White House press secretary Jen Psaki recently admitted that the Biden Administration has helped Facebook censor posts about COVID-19 that contain “misinformation.” She said that the government began playing a larger role in helping police social media posts after Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on the companies to “purge” pandemic posts. While health and government officials continue to contradict themselves on key issues, there have been talks of even more censorship on the Big Tech platforms.
“We are in regular touch with the social media platforms and those engagements typically happen through members of our senior staff and also members of our COVID-19 team — given as Dr. Murthy conveyed, this is a big issue, of misinformation, specifically on the pandemic,” Psaki said.
She went on to say that they’ve increased their disinformation research for flagging “problematic posts” on Facebook that spread disinformation. She emphasized that they were helping “boost” trusted content and get people accurate information through the COVID-19 community cord.
Psaki said there were about 12 people producing 65% of the anti-vax information and that they remain active on Facebook. She warned that social media companies needed to “move quickly” to remove such posts.
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said “false, misleading, or inaccurate information” is one of the biggest obstacles to ending the pandemic and that it has led to violence against public health workers. He said that limiting the spread of health misinformation is a “moral and civic imperative” that will require a whole-of-society effort. Social media platforms responded by trying to redesign their algorithms and increase the staff monitoring for “false content.”
But social media users have argued back that it’s not up to Jen Psaki and the Biden Administration to decide what’s “problematic” for everyone. Censoring Americans on Facebook over “disinformation” is the next step of how a tyrannical government treats its citizens. Disinformation for some is true for others. Take face masks for example. The evidence is still incredibly weak with the link between mask mandates and low COVID-19 case rates.
Big Tech is going down a slippery slope and losing our First Amendment right to free speech along the way. If the content doesn’t align with the radical-left narrative, then it’s disregarded as “disinformation” and censored from the whole world. Jen Psaki and the Biden Administration want to ensure that Facebook restricts having the right to free speech or a difference of opinion.
When it comes to the vaccine, critics argued that the American people should be given the pros and cons of the information and decide for themselves. No one knows the long-term issues with these vaccines since there hasn’t been time for the studies, but people need information from both sides.
The more these Big Tech platforms follow the requests of major politicians and work with the government, the more that these platforms become massive propaganda campaigns. No wonder so many entrepreneurs are starting their own social media platforms this year.
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