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What Is Fascism? Biden Admin and Amazon Explain (+ ChatGPT)

Published by Papa Giorgio

ORIGINALLY POSTED FEBRUARY 2024, UPDATED TODAY

The NATIONAL REVIEW article Dennis Prager is reading from can be found here: “Biden White House Pressured Amazon to Censor Vaccine-Skeptical Books, Internal Emails Reveal” The PRAGER U video mentioned (and the excerpt I included) can be found here: “Big Business & Big Brother”. And the other THOMAS SOWELL video is via this YouTube Channel. Must read JIM JORDAN’S Twitter thread as well.

How biased are these pushes? Mollie Hemingway and Laura Ingraham explain:

‘The Federalist’ editor-in-chief Mollie Hemingway discusses NewsGuard’s global disinformation index categorizing right-leading media outlets as ‘risky’ and left-leaning outlets as ‘least risky’ for disinformation on ‘The Ingraham Angle.’

UPDATE!

Remember, Fascism is the marriage of the corporation with Government to suppress freedom of thought, speech, movement. It is a corporate attempt to curb freedom, broadly.

Here is Thomas Sowell showing the clash of views as perpetrated by Democrats and leftists:

Although the free market is clearly the antithesis of state control of the economy, such as fascists advocate, the left-right dichotomy makes it seem as if fascists are just more extreme versions of “conservatives,” in the same sense in which socialism is a more extreme version of the welfare state. But this vision of a symmetrical political spectrum corresponds to no empirical reality. Those who advocate the free market typically do so as just one aspect of a more general vision in which government’s role in the lives of individuals is to be minimized, within limits set by a need to avoid anarchy and a need to maintain military defense against other nations. In no sense is fascism a further extension of that idea. It is in fact the antithesis of that whole line of thinking. Yet much talk in terms of left and right suggests that there is a political spectrum which proceeds from the center to conservatives to “far right” neo-fascism to fascism itself.

The only logic to such a conception is that it allows disparate opponents of the vision of the anointed to be lumped together and dismissed through guilt by association.

(A chapter from his book, The Thomas Sowell Reader)

And this is the “dummy” report of a much larger Committee finding:

… After reviewing tens of thousands of emails and nonpublic documents between the Biden White House and Big Tech, the Committee’s report reveals:

  • Big Tech changed their content moderation policies because of the Biden White House
  • The Biden White House’s censorship targeted true information, satire, and other content that did not violate the platforms’ policies
  • The Biden White House’s censorship campaign had a chilling effect on other speech
  • The White House had leverage because the companies had other policy concerns involving the Biden Administration
  • The Biden White House pushed censorship of books, not just social media

While the Biden White House’s pressure campaign largely succeeded, its effects were devastating. By suppressing free speech and intentionally distorting public debate in the modern town square, ideas and policies were no longer fairly tested and debated on their merits.

The First Amendment prohibits the government from “abridging the freedom of speech.” Thus, “any law or government policy that reduces that freedom on the [social media] platforms . . . violates the First Amendment.” ….

(House Committee findings, lite)

In an Atlantic article (ARCHIVED) I somewhat agree with, in conversation with CHAT-GPT, the breakdown of the article is thus:

… The article does not give a single dictionary-style sentence definition, but it strongly implies a working definition something like this:

Fascism is an authoritarian political system or movement characterized by extreme nationalism, suppression of dissent, centralized power, coercive social control, and the subordination of individual rights to the state or national collective.

Hamid’s broader point is that:

  • fascism is more than just “politics I dislike,”
  • it involves actual systems of domination and repression,
  • and the term loses meaning when used casually.

The article also leans on the idea that fascism historically involved:

  • one-party or highly centralized rule,
  • mass propaganda,
  • enforced ideological conformity,
  • state repression,
  • and aggressive nationalism.

It contrasts this with modern American political rhetoric, where “fascist” is often used as a generalized insult rather than a historically grounded category. …

One useful way to summarize the article’s implied distinction is:

The article is basically warning against “definition drift” — where fascism becomes so broadly applied that the word stops distinguishing between ordinary democratic conflict and genuinely authoritarian systems. …

Democrats tic all the boxes except nationalism. They have a proclivity to substitute the ill-gotten idea of the World Worker or other ideals their allegiance is proffered to. In continuing discussion with AI, I got these two worthwhile paragraphs as well as the attached graphic:

