Category Archives: Censorship

A controversial bill that would allow parents to have online access to what their children are learning in public schools won passage on Wednesday in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives.

The bill, which if enacted would take effect starting next school year, would provide information about curriculum, including the academic standard to be achieved, instructional materials, course syllabus, and assessment techniques.

With its approval by the House on a 110-89 vote with all Democrats and three Republicans opposing, the bill now goes to the Senate for consideration.

The measures sponsor, Rep. Andrew Lewis, R-Dauphin County, said he seeks to standardize a practice already happening in some districts in the commonwealth that makes it easy for parents to annually review a schools curriculum materials, rather than having to visit a school or administrative building to see them.

The bill would apply to school districts, career and technical centers, charter schools and intermediate units.

It simply brings our state into the 21st Century by making sure that especially in an environment of remote learning, parents can access the information that theyre entitled to [by state law] online, Lewis said.

Pa. Rep. Andrew Lewis, R-Dauphin County, referred to his bill requiring the posting of curriculum materials online as bringing the state into the 21st Century but one critic called it "an invitation to censorship."Oct. 6, 2021Screenshot from Pa. House of Representatives website

Republicans have touted the bill as a tool for transparency. But critics said it placed an unnecessary burden on school officials and suggested hidden motives are at play in this measure.

This bill will drag education right into the middle of the culture wars, said Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Allegheny County, Your neighbor, her grandfather in Florida, your crazy uncle and his best friend in California can all weigh in on what the schools are teaching your child. Lets be clear.

Frankel said teachers are happy to share with parents what their children are supposed to learn and parents also could ask their children directly about it.

This bill isnt about transparency for parents, Frankel said. Its about bringing the fights that get started on Fox News to the kindergarten classroom near you. ... This legislation is an invitation to the book burners and anti-maskers to harass our schools and our teachers.

Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, D-Philadelphia, picked up on that point, saying he sees it as having the potential to intensify threats and violence against teachers and school administrators already under fire over masking requirements and other matters.

It encourages certain factions in our country to be emboldened and to continue to spread lies about what is happening in our classrooms, Kenyatta said.

Rep. Aaron Bernstine, R-Butler County, countered those arguments, saying, There will be no lies because information will specifically be online so people can see it.

Referring to the bills critics, Bernstine said, Theres no reason to hide if theres nothing to be scared of.

Since broadband access is still limited in areas of the state, though, Rep. Mike Sturla, D-Lancaster County, said the only people who will be able to view the curriculum in those districts are those who are outside those areas. Secondly, he faulted the bill for failing to include private schools that receive public funding through various state programs.

This is a bad bill even if it did include those things, Sturla said. This is simply an attack on public education, plain and simple.

Lewis said the bill puts the responsibility for placing the curriculum and instructional materials online on the chief school administrator or a designee, not teachers. However, opponents argued teachers will be the ones who have to gather that information together and insisted it will be a burden for them.

The Pennsylvania School Boards Association and other public school advocacy organizations have opposed the bill.

This mandate would amount to a crushing level of work for educators at a time when they are navigating in-person instruction, addressing student learning delays, and meeting students needs during a global pandemic, said Rich Askey, president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association. Its an absolutely unnecessary distraction from what is really important teaching kids.

Among other concerns, Askey and Rep. Mark Longietti, D-Mercer County, said the bill raises questions related to the posting of copy-written materials, quizzes and tests online.

Sharon Ward, senior policy advisor of the Education Law Center, agreed with opponents that the bill is burdensome and unnecessary.

We are also concerned that the bill invites censorship in the guise of transparency, Ward said.

The bill was amended on Tuesday to require schools to update curriculum information each time a new or revised curriculum is used within 30 days of its approval.

Jan Murphy may be reached at jmurphy@pennlive.com. Follow her on Twitter at @JanMurphy.

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Pa. schools may be required to post their curriculum online. Is it about transparency or censorship? - PennLive

The recently proposed Conway School Board policy to silence parents is just another anti-American act of censorship from a cabal of out-of-control Conway school board members that include, Joe Lentini, Jessica Whitelaw, Joe Mosca, and Dr. Michelle Capozzoli. These people should never be elected again.

This same policy was rejected by the SAU 9 board recently. This is a very dangerous policy that sets the stage for further censorship from our locally elected officials.

