Trump Fires Barrage at Social Media Giants Over Censorship, Threatens Action
If you’re a conservative on social media, you may have noticed the discriminatory practices against conservative voices on those platforms.
Not unlike the IRS targeting tea party organizations, conservatives have been targets of censorship by social media giants who have manipulated their platforms to diminish the reach of their message.
You’ve got to give credit where credit is due. Barack Obama was a master at reaching his audience through social media during his presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2012.
It didn’t take long for conservatives to see how effective that venue was, and continues to be, as a campaign tool.
President Donald Trump took it a step farther by using Twitter to usurp the liberal media. He not only used Twitter during his 2016 campaign, but continues to voice his opinion on policy and other topics to over 53 million followers without a mainstream media spin.
However, since Trump’s election, those liberal social media giants seemingly have an issue with opposing views taking advantage of their platforms.
In July, the president made comments about Twitter’s “shadow banning” of Republicans and promised to investigate it further.
“We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once!” he wrote.
“When a person is shadow banned, their posts on a platform are rendered essentially invisible to everyone but themselves,” The New York Times reported. “Their experience using a site may not change — they feel like they are still posting normally — but other people cannot see the material they produce, said Monica Stephens, a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo who studies social media.”
“‘Shadow banning is when you are algorithmically being kind of shut down, and that often has to do with, particularly, the content that you are posting,’ Ms. Stephens said. ‘Maybe it doesn’t violate the terms of service, but they make it so other people can’t see that content,'” The Times continued. “The benefit of this, from the perspective of an online community, is that if a user does not realize they have been shadow banned, then they are less likely to just open a new account and use that one to continue their unwanted behavior.”
While Twitter has denied shadow banning or censoring conservatives, the president believes otherwise.
On Saturday morning, Trump fired off a string of tweets directed at “social media,” blasting them for silencing his supporters and others on the right.
“Social Media is totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices. Speaking loudly and clearly for the Trump Administration, we won’t let that happen. They are closing down the opinions of many people on the RIGHT, while at the same time doing nothing to others,” Trump wrote.
“Censorship is a very dangerous thing & absolutely impossible to police,” he continued. If you are weeding out Fake News, there is nothing so Fake as CNN & MSNBC, & yet I do not ask that their sick behavior be removed. I get used to it and watch with a grain of salt, or don’t watch at all.”
“Too many voices are being destroyed, some good & some bad and that can not be allowed to happen,” Trump said in his final tweet on the matter. “Who is making the choices because I can already tell you that too many mistakes are being made. Let everybody participate, good & bad, and we will all just have to figure it out!”
…..Censorship is a very dangerous thing & absolutely impossible to police. If you are weeding out Fake News, there is nothing so Fake as CNN & MSNBC, & yet I do not ask that their sick behavior be removed. I get used to it and watch with a grain of salt, or don’t watch at all..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 18, 2018
….Too many voices are being destroyed, some good & some bad, and that cannot be allowed to happen. Who is making the choices, because I can already tell you that too many mistakes are being made. Let everybody participate, good & bad, and we will all just have to figure it out!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 18, 2018
Politico reported that the Trump administration is already taking action to look into the problem:
“Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is slated to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee to discuss Russian election interference, along with executives from Facebook and Google, on Sept. 5,” Politico reported. “Staff of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have raised the possibility of subpoenaing Dorsey to testify before the panel on the company’s data and content policies, according to a source familiar with the discussion.”
On Friday, the Trump administration also charged Facebook with violating housing discrimination laws, a charge the company has denied.
Twitter, Facebook and Google are all private companies and can initiate any kind of policies that they want in their business plans — but when a company has so much power to determine which voices are silenced and which are not, we’re in very dangerous territory.
Conservatives won’t give up their voice without a fight.
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