Climate groups demand Big Tech censor climate change “misinformation”
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | October 6, 2022
Several climate change advocacy groups, including Friends of Earth and Greenpeace, have asked social media companies to treat “misinformation” about climate change like they do “hate speech” and opinions about Covid that go against government-backed authorities.
In a letter released on Tuesday, the groups also asked social media companies to be transparent about how they tackle climate disinformation and suggested that the company should report it under Europe’s Digital Service Act, which requires platforms to moderate “harmful” content.
We obtained a copy of the letter for you here.
The groups also demand that the platforms disclose data on content moderation of climate-related content.
“Social media companies bear responsibility for the role in amplifying and perpetuating climate disinformation but transparency, that would quantify the exact extent, has been lacking from platforms,” wrote the advocacy groups.
Most social media companies started moderating climate change content in 2020. However, critics still feel these companies are not doing enough and want even more censorship.
All of Us Are in Danger: When Anti-Government Speech Becomes Sedition
By John & Nisha Whitehead | The Rutherford Institute | October 5, 2022
Anti-government speech has become a four-letter word.
In more and more cases, the government is declaring war on what should be protected political speech whenever it challenges the government’s power, reveals the government’s corruption, exposes the government’s lies, and encourages the citizenry to push back against the government’s many injustices.
Indeed, there is a long and growing list of the kinds of speech that the government considers dangerous enough to red flag and subject to censorship, surveillance, investigation and prosecution: hate speech, conspiratorial speech, treasonous speech, threatening speech, inflammatory speech, radical speech, anti-government speech, extremist speech, etc.
Things are about to get even dicier for those who believe in fully exercising their right to political expression.
Indeed, the government’s seditious conspiracy charges against Stewart Rhodes, the founder of Oath Keepers, and several of his associates for their alleged involvement in the January 6 Capitol riots puts the entire concept of anti-government political expression on trial.
Enacted during the Civil War to prosecute secessionists, seditious conspiracy makes it a crime for two or more individuals to conspire to “‘overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force’ the U.S. government, or to levy war against it, or to oppose by force and try to prevent the execution of any law.”
It’s a hard charge to prove, and the government’s track record hasn’t been the greatest.
It’s been almost a decade since the government tried to make a seditious conspiracy charge stick—against a small Christian militia accused of plotting to kill a police officer and attack attendees at his funeral in order to start a civil war—and it lost the case.
Although the government was able to show that the Hutaree had strong anti-government views, the judge ruled in U.S. v. Stone that “[O]ffensive speech and a conspiracy to do something other than forcibly resist a positive show of authority by the Federal Government is not enough to sustain a charge of seditious conspiracy.”
Whether or not prosecutors are able to prove their case that Rhodes and his followers intended to actually overthrow the government, the blowback will be felt far and wide by anyone whose political views can be labeled “anti-government.”
All of us are in danger.
In recent years, the government has used the phrase “domestic terrorist” interchangeably with “anti-government,” “extremist” and “terrorist” to describe anyone who might fall somewhere on a very broad spectrum of viewpoints that could be considered “dangerous.”
The ramifications are so far-reaching as to render almost every American with an opinion about the government or who knows someone with an opinion about the government an extremist in word, deed, thought or by association.
You see, the government doesn’t care if you or someone you know has a legitimate grievance. It doesn’t care if your criticisms are well-founded. And it certainly doesn’t care if you have a First Amendment right to speak truth to power.
What the government cares about is whether what you’re thinking or speaking or sharing or consuming as information has the potential to challenge its stranglehold on power.
Why else would the FBI, CIA, NSA and other government agencies be investing in corporate surveillance technologies that can mine constitutionally protected speech on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram?
Why else would the Biden Administration be likening those who share “false or misleading narratives and conspiracy theories, and other forms of mis- dis- and mal-information” to terrorists?
According to the Department of Homeland Security’s terrorism bulletin, “[T]hreat actors seek to exacerbate societal friction to sow discord and undermine public trust in government institutions to encourage unrest, which could potentially inspire acts of violence.”
By the government’s own definition, America’s founders would be considered domestic extremists for the heavily charged rhetoric they used to birth this nation.