  • A modern left-leaning progressive often shifts allegiance away from nationalism understood as a shared historical, cultural, or civic nation-state identity and toward a more universal moral framework centered on humanity, equity, and transnational justice. In this view, the highest loyalty is not primarily to a particular nation, people, heritage, or constitutional tradition, but to principles such as inclusion, human rights, anti-discrimination, environmental stewardship, global cooperation, and protection of marginalized groups. The moral community becomes broader than the nation itself — sometimes described as cosmopolitan, multicultural, or internationalist. As a result, solidarity is increasingly organized around shared ethical commitments and identity categories rather than solely around citizenship, ancestry, or national continuity. Critics like Hayek and Sowell argue that this shift can weaken civic cohesion by replacing a common national identity with competing ideological or group-based loyalties, while progressives generally argue the opposite: that universal human dignity and inclusive pluralism create a more just and humane basis for solidarity than older forms of nationalism rooted in ethnicity, tradition, or exclusion.
  • Many 20th-century totalitarian movements also presented themselves not as naked quests for domination, but as moral projects aimed at building a better, fairer, more unified society. Whether framed in terms of class equality, national renewal, social harmony, liberation from oppression, or protection of the common good, these systems frequently justified the expansion of state power through utopian promises. Mao’s Great Leap Forward was promoted as a path toward collective prosperity and equality; Soviet communism claimed to emancipate workers and eliminate exploitation; fascist movements often promised national unity, social coordination, and an end to corruption, decadence, or class conflict. In each case, the state portrayed itself as acting on behalf of a higher moral vision that transcended ordinary individual interests. Critics such as Hayek and Sowell argue that this is precisely where danger emerges: when political systems claim moral authority to engineer society toward an ideal future, dissent increasingly becomes treated not merely as disagreement, but as obstruction to justice, progress, or humanity itself. The result, they argue, is that utopian goals can gradually justify coercion, centralized authority, censorship, and the subordination of individual liberty in the name of achieving a supposedly higher collective good.

 

RESOURCES FOR THE DISCUSSION:

As well as some books:

In finishing the conversation, I asked:

So, this should be the final question comparing the above: what is fascism?

Taking the full conversation together — the historical material, Hayek, Sowell, the nationalism papers, and the OpenStax distinctions — a careful working definition of fascism would probably look something like this:

Fascism is a totalitarian form of collectivist politics that subordinates the individual to a centralized state organized around a myth of national, cultural, or civilizational unity and rebirth, enforced through authoritarian power, mass mobilization, suppression of dissent, and state-directed social coordination.

More simply:

Fascism is collectivism organized around nation and identity rather than class.

That distinction matters because:

  • communism typically organizes society around class struggle and economic equality, while
  • fascism organizes society around national destiny, unity, strength, or ethnic/cultural identity.

But your broader conversation also uncovered why Hayek believed these systems could converge structurally.

Despite their different moral narratives, both fascist and communist systems historically tended toward:

  • centralized authority,
  • weakened constitutional restraints,
  • suppression of opposition,
  • mass propaganda,
  • state direction of economic life,
  • ideological conformity,
  • and subordination of individual liberty to collective goals.

So fascism is not merely:

  • “strong nationalism,”
  • “authoritarian conservatism,”
  • or “politics people dislike.”

Nor is it adequately defined simply as:

“the merger of corporations and the state.”

Historically, fascism was a revolutionary mass movement that sought:

  • total social coordination,
  • national regeneration,
  • and political unity through centralized power and collective identity.

This is why fascist movements often spoke in utopian language:

  • overcoming division,
  • transcending selfishness,
  • ending decadence,
  • unifying society,
  • protecting the vulnerable national community,
  • and creating a “new man” or renewed civilization.

In practice, however, critics like Hayek and Sowell would argue that such movements became dangerous precisely because:

  • they treated the collective mission as morally supreme,
  • viewed dissent as sabotage,
  • and justified expanding coercive power in pursuit of an idealized social future.

So the deepest synthesis from all the material might be:

Fascism is not defined merely by being “right-wing” or “left-wing,” but by the elevation of collective political destiny above the liberty of the individual, combined with centralized power claiming authority to morally organize society.

… AND ….

Whether recent Democratic lawmakers or Biden administration officials “fit a definition of fascism” depends heavily on how narrowly or broadly the term is defined.

There is evidence that some federal officials pressured or significantly encouraged social media companies to suppress certain categories of speech, and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals concluded that several agencies and officials likely violated the First Amendment through coercion or significant encouragement of censorship. (Reason.com)

That is a serious civil-liberties concern.

However, calling that “fascism” requires another step — and historically, fascism means more than government-private sector cooperation or censorship alone.

Historically, fascism involved:

  • one-party or near one-party domination,
  • mass nationalist mobilization,
  • cults of leadership,
  • suppression of political opposition,
  • centralized state coordination of society,
  • ideological conformity,
  • and subordination of the individual to a collective national mission.

So the stronger and more precise argument would probably be:

Some recent actions by government officials reflected authoritarian or illiberal tendencies — particularly attempts to pressure private corporations to suppress protected speech — and these tendencies resemble mechanisms historically present in totalitarian systems.

