By what right does a private corporation presume to dictate to its users what they may or may not think or post?
Gleichschaltung is a German word with a rich history. It stands for the coerced harmonisation of all forms of public expression with the official line. That concept is currently undergoing a renaissance, but not in the “captive nations” of the East.
Every morning after arriving in his office at the Propaganda Ministry, Dr. Goebbels would devote himself to the important task of disseminating a directive to all German media outlets, outlining what position on principal issues they were expected to take on that particular day. The media were instructed not only on what to say but – of equal importance – what not to mention. The system Goebbels set up worked like a charm. Under his meticulous supervision, in public discourse an imposing harmony of opinion reigned from one end of Germany to another, undisrupted by discordant voices.
One wishes that this mechanically imposed harmony, admired as it may have been by some, had come to an end in 1945. But a YouTube bulletin disseminated a few days ago reminds us that it did not.
YouTube users were curtly informed of the prevailing “Community Guidelines” on a topic which currently is at the top of the list of public concerns: The Covid-19 crisis. Here are the highlights of that guidance:
“COVID-19 medical misinformation policy
“YouTube doesn’t allow content about COVID-19 that poses a serious risk of egregious harm.
“YouTube doesn’t allow content that spreads medical misinformation that contradicts local health authorities’ (LHA) or the World Health Organization’s (WHO) medical information about COVID-19. This is limited to content that contradicts WHO [about the utter corruption of WHO, see here] or local health authorities’ guidance on:
“Treatment,
“Prevention
“Diagnosis
“Transmission
“Social distancing and self-isolation guidelines, and
“The existence of COVID-19.”
Sceptics are encouraged to go directly to the source if they have doubts about the authenticity of these appalling prohibitions:
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/9891785
YouTube then goes on to specify:
“What this policy means for you if you’re posting content:
“Don’t post content on YouTube if it includes any of the following:
“Treatment misinformation:
“Content that encourages the use of home remedies, prayer, or rituals in place of medical treatment such as consulting a doctor or going to the hospital.”
Notably, no definition of “egregious harm” or “home remedies” is given, nor is any rationale provided for prohibiting such remedies being recommended by persons who may have had a positive experience after using them. Nor is it explained to millions of religious people throughout the world why prayer and procedures condescendingly termed “rituals” are also on the prohibited list. Will members of the Christian Science religious denomination, who since long before the appearance of Covid have relied exclusively on prayer for therapeutic purposes and avoided medical cures, now be required to alter their beliefs? Not even in the Soviet Union were believers ever made to face such a stark choice. To even the least sophisticated it should now be obvious that the thrust of YouTube’s guidelines is not to promote health but to steer patients toward the extremely expensive solutions that have enabled the pharmacological industry to make a financial killing from Covid-19.
That impression is strongly reinforced by the nauseatingly repetitious proscriptions that follow:
“Content that recommends use of Ivermectin or Hydroxychloroquine for the treatment of COVID-19
“Claims that Hydroxychloroquine is an effective treatment for COVID-19
“Categorical claims that Ivermectin is an effective treatment for COVID-19
“Claims that Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine are safe to use in the treatment COVID-19
“Content that recommends use of Ivermectin or Hydroxychloroquine for the prevention of COVID-19
“Claims that Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine are safe to use in the treatment COVID-19.”
What evidence is there that they are unsafe? No indications are given. The governments of India, Japan, and the municipal authorities of Mexico City, among others, are quite happy with the results of the application of these treatments. So are their cured citizens who, however, are now prohibited by YouTube from telling others about their successful recovery.
If YouTube were merely a media platform, what possible interest could it have in disparaging cheap and effective alternatives to outrageously expensive, untested, and harmful pharmaceutical preparations of undisclosed composition, for the ill effects of which companies that produce them refuse to accept any tort liability?
The YouTube guideline goes on to disqualify questioning of masks or of their effectiveness and “claims that an approved COVID-19 vaccine will cause death, infertility, miscarriage, autism, or contraction of other infectious diseases,” although it is an amply documented fact that it will do all those things. Also forbidden are claims that “an approved COVID-19 vaccine will contain substances that are not on the vaccine ingredient list, such as biological matter from fetuses (e.g. fetal tissue, fetal cell lines) or animal products.” Never mind that several manufacturers have already admitted that it does, albeit using the weasel concept of “fetal cell lines” to mask the morally objectionable use of material from aborted babies, and so on and so forth, in dreary detail that even Dr. Goebbels would have felt too embarrassed to put in one of his directives.
Readers are again urged to go to the link provided above to confirm for themselves the extent to which a private virtually monopolistic media corporation such as YouTube (along with other similar concerns, such as Twitter and Facebook) is willing to go in dictating to citizens what opinions they are prohibited from expressing.
And now we come to the nitty-gritty: What happens if posted content violates YouTube policy:
“If your content violates this policy, we’ll remove the content and send you an email to let you know… If you get 3 strikes within 90 days, your channel will be terminated.
“We may terminate your channel or account for repeated violations of the Community Guidelines or Terms of Service. We may also terminate your channel or account after a single case of severe abuse, or when the channel is dedicated to a policy violation.”
There is no disclosure of who makes these determinations or any hint of due process or appellate procedure.
The perceptive reader must by now entertain the logical question: by what right does a private corporation, chartered to make its services available to all members of the public on a non-discriminatory basis, presume to dictate to its users what they may or may not think or post? The same question, of course, can be put to other private corporations which are also abusing their privileged position in order to impose ideological tyranny. Twitter and Facebook come to mind.
And where are the public authorities to reign in these unhinged private tyrants? The state, indeed, seems to have withered away, exactly as Marx predicted, or it may simply have merged with private corporations to lay the foundations of fascism, as Mussolini is alleged to have said. The state’s unsavoury role in this assault on freedom of expression is of particular concern. While passively subcontracting the dirty work to private corporations, it can perfidiously claim that no formal curtailment of personal liberties is taking place. The First Amendment remains technically intact since it is not the government that is undermining it.
The Covid-19 social control experiment has been running for almost two years. It cannot be denied that it has accomplished some of its objectives, but in important respects it has also been an unmitigated failure. YouTube’s offensive list of “don’ts,” issued after two years of intense global indoctrination, is irrefutable proof of that. In spite of unwavering support by politics, media, finance, and corrupt “science,” the Covid narrative has fallen apart under relentless battering by competent and informed partisans of truth and liberty.
Dr. Goebbels’ inept disciples have overlooked the concept of gute Propaganda, paradoxically one of the key postulates of the doctor’s technique. It means that to be credible, successful, and ultimately persuasive, propaganda must be heavily laced with elements of truth. In their hubris and unremitting reliance on crude force, they failed to do their homework. “Good propaganda,” Goebbels wrote, “need not lie, in fact must not lie. Propaganda which makes use of the lie … cannot have success in the long run … but a right idea must also be set forth in the appropriate way.”
They have obviously failed to find the appropriate way to package Covid-19 for the hesitant and disbelieving masses. Hence, their inelegant solution is to try to ram it down everybody’s throat, which is a risky approach and likely to backfire. Schade … the doctor is probably muttering in his molten lake in hell.