All across the country, those who challenge the government’s authority with rhetoric no less colorful than the founders’ are being shut up, threatened with arrest or at the very least accused of being radicals, troublemakers, sovereign citizens, conspiratorialists or extremists.
Some are being fined.
In Punta Gorda, Florida, for instance, two political activists were fined $3000 for displaying protest flags with political messages that violated the city’s ordinance banning signs, clothing and other graphic displays containing words that the city deems “indecent.” The protest signs displayed phrases which said “F@#k Policing 4 Profit,” “F@#k Trump,” “F@#k Biden,” and “F@#k Punta Gorda, trying to illegally kill free speech.”
Coming to the defense of the two activists, The Rutherford Institute challenged the City of Punta Gorda’s ban on indecent speech as a violation of the First Amendment’s safeguards for political speech.
We won the first round, with the Charlotte County Circuit Court ruling against the City, noting that the ordinance was clearly designed to chill political speech, which is protected under the First Amendment.
You see, the right of political free speech is the basis of all liberty.
No matter what one’s political persuasion might be, every American has a First Amendment right to protest government programs or policies with which they might disagree.
The right to disagree with and speak out against the government is the quintessential freedom.
Every individual has a right to speak truth to power using every nonviolent means available.
This is why the First Amendment is so critical. It gives the citizenry the right to speak freely, protest peacefully, expose government wrongdoing, and criticize the government without fear of reprisal.
Americans of all stripes would do well to remember that those who question the motives of government provide a necessary counterpoint to those who would blindly follow where politicians choose to lead.
We don’t have to agree with every criticism of the government, but we must defend the rights of all individuals to speak freely without fear of punishment or threat of banishment.
This is how freedom rises or falls.
As comedian Lenny Bruce, a lifelong champion of free speech, remarked, “If you can’t say ‘F@#k’ you can’t say, ‘F@#k’ the government.’”
Unfortunately, what we’re dealing with today is a government that wants to suppress dangerous words—words about its warring empire, words about its land grabs, words about its militarized police, words about its killing, its poisoning and its corruption—in order to keep its lies going.
If the government censors get their way, there will be no more First Amendment.
There will be no more Bill of Rights.
And, as I point out in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, there will be no more freedom in America as we have known it.
Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His most recent books are the best-selling Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the award-winning A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, and a debut dystopian fiction novel, The Erik Blair Diaries. Whitehead can be contacted at staff@rutherford.org. Nisha Whitehead is the Executive Director of The Rutherford Institute. Information about The Rutherford Institute is available at www.rutherford.org.
Facebook and the US government have united against Americans with the ‘wrong’ views
By Felix Livshitz | Samizdat | October 6, 2022
It’s been revealed by sources within the US Department of Justice that direct messages sent through Facebook by American users, along with public postings, have been rigorously monitored, and reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) if they express anti-government, anti-authority views, or if they question the legitimacy of the November 2020 presidential election’s outcome.
Witch hunt on the web
Under the terms of a secret collaboration agreement with the FBI, a Facebook staffer has, over the past 19 months, been red-flagging content they consider to be “subversive” and immediately transmitting it to the Bureau’s domestic terrorism operational unit, without the FBI having filed a single subpoena – outside the established US legal process, without probable cause, and in breach of the First Amendment, in other words.
Just as shockingly, these intercepted communications were then provided as leads and tips to FBI field offices across the US, which in turn secured subpoenas in order to officially obtain the private conversations that they already possessed, and thus cover up the fact the material had been obtained extra-legally. Facebook invariably complied with these subpoenas, and would send back “gigabytes of data and photos” within an hour, suggesting the content sought was already packaged and awaiting legal confirmation before distribution.
It is uncertain quite how many users were flagged, but it’s abundantly clear a specific type of person was of interest to the FBI – “red-blooded” conservative right-wingers, many of whom supported the right to bear arms. No one connected to Antifa, BLM or any other left-wing group was ever informed on.
It seems not a single Facebook user snitched upon for daring to be possessed of troublesome political opinions was ever arrested, or prosecuted, for their wrongthink, even though some were reportedly subject to covert surveillance and other forms of intrusion and harassment. Their views were consistently found to not translate to criminality or violence – their words were simply brutal condemnations of Biden’s election and presidency, and aggressive calls for protests.
