Americans Must Not Let Big Tech Suppress Political Speech Going into 2020 Election
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The new book “Big Tech Tyrants” makes a powerful case for why Americans must be vigilant going into the 2020 election year, given Silicon Valley’s record of suppressing political speech, particularly from the conservative perspective.
“We know that the leftist leadership of the social media platform aims to influence elections going forward and certainly in 2020 — they have said as much publicly,” write co-authors Floyd Brown, publisher of The Western Journal, and Todd Cefaratti, political activist and senior consultant for Liftable Media, Inc.
The authors start their book with an overview of just how pervasive and powerful big tech companies have become.
“Facebook is the most successful ‘thing’ ever to happen, measured by audience: 2.2 billion people spend an average of 50 minutes a day on it,” they write.
The information social media platforms know about their users is truly staggering; they know everything from the websites you visit and who you associate with, to where you go and your political views.
Brown and Cefaratti argue that Facebook, Google and Twitter have transitioned from social media platforms to publishers by presenting not necessarily what users indicate they want, but what the platform’s executives believe they should see.
Facebook’s head of global news partnerships, Campbell Brown, said as much during a February 2018 media conference in California, just as the social media giant implemented a new “trusted sources” algorithm change.
“This is not us stepping back from news, this is us changing our relationship with publishers and emphasizing something that Facebook has never done before. It’s having a point of view and leaning into quality news,” said Brown, who is quoted in the book.
The former CNN and NBC News anchor added, “We are, for the first time in the history of Facebook, taking a step to try to define what ‘quality news’ looks like and give that a boost.”
The authors believe the Facebook executive’s pronouncement is “hubris writ large.”
Floyd Brown and Cefaratti also discuss many other instances of conservative sites facing suppression and outright censorship from Google and Twitter.
The authors note that Google is responsible for more than 75 percent of search engine traffic in the U.S. and 90 percent on mobile devices.
One of the primary ways the company shows its bias against conservatives is in the search results people see.
Brown and Cefaratti write, “in July 2016, with the presidential campaign in full swing, anybody who went to the Google search function and typed ‘presidential candidates,’ would have seen the top feature bar populated with three names: Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Jill Stein (Green Party).”
There was no mention of Donald Trump or Gary Johnson (the Libertarian Party candidate). Google was alerted and fixed the “technical bug.”
Google’s autocompleting function also did not fill in negative stories about Hillary Clinton.
Brown and Cefaratti also turn their sights on the multiple instances Twitter shadow-banned conservatives, such as Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel and House Freedom Caucus members Reps. Mark Meadows of North Carolina, Jim Jordan of Ohio, Devin Nunes of California and Matt Gaetz of Florida.
The authors argue it is time to hold big tech accountable and break up these companies to ensure competition.
The two contend, “True tyranny, the kind America has never really known … has always begun with a powerful authoritarian censoring of free speech.”
Order your copy today of the eye-opening new book “Big Tech Tyrants.”
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