03/11/2018 / By JD Heyes
At his company’s founding, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s mission was “to make the world more open and connected,” and I’ve no doubt he believed that.
That was then. He clearly doesn’t believe it anymore.
These days Zuck’s idea of making the world “more open and connected” consists of it being ‘more open and connected’ to Left-wing ideology at the expense of informed consent.
That’s the only way to explain the social media giant’s “full-scale assault on President Donald Trump and conservatives” that began earlier this year “that has seen engagement on Trump’s Facebook posts plummet by 45 percent,” Matthew Vadum writes at Frontpage Magazine.
Under the guise of combating “fake news” and “Russian propaganda” following a year of what I’d have to characterized as questionable ‘outrage’ from the establishment media and mostly Democratic politicians following Trump’s victory, Facebook has begun cracking down on conservative sites and voices. Many report a falloff in Facebook traffic to their websites so dramatic they have either shuttered operations or are considering it. The National Sentinel, an independent news site where I serve as editor-in-chief, has seen its Facebook “reach” and traffic decline by 75-80 percent in a matter of weeks, even though our “follows” and “likes” continue to grow.
“The Left’s farfetched Russia-Trump electoral collusion conspiracy theory scapegoated Facebook, claiming the website spread Russian propaganda and fake news that helped Trump beat the yet-to-be-indicted Hillary Clinton,” Vadum writes.
If you remain unconvinced, The Washington Post provided further evidence of a conservative crackdown. No less than “Mr. Constitutional Law Professor” himself, President Obama, leaned on Zuckerberg to do ‘something’ about all that fake news (coming from conservatives, dontcha know). Laughingly, the Post framed it as though Obama was trying to do Zuckerberg a solid by giving him “a wake-up call over fake news” on the social media platform:
Nine days after Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg dismissed as “crazy” the idea that fake news on his company’s social network played a key role in the U.S. election, President Barack Obama pulled the youthful tech billionaire aside and delivered what he hoped would be a wake-up call.
Right. Because Obama is just “concerned” and trying to help the little guy out. You bet.
The Post noted further:
Now huddled in a private room on the sidelines of a meeting of world leaders in Lima, Peru, two months before Trump’s inauguration, Obama made a personal appeal to Zuckerberg to take the threat of fake news and political disinformation seriously, although Facebook representatives say the president did not single out Russia specifically. Unless Facebook and the government did more to address the threat, Obama warned, it would only get worse in the next presidential race.
The Post noted further that Zuckerberg acknowledged the ‘problem’ of fake news but nevertheless defended his platform; and yet, here we are a year later with obvious censorship of conservative — not Left-wing voices. Coincidence? (Related: Massive outpouring of support for the Health Ranger after outrageous YouTube censorship of entire channel, wiping 1700+ videos spanning 10+ years.)
It wasn’t just Obama pushing Facebook to ‘act.’ Far-Left Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California has openly threatened Facebook. “You’ve created these platforms, and now they’re being misused, and you have to be the ones to do something about it … or we will,” she said.
Somebody listened. As Breitbart News reports, Facebook engagement for Trump’s official page has declined by 45 percent over the past six months, even as the president’s popularity (and his follows) was rising. Meanwhile, total engagement for 2016 Democratic presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders and prospective 2020 Democratic challenger Sen. Elizabeth Warren have not declined at all.
“In January, Facebook introduced a major change to its newsfeed algorithm. In a post, CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed that the change aimed to give greater emphasis to posts from ‘friends, family and groups’ and less to ‘businesses, brands, and media,” Breitbart reported. “The change was followed by a promise to promote what Facebook calls ‘broadly trusted’ news sources on the platform.”
And there you have it. Zuckerberg has given his editors broad censorship authority they appear to be applying primarily to conservative voices.
So much for the mission “to make the world more open and connected.”
J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.
Sources include:
Tagged Under:
algorithm change, Censorship, conservatives, Facebook, fake news, independent media, left cult, libertarians, mark zuckerberg, President Obama, President Trump, Social media, suppression, Twisted
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