There are many instances when censorship can be a good thing. We don’t need strong sexual graphics or content in books read by young children for instance. We can censor information that allows people to engage in risky or dangerous behavior like instructions to construct a bomb or recommendations to use illegal drugs. In a free society, those are among the few instances where censorship makes sense.
But, what happens when you have those of only one ideology with the means to censor as they wish? What happens when you give only one group of people the power to decide what can be censored and what information can be seen? This would be like stifling every product by one in a free-market economy so that all people purchase that one product. In actuality, this happens many thousands of times a day; every day. There no longer is a free flow of information; even accurate information.
In this short video, former ABC 20/20 personality, and later Fox personality, John Stossel, talks about how censorship, banning and the thought-police in America today only allow information they find palatable to see the light of day. His points and examples are all factually accurate. When I used to post to Facebook, I posted one quote of Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono that could be seen on C-span, when she was addressing people who are pro-life. Facebook immediately restricted my post and warned me that it violated their “dangerous persons and organizations” policy. I was warned that one more violation would mean my account would be banned. I explained to them that I was just quoting something the Democrat Senator had just said a day prior, but they didn’t care. The net-impact of this warning was that I stopped using Facebook. That silenced me. That is what the people who run, and work for, Facebook wanted.
Here is what John Stossel says about this trend. On the day that Facebook silenced me, they also silenced at least hundreds of others, while other social media platforms, like Twitter, Youtube and Instagram silenced thousands more. A majority of those silenced were most likely passing along factual, or scientifically-sound, information.
