January 12, 2022

The culture war intensifies. Big Tech embraces cancel culture by its active and increasing censorship of conservatives and those espousing traditional moral values like heterosexual marriage and the sanctity of life.

Before plunging into this important topic and showing why it is a threat to the freedoms we enjoy as Americans, some definitions are in order.

Big Tech 

“Big Tech” commonly refers to the five most dominant information technology companies: Apple, Google (Alphabet), Amazon, Facebook (Meta), and Microsoft. Of these companies, Apple, Google, Amazon, and Facebook have the most influence and control over the messages sent to the American public. I add Twitter to this group because of its vast audience of over 73 million users in the United States.

Cancel Culture

According to Jonathan Noyes at Stand to Reason, cancel culture arbitrarily eliminates rational discussion and debate over important issues.

To cancel someone means to silence them. It means to use power to deplatform them, to demonetize them, or even to get them fired from their jobs because their views are politically incorrect. Notice, it’s not just the ideas that get canceled and discarded, though; the person gets canceled and discarded, too.

How Big Tech Embraces Cancel Culture, Some Examples 

Perhaps the most egregious censorship took place within days of the January 6, 2021 events on Capitol Hill.

It was this time last year Silicon Valley rolled out a long-anticipated purge of political dissidents from the 21st-century digital public square, starting all the way at the top with President Donald Trump. In the aftermath of a two-hour riot at the Capitol, the outgoing president became the most canceled man in America.

Within 48 hours last year, Trump was stripped from Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and [[twitter]]. Shopify pulled the president’s online stores from its platform and YouTube escalated its enforcement against claims of voter fraud.

Soon after, Amazon showed its leftist leanings by removing Ryan Anderson’s excellent book, When Harry Became Sally on February 21, 2021. Fortunately, I already had my copy! You can buy this must-read book by clicking the link.

Amazon, by far the world’s largest bookseller, has until recently promoted itself as an open marketplace of ideas, with all kinds of transgressive and provocative works for sale, including Hitler’s notorious book “Mein Kampf.”

But on February 21, Amazon suddenly removed any trace of When Harry Became Sally, a book published three years ago by Ethics and Public Policy Center President Ryan T. Anderson. Described as “sensitive” and “fair-minded” by professors at top medical schools, the policy treatise takes a traditional stance on the controversial issue of transgenderism.

Google Bans Anti-Abortion Adds 

“At the request of abortion activists, Google has just BANNED all of Live Action’s pro-life ads, including those promoting the Abortion Pill Reversal treatment, a resource that has saved 2,500 children to date,” reads the release.

The ads had been running for the past four months before Google refused to allow them to run, she said, adding that advertising for abortion services continues to be permitted.

“Google has sided squarely with extremist pro-abortion political ideology, banning the pro-life counterpoint and life-saving information from being promoted on their platform.

“This is a blatant, political double standard: Google is ok with ads promoting life-ending drugs, but not life-saving treatments.”

Big Tech Embraces Cancel Culture on Uncomfortable Political Matters

You may remember that Hunter Biden, Joe’s son, and his dealings in Europe and China were potential problems for Joe’s candidacy. Joe didn’t need to worry. The mainstream media and social media soon stepped in to help.

It’s been more than a year since Facebook and Twitter colluded with Democrat-friendly media to censor a story that reflected badly on their preferred candidate less than three weeks before the 2020 election.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey blithely admitted after the election that locking The Post’s account for two weeks on the basis of a non-existent “hacking” offense was a “mistake.”

Big Tech Embraces Cancel Culture—recent examples 

A Congresswoman from Georgia (Republican of course) was recently suspended by Twitter and Facebook. Why? 

On Sunday, Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was permanently suspended from [[twitter]]. Her crime? Sharing statistics from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) maintained by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). According to the New York Times, Greene published a chart from the CDC claiming the data showed “extremely high amounts of COVID vaccine deaths.”

Shortly after Greene was kicked from [[twitter]], the Georgia congresswoman was slapped with a 24-hour suspension on Facebook for a similar alleged violation of the platform’s community standards, i.e., permitted viewpoints. Greene revealed the suspension in a Telegram post Monday morning

Certainly, nefarious goings on here!

Twitter Locks Republican Congressman’s Account, Claims Calling A Man A Man Is ‘Hateful’ ‘Violence’

Twitter locked Republican Study Committee Chairman Jim Banks out of his official account early Saturday morning for a Tuesday tweet observing, “The title of first female four-star officer gets taken by a man” — a reference to transgender federal official Rachel Levine.

Twitter’s ban notification to Banks explained that calling a man a man “violate[s] our rules against hateful conduct.” The Twitter ban statement also claimed accurate descriptions of human biology “promote violence.”

“It’s ridiculous for Twitter to say that acknowledging biological reality is somehow inciting violence,” Banks spokesman Mitchell Hailstone said in a Saturday phone call. Hailstone said Banks is disputing the ban with Twitter. The company did not respond within three hours to an emailed request for comment on the matter.

Twitter Suspends Conservative Blogger Matt Walsh for Saying That Men Are Men–LifeSite 

Just how did Matt sin according to Twitter?

The Daily Wire commentator Matt Walsh was temporarily suspended from Twitter over the weekend for a pair of tweets that accurately identified the biological sex of several “transgender” public figures, and expressed disrespect of prevailing “gender identity” dogma.

“The greatest female Jeopardy champion of all time is a man,” one of the since-quashed tweets read. “The top female college swimmer is a man. The first female four-star admiral in the Public Health Service is a man. Men have dominated female high school track and the female MMA circuit. The patriarchy wins in the end.”

The conservative personality was referring to Jeopardy contestant Amy Schneider, University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas, and Assistant Health & Human Services (HHS) Secretary Rachel Levine, three men with gender dysphoria who have recently enjoyed public accolades for achievements as women despite not actually being women.

For those remarks, Twitter gave Walsh a 12-hour suspension, presumably for allegedly violating the social network’s “Hateful Conduct Policy” prohibiting “targeted misgendering” of “transgender individuals.”

“I just got suspended on Twitter because I pointed out that biological males are men,” Walsh subsequently told Fox News host Tucker Carlson about the situation. “And this, to me, is all a part of the game here. That this is what leftism is. If you criticize it, then they’re gonna shut you down because they realize that they cannot engage intellectually.”

I think this belongs in the “You Can’t Make This Stuff File.”

What do you think? Let me know.

Big Tech Embraces Cancel Culture–The Little Guy Too 

Public figures are not the only ones affected by big tech’s silencing.

Every time I try to post something about the apostate Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), Facebooks blocks me.

Recently, I shared a post about Twitter’s censorship of Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and receive a scolding from Facebook.

Please share your experiences with social media censorship with me in the comments section. 

 

Conclusion 

I agree with this assessment from the Federalist:

The censorship won’t stop. The ideological forces behind it have benefitted too much. It helped land their preferred presidential candidate in the White House. It kept millions of Americans trapped in their homes for months on end to record profits for big business. It’s enabled bad actors to manipulate the public discussion and brand outcasts out of those who fail to follow the predetermined narrative, to detrimental consequences.

Recommended reading

Coming next: Big Tech & Cancel Culture – Consequences