” mail services, which scan my mail looking for anything the NSA is interested in. I would never pay for an Operating System and wouldn’t use one that is not open source.
Do I care whether Ford Fischer is monetized? Guess.
Your view is very short-sighted and misses the point. Corporate censorship is government censorship. And your solution may work fine for you as an individual, but it does not address the subject under discussion. If you think that your individual solution will protect you against government action, you are mistaken. What must be addressed is the societal acceptance of irresponsible and unaccountable corporate decisions that affect millions of people worldwide.
I take ” public transportation ” to get around Zoo York City and I do the puzzles in the newspaper to keep my mind functioning. Every now and then I will see other commuters reading books or magazines; but most of them are gabbing on their cell phones or texting or doing something with their ” electronic gadget “. That is a world that I have never entered because I do not wish to ever be a part of it. ” Being Unplugged ” means that I do not have to endure that part the matrix. At my age serenity is important.
It may give you a quieter life, but if you think that your self-imposed “isolationism” relieves you of your obligation to work against government intrusion into the private live of citizens; if, in fact, you think your self-imposed isolation protects you from encroaching government control, you are not living in the real world. In fact, your concentration on individualism at the expense of society is selfish and unavailing in the long run against the very thing you profess to detest. Serenity is good, but not passivity.
If you had any idea of what this 75 year old man battles against you would have never made that comment. Your assumption is very incorrect to say the least.
yeah, the democraps and the repugnants are still trying to keep the gullible voters in their fast-shrinking system….
I’d love to read a piece by an expansive, forward-looking mind…on the need for key social media, like Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, etc., to become public utilities. They’re too important to be in the hands of greedy private profiteers. They should be paid well…hell, they’ve already been paid well…and should be proud to retire from the field, knowing they have pioneered for humanity an important means of enhancing democracy.
What say you all!?
!
I agree that the social media infrastructure should be a public utility. The advances of science should be available to everyone, not just used as a profit machine for a class of billionaires at the expense of the rest of society. After all, the Internet–the world-wide web–was designed to be just that: available to one and all.
The USA is currently in a true Constitutional crisis because of bureaucratic partisan manipulation of government services at the highest levels of its own government. How about we take a wait and see attitude to see if government by the People and for the People can regain some level of control before dishing ever more power of the People to the ruling elites who control those same partisan bureaucrats?
The real crisis in the USA is that the Deep State has been caught trying to stop Trump, as candidate, President-elect and President. A conspiracy led by Brennan, from Obama down. They thought that Clinton would win and everything be covered up, but shit happens. My fondest wish is that the incarcerations include the hideous Alexander Downer for his bit part in setting up Papadopoulos as part of the efforts to obtain fraudulent FISA Court licences to spy on Trump. PS I loathe Trump, too.
Stop calling other people names, you’re making a fool of yourself.
The truth hurts, eh, ‘Rob’.
Personally, I don’t care too much about being hurt. It’s either bad behavior or there is something in there for me to figure out.
I do care a lot on addressing the War on freedom of speech that Caitlin does so well. Calling people “ Infantile narcissists “ is not the way to go imho. We don’t need (more) emotional exchanges between pro’s and con’s but plans, strategies and lawyers.
check out the individuals who actually make these decisions. they are not Trump or Pompeo or Shanahan. as a group, they are called the Deep State for good reasons.