However, once these users’ information reached FBI headquarters, it appears to have been selectively and misleadingly edited, “the most egregious parts highlighted and taken out of context” in order to perk the interest of field offices. Once the same data was sought and accessed by them via subpoena, the conversations “didn’t sound as bad” and none pointed to any “plan or orchestration to carry out any kind of violence.” No one spoke of injuring, let alone killing, anyone.
The entire operation appears to have been a gigantic waste of time but, given the Biden administration’s rhetoric about the January 6 Capitol “insurrection,” it would hardly surprise if the FBI was under intense political pressure to make as many arrests as possible of “right-wing terrorists” in order to make the sensationalist fantasies of White House officials a reality.
During the War on Terror, the FBI was in effect charged with creating a domestic terror threat, and delivered on a grand scale. Almost every major terrorism-related case in the post 9/11 period was effectively entrapment, with informants and undercover agents encouraging often mentally ill people to commit violent acts, helping them sketch mass casualty plans, and even providing the weapons to be used in the plots, which the FBI heroically busts at the last minute.
Luckily for those Facebook users flagged to the FBI, none were the victim of similar sting operations, although in the case of the October 2020 kidnapping plot targeting Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer by militia members, at least 12 individuals involved in the planning were working for the Bureau.
Who polices the police?
In two separate statements to the New York Post, a Facebook spokesperson seemed to contradict themselves on whether the Justice Department whistleblowers’ claims were accurate. First, they said the allegations were“false because they reflect a misunderstanding of how our systems protect people from harm and how we engage with law enforcement.” An hour later, they got in touch unprompted to say the accusations were “just wrong,” rather than “false.”
Coincidentally, that spokesperson previously worked for Planned Parenthood and “Obama for America.” The latter campaign, to get the then-President re-elected in 2012, not only employed the exact same tactics as Cambridge Analytica to harvest user data without knowledge or consent, but has also admitted it was allowed by Facebook to “do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to do because they were on our side.”
For its part, the FBI would neither confirm nor deny the incendiary charges, although that the Bureau maintains a little-known “unclassified/law enforcement sensitive” relationship with Facebook has long-been a matter of record, and a spokesperson did concede that this connection allows for a “quick exchange” of information in an “ongoing dialogue.”
Even more ominously, if we accept that Facebook’s denial it has a subpoena-less agreement for the unfettered sharing of private user data to be truthful, this could imply that the FBI is running an agent –a “confidential human source,” in Bureau parlance– within the social media giant who has unfettered access, whether granted or not, to sensitive, private information on millions of users.
Of course, Facebook’s denial could just be a lie – or a literally true but consciously dishonest statement, in that it is aware a senior staffer is passing the FBI information and has approved the arrangement but this is not formal or officially admitted. Such a setup would grant the social media monopoly plausible deniability were questions to arise about misuse of users’ data – as they now have.
There are strong grounds to believe that whether Facebook is fully aware of the staffer’s relationship with the FBI or not, it would approve of the arrangement, and its upper-tier employees assisting US security and intelligence agencies in their work.
The Washington Post recently exposed how the Pentagon is conducting an extensive internal audit of all its psychological warfare operations online, after several fake accounts it was running were identified by researchers.
A fascinating passage in the article noted that, back in Summer 2020, David Agranovich, Facebook’s Director of Global Threat Disruption, who spent six years at the Pentagon then served as Director for Intelligence at the elite White House National Security Council, got in touch with his Pentagon pals directly, to warn them he and his team had identified a number of US military-managed trolls and bots on its network, and “if Facebook could sniff them out, so could US adversaries.”
“His point was, ‘Guys, you got caught. That’s a problem.’”
The obvious meaning of all this, which The Post apparently missed, is that senior Facebook staff consider their platform being weaponized for information warfare purposes to be acceptable if not welcome, as long as it’s US military and intelligence operatives doing it, and they don’t get “burned” – and they are willing to provide American spies with helpful guidance on how to operate in secret more effectively.
DHS is spending millions to combat “misinformation” and “disinformation”
By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | October 5, 2022
Despite shutting down its “Disinformation Governance Board” after First Amendment violation concerns, the United States (US) Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is still handing out millions in grants in order to combat “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and “conspiracy theories.”
