Some people are optimistic that the promotion of Joel Kaplan to be Meta’s president of global affairs heralds the end of, or at least a big reduction in, censorship at Meta’s social media sites of Facebook and Instagram. This optimism springs from the fact that Kaplan leans Republican in the notoriously Democratic leaning company, and even was White House deputy chief of staff for policy in the Republican George W. Bush administration.
Tag: Facebook
On Thursday, I wrote about a Wednesday Washington Times article detailing allegations by current and former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents that FBI agents had been given quotas for investigations of “domestic terrorism” and “white supremacy” related crime. The results included a bunch of FBI agents spinning their wheels on trying to find crimes and criminals where none are, while surveilling and investigating plenty of people critical of government in the process.
Interviewed Wednesday by host Stuart Varney at Fox Businesses, libertarian communicator and former United States House of Representatives member Ron Paul shared some of his thoughts about Facebook’s “absurd” blocking of Paul from using his Facebook account, as well as about the related threat of fascism.
This week Twitter and Facebook announced they are barring United States President Donald Trump from posting at their respective websites.
“Masks work? NO” began a Saturday Twitter post by Scott W. Atlas, a top coronavirus advisor for President Donald Trump. In the remainder of the tweet, Atlas proceeded to briefly relate support for this conclusion and for the proposition that masks being promoted as a means to limit the spread of coronavirus infections cause “many harms.”
Because Atlas dared to challenge the “wear your mask” mantra supported by phantom science, Twitter removed Atlas’ tweet.
This week, video of a Washington, DC press conference of doctors was racking up millions of views. In the Monday press conference, several doctors of the group America’s Frontline Doctors challenged much of the party line that has been pushed for months by many people in media and government about coronavirus and how it should be dealt with medically and politically.
You may be concerned about Facebook and other companies restricting what may be communicated and who may communicate on the companies’ social media platforms, as well as those companies limiting the ability of people to easily see the posts of people and organizations they follow. The Intercept writer Mehdi Hasan is concerned about something else. He thinks Facebook is doing too little to suppress speech, especially speech critical of Islam and Muslim people.
United States Department of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, in a Monday press conference, attacked cryptocurrencies, including Facebook’s planned Libra. Mnuchin charged that Libra and other cryptocurrencies “could be misused by money launderers and terrorist financiers” and are a “national security issue.” Further stated Mnuchin: “Cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin have been exploited to support billions of dollars of illicit activity like cybercrime, tax evasion, extortion, ransomware, illicit drugs and human trafficking.”
Mnuchin, however, likely has no real reason for such concerns about Libra. It looks like backers of Libra are prepared to help the US government crack down on cryptocurrencies and financial privacy.