A One-sided Situation
As a child do you remember using the alibi that went something like, “It wasn't me mom, I was with Johnny. You can even call him” - the greater the actual guilt, the greater the exaggeration and earnestness in a young petitioner’s voice.
So if mom doesn’t call Johnny, she only hears one side of the story and really has no grounds to believe otherwise. However, as judge, jury, prosecutor and sometimes executioner mother did not always side with the child even though the telephone call was not that often made. Frequently and rightfully, moms can be autocratic.
But one can see from this single, simple example that the suppression or proscription of speech or writing can be a most valuable tool if one is just trying to get his opinion, creed, or perspective ahead of others or merely just advanced.
Chinua Achebe, a Nigerian novelist, poet, and critic said, “If you only hear one side of the story, you have no understanding at all.” Or alternatively, if you only hear one side of the story, you cannot argue from the perspective or viewpoint of another.
This is why censorship and having control and custody of ‘misinformation or disinformation’ is so absolutely important to many. And, one can confess this or not; censorship fundamentally comes from one side of the political spectrum. Even the legacy presses and social media giants are servants of progressive politics and are inclined to pursue censorship if it could potentially damage their favored politician or ideological issue.
Censorship is done solely as a benefit to the censor, not, as they claim, protection for and of the people, for if that were the case, then they must assume most people are imbecilic and they, the censors, are the only ones of intelligence and virtue. Censorship is done because the alternative, substitute, or flipside may have merit and thus may lead people away, not merely astray, but simply away.
Censorship and the designation of material as ‘misinformation’ or ‘disinformation’, in the political arena is most often done because certain information, reports, or data are contrary to bureaucratic or legislative philosophy and thus power. These facets of deceit create militant journalism promoting and advancing fascism.
This naturally happens in the world of climate change where adversarial facts, data, and evidence are incessantly suppressed or called disingenuousness. Those that rebuff the climate change eco-politicians, activist scientists, and radical bureaucrats have persistently asked for a debate or series of debates to arrive at the concluding resolution relative to the truth of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming (CAGW), but are met, continually with, resistance. This is the height of censorship – this is the height of cowardice.
Dr. Wayne Dyer says, “The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you don't know anything about”. Most people know nothing of anthropogenic climate change, but more people know nothing of exactly how much it has been discredited, disproven, and disgraced.
Yet, people are beginning to suffer the consequences of a world starved of reliable energies. Among many other deficiencies, gas prices are at record levels, inflation is soaring, and food and other shortages abound, yet, the people in power continue to say that these are the consequences of them and their virtues saving you.
The linked story “Green Fascists Are Destroying the World” from American Greatness, relative to the banishment of the CO2 Coalition from LinkedIn relates in detail how and why censorship of opposing climate science is a full-time job for these climate alarmists and corporatism autocrats. It’s a powerful, well-written essay on the absurd actions and backward activities of the politicized climate crazies. I encourage its full read.
Social media, including Facebook, Google, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter have all banned together and play the exact same game against any content that does not fit into their progressively political mold. Opposition to climate change is a major offense. Normally they cannot repress and censor content based on facts, so they use a self-satisfying, discriminatory policy called ‘community standards’.
Social media is undoubtedly here to stay, thus Congress must be made to re-examine Section 230 of the United States Communications Decency Act (CDA) which currently provides carte blanche capacity and capability for these bad actors to simply do as they please.
The one class of censorship that is not controlled by the courts or anyone else is the act of self-censorship. Wikipedia defines self-censorship as the act of censoring or classifying one's own discourse. An example may be hesitating, vacillating, or abstaining from posting or saying something because someone may be offended, insulted, or angry. Most people practicing self-censorship tend to believe the worst and are concerned about all the things that might go wrong - the major ones feeling alien within a wholly partisan groupthink or being emotionally apprehensive towards one’s typical political bias or ideology - in other words being their own political science denier.