The DHS has previously claimed that online misinformation is a terror threat and these grants were made in a similar vein and doled out as part of a “Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention Grant Program.”
In total, over $3 million of taxpayer money was handed over to universities, think tanks, and nonprofits who will use the money to fund projects that fight what they deem to be misinformation and disinformation.
The University of Rhode Island was given $701,612 for its “Media Literacy and Online Critical Thinking Initiatives” and “Youth Resilience Programs.” The description for this grant claims that “disinformation, conspiracy theories, and propaganda have become large-scale social problems” and says that part of the funds from the grant will be used for “online and face-to-face dialogues [that] help demonstrate how to critically analyze propaganda, disinformation, and domestic extremism.”
The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a quasi-government entity and think tank that produces research that informs public policy, was granted $750,000 for its “Raising Societal Awareness,” “Civic Engagement,” and “Media Literacy and Online Critical Thinking” initiatives. The grant will be used to “develop an educational digital game and supportive materials for educating students in secondary schools in Northeast Washington Educational Service District 101 (ESD 101) in Washington State on disinformation.” The game and its learning program will “help students understand different strategies used to spread disinformation by malignant actors” and provide “a hands-on learning experience around strategies and policies to combat disinformation at the institutional level.”
The Syracuse University S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communication was awarded $592,598 for an “extended reality” (XR) project which covers virtual, augmented, and mixed reality. The grant description claims that “terrorist recruiters and violent extremists will “most certainly target new forms of technology for their efforts to spread conspiracy theories, air grievances, and to craft misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation.” The project will create and test “Media Literacy interventions focused on Harmful Information in virtual spaces, to inform the prevention of extremism and violent content in the metaverse.”
The nonprofit International Center for Religion and Diplomacy (ICRD) was given $750,000 to “inculcate resilience against the spread of disinformation and its divisive effects by making faith actors a part of the solution.” Tech company Moonshot will provide insights on “specific trends around disinformation and the spread of violence inciting narratives.” This data will be used by the ICRD to design workshops that build “societal resilience” where communities can “evaluate the meaning of religious disinformation for their future.”
The Carter Center, a nongovernmental nonprofit founded by former President Jimmy Carter, was awarded $99,372 for “Media Literacy and Online Critical Thinking Initiatives.” As part of these initiatives, The Carter Center will partner with Syracuse University to “demonstrate the effectiveness of its media literacy curriculum in mitigating the harms presented by dis-, misinformation.” Through this partnership, The Carter Center intends to roll out its curriculum modules in multiple classroom settings and target a wide population aged 18-60. The description for this grant claims that media literacy trainings build capacities in “recognizing false and misleading information.”
Lewis University was given $157,707 for “Media Literacy and Online Critical Thinking Initiatives.” It plans to use some of this grant money to “maintain and improve” its H2I (How2Inform) website which currently consists of content it says is “helpful in combating misinformation.” The description for this grant claims that “free tools and resources will be provided equitably to communities within the state to help combat online misinformation.”
The DHS awarded these misinformation and disinformation grants last month alongside another $699,763 grant to Middlebury Institute’s Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism (CTEC) which was given to study “extremism” in gaming.
In addition to awarding grants, the DHS recently claimed that “radicalized” Americans who believe “false narratives” online are the new terror threat and has pushed for the continuance of its disinformation work.
RT wins court case against Google
Samizdat | October 4, 2022
Google has been ordered by Moscow’s arbitration court to restore RT’s YouTube channels, which were blocked by the tech giant following the launch of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine.
The decision was announced on Tuesday as the court found in favor of ANO TV-Novosti, RT’s founding company, against Google LLC, Google Ireland Limited and the Russian Google division. They have been ordered to restore access to some 27 blocked channels.
If they fail to do so, a court penalty of 100,000 rubles per day ($1,694) will be imposed on Google until access to all of the channels is restored. Every week, the amount of the daily penalty will double.
Google now has 30 days to appeal the court’s verdict.