In a lame excuse to defend the policy, Lentini stated that the meetings are contentious, and that people are not showing up. The real issue is that very few people previously attended and now this cabal does not want to take any criticism from an energized and passionate group of parents.

The Suns Sept. 30 article stated that Lentini helped craft the policy, which is highly doubtful and was allegedly borrowed from the New Hampshire School Board Association, a membership lobbying organization that rejects parents rights in favor of school boards.

Nevertheless, if Lentini did help craft this draconian censorship policy it was poorly written, where the proposed policy prohibits, obscene, libelous, and defamatory statements. If further allows the board chair to terminate the speakers privilege to speak based on the chairpersons definition of such.

Nonetheless, Lentinis proposed censorship policy is perplexing in that it prohibits libel, which according to Blacks Law Dictionary is a Defamatory statement published through any manner or media. Accordingly, my act of writing and publishing this letter could be considered defamatory and libelous according to Lentinis distorted assessment, and my and other constituents privilege to speak could be terminated.

This is a tyrannical rule organized by board chair Lentini who clearly stated on a public meeting online that he and others should not have to listen to parents. Lentinis hubris meter is now maxed-out at 100 percent, and it is unclear why he is still in this elected position when he doesnt want to hear from constituents.

Public officials cannot shield themselves from bona fide public criticism, no matter how hard they try, this has been upheld in the landmark New York Times v. Sullivan case. It is time for Lentini, Capozzoli, Mosca, and Whitelaw to take a refresher course in American Civics and First Amendment free speech.

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Kevin Clifford: School board silencing parents is just another act of censorship - Conway Daily Sun

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Last week, Amazon.com prohibited ads on its website promoting the bestselling book BLM: The Making of a New Marxist Revolution, a deep-dive into Black Lives Matter (BLM) organizations and their agenda to tear down Americas institutions and replace them with their version of a Marxist Utopia.

When The Heritage Foundation attempted to place ads to promote Heritage Senior Fellow Mike Gonzalezs BLM expos, Amazon said that the ad we created didnt comply with its Creative Acceptance Policies because it contains book/s or content that is not allowed. Content that revolves around controversial or highly debated social topics is not permitted.

Using that absurd standard, one of the worlds largest booksellers apparently wouldnt allow ads for the biggest bestseller in historythe Biblea book that stirs incredible debate and is considered controversial by those who dont believe it. Nor could anyone advertise books pro or con about federal spending, welfare, climate change, abortion, or COVID-19, for that matter.

Mr. Gonzalezs book is critically important to the debates were having in America today over racial issues, the teaching of American history, and our American identity. The book delves deeply into the backgrounds of the BLM leaders, showing them to be avowed Marxists who say they want to dismantle our Constitution, our social institutions, and our very way of life. They use social media to spread their message and organize not just marches and sit-ins but riots that have been exceedingly destructive, violent, and even deadly.

Americans deserve to know the difference between genuinely saying black lives matter and the radical Marxists behind the Black Lives Matter organizations who want to overturn society and sow deep divisions among the American people.

Thats why Heritage appealed Amazons decision and issued a forceful public statement in response. Amazon subsequently reversed its decision and will allow the paid promotion of the book to move forward.

An Amazon spokesperson said that the original decision to ban the promotion resulted from human error, not an automated decision by a computer or algorithm. While I appreciate the reversal of such an egregious decision, this incident is consistent with the trend of Big Tech companies to suppress conservative speech they disagree with.

The fact that this was the result of human error further demonstrates the need for Big Tech companies to establish clear and consistent rules and policies and then implement them fairly across the board. Private companies certainly have the right to pick and choose what products are advertised and sold on their platforms. But too often, these companies have vague and very subjective rules. They inconsistently enforce those rules to censor viewpoints they disagree with, and they lack genuine recourse for users who are suspended from their platforms and services.

Although Amazon reversed its decision, it apparently has the no controversial or highly debated social topics standard in writing that one of its employees was enforcing.

This episode is a reminder that while sometimes Big Tech can be pressured to respond in some instances of content suppression, there are many more instances where those without resources or a large enough public profile simply have to live with the arbitrary decisions made by these companies.

And its not just censorship. Some companies are prohibiting conservatives from using their digital services like banking, digital payments, email delivery, and online fundraising when their only sin is to have a political viewpoint that differs from the generally leftist viewpoint of Big Tech.