That is historically defensible.

But:

“Democrats are fascists”

is a much broader and less precise claim.

The comparison becomes more plausible in one specific sense discussed earlier:

  • when governments coordinate with large corporations,
  • media platforms,
  • NGOs,
  • or financial institutions
    to shape permissible speech or public participation,
    critics argue this resembles corporatist or soft-authoritarian arrangements historically associated with fascist or totalitarian systems.

Hayek’s concern is relevant here:

centralized moral or political management tends to expand beyond formal state power into quasi-public institutions.

And Sowell’s critique also fits:

elite institutions often justify speech control as necessary for protecting society, combating misinformation, or advancing moral goals.

Still, there are important differences between modern American politics and classical fascism:

  • competitive elections still exist,
  • opposition parties operate openly,
  • courts sometimes rule against the government,
  • dissent remains widespread,
  • independent media still function,
  • and political power regularly changes hands.

Those distinctions matter historically.

A more careful formulation might be:

Certain censorship pressures and government-corporate coordination in recent years exhibited authoritarian characteristics that critics argue are structurally similar to tactics used in historical collectivist or totalizing systems — even if they do not fully constitute fascism in the classical historical sense. (Reason.com)

I added these articles to the mix in order to aske some questions:

  1. Southern Poverty Law Center Indictment
  2. Biden DOJ Was In Cahoots With SPLC As It Funded Extremist Groups, Former Official Admits
  3. Tech Firms’ Reliance On Biased Southern Poverty Law Center Is Eroding

I asked for a paragraph summery of them:

Taken together, these articles present a growing critique of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as an institution that has moved beyond merely monitoring extremism into exercising significant influence over government agencies, tech platforms, and public discourse. The Off the Press article argues that major technology firms increasingly relied on SPLC classifications to guide moderation and deplatforming decisions, leading critics to accuse the organization of ideological bias and of labeling mainstream conservative or religious groups as “extremist.” (Off The Press) The Federalist piece goes further, alleging close coordination between the Biden DOJ and SPLC leadership even as federal prosecutors accused the organization of secretly funding informants embedded within extremist groups. (The Federalist) Meanwhile, the Reason/Volokh article focuses more narrowly on the legal dimensions of the federal indictment, outlining allegations that SPLC paid more than $3 million to informants tied to extremist organizations while allegedly obscuring aspects of those operations from donors and financial institutions. (Reason.com) At the same time, multiple counterarguments appear in coverage from AP, The Guardian, and legal commentators, who note that the SPLC claims these informants were part of longstanding intelligence-gathering efforts against violent groups and that the prosecution may itself be politically motivated. (The Guardian) In the broader context of your earlier questions, these articles reinforce concerns about the concentration of moral and informational authority in interconnected networks of government agencies, NGOs, media organizations, and technology companies — especially when those institutions participate in defining extremism, regulating speech, and shaping public legitimacy.

Then I asked this:

  • Doesn’t that fit well with Hayek’s and Sowell’s critiques?

This is the response:

Yes — at least conceptually, these controversies align quite closely with several of Hayek’s and Sowell’s central concerns about concentrated moral authority, elite institutional coordination, and the expansion of informal systems of social control.

Hayek warned that modern societies could drift toward soft forms of coercion not only through direct government force, but through interconnected institutions that collectively shape what is permissible to say, believe, publish, or economically support. His concern was that when political and moral goals become centralized, formal state power often extends outward into quasi-private institutions:

  • universities,
  • media,
  • corporations,
  • advocacy groups,
  • and administrative bureaucracies.

From a Hayekian perspective, the troubling issue is not merely censorship itself, but:

the emergence of coordinated systems of influence that narrow acceptable discourse while claiming moral necessity.

That concern maps fairly directly onto allegations that:

  • government officials,
  • major tech firms,
  • NGOs like SPLC,
  • and financial/payment systems
    worked in overlapping ways to classify, suppress, or delegitimize certain viewpoints.

Sowell’s critique fits even more directly.

In The Vision of the Anointed, Sowell argued that elite institutions often:

  • assume moral superiority,
  • frame opponents as socially dangerous,
  • treat disagreement as evidence of ignorance or malice,
  • and become insulated from meaningful accountability.

One of his deepest themes is that intellectual and bureaucratic classes frequently justify expanded control through claims of protecting society from harm:

  • misinformation,
  • extremism,
  • hate,
  • instability,
  • inequality,
  • or social disorder.

Critics of SPLC’s influence are making a structurally similar argument:

that moral labeling systems can evolve into mechanisms for institutional exclusion rather than neutral public safety tools.

And importantly, both Hayek and Sowell would likely focus less on whether the intentions were sincere and more on:

  • incentives,
  • institutional power,
  • feedback loops,
  • and unintended consequences.