The lawsuit against Google was filed back in May when the court, at RT’s request, took interim measures to “make sure it is possible to enforce the judicial act” against the company and seized all financial assets and movable and immovable property of the tech giant’s Russian division to the value of 500 million rubles ($8.4 million).
Similar amounts have also been seized from the company in two other pending lawsuits filed by Russian television companies NTV and the GPM Entertainment Television, which have also had their content blocked on YouTube.
YouTube administrators restricted access to all RT and RTD channels in early March, shortly after Russia launched its military operation in Ukraine.
According to a March report from Roskomnadzor, Russia’s media watchdog, there have been some 54 cases of YouTube restricting content belonging to Russian channels.
Following the launch of Russia’s military offensive against Ukraine, Western governments and private tech companies began a censorship campaign against Russian media they deem to be ‘state-controlled’. The European Union completely banned RT and Sputnik from its airwaves. RT America was forced to cease operations amid US sanctions on Moscow, while Google removed RT’s and Sputnik’s apps from its Play Store, and YouTube blocked access to all of the broadcasters’ channels.
Roger Waters says he’s on Ukrainian ‘kill list’
Samizdat – October 4, 2022
British rock star Roger Waters, a co-founder of Pink Floyd, has allegedly been placed on a Ukrainian “kill list” after speaking out against Western military meddling and calling on Kiev to make peace with Russia.
In an interview with Rolling Stone published on Tuesday, the 79-year-old pushed back against accusations that he’s been repeating Russian talking points about the conflict in Ukraine. “Don’t forget, I’m on a kill list that is supported by the Ukrainian government. I’m on the fu**ing list, and they’ve killed people recently… When they kill you, they write ‘liquidated’ across your picture. Well, I’m one of those fu**ing pictures.”
Waters gave the example of Darya Dugina, the Russian journalist murdered in August after appearing on the Ukrainian Mirotvorets list. As the musician noted, her entry on the list was marked “liquidated” after she was killed in a car-bombing. Others who have questioned or criticized the Kiev regime, such as photojournalists Andrea Rocchelli of Italy and Andrei Stenin of Russia, have also been killed after appearing on the Mirotvorets list. The site lists personal information on its blacklist targets, which also include politicians and NGO activists.
Mirotvorets, or “Peacemaker,” is an independent database of individuals whom anonymous moderators consider to be threats to Ukrainian national security. The site denies being a kill list; rather, it claims to be a source of information for law-enforcement agencies and “special services” about pro-Russian terrorists, separatists and war criminals, among others. It allegedly has links to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry.
Waters stirred backlash earlier this year, when he suggested that US President Joe Biden was a “war criminal” for fueling the Ukraine crisis and sent an open letter to the wife of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, urging her to help “stop the slaughter” by pushing for a negotiated peace deal with Russia. He later sent an open letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin, asking for guarantees that Russia wouldn’t expand beyond Crimea and the Donbass region.
Pressed by Rolling Stone on why he isn’t supportive of Ukraine’s resistance against Russian forces, Waters said, “Because it’s an unnecessary war, and those people should not be dying. And Russia should not have been encouraged to invade Ukraine.” He also dismissed reports of Russian war crimes in Ukraine as Western propaganda.
Two concerts that Waters had scheduled for next April in Krakow, Poland, may be canceled because of his push for a negotiated peace in Ukraine, the musician said late last month. “Draconian censoring of my work will deny them the opportunity to make up their own minds,” he said of his Polish audiences.
The wide-ranging Mirotvorets kill list also includes Faina Savenkova, a 13-year-old girl in the Lugansk People’s Republic who called for the United Nations to end the fighting that has dragged on in her region since 2014.
Tech platforms contemplate how to deal with Texas’ anti-censorship law
By Dan Frieth | Reclaim The Net | October 3, 2022
Tech companies are considering several options in response to the Texas social media law that prohibits them from political viewpoint-based censorship. The law was recently upheld by the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
According to a report by The Washington Post, one of the options that has been suggested is a pop-up that says: “The content you are about to see contains graphic violence, white supremacist imagery and other objectionable material. If you don’t want to be exposed, click here.”
Another option, which is highly unlikely, is for the tech companies to shut down their services in Texas.