Thats why researchers at The Heritage Foundations Center for Technology Policy continue to recommend legislative and regulatory solutions to ensure that these companies are held accountable when they unfairly suppress speech or deny services. While respecting the private property rights of such companies, Heritage has put forward solutions to limit the nearly unchecked power of Big Tech and make them more accountable to the American people.

Those solutions include targeted reforms of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which gives these companies certain legal protections when hosting user-published content on their platforms. Other solutions include organizing grassroots efforts to push for transparency from tech companies and ultimately encouraging the creation of alternative tech products and services that dont discriminate.

Examples of Big Tech censorship are inescapable and irrefutable. Sometimes they are brazen and outright; other times, they are dressed up in vague platitudes about objectionable content. But the outcome is still the samevoices that these left-leaning companies dont agree with are deemed unacceptable and are silenced.

Big Techs influence over everyday American life continues to grow. We must establish clear standards for how these companies behaveand mechanisms to hold them accountable when they dont.

Rob Bluey is vice president of communications for The Heritage Foundation and executive editor of The Daily Signal.

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Big Tech's conservative censorship inescapable and irrefutable - Washington Times

Facebook is disputing the claim that it provided President Trump and his campaign more editorial leeway ahead of the 2020 election as part of a deal to avoid new federal regulation.

The newest tussle is part of a larger battle Facebook is fighting with critics who say they have evidence that Facebook applies different rules for politicians and VIPs than it does for the regular posters using its platforms. Answers about how Facebooks censorship regime developed in the run-up to its ban of then-President Trump earlier this year could prove critical to regulatory and policy decisions debated by federal lawmakers and affect Mr. Trumps lawsuit against Facebook over his ban.

Author Max Chafkin is claiming Mr. Trumps fingerprints were on Facebooks decision not to fact-check political speech before the 2020 election. Mr. Trump, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Jared Kushner Mr. Trumps son-in-law and billionaire tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel huddled in private at the White House in 2019 and hatched a plan, according to Mr. Chafkin, author of The Contrarian a book about Mr. Thiel.

The specifics of the discussion were secret but Thiel later told a confidant that Zuckerberg came to an understanding with Kushner during the meal, wrote Mr. Chafkin for New York Magazines website. Facebook, he promised, would continue to avoid fact-checking political speech thus allowing the Trump campaign to claim whatever it wanted. If the company followed through on that promise, the Trump administration would lay off on any heavy-handed regulations.

Facebook is dismissing the allegation as nonsense.

The policy was announced before this dinner ever took place, Andy Stone, Facebook spokesperson, said on Twitter.

Mr. Stone said the policy developed over the course of a year before that meal, citing a September 2019 Facebook statement and a 2018 report in The Washington Post as evidence that Mr. Zuckerberg did not concoct a secret plan over a meal with Mr. Trump.

Regardless of when Facebook decided to treat political speech differently than other forms of online speech, the companys critics are already up in arms about how it treats various users differently.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Facebook engaged in whitelisting exempting select people from its enforcement actions online. An internal review of Facebooks whitelisting behavior found it indefensible, according to the Journal, despite Facebook employing the practice to address prominent accounts.

Facebook says critics fundamentally misunderstand its rules.

Dan Gainor, vice president at the conservative Media Research Center, criticized Facebooks whitelisting practices but does not believe the social media giant is alone.

As for whitelisting, it seems obvious they do it in some formal way, [b]ut all of the major social media companies treat some posters differently than others, Mr. Gainor said in a message. Its awful, inconsistent and not even transparent. I just dont think Facebook is the only one giving certain users special treatment.

Facebooks rules, however, are under more scrutiny than other tech platforms because of how lawmakers and regulators have taken aim at its platforms. For example, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois Democrat, wrote to Mr. Zuckerberg on Monday to request all documents regarding suspected human trafficking using Facebook and Instagram accounts.

While the CEOs of tech companies routinely receive letters from disgruntled lawmakers, Mr. Krishnamoorthi leads a subcommittee on economic and consumer policy within the House Committee on Oversight and Reform with considerable say over regulation for the social media companies.