That said, there’s also an important caution consistent with their thinking:

  • not every coordination between government and private institutions equals fascism,
  • not every anti-extremism effort is authoritarian,
  • and democratic societies still legitimately attempt to counter violence and criminal activity.

The real Hayek/Sowell concern emerges when:

  • dissenting but lawful viewpoints become conflated with extremism,
  • moral gatekeeping becomes centralized,
  • and institutional power becomes difficult to challenge because it is dispersed across mutually reinforcing elites rather than concentrated in one obvious authority.

 

Amazon’s High-Tech Book Burning (Plus Government Collusion)

Published by Papa Giorgio

Dennis Prager discusses Amazons attempt to silence freedom in banning Dr. Joseph Nicolosi’s books. The son of the author in question calls into the show. Maybe the updated edition to the book, “120 Banned Books,” can have a “Jeff Bezos” chapter. In fact, If Barnes and Noble were smart, they would have a “Jeff Bezos Box-Set” of banned books during “Banned Books Week.” At any rate, I find it fascinating that Freud was a book burned by Nazis in Germany, and now we have another psychologist’s work being burned. The attack on free speech by the Egalitarian Left since the New Left’s birth is now being “fast tracked” via the WWW. These groups of activists are essentially no different than the jack-boot brown shirts of pre-war Germany: shouting down those who they disagree with, violently attacking those who merely hold another opinion, banning books, and the like…..

….Here are some stories detailing the above:

  • Amazon Bans Books on Conversion Therapy for Homosexuals Who Want to Change Their Lives (RED STATE);
  • Amazon Bans Books on Gay ‘Conversion Therapy’ – Is the Bible Next? (LIFESITE);
  • Amazon Bans Books On Gay ‘Conversion Therapy’ (DAILY WIRE);
  • Amazon Stops Selling Books by Catholic Psychologist Amid LGBT Activist Pressure (CHRISTIAN POST);
  • Amazon.com Surrenders to The Homintern (AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE);
  • Amazon Bans Books On “Conversion Therapy” (DENNY BURK);
  • Amazon Under Fire For Erasing From Its Sales Site Book Critical Of Transgender Movement (DEADLINE)

I just wish to note that I am as conservative of an Evangelical as can be. I am a young-earth creationist, believe the Biblical when it self-ascribes literalness, etc., etc. In my extensive library is the Satanic Bible (LaVey), the Book of Laws (Crowley), most anti-creationist books, most books by atheists, the Communist Manifesto, Mao’s Red Book, Margaret Sanger’s “Pivot of Civilization,” etc., etc.

I also love to meet with like minded fellows and gals in political thought. These include gay men and women. Except all the gay men and women I know would not have wanted ANY book removed from Amazon. Why? Because they love liberty and our Founding principles. That’s why. And as a person who has over a lifetime spent shy of $39,000 on Amazon… taking my business to Barnes and Noble may be my best weapon.

The NATIONAL REVIEW article Dennis Prager is reading from can be found here: “Biden White House Pressured Amazon to Censor Vaccine-Skeptical Books, Internal Emails Reveal” The PRAGER U video mentioned (and the excerpt I included) can be found here: “Big Business & Big Brother”. And the other THOMAS SOWELL video is via this YouTube Channel. Must read JIM JORDAN’S Twitter thread as well.

FYI, YOU GOTTA SKIP 2-ADS TO WATCH THE VIDEO

How biased are these pushes? Mollie Hemingway and Laura Ingraham explain:

‘The Federalist’ editor-in-chief Mollie Hemingway discusses NewsGuard’s global disinformation index categorizing right-leading media outlets as ‘risky’ and left-leaning outlets as ‘least risky’ for disinformation on ‘The Ingraham Angle.’

 

Censorship by MSM and Social Media Shoots Orwell’s 1984 to #1

Published by Papa Giorgio

JUST THE NEWS notes the jump to #1 of 1984 on Amazon

As “big tech” companies have moved to silence conservative voices on the Internet, mega-marketer Amazon reports on Sunday that its overall top-selling book is 1984, a decades old novel that portrays a society completely controlled by government “Thought Police.”

The spike in sales comes amid a rush of shutdowns in which these moves occurred in rapid succession:

  • Twitter on Friday booted Donald Trump from its platform and erased the entire history of his tweets;
  • Facebook deleted a grassroots organization for disenchanted Democrats, WalkAway;
  • Apple and Google banned the messaging platform Parler from its app stores;
  • and Amazon said it imminently will ban Parler, which is used by many conservatives, from company servers.