There is also the option of complying with the law and stopping all political censorship and go back to where the platforms were a decade ago – something the platforms are going to be reluctant to do.
Shutting down their services in Texas would be costly because Texas has the second largest population in the country. Also, it would be difficult for the tech companies to detect if a Texas resident is accessing their services from another state.
The pop-up option warning users they are about to view sensitive content would also not be legal because Texas officials could argue that the pop-ups are a form of censorship.
Assuming that the Supreme Court will strike down the law on First Amendment grounds is also considered risky.
The law applies to all platforms with more than 50 million users, meaning it will apply to smaller platforms like Yelp, Etsy, and Pinterest.
Some argue that the law will be tougher on smaller companies because they do not have the resources of large companies, yet they could be the subject of lawsuits that could be financially crippling.
Professor reports to WEF, expresses frustration about “misinformation” because it’s legal speech
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | October 2, 2022
Brown University Professor Claire Wardle told The World Economic Forum that she’s frustrated about “misinformation” because it’s legal speech: “I keep saying: Well, it might be legal, but if it’s leading to harm, can’t we actually have a conversation about that?”
Wardle addressed Adrian Monck, the Managing Director, Head of Public And Social Engagement, who was moderating the panel.
“So my fear, when it comes to your point, Adrian, is that people say: ‘Oh, the First Amendment, what kind of harm is this causing?’ Well, what does this kind of low-level, conspiratorial, hateful, misogynistic content, that doesn’t break platform guidelines, over time, where is that leading us? So I just wish we could have a more nuanced conversation about speech because I worry that this idea of more speech is good speech — that’s not really the case,” Wardle said.
“And if you talk to people of color or women, their experiences on the internet look very different to probably your experience, Adrian. And so this idea that all speech is equal is not true. And I wish we could just have that conversation properly and talk about the long-term impacts of different types of speech.”
Co-founder of the Information Futures Lab at Brown University’s School of Public Health, Claire Wardle, recently said she thinks that misinformation has “terrifying” implications for future elections.
“When you have half the country that fundamentally does not believe that the system of democracy, that the electoral process is one that they trust — I don’t want to be a Debbie Downer — but I am really concerned around the midterms,” Wardle said on the Rhode Island Report podcast.
She added she thinks that the situation will be worse for the 2024 election.
“I think there’ll be a number of races where we just won’t have a winner,” Wardle said. “There won’t be the infrastructure to call some races, and I don’t know where we end up. That’s why I think it’s a terrifying situation.”
UN tells WEF how it partners with tech platforms to promote narratives
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | October 2, 2022
The World Economic Forum (WEF) held the Sustainable Development Impact Meetings, where unelected groups held a “Tackling Disinformation” panel, with participants including the UN, Brown University, and even CNN.
The panel discussed how best to control narratives on issues like climate change and COVID-19.
The UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications, Melissa Fleming, noted that the UN had partnered with Big Tech companies, including Google and TikTok, to control narratives surrounding COVID and climate change.
“We own the science, and we think that the world should know it, and the platforms themselves also do,” she said.
The UN said it partnered with Google to influence search results on climate change so that narratives from “authoritative” sources would appear at the top of search results.
“We partnered with Google,” said Fleming. “For example, if you Google ‘climate change,’ you will, at the top of your search, you will get all kinds of UN resources.
“We started this partnership when we were shocked to see that when we Googled ‘climate change,’ we were getting incredibly distorted information right at the top.”
The UN also says it partnered with TikTok on a project dubbed “Team Halo,” to control the narratives surrounding COVID-19.
“We had another trusted messenger project, which was called ‘Team Halo’ where we trained scientists around the world and some doctors on TikTok, and we had TikTok working with us,” Fleming said.
“Another really key strategy we had was to deploy influencers,” she said, adding, “influencers who were really keen, who have huge followings, but really keen to help carry messages that were going to serve their communities, and they were much more trusted than the United Nations telling them something from New York City headquarters.”
The “Tackling Disinformation” panel was moderated by Adrian Monck, the WEF’s managing director.
Monck said that the CNN was part of the strategy to “own the narrative.”
“CNN is both an organization that’s trying to make sense of the world and trying to establish the facts; it’s also part of a political war on who owns the narrative,” he said.
