The Dangers Of Biased Social Media

I am writing this article as someone who has been routinely ‘shadow banned’ on Facebook, fact checked incorrectly, and restricted. Some of our social media has decided that they are the sole arbiters of what is truth and they are not open to opposing viewpoints. This is dangerous to a society that supposedly embraces free speech.

Yesterday, Townhall reported that Elon Musk has confirmed that Twitter did interfere in the 2020 election.

The article reports:

Newly minted Twitter CEO and owner Elon Musk revealed Wednesday that under previously leadership, the social media giant did in fact interfere in elections. Musk promised “Twitter 2.0” will change course and operate transparently on the issue. 

…Most infamously, Twitter banned any mention of Hunter Biden’s “laptop from hell” in the lead up to the 2020 presidential election. By default, they also censored Joe Biden’s deep involvement and shady business dealings with foreign adversaries. 

At the time platform executives, including then CEO Jack Dorsey, justified the multi-month banning of the account belonging to the New York Post — the nation’s oldest paper — whose reporters broke the laptop story in October 2020. They also banned White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany after she shared the story, along with countless others who did the same. 

During testimony on Capitol Hill in 2021, Dorsey admitted the social media platform had no factual basis for censoring the story. 

The article notes that a recent poll showed a significant number of voters would not have cast their ballots for Biden if they had known about the contents of the laptop.

The article includes the following quote:

Nearly four of five Americans who’ve been following the Hunter Biden laptop scandal believe that “truthful” coverage would have changed the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, according to a new poll.

A similar percentage also said they’re convinced that information on the computer is real, with just 11% saying they thought it was “created by Russia,” according to the survey conducted by the New Jersey-based Technometrica Institute of Policy and Politics.

And an even higher number — 81% — said US Attorney General Merrick Garland should appoint a special counsel to investigate matters related to the first son’s infamous laptop, the existence of which was exclusively revealed by The Post in October 2020.

Actually, Twitter is not entirely to blame. What about Americans who didn’t bother to do their own research but instead depended strictly on the mainstream media? We cannot maintain our republic without informed voters. We need more voters willing to be informed.