Gina Miller
The evil face of Facebook censorship
By Gina Miller
Listen to an audio version of this column
For many years I resisted joining Facebook. I looked at it with disdain, as nothing more than a do-it-yourself surveillance network, a government spy's treasure trove, which, of course, it is. I finally decided it could also be a useful tool in sharing my columns and networking with fellow patriots. I knew I wouldn't stupidly post information about myself that I didn't want everyone and their dog to know, like photographs of my lunch and when and where I'm away from home at the moment (hello, house burglar!), so I broke down and joined last October.
I quickly learned how the site works, and I also observed the strange way the "news feed" page doesn't seem to make sense, how some stories take off with lots of attention and others of equal or more importance are hardly noticed. You can organize your news feed by "top stories" or "most recent," and I set mine to "most recent," but Facebook keeps changing my setting back to "top stories." Why? I believe it's because Facebook manipulates these "top stories," whatever they consider them to be. It likely manipulates the "most recent" stories, too, by simply omitting some and showing others.
We know that Facebook does manipulate our news feed page. It recently admitted using close to 700,000 users as unwitting guinea pigs in a purported "scientific" study to see how they would react to being flooded with positive or negative posts on their news feeds. Many users were outraged by this. Others, if they were even aware of the study, just shrugged their shoulders, re-closed their eyes and went back to playing Facebook video games and "poking" each other.
When we sign up on Facebook, we should know that it is a company run by liberals. The young CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is a leftist and vocal supporter of Barack Obama (or whatever his name is). That should tell you plenty about where his sympathies lie. Facebook's notorious censorship of conservatives and pro-family advocates comes as no surprise, although it's utterly detestable in a "free" society like ours is supposed to be. I have known people who have had their pro-life, pro-family pages deleted by Facebook without warning or explanation, including Americans for Truth About Homosexuality's Peter LaBarbera, who had his personal page deleted without reason or notification, although the reason was undoubtedly the iron fist of "political correctness," since Pete tells the truth about the immoral, unnatural and unhealthy behavior of homosexuality and its tyrannical, activist movement.
While it may be hard to actually see manipulation of stories on Facebook, because you can't see what's being buried, there are dramatic, obvious examples of Facebook manipulation. One of the biggest ones I know is that of Renew America's Facebook page. Renew America became a co-sponsor and promoter of Conservative Majority PAC's Pledge to Impeach drive to recruit congressmen and the American people to commit to the impeachment and removal from office of the lawless Obama and his collaborators for their anti-constitutional, even treasonous, crimes against the United States.
In his July 7th column, "Is Facebook Blocking RenewAmerica's Impeachment Drive?" President and Editor of Renew America, Stephen Stone, wrote:
Many have lamented the lack of a conservative option to Facebook. Even if someone had the knowledge, money and ability to create and launch such an alternative, the website would be hard-pressed to ever gain the reach that Facebook has. Facebook is simply a powerful behemoth.
As Stephen Stone noted:
Those of us who know the Lord and have studied His Word, know that the future is a horribly dark place of unimaginable tyranny and global, even supernatural, surveillance. We're watching it fall into place more each day. We should not be surprised by any of this, and we're not, although that doesn't mean we don't speak out against it.
Meanwhile, I'll continue to use Facebook until its censors delete my page for containing soon-to-be-outlawed "hate speech," since I speak the truth about their beloved Dear Leader, his evil schemes and the vile agenda of the radical Left.
© Gina Miller
September 4, 2014
Listen to an audio version of this column
For many years I resisted joining Facebook. I looked at it with disdain, as nothing more than a do-it-yourself surveillance network, a government spy's treasure trove, which, of course, it is. I finally decided it could also be a useful tool in sharing my columns and networking with fellow patriots. I knew I wouldn't stupidly post information about myself that I didn't want everyone and their dog to know, like photographs of my lunch and when and where I'm away from home at the moment (hello, house burglar!), so I broke down and joined last October.
I quickly learned how the site works, and I also observed the strange way the "news feed" page doesn't seem to make sense, how some stories take off with lots of attention and others of equal or more importance are hardly noticed. You can organize your news feed by "top stories" or "most recent," and I set mine to "most recent," but Facebook keeps changing my setting back to "top stories." Why? I believe it's because Facebook manipulates these "top stories," whatever they consider them to be. It likely manipulates the "most recent" stories, too, by simply omitting some and showing others.