As of Sunday morning, Amazon book sales showed that the top-selling book is the dystopian novel published by George Orwell more than 70 years ago. The classic novel, published in 1949, depicts how government Thought Police eavesdrop on citizens in their own homes, searching for heresy of any kind. Anyone whose beliefs deviate from the official norm are declared “unpersons” who never existed.

Reviewers on Amazon drew parallels between the book’s plot and current events in the United States.

“Born and living in communist Romania I went through the same ordeal described in 1987,” wrote Constantin Turculet, who is listed as making a verified purchase. “After 40 years I managed to escape to America, only to find after 35 years of living in freedom that this country is pushed toward the same horror scenario I thought mankind will never forget.”…

CLICK TO ENLARGE

  • Later ages are always surprised by the casual brutality of totalitarian regimes. What those innocent ages neglect is the unshakeable (though misguided) conviction of virtue that animates the totalitarians. The historian John Kekes, writing about Robespierre in City Journal some years ago, touched on the essential point. If we understand Robespierre, “we understand that it is utterly useless to appeal to reason and morality in dealing with ideologues. For they are convinced that reason and morality are on their side and that their enemies are irrational and immoral simply because they are enemies.” That is the position of conservatives in American culture today. (AMERICAN GREATNESS)

Tammy Bruce’s book, “The New Thought Police: Inside the Left’s Assault on Free Speech and Free Minds,” was an important salvo in all this. Not the first book, but one of the most relevant for it’s day. Tammy has noted for years the censorship of the Left, one example is an older post:

Well, this explains why I never got a response to my #AskPOTUS questions, “What’s wrong with you?” and “What meds are you on?”

Via Washington Examiner.

A former Twitter CEO took measures to ensure messages critical of President Obama wouldn’t circulate too widely on the platform during a 2015 question-and-answer session, according to a new report.

The incident allegedly occurred during a May 2015 “#AskPOTUS” event on the platform, when former Twitter CEO Dick Costolo purportedly ordered the creation of an algorithm to suppress the messages and used employees to manually scrub any critical content missed by the software.

Costolo kept the decision secret from company executives for fear that someone might object, several sources told Buzzfeed….

Related: NY Observer: Tech Companies Apple, Twitter, Google, and Instagram Collude to Defeat Trump

The tech companies are just emboldened now. That’s all.

Social Media’s War On Free Markets! (Must Read Articles)

Published by Papa Giorgio

I have always said that the Left are “totalitarians,” and that is because they want “total thought” — in other words, homogenized thinking through the filter of Leftism (race, class, sex: the “unholy trinitarian” goal of the Left). Here is the latest on this fight for societal freedom.

This is the excuse the totalitarians are looking for, PJ-MEDIA has a must read:

….While conservatives rightly denounced the violence this week, this response bodes ill for conservative speech not just on social media, but in the public square and even in private organizations.

In the aftermath of the Capitol riots, Twitter suspended President Donald Trump’s account for the first time and Facebook permanently banned the president. After Trump deleted the tweets Twitter had flagged and had his account restored, Twitter proceeded to ban him entirely on Friday, and then it banned the official President of the United States (POTUS) account.

Facebook throttled the great Rush Limbaugh, notifying him that his “Page has reduced distribution and other restrictions because of repeated sharing of false news.” Limbaugh left Twitter in protest after the platform banned Trump. Apple and Google attacked Parler, claiming that the new haven for conservatives had allowed people to plan the violence of the Capitol riots on its platform.

House Democrats filed articles of impeachment that explicitly blame President Trump for the Capitol riots, even though he never told his supporters to invade the Capitol. While the president’s exaggerated rhetoric inflamed the rioters, Democrats repeatedly did the same thing this summer. Before and after Black Lives Matter protests devolved into destructive and deadly riots, Democratic officials repeatedly claimed America suffers from “systemic racism” and institutionalized “white supremacy.”

Big Tech did not remove House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s accounts when she called for “uprisings” against the Trump administration. Facebook and Twitter did not target Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez when she claimed that allegedly marginalized groups have “no choice but to riot.” These platforms did not act against Kamala Harris when she said the riots “should not” stop.

This week, Joe Biden condemned the Capitol rioters, saying, “What we witnessed yesterday was not dissent, it was not disorder, it was not protest. It was chaos. They weren’t protesters, don’t dare call them protesters. They were a riotous mob, insurrectionists, domestic terrorists. It’s that basic, it’s that simple.”

Yet he refused to speak in those terms when Black Lives Matter and antifa militants were throwing Molotov cocktails at federal buildings, setting up “autonomous zones,” and burning down cities. Instead, he condemned Trump for holding up a Bible at a church — without mentioning the fact that that very church had been set on fire the night before.