WAFA documents 26 Israeli violations against Palestinian journalists and media in September
WAFA – October 1, 2022
RAMALLAH – The Palestinian News and Information Agency, WAFA, documented 26 Israeli violations against Palestinian journalists and media in the occupied territories during September.
It said in its monthly report on Israeli violations against journalists and media outlets published today that the Israeli occupation forces continued to deliberately target Palestinian journalists with an aim to limit their coverage of the Israeli army practices and violations against the defenseless Palestinian citizens.
The report said 11 journalists were hurt in September from rubber-coated metal bullets and tear gas canisters fired by soldiers, as well as severe beatings and other attacks.
In addition, 13 cases were recorded in which soldiers detained, seized press cards or opened fire at journalists without causing injury, while two cases were documented in which soldiers damaged press equipment and attacked media outlets.
Gavin Newsom Sics California’s Medical Boards on Doctors who Challenge the Coronavirus Party Line
By Adam Dick | Ron Paul Institute | October 1, 2022
On September 8, I wrote about California Governor Gavin Newsom having AB 2098 — legislation that “tells the state’s medical boards to punish doctors who challenge the coronavirus orthodoxy” — on his desk for him to either veto or sign into law. The punishment the state medical boards could impose under the legislation includes revoking doctors’ medical licenses.
Here is an update. On Friday, Newsom signed into law this bill directing the prosecution of an attack on free speech, medical freedom, and the pursuit of better health.
The coronavirus orthodoxy, or party line, the legislation seeks to protect has repeatedly been wrong — from promoting “social distancing” and mask wearing that have not been shown to provide a net benefit in countering coronavirus to advocating that everyone take the “safe and effective” coronavirus “vaccine” shots that turned out to be both exceedingly dangerous and ineffective. The coronavirus orthodoxy also demanded that much of the economy and social interactions be shut down for an extended period of time in a supposed effort to reduce the spread of the not-very-threatening-to-most-people coronavirus. In short, the coronavirus orthodoxy is an enemy of wellbeing.
Newsom’s decision to sign AB 2098 into law is not surprising given that he has been one of the governors most adamant in imposing a coronavirus crackdown.
PayPal to expand its speech restriction rules in November
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | October 1, 2022
On the heels of its censorship spree in the UK – that received backlash so great it got the attention of lawmakers – PayPal is rolling out a new agreement that gives itself more censorship powers and the ability to strip income from those who don’t abide to its speech rules.
Violation of the “Acceptable Use Policy constitutes a violation of the PayPal User Agreement and may subject you to damages, including liquidated damages of $2,500.00 U.S. dollars per violation,” PayPal writes.
PayPal’s clause about taking users’ funds for a violation of its rules has long been established. But, as published on September 26th and to be effective on November 3rd, 2022, PayPal will add restrictions to its acceptable use policy that go beyond illegal activities and fraud and into the realm of policing speech.
The updated policy prohibits users from using PayPal for activities that:
“Involve the sending, posting, or publication of any messages, content, or materials that, in PayPal’s sole discretion, (a) are harmful, obscene, harassing, or objectionable … (e) depict, promote, or incite hatred or discrimination of protected groups or of individuals or groups based on protected characteristics (e.g. race, religion, gender or gender identity, sexual orientation, etc.) … (g) are fraudulent, promote misinformation … or (i) are otherwise unfit for publication.”
Big Tech platforms are increasingly finding ways to punish people’s speech under the guise of banning 🛡 “misinformation,” and making themselves as the arbiters of truth in deciding what is and isn’t true.
Backlash at PayPal in the last week caused it to backtrack on its censorship of the Free Speech Union, its founder Toby Young, and his news website The Daily Sceptic after pushback from both sides of the British political spectrum.
Critics argued that the removal of the accounts was view-point discrimination.
PayPal never gave a specific reason for the suspension of the accounts. They only said that the accounts had violated the acceptable use policy.
After the accounts were removed, a spokesperson for the financial services provider said: “Achieving the balance between protecting the ideals of tolerance, diversity and respect for people of all backgrounds and upholding the values of free expression and open dialogue can be difficult, but we do our best to achieve it.”