We know that Facebook does manipulate our news feed page. It recently admitted using close to 700,000 users as unwitting guinea pigs in a purported "scientific" study to see how they would react to being flooded with positive or negative posts on their news feeds. Many users were outraged by this. Others, if they were even aware of the study, just shrugged their shoulders, re-closed their eyes and went back to playing Facebook video games and "poking" each other.
When we sign up on Facebook, we should know that it is a company run by liberals. The young CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is a leftist and vocal supporter of Barack Obama (or whatever his name is). That should tell you plenty about where his sympathies lie. Facebook's notorious censorship of conservatives and pro-family advocates comes as no surprise, although it's utterly detestable in a "free" society like ours is supposed to be. I have known people who have had their pro-life, pro-family pages deleted by Facebook without warning or explanation, including Americans for Truth About Homosexuality's Peter LaBarbera, who had his personal page deleted without reason or notification, although the reason was undoubtedly the iron fist of "political correctness," since Pete tells the truth about the immoral, unnatural and unhealthy behavior of homosexuality and its tyrannical, activist movement.
While it may be hard to actually see manipulation of stories on Facebook, because you can't see what's being buried, there are dramatic, obvious examples of Facebook manipulation. One of the biggest ones I know is that of Renew America's Facebook page. Renew America became a co-sponsor and promoter of Conservative Majority PAC's Pledge to Impeach drive to recruit congressmen and the American people to commit to the impeachment and removal from office of the lawless Obama and his collaborators for their anti-constitutional, even treasonous, crimes against the United States.
In his July 7th column, "Is Facebook Blocking RenewAmerica's Impeachment Drive?" President and Editor of Renew America, Stephen Stone, wrote:
-
On April 15, RenewAmerica's Facebook page dramatically surged to 100,000 fans – after years of being parked around 10,000.
... The obvious reason for the surge in fans was RA's prominent promotion of Obama's constitutionally-required impeachment in article after article, graphic after graphic, spread across our Facebook page and shared with recipients week after week, beginning late last summer.
Within a week after reaching this milestone, our Facebook page grew by another 10,000 fans – an increase of nearly 1,500 a day – and within a month, our page reached 150,000 fans, a phenomenal expansion that continued to increase between 1,000 and 2,000 a day.
All due mainly to RA's aggressive public push for impeaching the most lawless, traitorous president in our country's history. This impeachment push was the only distinguishing thing RA was doing differently that could possibly explain the remarkable escalation of its Facebook page's influence after years of plateauing around 10,000.
The obvious connection between our vocal impeachment effort and our dramatic surge in reach was impossible to dismiss.
Facebook's "Obama brigade" to the rescue
A month after RA's Facebook page reached 100,000 fans – and just days after it surpassed 153,000 – our rate of "likes" began plummeting as precipitously as it had risen. This sudden collapse began noticeably May 14. In the eight weeks since then, the page has gained just 7,000 new fans – dropping from 1,500 new likes a day to just 100 a day, a 93 percent decline.
Many have lamented the lack of a conservative option to Facebook. Even if someone had the knowledge, money and ability to create and launch such an alternative, the website would be hard-pressed to ever gain the reach that Facebook has. Facebook is simply a powerful behemoth.
As Stephen Stone noted:
-
Respected as the world's most popular social media service, Facebook has a duty to its far-reaching community, and to the nation that enabled that community, to be fair and neutral in matters of legitimate politics. Considering that the Constitution prescribes impeachment and removal as the sole remedy to a lawless president, Facebook has no valid justification for squelching vitally important public discourse in a partisan effort to protect an unprecedentedly errant Chief Executive.
... In a truly free country, no subversive bully should be allowed such inordinate sway, without challenge, in the political arena. I call upon Facebook to cease and desist from any appearance – or reality – of interfering with the growing movement to impeach and remove Barack Obama, and let the American people, in ways mandated by the Constitution, decide the man's fate.
Those of us who know the Lord and have studied His Word, know that the future is a horribly dark place of unimaginable tyranny and global, even supernatural, surveillance. We're watching it fall into place more each day. We should not be surprised by any of this, and we're not, although that doesn't mean we don't speak out against it.
Meanwhile, I'll continue to use Facebook until its censors delete my page for containing soon-to-be-outlawed "hate speech," since I speak the truth about their beloved Dear Leader, his evil schemes and the vile agenda of the radical Left.
© Gina Miller
The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
