Tag: youtube

YouTube CEO says content censorship is “consistent” for all creators, contradicting previous statements

YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has defended the company’s moderation and censorship decisions in an interview as being consistently implemented for all creators in the same way – but that sits at odds with the reality of the platform’s policy which promotes what it considers “authoritative sources” over independent creators.

Wojcicki herself in the past admitted that legacy media are allowed to post content that would otherwise fall into the “hate speech” category because they provide their own “context” for it. This would mean that the same moderation rules therefore do not apply to all.

But speaking for Marketplace, Wojcicki claims that censorship (“moderation”) decisions are not taken lightly, and are applied in a consistent manner that doesn’t discriminate between creators.

She also used the fact both sides in the US political divide criticize YouTube (one side saying there is too much censorship, deplatforming and other kinds of restrictions, while the other believes there isn’t enough) as proof that YouTube is getting it right and “striking a balance.”

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An FDA Official Demanded Google Censor A YouTube Video The Agency Didn’t Like

Federal efforts to censor social media extend past discussions with companies like YouTube over broad guidelines about Covid-19 “misinformation” to specific demands for suppression of individual posts, an email from an FDA official reveals.

In the April 30 email, the Food and Drug Administration director of social media, Brad Kimberly, told a Google lobbyist about that the agency expected YouTube to pull a video touting the potential of a new monoclonal antibody treatment for Covid. (Google owns YouTube.)

“Overall, the video is very problematic when it comes to COVID misinformation,” Kimberly wrote to the lobbyist, Jan Fowler Antonaros.

“This video should be pulled.”

YouTube initially declined to remove the video. However, it has since been taken offline.

How often the FDA has made other censorship demands is unknown, because the agency is apparently hiding the existence of its efforts in response to Freedom of Information Act requests.

In October, I asked the FDA and several government agencies to disclose both their internal discussions about me and their communications with social media companies like Twitter and YouTube about censoring Covid “misinformation” in general.

On Nov. 30, the FDA responded it had found some emails about me – mainly in response to questions I had asked in April and May for a story about VAERS, the federal vaccine adverse events reporting system. But FDA said it could not find any emails between its officials and social media companies that met my request.

Yet at the bottom of the emails containing the agency’s discussions about me was the email between Kimberly and Antonaros – apparently attached there by accident, as it had nothing to do with me.

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YouTube censors Dr. Fauci satire song video

YouTube censored and demonetized a song criticizing Dr. Anthony Fauci. The platform claimed that the song violated its policy on medical misinformation.

The song, called “Sad Little Man” by Five Times August, accuses Fauci of lying. It references experiments performed on beagles that the Fauci-led National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases was accused of funding.

The song also says people worship Dr. Fauci, accepting everything he says.

The video of the song contains animated images of Fauci in a crown, clown shoes, and at some point with devil’s horns.

Speaking to The Federalist, the writer of the song and member of the Five Times August band Brad Skistimas said that the video was temporarily removed. The removal came after it started going viral following a mention by radio host Glenn Beck.

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YouTube Temporarily Suspends Sen. Johnson’s Channel Over Vaccine Injury Panel

YouTube has again suspended Sen. Ron Johnson’s (R-Wis.) channel over a roundtable that featured people who say they were injured by COVID-19 vaccines and experts discussing the shots.

“For the 5th time this year, YouTube is censoring me from telling you the truth. This time they don’t want you to hear 3.5 hours of stories from doctors, scientists, and the vaccine injured,” Johnson said in a statement.

A 34-minute portion from the roundtable, held on Nov. 2, is still available for viewing on YouTube. The full version is up on Rumble, a YouTube competitor.

The roundtable stretched for nearly four hours. It included multiple people who say they suffered severe side effects from COVID-19 vaccines, including Theresa Long, an Army lieutenant colonel, and several experts, including Dr. Peter Doshi, an associate professor of pharmaceutical health services research at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy.

A YouTube spokesperson told The Hill that the suspension stemmed from Johnson citing statistics from the Vaccine Adverse Effects Reporting System, a passive system run by federal authorities. Public health officials have repeatedly encouraged Americans to submit possible adverse events to the system for review.

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After Cheerleading Censorship for Years, WaPo Now On Receiving End of It, And They’re Pissed

In 2017, the Washington Post made an announcement that they are making their newspaper’s slogan to “Democracy Dies in Darkness.” This slogan, while true, was incredibly ironic and hypocritical as the newspaper has long championed the censorship of their political rivals. If only one side of an argument is allowed to be heard, this is hardly democracy, yet it is the policy of those at the WaPo.

Not to long after proclaiming that democracy dies in the darkness, the WaPo waged a massive campaign of censorship symbolically blowing out candles to ensure their political rivals “die in darkness.” It started with Alex Jones and a hit piece calling for his removal from social media titled “Facebook Wants To Cut Down On Misinformation. So Why Isn’t It Doing Anything About InfoWars”

But even before they changed their motto, WaPo had long championed censorship and they had no problem using lies to achieve these means. In 2016, the Free Thought Project was brought up in the WaPo, who claimed — with zero evidence — that we were part of a Russian propaganda effort to “spread fake news” during the election.

