It could be a mistake to suppress online misinformation and disinformation about topics such as climate change.
This is the core thesis of a piece published by American Enterprise Institute (AEI) on Thursday.
Bronwyn Howell, AEI senior fellow, wrote that it is important to consider how historians will see our societies if the collective, digital record that has replaced papers, letters, and newspapers is purged from dissenting views. “If records of climate change skeptics’ views were deleted to make it easier for people to implement changes, it may not be obvious to future generations that this was a highly contentious topic that divided societies and influenced decisions made by political leaders as complex issues unfolded.”
Howell specifically criticized Jacinda Ardern, the New Zealand Prime Minister, for her speech to September’s United Nations General Assembly. Ardern spoke out to justify censoring content about climate change and war as well as content subjectively deemed “hateful or dangerous.”
Ardern explained to the multilateral organization, “How can you end a war if people believe that the reason for it exists is not only legal but also noble?” “How can you address climate change if people don’t believe it exists?” How can you ensure that the human rights of others are protected when they are subject to hateful and dangerous ideology and rhetoric?
Howell pointed out that Ardern justified “constraints upon the right to freedom of speech” in order to protect the “prevailing source for order” embraced social media content moderators.
Howell stated that removing objectionable views from the internet “would create an inaccurate and misleading impression about our lives.” “Ironically,” Howell wrote, “Removing disinformation in the past creates misinformation for the future.”
Howell reflected on the long history of the world’s printed, hard-copy records dissenting views. How the written word has allowed rich debate and disagreement about current affairs over time.
She wrote that “this has informed historical discourse, understanding of the circumstances faced people and societies of that time,” “This has led us to the conclusion that all societies exist in chaos because there is no one consensus among their members.
Suppressing content, in addition to sanitizing the past, can unfairly allow individuals to retroactively claim that they have shaped a view that is shown to be pivotal, Howell wrote. “Because there is no record that could reliably contradict this.”
Fast forward to today.
Just like the Chinese Communist Party-linked TikTok, American-in-name-only companies Facebook and Twitter are working to thwart certain posts about elections, interfering with the American democratic process and potentially altering the course of history.
Big Tech companies routinely remove objectionable views from social media. MRC’s CensorTrack database contains over 4,500 cases of censorship by tech giants.
Conservatives are being attacked. Get in touch with your representatives to demand transparency, clarity, and equality for conservatives from Big Tech.