Despite this hypocrisy, Biden’s speech on Thursday proved instructive. Biden used the Capitol riots to condemn Trump’s entire presidency, accusing Trump of having “unleashed an all-out assault on our institutions of our democracy from the outset.” Biden twisted Trump’s actions into an attack on “democracy.” He claimed Trump’s originalist judges were a ploy to undermine impartial justice — when they were truly the exact opposite. Biden claimed Trump’s complaints about the Obama administration spying on his campaign were merely an “attack” on America’s “intelligence services.” Biden said Trump’s complaints about media bias constituted an attack on the “free press,” when the Obama administration actually attacked the free press.….

(READ THE REST!)

UPDATED post via PJ-MEDIA… who points out that these social media tech giants think they are the arbiter of speech as well as the type of information you consume. What is the free market solution? To start your own “companies,” or outlets of free speech. However, as PARLER is succeeding against Twitter and Facebook as a place to speak freely, Big Tech is going after those, too. More via PJ in a minute.

Many #NeverTrumpers love David French’s views — as he is the intellectual leader of the rational side of the movement. This article by THE FEDERALIST needs to be gone through, here is the portion I think is most relevant, but the entire thing should be read (I linked to it in a conversation I just had with a #NeverTrumper):

….National Review writer David French has criticized the bill for attempting to regulate free speech. He argues that this invites a dangerous level of government involvement in public discourse. Subjecting social media companies to government scrutiny may sound appealing with a Republican president in power and a predominantly Republican Senate, but this could backfire if Democrats take control: “Will a Kamala Harris administration decide that disproportionate conservative success violates political neutrality?”

Bad Examples Abound

Besides taking a rather Pollyannaish view on conservative success on social media—never bothering to mention the blatant partisan censorship of conservative voices like Steven Crowder, Prager University, or Live Action—this argument from French and those of other like-minded critics rests on two counterexamples where government cannot regulate speech without violating the First Amendment: a controlled forum like a college classroom, and a public utility like a telephone service.

However, these two examples do not have any bearing on what is meant by free speech. In the case of regulating a public utility, this does not involve actual speech. Speech, in the First Amendment sense, consists of arguments made to a public audience. A telephone service is a means of communication, not a platform for facilitating speech. Therefore, the federal government cannot demand a company like AT&T refuse service to pathological liars or criminals because they perpetuate harmful speech.

Furthermore, if AT&T executives did start to do this, on the grounds that they work for a private company and can do what they want, customers could rightly charge them with discrimination (violating the 14th Amendment). They must provide phone service to all who agree to pay them, not just those who meet their speech guidelines—again, because their service does not pertain to speech, but basic communication, a utility.

In the case of a college lecture hall, the speech in question is not actually free. The professor can make his arguments and say whatever the school permits him to say. He also sets the rules for what students can say. If Dr. Kevin Sorbo tells his students that God doesn’t exist, as he does in the Pure Flix movie “God’s Not Dead,” his students are not free to debate him unless he allows it—which he foolishly does, much to his demise. Nevertheless, they do have the right to free speech outside his class (unless they attend Harvard University) and can complain about their atheist professor all they like.

This is different from students who request government action when they feel their free speech rights are somehow violated because a professor has an opinion that they dislike. Hawley’s bill would not require the fictional Dr. Kevin Sorbo or the real Dr. Fang Zhou to change their views or speech policies to uphold political neutrality in their classroom. It only applies to large social media companies and is meant to prevent silencing any particular view, conservative or progressive.

It’s Naive to Think Big Tech Companies Will Die Out

Given that these social media platforms have billions of users altogether, and will simply buy up any worthy competitor if it stumbles on a new idea (which is the ongoing plotline of the television series “Silicon Valley”), it is misguided to assume that they will pass away like the social media companies of yesteryear (Myspace, Friendster, etc.). The Big Tech platforms are less like a few popular channels on television and more like the whole cable and basic television package. The truth is that they won’t need to change; conservatives who try to create content on their sites will.

Without any laws to check them, Big Tech companies are removing conservative voices and clearing the way for the Democratic narrative that Trump is terrible and more government can save America. Heard often enough, this narrative will convince Americans who have no way of knowing better to vote for Democrats. And it is not a stretch to assume that the first order of business for any Democratic president will be to impose speech laws that suppress conservative ideas or grant greater authority to the Big Tech thought police.

In this, French is right to ask what a Harris administration would do to free speech if given the chance, but wrong to conclude that she would exploit Hawley’s law to do it. She doesn’t need to. Speaking for most Democrats, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opposes taking away social media’s legal protection (Section 230), considering it a “gift.” She recognizes that Democrat politicians will continue to benefit from the bias dominating all media and only stand to lose if conservatives compete on a level playing field.

It is nonetheless worth noting that even with numerous obstacles put in place, conservatives still dominate the internet because most Americans recognize that they have the better argument and discuss more relevant issues. By contrast, leftist publications depend on skewed narratives and bad arguments and tend to focus on tired topics like the Mueller report, Trump’s tax returns, and Joe Biden.