Citing the now-heavily discredited “think tank” known as Prop or Not, the post claimed TFTP and dozens of other news media websites “got support from a sophisticated Russian propaganda campaign that created and spread misleading articles online with the goal of punishing Democrat Hillary Clinton, helping Republican Donald Trump and undermining faith in American democracy.”

Clearly no one cared to look at our articles at the time which criticized both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. What’s more, despite being completely disproven and despite the entire ‘Russian meddling’ narrative crashing into ashes earlier this month, the article remains up on their website. 

WaPo’s calls for censoring their political rivals are as numerous as they are scandalous and continue this very day. Just this week, WaPo published a piece demanding that Big Tech immediately censor anyone who challenges the establishment’s narrative on climate change.

The WaPo has even gone so far as to push for modifying the actual First Amendment’s provision for free speech. Yes, they advocated for changing the very constitution of the United States to remove speech they didn’t like. Of course this was done in the vein of “preventing hate speech” but they completely ignored the inevitable effects of such lunacy.

“Yes, the First Amendment protects the “thought that we hate,” but it should not protect hateful speech that can cause violence by one group against another,” the article read.

But there are already laws on the books against inciting violence toward others. Not to mention, the WaPo has long pushed “hateful speech” that incites violence against groups with which they disagree. In fact, just last year, the paper took a page straight out of the Nazi propaganda playbook which was used to demonize Jews and used it to dehumanize Trump supporters — as rats who should be exterminated.

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YouTube hosts HUNDREDS of ‘disgusting’ videos showing baby monkeys being tortured & killed

Animal rights campaigners have repeatedly lobbied the world’s largest video sharing network to act and remove the videos. But a simple search of “torture baby monkey” still showed up hundreds of results this evening, Express.co.uk can reveal.

Some videos warned viewers that the video “may be inappropriate for some users” but still allows people to click through.

Among numerous videos available on the site this evening, one called “Tortured Primates” showed a monkey being electrocuted to death.

Another sickening clip was entitled “Terrified infant monkeys, ripped from their mothers’ arms” and showed an incredibly distressed baby primate being abused.

Meanwhile a third called “Monkeys Abused and Teased” had been live for two months and had garnered 40,000 views in that time.

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Google And YouTube Will Demonetize Content Denying ‘Scientific Consensus’ On Climate Change

Google and YouTube announced a new policy Thursday demonetizing all content that denies the scientific consensus on climate change.

Google will no longer allow ads for “content that contradicts well-established scientific consensus around the existence and causes of climate change,” the company announced in a support page added to its website Thursday. The policy, which Google will start enforcing next month, covers YouTube videos and websites that treat climate change as a “hoax or a scam,” content “denying that long-term trends show the global climate is warming” and content “denying that greenhouse gas emissions or human activity contribute to climate change.”

The search giant said it was implementing the policy due to pressure from advertisers, who didn’t want their products associated with content promoting climate denial.

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YouTube will now ban misinformation on all common vaccines, not just those for COVID-19

YouTube is now blocking several video channels associated with high-profile anti-vaccine activists like Joseph Mercola and Robert F. Kennedy, and banning any videos that claim “commonly used vaccines approved by health authorities are ineffective or dangerous,” The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

The video platform had previously blocked misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccines, but not videos that made erroneous or misleading claims about vaccines like those for measles or chickenpox, per the Post.

YouTube Vice President of Global Trust and Safety Matt Halprin said the company did not act sooner because of its myopic focus on COVID-19 vaccines. Its ban was expanded when YouTube realized misinformation regarding other vaccines was contributing to that regarding the COVID vaccine. “Developing robust policies takes time,” said Halprin.

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New study further debunks “far-right” rabbit hole YouTube narrative

YouTube uses algorithms to suggest videos depending on what you watch. There have been many stories about how YouTube’s recommendation algorithms have “radicalized” people by populating their viewings with a specific subject, particularly when the subjects are “conspiracy theories.”

Yet, these accusations have been accused of being a “conspiracy theory” themselves as several studies have debunked such claims.

A new study published Monday further suggests that video recommendations on YouTube do not radicalize people.

The study focused on whether the alleged radicalization is anecdotal or represented an undeniable trend. The results of the study do not rule out the existence of radicalization through social media. However, it does strongly suggest that this radicalization is not at all common.

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YouTube suspends Sky News Australia in brazen and “disturbing” censorship

Sky News Australia, one of Australia’s most popular broadcasters, has been suspended from posting new content to YouTube for a week due to a supposed violation of YouTube’s guidelines on the spread of COVID-19 “misinformation.”

YouTube does not allow any video that conflicts with local health authorities or the World Health Organization’s (WHO) medical advice, although it does appear to be depending on who the “offender” is as to whether YouTube censors a video or channel.

Violations on YouTube are subject to a “three strikes” policy, with the first resulting in a one-week suspension, a second strike within 90 days leading to a two-week ban, and a third strike resulting in permanent removal from the site.

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