Allum Bokhari’s just released book, “DELETED,” makes an impressive case that the Internet has become the transit that tech companies use to censor everything we read, hear, say, or think.
In one chapter Bokhari wrote about Dr. Robert Epstein, former editor in chief of Psychology Today, who has studied potential effects of search engine results on political decision-making for years. In 2013 Epstein selected a diverse set of American participants and presented them with a choice between two political candidates.
Participants were given brief profiles of the candidates, and asked to rate each one according to five measurements. Votes for the two candidates were evenly split among the participants who were then divided into three groups. Two groups were given programmed search engines with heavily biased information toward one or the other candidate. The third group was given balanced information, and each group was given 15 minutes “to search the Internet.”
Results: “The proportion of people favoring the search engine’s top-ranked candidate increased by 48.4 percent, and all five of our measures shifted toward that candidate. What’s more, 75 percent of the people in the bias groups seemed to have been completely unaware that they were viewing biased search rankings.”
Bokhari wrote, “As a result of his research, Epstein has called Google the ‘most powerful mind-control engine ever created.’ He believes that the vast power of search engines to alter our political preferences stems from the fact that the users of the technology don’t perceive search results to be biased.”
In a later chapter Bokhari wrote about “The Good Censor,” an inside document leaked out of Google in October 2018. Quoting the document he wrote, “big tech firms [the document cites Google, Facebook, and Twitter] have gradually shifted away from unmediated free speech and towards censorship and moderation.” (Please note that Google, Facebook, and Twitter lean hard LEFT favoring Biden and undermining Trump.)
The document itself admits these companies control the majority of online communication. Authors of the document discuss only two models of controlling speech on the Internet: one that “prioritizes free speech for democracy,” and another that “favors dignity over liberty and civility over freedom.” The document also says that since 2016 all major tech platforms have shifted their control away from free speech and toward “dignity” and “civility,” i.e. censorship.
During the pandemic we’ve heard a lot of debate from those who value liberty (Bill of Rights) vs. those who value safety (follow the science). These days we can’t have it both ways given the government’s new orders and authority.
For example, Kenneth Cleveland, M.D., Executive Director of Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure sent the following memo to “All Licensees of the Medical Board,” after receiving complaints about licensees’ advice not being “consistent with the guidance and/or orders coming from MS Department of Health (MSDH) and the Governor’s office.”
Cleveland continued, “Orders from the MSDH and the Governor’s office are legally binding orders and should be obeyed to the greatest extent possible. If you are asked to advise a public or private institution, or for that matter if you are advising a patient, you should base your advice on evidence-based medicine and not personal views.”
At every political level authorities are making us do it what they deem best. We are being mislead and divided.
24 comments:
I have no problem with them censoring unsubstantiated political disinformation. You are going very low and failing if you need or welcome this kind of help.
Maybe people could read the NYT, WAPO, and WSJ, and listen to BBC America, or NPR, instead of getting all their "news" from social media.
He is so on the money!
We need better understanding of the difference in education and indoctrination. Go to one and avoid the other or nothing matters because we shall have intellectual slavery.
Glad this Epstein didn't kill himself, unlike Jeffrey, who didn't either.
Re-read 1984.
@8:13 a.m. I'm sorry your IQ isn't high enough to discern the differences between fake and real news.
@8:32, very rarely, at least from what I've seen, no one will read any print material anymore nor even entertain listening to anything on the radio or TV. If the print form were free, maybe, but as I have seen and heard from my children, why pay for it when FB, Twitter, Tik-Tok, etc is free. I listen to radio all of the time and have gotten rid of the so called neutral cable.
When you have politicians like Adam Schiff telling people something is a Russian plant, and the DNI director coming out and saying it most definitely not, that's where you need to start fixing the problem.
I appreciate the connection of censorship to Cleveland's comments. At first glance it may seem to be a reasonable thing but look at what he's really saying and who he's saying it to: If you doctors out there actually treating patients deviate your advice in any way from that given by the MSDH & Governor, you are engaging in personal opinion that has no basis in science, no matter what your experience and education is, so shut it and say what we tell you to say. This should concern you whether you're on the right or left. The MISSISSIPPI Dept. of Health and Tater Tot Reeves (Who don't even completely agree with each other) are the end all be all of medical guidance?
Yeah the director of the DNI coming out and saying anything should worry more people than anything. Even the folks at Fox know that.
2 senate committees have found no wrong doing by the Bidens and furthermore found that the Russian are trying to mess with the election to help Trump. Those are the verified facts.
Can't say I didn't warn you with "I'm the slime" way back in 1973!
@8:51 I can tell the difference and as Bill says I get my info from all of them. Like the Post story it smells when the BBC and Reuters can't verify a story.
Wow! A cogent and insightful column. So refreshing after reading the drivel Sid and Bill.
Especially when his operating privileges were revoked.
Oh dear...let's all pretend that our choices are being vulnerable to propaganda or censorship as if there is no way to eliminate lies and slander and libel with laws and regulation.
Let's all pretend that humans have no history of believing what they want to be true or searching for reinforcement of any myths they hold.
" I know he hits me, but I deserve it and he really loves me".
All "news" is propaganda. People use their own confirmation bias to decide which flavor of propaganda they prefer to consume.
These people need to understand the Streisand Effect. Censorship just makes the subject matter more enticing and alluring.
Take Mein Kampf as an example of how actually not censoring something dilutes public interest. Any American can easily get a copy of Hitler's manifesto. But how many people will actually ever bother to read it? And supposedly Mein Kampf magically turns anyone who reads it into a rabid Nazi!
I take it 9:27 is very pro for Prop 65, especially when the pot is laced with Crystal meth, LSD, heroin, etc.
If the Russians are helping Trump, why is Putin endorsing Biden? Not only the Russians but also the Chinese. Is Newsweek fake news?
Why not include the actual link to the study for verification? I have heard 54% of statistics quoted are made up on the spot, or is it 67%?
You're going to whine about extremists while citing Daily Kos?
What a great interesting read!
I've been reading the newspaper every day for the last 30 plus years. The local paper where I lived and often USA Today. Of course now, USA Today controls most local newspapers, including the Clarion Ledger. It is hard to fathom how biased, now blatant, they have become. Just when I think it can't get worse, they go to another level. USA today just yesterday said that for the first time in history they are formally endorsing a Presidential candidate. It's hard to fathom that statement of hypocrisy. I try to stay informed on local and national topics but it is utterly pathetic what they pass off now as "news".
I am just about done subscribing to these two sources and have just started to read the Epoch Times. It appears to be very well written with very thoughtful topics.
Just RELEASE and POST all of the Hunter Biden laptop content [or as much as relevant] uncensored to an internet "read only" website, and let the general public review it without the filtering, slanting and bias. The people who care to know the truth about it can then decide if it appears legitimate, and if anyone else has information to disprove its authenticity, then let them put it out there similarly.
@7:24
They can't do that because the laptop was allegedly full of child porn of a young female Biden relative that Hunter was obsessed with. A real chip off the old block since his dad can't resist publicly sniffing and stroking little girls either.
But what is most damning for Joe Biden are the emails instructing all the Biden relatives placed into lucrative positions to give half their pay in Tribute to Papa Joe.
OOOOOOh no, 8:37 are you serious that Epstein is dead!!! That is awful.
How are they going to make a "Welcome Back Kotter" reunion show?
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