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Facebook denies it withheld censorship under Trump to avoid regulation - Washington Times

United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), along with Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Ron Johnson (R-WI), and Roger Marshall (R-KS), on Wednesday, July 28 introduced the Disclose Government Censorship Act, which seeks to end the government-directed speech suppression and viewpoint censorship the White House recently revealed in stating that it routinely urges Big Tech companies to remove the speech of Americans that the government deems inaccurate or unhelpful.

The recent collusion that has come to light between the Biden Administration and Big Tech is not only disturbing, but inconsistent with the governments constitutional role in American life, Sen. Hagerty said. The purpose of the First Amendment is to prevent government from suppressing speech with which it disagrees.

If the federal government is attempting to end-run the Constitution by secretly working with tech platforms to censor Americans speech, then the American people deserve to know. Requiring transparency will ensure that the government cannot work secretly to censor Americans.

Sen. Rubio added, No government should pressure social media companies into censoring their users legal speech. That is particularly true for our own government. This legislation will require transparency from governments, including the Biden Administration, when they collude with Big Tech and silence Americans in the process.

And Sen. Johnson said, Big Tech, the mainstream media, and the Administration have no credibility in determining what is and isnt misinformation. Im pleased to co-sponsor Senator Hagertys legislation that aims to provide transparency regarding this administrations actions and prevent Big Tech and Big Government from colluding to censor the free speech of Americans.

Sen. Marshall added, Theres a reason that our founding fathers had the wisdom to enshrine the right to free speech as our first freedom, because its fundamental to the health of our democracy. Government must not be in the business of picking and choosing who gets to speak up or what can be said in the public sphere, and this bill ensures transparency in any efforts to censor opinions with which they disagree.

To provide transparency regarding these censorship efforts, the Disclose Government Censorship Act requires Executive and Legislative Branch employees to publicly disclose on an easily accessible website any communications with technology platforms regarding action or potential action by the platforms to restrict speech, with the exception of communications for a legitimate law enforcement or national security purpose.

This legislation also establishes a cooling-off period during which government employees who engage with Big Tech platforms to censor Americans speech cannot turn around and lobby the government on behalf of such platforms, in order to prevent conflicts of interest that create the potential for increased censorship.

In April, Hagerty introduced the 21st Century FREE Speech Act, which would (1) abolish Section 230s license to censor, (2) treat the largest Big Tech platforms like common carriers that must provide reasonable, nondiscriminatory access to all consumers to prevent political, religious, or other censorship, and (3) require Big Tech platforms to disclose their content management and moderation practices to users, so that consumers can better understand and assess the information they receive.

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Legislation seeks to end government collusion with Big Tech to censor - Kingsport Times News

A group of social media companies and their leaders have asked the Miami, Florida federal court overseeing the cases filed against them by former president Donald Trump and several other social media users to move the lawsuits to the Northern District of California. Twitter Inc. moved to transfer the case pending against it earlier this month on similar grounds, that its terms of service mandate that litigation filed against it take place in the proposed transferee district.

The July-filed complaints allege that the platforms illegally censored the plaintiffs in violation of federal law and the U.S. Constitution, as previously reported. In Facebooks filing, the company notes several procedural pitfalls plaguing the lawsuit, including the plaintiffs failure to serve either the company or its CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook also recounts how the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint that added two Florida law claims for unfair business practices in addition to its allegations that Facebook and Zuckerberg violated the First Amendment by censoring protected speech. The lawsuit also claims that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act incentivized Facebook and Mr. Zuckerberg to deplatform and censor Plaintiffs, and so is unconstitutional, according to last weeks motion.

Both transfer requests note at their outset that the cases are legally baseless and should be dismissed. They argue that the companies terms of service forum selection clauses govern where lawsuits may take place, and that place is the Northern District of California.

Facebook first contends that its mandatory forum-selection clause is valid, explaining that the plaintiffs cannot meet their heavy burden of showing that enforcement would be unreasonable. The claims also fall within the ambit of the clauses broad scope, Facebook asserts. Finally, the motion claims that no extraordinary circumstances justify rejecting the agreement that the plaintiffs entered into when they signed up to use Facebook.

In their motion to transfer venue to the same district, YouTube and defendant Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google LLC, YouTubes parent company, make similar arguments in favor of transfer based upon YouTubes term of service and its binding forum selection clause.

Facebook is represented by White & Case LLP and Kirkland & Ellis LLP, YouTube by Stearns Weaver Miller Weissler Alhadeff & Sitterson P.A. and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, and Twitter by Homer Bonner and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr.

