Purging Today’s Freedom Activists: Why Big Tech’s Censorship Isn’t Directed Solely at Trump Supporters

Celý článek

There’s been a lot of unrest in the U.S. and just before the presidential election’s electoral vote, Big Tech took action and censored a great number of individuals and even competing social media platforms. Moreover, even after President Biden’s first few days in office, social media apps continued to purge dissent. On January 22, Facebook deleted my social media profile, and a former co-worker’s account as well, for our libertarian views.

An Anti-War, Free-Market Libertarian Speaking Out Against Tyranny and Censorship

For many years now I’ve been an activist and years ago, Dr. Ron Paul helped me find libertarianism. At that time, I was a minarchist who believed in a minimalist form of government and the constitution. However, after traveling further down the rabbit hole, by reading the likes of Larkin Rose, Lysander Spooner, and others, I changed. Six months later, I considered myself an anarcho-capitalist. In 2008, I created my Facebook account and since then, even well before I began writing about bitcoin, I amassed a large following.

Years later, in late 2011 into 2012, I discovered bitcoin and three years later, I decided to write about the technology every single day for a profession. For over a decade, I had used Facebook to share my libertarian views, connect with others, and share my bitcoin articles as well. It was in 2020 when things really started to change on the platform. Censorship was taking place regularly, and the company had applied ‘fact-checkers’ that are used to flag alleged ‘fake media.’ I personally never advocated violence, hate, or anything that truly went against community standards.

I did, however, explain on a regular basis that the government is an immoral entity, one that is built upon violence. I was not a Trump fan or a Republican, however, I had shown distaste for Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Obama, Bush, and the rest of the presidential goons. Yes, I regularly told political followers that they had lost all decency by forgetting to be individuals and instead of towing R & D party lines. Many posts I had written also called for opening the economy, letting people decide on whether or not they want to wear a mask, and other topics involving the coronavirus and civil liberties.

Big Tech Censorship Is Not Just Targeting Trump Supporters, but Anyone Who Supports Free Thought and Liberty

Then during the first week of the year, after the Capitol breach in Washington DC, I wrote about the event. My editorial was a scathing critique of Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Google, and Amazon’s decision to censor not only Donald Trump but hundreds of right-wing supporters, conservatives, and libertarians. During that period of time, I had also predicted that my Facebook (FB) profile, in particular, would be axed in due time. I told an old friend from high school that week that I knew that I would be next in line, and two weeks later my prediction came to fruition.

Before my account was deleted, I managed 15 libertarian-based pages, had close to 5,000 friend connections, and moderated six cryptocurrency groups. On Friday morning, the account was completely disabled and was given no access to my FB profile data.

Now, this editorial isn’t a complaint, but more of a documentation of events in order to showcase the fact that the current Big Tech censorship is not just focused on Trump conservatives, but literally anyone with a dissenting opinion against the state. I wasn’t the only one who was purged, as a number of other like-minded individuals who expressed distaste for the current oligarchic rule were also wiped off Facebook on Friday. Sterlin Lujan, a former news.Bitcoin.com contributor, was also purged by Facebook and just like my experience, we were given no reason and no chance to appeal the decision.

“I woke up in the morning and as usual I checked my Facebook page,” Lujan explained to me. “It was still active. I took a restroom break, sat back down at the desk, and my account was logged off. I tried to log back in and it said my account was disabled for violating community standards. I tried to appeal the decision, but I received an auto-response saying I could not appeal my account. This is nothing new for me. I have had issues with Facebook censoring my pages and accounts for a couple of years now. Back in 2018, my Facebook page Psychologic-Anarchist got purged. It had around 50,000 followers, and I have managed other pages that got censored as well,” Lujan added.

Lujan said that many people think only ‘extremists’ are getting the ban hammer. But in reality, anyone who supports free thought and liberty has gotten caught up in their censorial campaigns. The libertarian further stressed that moderators and decision-makers of these social media platforms want people to be carbon copies of each other, uttering the same platitudes and gleefully discussing simple things like the weather.

“My own personal feed was filled with discussions on freedom from government intrusion, the importance of privacy and cryptography, and the power of compassion and love for transforming society into one based on voluntary action rather than coercion,” Lujan emphasized. He further added:

In this regard, I did not break any community standards as they claimed I did. Of course, they did not bother to point out any “wrongdoing.” Facebook, along with other Big Tech social media platforms, are on a crusade to purge people who don’t support big government, political correctness, and communist mentalities. It’s a tragedy, but what’s happening represents all the scary stuff that Orwell chronicled in his book 1984. We are actually living in a much worse dystopian nightmare by comparison.

The Ruling Elite Fears What We Might Say

Currently, the unrest in the U.S. is being suppressed by censorship and the whole principle of censorship is wrong and immoral. The experience has led me to agree with Lujan’s opinion, that this societal system is swelling into a grotesque dystopian nightmare. One where voices are silenced regularly for speaking freely and not adhering to the nation state’s propaganda.

For years now, and just a few weeks before this event, I had written extensively about people migrating to decentralized social media. I am still using Twitter, but have migrated my social media presence to places like noise.cash, Flote, Minds, memo.cash, member.cash, and Peepeth as well. This is the best I can do and we can do, which is just re-build and migrate to decentralized social media that allow free speech and censorship-resistant discussions.

The worst part about the current censorship in the U.S. is the fact that the populace (even friends and family) is sitting idly by watching it all without protest. In fact, many are becoming apologists for censorship and giving excuses to those who produce the suppression. Just like Lujan and the others who have been purged, I was not a Trump supporter and I only spoke my mind about collective tyranny. Yet I was deplatformed because I will never stand down to collective tyranny, and I have promised myself to hold my principles dear.

My main goal is to let you the reader know that this Big Tech censorship is quite real and fascism in the U.S. is thriving. There’s no doubt that this current censorship agenda will continue and freedom activists should be prepared to fight it with whatever voice we have left. As Laurie Halse Anderson once said, “censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance.”

What do you think about my experience with Facebook censorship? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.