PayPal was accused of ignoring the fact that defending someone’s right to free speech is not the same as promoting their views.
“Forgive me if I don’t leap for joy,” Young told The Telegraph after the accounts were reinstated. “The last two weeks have been a nightmare as I’ve scrabbled to try to stop The Daily Sceptic and Free Speech Union going under. PayPal’s software was embedded in all our payment systems, so the sudden closure of our accounts was an existential threat.”
PayPal has a strong history of censorship. In June, it banned the account of evolutionary biologist Dr. Colin Wright who researches the differences between the sexes.
Free speech advocacy groups have criticized PayPal for the lack of transparency and its lack of due process when freezing or closing accounts. The groups argue that the company should give users details on the policy that has been violated and an opportunity to appeal the decision.
When Dr. Wright asked why his account was suspended, he was told to “submit a subpoena.”
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New Book
New Book: No Autoimmunity The Body Doesn’t Attack Itself
Lies are Unbekoming | September 24, 2026
The label for Humira, once the best-selling drug in the world, lists its risks in plain print. One of them, in the label’s own words, is new “autoimmune” disease.
A drug prescribed for a condition labelled autoimmune carries a warning that it can cause a condition labelled autoimmune. That contradiction sits in every box, on a folded paper almost nobody reads.
My new book starts there.
No Autoimmunity: The Body Doesn’t Attack Itself
For seventy years, “your body is attacking itself, and we don’t know why” has ended the conversation for people diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, Hashimoto’s, Type 1 diabetes, Crohn’s and psoriasis. More than eighty conditions now carry the autoimmune label. The diagnosis comes with a prescription for life. It almost never comes with a question about cause.
This book asks the question and answers it from the framework’s own records: its drug labels, its journals, its regulatory filings, and its own experiments. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Iran offers Trump deal before US election
- Merz regime wants ‘secret police’ – opposition
- Israeli settlers terrorize West Bank Palestinians with state-provided drones: Report
- They see them, then kill them: Israeli quadcopters track, deliberately target civilians in Gaza
- Debunked: Trump’s egregious UNGA claims on war against Iran crumble under scrutiny
- Europe was part of the infrastructure of US aggression against Iran: Deputy FM
- New evidence on the Bucha Massacre
- Italy and France debunk reports CIA issued ‘Russian drone threat’ warning
- How Russia is Rewiring the Global South
- Britain’s elites want you ready to die for a war they keep imagining
- If Americans Knew
- Trump betrayed voters with his campaign lies and prioritized a foreign country once he took office
- Netanyahu calls Israel’s war in Gaza ‘opposite of genocide’ in UN speech to near-empty hall
- Settler Kidnappings: Torture, Sexual Abuse and Terrorisation of Palestinian Abductees as Israel Deepens Annexation of West Bank
- Gaza winter nears as 162,000 tents become unusable, raising fears of humanitarian crisis
- Netanyahu says, “It’s the opposite of genocide”; UN says Gaza economy is world’s ‘most severe crisis on record’ – Daily Update
- Israel’s US-Backed Assault on Gaza Has Created the ‘World’s Most Severe Economic Crisis on Record’: UN
- ‘Protecting U.S. Citizens’… From Israel
- ‘This is where I live now, the back of a truck’: a day in the life of a grandmother in Gaza
- In UN Speech, Iran’s President Displays Pictures of Children Killed by US, Brings Attention to Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal
- Israel displaces hundreds of Palestinians amid wave of demolitions in West Bank
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
- New Study: ‘Global Drought Shows No Detectable Recent Acceleration Under Climate Warming’
- Economic Masterminds: German Socialists Suggest Taxing Productivity Gains Stemming From Using AI
- The South China Sea Has Not Been Cooperating With The Climate Change Narrative
- Energy Crisis: Germany Enters Heating Season With Historically Low Gas Reserve Fill Levels
- New Study: The Antarctic Ice Sheet Gained Mass From 2020-2024 Due To Staggering Snow And Ice Accumulation
- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
- Climate Extremists Target, Attack Large-Scale Power Grid Infrastructure In Germany!
- New Study: Antarctic Ice Melt Has Contributed Less Than 1 Centimeter To Sea Level Rise In The Last 30 Years