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Facebook and YouTube Join Twitter, Requesting Transfer of Censorship Cases to NDCA - Law Street Media

The big-name social media companies have all done a ratheratrocious jobof moderating user speech on their platforms. However, much like Florida's similarlyunconstitutionalattempt to address the issue (S.B. 7072), Texas' recently enactedH.B. 20would make the matter worse for Texans and everyone else.

Signed into law by Governor Abbott last week, the Texas law prohibits platforms with more than 50 million users nationwide from moderating user posts based on viewpoint or geographic location. However, as we stated in ourfriend-of-the-court briefin support of NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Associations lawsuit challenging Florida's law (NetChoice v. Moody), "Every court that has considered the issue, dating back to at least 2007, has rightfully found that private entities that operate online platforms for speech and that open those platforms for others to speak enjoy a First Amendment right to edit and curate that speech."

Inconsistent and opaque content moderation by online media services is a legitimate problem. It continues to result in the censorship of a range of important speech, often disproportionately impacting people who arent elected officials. That's why EFF joined with a cohort of allies in 2018 to draft theSanta Clara Principles on Transparency and Accountability in Content Moderation, offering one model for how platforms can begin voluntarily implementing content moderation practices grounded in a human rights framework. Under the proposed principles, platforms would:

H.B. 20 does attempt to mandate some of the transparency measures called for in the Santa Clara Principles. Although these legal mandates might be appropriate as part of a carefully crafted legislative scheme, H.B. 20 is not the result of a reasonable policy debate. Rather it is a retaliatory law aimed at violating the First Amendment rights of online services in a way that will ultimately harm all internet users.

We fully expect that once H.B. 20 is challenged, courts will draw from the wealth of legal precedent and find the law unconstitutional. Perhaps recognizing that H.B. 20 is imperiled for the same reasons as Floridas law, the Lonestar State this week filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the appeal of a federal courts ruling that Floridas law is unconstitutional.

Despite Texas and Floridas laws being unconstitutional, the concerns regarding social media platforms' control on our public discourse is a critical policy issue. It is vitally important that platforms take action to provide transparency, accountability, and meaningful due process to all impacted speakers and ensure that the enforcement of their content guidelines is fair, unbiased, proportional, and respectful of human rights.

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Texas' Social Media Law is Not the Solution to Censorship - EFF

Censorship is the theme of this years Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival, but the four-day event has also turned out to be about resilience.

Those involved this year have determinedly created art through a pandemic with the many off-Cape artists waiting a year to be able to travel to present their work and some have faced the fears and challenges of a hurricane, too.

The Mahagonny Songspiel, written by Bertolt Brecht with music by Kurt Weill, will be presented with music and puppetry each day of the Sept. 23-26 annual event by members of AllWays Lounge in Exile from New Orleans.

Final rehearsals to bring the show north to Provincetown to celebrate playwright Williams had just begun last month when Hurricane Ida hit Louisiana, according to festival co-founder/curator David Kaplan.

They continued to rehearse, in rehearsal space without electricity and running water, going home to places without electricity and running water, he says. I thought (the show) might have to be canceled … but Dennis (Monn), the director, said no, (readying for the Williams festival) is what is giving them a sense of purpose.

Theyre doing something. Theyre not passively enduring a hurricane. Theyre creating something … and looking forward to coming to Provincetown and showing what theyve got, Kaplan says.

Here, the production had to be moved outside because of COVID-19 concerns as have most of the presentations and the festival is providing a keyboard and drum kit to replace what was destroyed in New Orleans. The theater company has been indefatigable, Kaplan marvels. Its been very inspiring. … Its heroic. They deserve support.

The complex musical score the group will perform is described as Hitlers least favorite collection of songs. Brechts tangos, love ballads and musical commentary are part of a fable of innocence that addresses a morally bankrupt society. The reaction at its 1927 premiere nearly a century ago? Nazi and Communist sympathizers blew whistles to stop it.

As part of telling that history of trying to censor thought, AllWays Lounge will be handing out whistles to the Provincetown audience, too.

Thats just one of numerous creative ways productions in the festival will explore and create conversations about the Tennessee Williams & Censorship theme. Thats the same focus as 2020 when organizers managed to put on a much smaller, outdoor event but the emphasis has changed from Puritans and writer Williams battle with censors.