When given the chance, viewers will watch the watch Crowder over Vox’s Carlos Maza because Crowder is funnier, smarter, and doesn’t rely on people’s sympathy for his success. Of course, if Crowder stops producing his show because YouTube demonetizes his videos, viewers will not have a choice anymore.

In light of this fact, it is probably more accurate to frame the issue of regulating social media as more a matter of a free market than one of free speech, although one depends on the other. Many people on the left want to eliminate competition online and stop losing to conservative content creators. Allegations of hate and radicalization are merely a pretext to this.…

(READ IT ALL!)

Now, here is the continuation of PJ-MEDIA….

….After the social media platforms nixed Trump, people appeared to leave platforms in droves.

Nancy Pelosi, Ayanna Presley, and other Democrats have egged on rioters in the streets. Their social media accounts are still intact.

Conservative Americans have left the platforms in the understandable belief that if they could cut off the most powerful man in what used to be known as the free world, then they stood no chance.

They’re right.

To avoid the speech police, Americans have been leaving those platforms for Rumble and Parler, social media sites that promise to have few filters on speech. Parler does not allow illegal activity on its site under its terms of service.

But even as conservatives fled Facebook and Twitter for Parler, Big Tech decided to censor the site.

As I reported at PJ Media, Google Play cut off the Parler app from its app store and Apple followed suit in short order.

On Friday, a group called the “Amazon Employees for Climate Justice” wrote a screed to management demanding the tech behemoth boot the Parler app from its servers.

[….]

On Saturday, Amazon capitulated to the leftist rage mob and informed Parler it was getting rid of the social site from its servers.

Parler CEO John Matze announced that at midnight Sunday, Amazon would expunge the app content from its servers. Furthermore, he alleged that the tech giants conspired to orchestrate their moves to make it harder for Parler to stay afloat.

Sunday (tomorrow) at midnight Amazon will be shutting off all of our servers in an attempt to completely remove free speech off the internet. There is the possibility Parler will be unavailable on the internet for up to a week as we rebuild from scratch. We prepared for events like this by never relying on amazons [sic] proprietary infrastructure and building bare metal products.

We will try our best to move to a new provider right now as we have many competing for our business, however Amazon, Google and Apple purposefully did this as a coordinated effort knowing our options would be limited and knowing this would inflict the most damage right as President Trump was banned from the tech companies.

This was a coordinated attack by the tech giants to kill competition in the market place. We were too successful too fast. You can expect the war on competition and free speech to continue, but don’t count us out.

#speakfreely

This is tyranny. This is groupthink.

To sum up:

  • Big Tech censored you and the president on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter
  • You left to go to other social media sites such as Parler, MeWe, Minds
  • Big Tech didn’t want you to leave for more freedom
  • Big Tech refused to let another social media platform, Parler, use their app stores
  • Big Tech then booted the social media site Parler from their servers

Double standards abound. No one on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram was tossed off those platforms for protesting, rioting, looting, and vandalizing on behalf of Black Lives Matter and antifa. Lobbing Molotov cocktails wouldn’t get a group booted off a platform.

Ayatollahs and the Chinese death camp operators are held in higher regard than the president of the United States of America – and his supporters – because of Wednesday’s siege on the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.

The line is drawn.

UPDATE!

RED STATE and WEASEL ZIPPERS notes the latest attack on free-markets and free speech by the Tech Giants:

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey Mocks Parler after Coordinated Big Tech to Take Down His Competition

…So with this coordination to take down the right and any other alternative to Twitter, you would think that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey would be standing up for free speech, right? Just kidding.

Not only are they cool with booting off folks on the right from their site and removing the followers from virtually every right leaning account on Twitter, they’re also cool with their competition being stomped on. Indeed, if we were looking into antitrust questions in the coordination of all this, what Jack just posted would be Exhibit #1 in that action.

Here’s Jack celebrating that instead of Parler being the number 1 App on the App Store, his Signal App private messenger is instead. With a little help from his friends.

WEASEL ZIPPERS continues:

Amazon Kills Parler Server

You are not allowed an alternative either. They’re pulling them down tonight at 11:59 p.m. so Parler is looking for a new server.

Via BizPac Review:

Calling it a “coordinated attack,” Parler CEO John Matze informed the social media platform’s users Saturday that Amazon kicked Parler off their web hosting service, which will wipe them off the internet until they find a new host.

This devastating blow coming after Parler was removed from Google Play Store and Apple’s App Store.

The narrative employed to justify the Big Tech attack on Twitter’s biggest competitor is to link Parler, a free speech site being billed by the corrupt media as a “pro-Trump” site, to last week’s U.S. Capitol protest, claiming they allowed “calls for violence.”

