Just In: Twitter Permanently Bans Alex Jones
The apparent censorship of conservative voices on social media platforms — or really any voice that doesn’t comport with the far left — has become a rather important issue in recent months.
Social media platforms that promote themselves as open forums for all people have increasingly been cracking down on voices from the right, for little more than posting things that the left doesn’t like.
Whether it be by way of temporary suspensions, algorithm-throttled reach among followers, “shadowbans” that hide user content or permanent bans that remove them altogether, having videos demonetized or losing access to paid advertisements, these platforms have certainly come up with a variety of ways to control what people can see in their “open forums.”
Alex Jones, a conspiracy theorist who isn’t exactly conservative but is aligned more with the right than the left, was banned about a month ago in what looked an awful lot like a coordinated effort between several of the prominent big tech companies and social media platforms — specifically Apple, Facebook and YouTube, among other smaller platforms.
Notably absent from the group who permanently banned Jones was Twitter, who instead opted to temporarily restrict Jones’ accounts for a week. The platform caught plenty of heat from the left for failing to join their Silicon Valley comrades in dropping the ban hammer on the conspiracist the left loves to hate.
The leftist pressure on Twitter to fully get rid of Jones and his InfoWars website may have finally achieved its goal, as CNN — who was undeniably at the forefront of the silencing effort — just reported that the accounts of both Jones and InfoWars have now been permanently banned by the platform.
In a three-part tweet by Twitter Safety — a ridiculously Orwellian name if there ever was one — the platform announced, “Today, we permanently suspended (Alex Jones) and (InfoWars) from Twitter and Periscope. We took this action based on new reports of Tweets and videos posted yesterday that violate our abusive behavior policy, in addition to the accounts’ past violations.”
“We will continue to evaluate reports we receive regarding other accounts potentially associated with (Alex Jones) or (InfoWars) and will take action if content that violates our rules is reported or if other accounts are utilized in an attempt to circumvent their ban,” the message from the anonymous Twitter overlords added.
According to CNN’s report, the permanent ban of Jones and his alternative media outlet came less than one full day after Jones had confronted CNN reporter Oliver Darcy on Capitol Hill.
The confrontation occurred while Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was there to testify before congressional committees about the censorship of conservatives — more specifically, whether or not the dominant handful of social media platforms were in violation of anti-trust laws by unfairly keeping competitors out of the market.
It is worth noting that Darcy has been all but obsessed with getting Jones kicked off Twitter for some time, almost as if he took Jones’ continued presence on the platform as a personal affront.
When Jones had initially only been suspended for a week by Twitter — because “he hasn’t violated our rules” — Darcy set about digging through voluminous old tweets and videos from Jones until he found a few to present to Twitter authorities that were in violation of those rules.
Just prior to his roughly 10-minute confrontation with Darcy — which was streamed live via Twitter’s Periscope — Jones had also engaged in a heated confrontation with Republican Florida Sen. Marco Rubio — also streamed on Periscope — which likely contributed to the decision on Thursday to ban Jones.
Perhaps serving as the icing on the cake of the decision, a photo revealed that Jones had also attempted to confront Twitter CEO Dorsey himself as he was leaving Congress following the hearings.
To be sure, Jones is something of a nutcase who isn’t all that widely embraced among conservatives, although he certainly does still have a devoted following of fans. But one doesn’t have to agree with or even like Jones much to realize that his permanent ban from Twitter, especially if for ideological purposes, is not a good thing at all.
Free speech is under attack by the progressive left, and that is not an overstatement or hyperbole, but the basic fundamental truth … at least for those who use their free speech to say things that aren’t in line with leftist dogma.
If the left is able to get away with banning Jones — effectively censoring and silencing his voice on social media — without any significant repercussions, because he is widely despised by many people across the ideological spectrum, then his voice will only be the first.
Should the left succeed in removing Jones and InfoWars from allegedly open forums where all voices can be heard, what’s to stop them from similarly attempting to silence other voices they dislike, such as certain prominent conservative pundits or conservative media outlets like this one?
The very purpose of the First Amendment guarantee of free speech is to specifically protect the unpopular opinions of unpopular people — like Jones — from being silenced.
If nobody stands up in defense of his right to rant and rave about conspiracy theories, who will defend us when we get banned for talking about “conspiracies” the left doesn’t want us to discuss?
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