In 2021, were discussing when, if ever, censorship is appropriate, Kaplan said when he announced the season.

The festival will include four plays by Williams, who spent a few summers in the 1940s in Provincetown and wrote some of his best-known work there, including The Glass Menagerie.

The festival will include Williams 1940 Battle of Angels, the run of which was cut short by Boston censors, presented by Blessed Unrest, a subversive physical theater ensemble from New York City. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Department of Theatre will present Why Did Desdemona Love the Moor?, an unfinished short story by Williams in which a Black screenwriter in 1940s Hollywood has a secret affair with his films white leading lady, a piece never produced because of the interracial relationship.

Back this year will be The Municipal Abattoir, which Kaplan staged last year on a dune as a Hitchcock-inspired thriller. The Philadelphia-based Die-Cast ensemble will explore The Demolition Downtown, a pointedly political short play by Williams in which a suburban family shuts themselves up in their house as explosions rock their countrys capital.

Other shows presented will include the Longing Lasts Longer rock manifesto by Penny Arcade (with a connected interactive workshop) confronting cultural amnesia as a form of censorship. A Sex play from 1926 that got Mae West thrown in jail will be produced by international ensemble The Goat Exchange, during a Tea Dance at The Boatslip Resort and Beach Club.

The Witch is a satire based on a 1616 drama by Thomas Middleton, with an all-female cast from the Outer Cape group Campfire Quorum playing women from the Pilgrim ship Mayflower.

Beyond live performances, there will also be workshops, parties and educational programming, all connected to Williams and the censorship theme. One-time events will be a Tennessees Latest Peep Show burlesque show bump and grind response to censorship by Lefty Lucy who also had to rehearse from a damaged New Orleans home; and a Cut Blanche interactive censoring display of the 1951 film of A Streetcar Named Desire, led by the former festival executive director Jef Hall-Flavin.

Beyond censorship, a pandemic and a hurricane, Kaplan adds the countrys political divide to the challenges that artists involved with the festival and beyond have to face. While some left-leaning people are angry or dismissive these days of people in conservative southern states, Kaplan said its important to think about the artists and others living in those states who dont agree with politicians stands on controversial topics and actions.

It is significant that we have a Tennessee Williams festival in New England, and not just in Mississippi (where Williams was born) and New Orleans (where he spent much of his later years) because he is an American writer, Kaplan says. We dont need to allow politicians and other people to define American identity for us. We can have our artists both dead and alive and future help to identify American identity. … We share this American cultural figure.

In New England, he says, we have an obligation … to recognize and help support those people in the South who are struggling to be heard, and that includes artists.

Noting that a group from Texas Tech University has been part of the Williams festival for years, Kaplan says, No matter how we feel about the governor of Texas, thats not the point. Not everyone in Texas feels that way and we want to encourage the people in Texas with whom we have common interests to come celebrate, and meet each other.

Then he adds with a laugh: And conspire.

Contact Kathi Scrizzi Driscoll at kdriscoll@capecodonline.com. Follow on Twitter: @KathiSDCCT.

What: The 16th annual Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival

When: Sept. 23-26

Where: Various venues around town

Tickets and information: twptown.org and 866-789-8366

COVID-19 protocols: Most performances will be outdoors or under tents with open sides. For indoor shows, a vaccination card or negative PCR test is needed for admission. Masks and social distancing required at all shows.

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'It's heroic': Tennessee Williams theater fest goes on despite a pandemic and a hurricane - Cape Cod Times

WASHINGTONEarlier this week, The Heritage Foundation was informed that Amazon would not support paid promotion of Heritage Senior Fellow Mike Gonzalezs expos on the Black Lives Matter movement, BLM: The Making of a New Marxist Revolution. Amazon declared promotion of the book no longer complies with our current Creative Acceptance Policies because it contains book/s or content that is not allowed. Content that revolves around controversial or highly debated social topics is not permitted. In other words, Heritage viewpoints were effectively being censored.

Heritage appealed the decision earlier this week, giving Amazon well beyond its own stated response time before issuing a forceful statement Thursday morning. Amazon subsequently reversed its decision and will allow paid promotion of Gonzalezs book to move forward. Importantly, an Amazon spokesperson told The Daily Signals Fred Lucas that the original decision banning promotion was the result of human error, not an automated decision by a computer or algorithm.