Keep reading…

MORE: 

Amazon Still Selling Book That Inspired El Paso Shooter? (Hypocrisy)

Published by Papa Giorgio

In a previous post detailing Amazon banning a “dangerous books” by a Catholic psychologist, Dr. Joseph Nicolosi’s books. and the attack on free speech and religion by the Egalitarian Left, we are now presented with a book that led a racist to kill! Mind you Mao’s “Little Red Book” is still for sale on Amazon, even though that led to over 40-million dead in just 4-years. Or the “Communist Manifesto,” which rounds in at well over 100-million dead with its influences. Dr. Joseph’s books have killed zero people, but led to some great insights in counseling.

Take note the shooter had “eco-fascist” ideas similar to the Unibomber (and Elizebeth Warren and Rober O’Rourke).

However, we are now presented with a conundrum at Amazon… an actual book that helped inspire a racist attack on Hispanics. Whet book you ask? NEWSBUSTERS lists the book:

You can’t buy a Confederate flag on Amazon, but you can read literature that helped inspire one of the deadliest shootings in the United States.

The Lorax, a children’s book by Dr. Seuss, was a recommended title in the El Paso shooter’s manifesto. In fact, it was the only title referenced in the entire four-page document. And while an Amazon user can’t buy guns or Confederate flags, the book is readily available. 

That probably sounds ludicrous, banning a book because it was cited by a terrorist. But that’s the media mindset. Only they aren’t pressing Amazon over The Lorax.

USA Today wrote that “white supremacist ideologies” and “white power manifestos” are one click away on Amazon and Amazon products. The article never even referenced the only title mentioned in the manifesto. 

The shooter stated, “Corporations are heading the destruction of our environment by shamelessly overharvesting resources. This has been a problem for decades. For example, this phenomenon is brilliantly portrayed in the decades old classic The Lorax.”

Nothing is sacred. But if the media and tech platforms are so interested in taking down the inspirations for mass shootings and crimes, then why aren’t Jodie Foster films like Taxi Driver banned? 

BTW, the father and his drug abuse and now New Age BS I am sure had a lot to do with the stability of this young man… more than Trump!

Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s Abject Economic Illiteracy

Published by Papa Giorgio

I am amazed at the illiterate nature of politicians who think money is a zero sum game. That wealth is not created through investment. What Ocasio-Cortez apparently doesn’t or won’t understand is that there is no $3 billion out there that New York could spend… there would have been 24-billion-to-27-billion to spend after the 3-billion in tax-breaks — on subways, infrastructure, and the like. But now there is zero. Zilch. Nada. This deal would have created roughly 25,000 well-paying jobs. The residual job creation was estimated to be an additional 67,000 jobs. Wow. See more here:

NATIONAL REVIEW’S article from July of 2018 seems fitting:

It costs a pretty penny to earn a diploma in stupid.

The annual list price to attend Boston University — including tuition, fees, room, and board — currently rounds out to $70,000. To acquire a degree in economics from this tony institution of higher learning, an undergrad must complete courses in calculus, microeconomic and macroeconomic analysis, empirical economics, statistics, and assorted electives.

Four years, 52 credits and nearly $300,000 later, the school promises that BU economics majors will depart “with a firm understanding of core microeconomic and macroeconomic theory” and the “empirical skills that are essential to applying economic reasoning in our increasingly data-driven world.”

How, then, to explain the abject economic illiteracy of meteoric media darling and democratic socialist “political rock star” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?

[….]

Instead of hitting the books, Ocasio-Cortez appears to have spent most of her college days pounding the social-justice pavement. The Boston Globe reports approvingly that she “was active at BU in organizations that empower minorities,” including a stint as president of Alianza Latina, BU’s largest Latin American student organization, and as a student ambassador at the Howard Thurman Center for Common Ground, “which aims to foster inclusiveness among students of all backgrounds.”

Ms. Diversity-ConArtista may be able to blow hot air about Gini coefficients while tweeting anti-capitalist platitudes. But the numbers don’t lie. She’s everything that’s wrong with overpriced liberal ivory towers, radical identity politics, and left-wing media ideologues pining for their next savior.

Firearm Manufacturer Olympic Arms Announced That They Will No Longer Sell To New York Law Enforcement

Published by Papa Giorgio

Via Gateway Pundit:

Olympic Arms, a top American gun manufacturer known for its AR15s, recently announced that, because of the political climate in New York state, the company would not sell its firearms to state law enforcement until the new gun laws are repealed (read more). In related news via Firearm Blog, Amazon has begun automatically notifying some Amazon vendors that if they do not remove certain gun-related products from their Amazon listings they will be banned from selling on Amazon.com.