Trump told Reuters, "I won’t mention names but when they take certain people off of Twitter or Facebook and they’re making that decision, that is really a dangerous thing because that could be you tomorrow."
Censorship is a dangerous thing
President Trump has spoken out about the censorship of conservative voices on social media before. In a series of tweets from August 18, Trump admonished social media companies for "totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices."
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.......
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 18, 2018
"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..," the President said via Twitter.
.....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
Trump added that "too many voices are being destroyed, some good & some bad, and that cannot be allowed to happen..."
....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
Trump's criticism of social media censorship followed the blatant silencing of Alex Jones and InfoWars. Apple, Spotify, Facebook and YouTube all banned Jones and his website within just 12 hours of each other -- and many other, smaller social network sites joined in on the censorship thereafter. Twitter ultimately succumbed to peer pressure and reportedly suspended Alex Jones' account on August 15.
Silencing conservatives
Even though representatives from companies like Facebook say they do not moderate content based on political leanings, there is evidence to the contrary. LifeSiteNews, for example, recently reported that Facebook banned their pro-life ads. After jumping through endless hoops to get their ad up-and-running, a Facebook rep eventually told LifeSite that their pro-life message was probably "too offensive" for the social media site, and that it "may be that the topic of choice for your Ads is what is being disapproved.”
The Facebook rep reportedly said, "I definitely understand what you are referring to, but more than likely the topic you are speaking of may offend some, or Facebook finds they would rather not allow that type of Advertising at this time.”
“Perhaps Facebook would rather remain neutral as they would not want to offend either side. While you do have authorization to run Ads, perhaps this topic might be the cause of those disapproval,” the reply continued. LifeSiteNews noted that ads for Planned Parenthood, some of which were politically aggressive and called out pro-life legislators by name, were allowed to run during the same time frame -- clearly some partisan views are more "allowable" than others, at least in the Facebook hive-mind.
See more coverage of stories about political bias and social media at Censored.news.
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