Heritage Foundation President Kay C. James said:

While we appreciate Amazon reversing this egregious decision, this incident is consistent with the trend of Big Tech companies to suppress conservative speech they disagree with. Thats why The Heritage Foundations Center for Technology Policy continues to monitor Big Tech companies and recommend legislative and regulatory solutions to ensure that they are held accountable when they unfairly suppress speech, especially speech that encourages healthy debate on the critical issues that America faces.

Amazons original stated reason for suspending the ad included that it does not allow content that revolves around controversial or highly debated social topics. Using that standard, one of the worlds largest booksellers apparently wouldnt allow ads for the biggest bestseller in historythe Bible.

Kara Frederick, research fellow in Heritages Center for Technology Policy, released the following statement upon learning of Amazons reversal:

This episode is a reminder that while sometimes Big Tech can be pressured to respond in certain cases of wrongdoing, there are so many more instances where those without the resources or large-enough public profile simply have to live with the arbitrary decisions made by these companies. The fact that this was the result of human error further demonstrates the need for Big Tech companies to establish clear, sensible, and consistent rules and policies, and then implement those rules and policies fairly across the board. They also must be willing to publicly admit mistakes when they do occur, whether intentional or not. Big Techs influence over everyday American life continues to grow. Its vital that we establish clear standards for how these companies behave, and mechanisms to hold them accountablewhen they dont.

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Heritage Pressure Leads to Amazon's Reversing Censorship Decision - Heritage.org

By Phil Lawler (bio - articles - email) | Sep 17, 2021

In todays Wall Street Journal, my friend Tom Spence, president of Regnery Publishing (which brought out my book Lost Shepherd), lets loose on Banned Books Week. He explains that this gimmicky promotion caters primarily to those who believe that schoolchildren should have access to anything bound between two covers without the interference of those busybodies we call parents.

Unfortunately, Spence observes, there are books being banned todayalthough the sponsors of Banned Books Week have nothing to say about it. Books that offend against woke attitudes and politically-correct standards are disappearing from bookstores and from the Amazon menu. Authors are cancelled. Lecturers are disinvited.

Such censorship hurts the authors, of course. But it also hurts the rest of us, their potential readers, because we never have a chance to learn what they have to say. We dont even know what we dont know.

The censorship is not confined to written works alone, however. The social-media giants, Facebook and Twitter, are even more blatant in stifling the views that their employees find offensive. How often have you seen a fact-check pasted onto a controversial postand, if you took the time to investigate, discovered that the fact-check was far more misleading than the post it sought to correct.

An urban television news team recently issued an appeal on Facebook, asking for stories about unvaccinated people who had been felled by Covid. That Facebook page was promptly flooded with thousands of replies. But the vast majority of those replies were not giving the reporters what they wanted; instead they were telling stories about friends and relatives who had been harmed by the Covid injections, or had contracted Covid even after being fully vaccinated. Clearly this response was not what the TV news editors expected. Still, isnt it a story nonetheless?

News editorslike publishers and librarians and bookstore owners and social-media baronshave enormous power to sway public opinion. They exercise that power not only by putting their own slant on news stories, but alsofar more ominouslyby censoring the stories they find inconvenient. You cannot be outraged by an injustice, or encouraged by a positive development, if you dont hear about them.

Mistrust of the mass media is widespread in our society today. Many Americans say that they dont believe what they hear from the mainstream media. That skepticism is richly deserved, and for the most part healthy. Still a problem remains. You may not believe what you see in the mainstream media, but what about what you dont see? You dont know what you dont know.

This is why, for more than 30 years now, I have been insisting that discerning readers need to find their own trusted sources of news. If you know that the mainstream media are offering slanted coverage of some stories, and blacking out other stories altogether, you need to find outlets that will provide accurate reporting on the subjects that interest you. Which is I why I established Catholic World News, 25 years ago, and why I want you all to encourage your loyal Catholic friends to discover us.

Phil Lawler has been a Catholic journalist for more than 30 years. He has edited several Catholic magazines and written eight books. Founder of Catholic World News, he is the news director and lead analyst at CatholicCulture.org. See full bio.

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Here's how to beat liberal censorship of ideas - Catholic Culture