Zionist Censorship on Facebook 82

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Facebook has refused to carry an advert for my book of early collected works, Zionism is Bullshit. At first it refused the ad on grounds of “profanity”. I then removed the title of the book from the advert (though it might still be dimly discerned on a small photo if you squint) and resubmitted, but approval was denied again. I then appealed, and this time the ad was refused because it “denigrates the religious views of others”. The text was standard book blurb and in no way did that.

If I were to claim that I owned your property because God gave it to my ancestors thousands of years ago, I would expect you to denigrate my view. To refuse criticism of zionism is ridiculous.
Facebook has just announced that it is employing 10,000 more people to be directly engaged in censorship – ostensibly to weed out “fake news”, which evidently includes disagreement with Israel. The main role will of course be the suppression of any alternative view to the neo-liberal propaganda spewed out by the corporate and state media.

Twitter is just as bad. Like 100,000 others I have received an email from Twitter making the ludicrous accusation I am tweeting Russian propaganda. I was “ghost banned” for a while by Twitter last year. There is a huge danger here. This website gets over 75% of its traffic through Twitter and Facebook. The wonderful widening of political debate through citizen access to the new media of the internet is going to be under real threat as Twitter and Facebook are turned into neo-liberal gatekeepers. This website and those like it can simply be starved of traffic.

Twitter and Facebook are of course now vast global corporations, and are stating to behave absolutely to type – or arguably worse. I was happily surprised when Amazon accepted Zionism is Bullshit for publication on their “print on demand” service. Plainly Facebook is more restrictive here than Amazon.

The development of non-corporate social media platforms with the saturation coverage of Facebook or Twitter is a daunting task. Some kind of consumer revolt against censorship by existing customers may be a more hopeful route. But action is essential if the social media gains of the last few years are to be maintained.

I have also brought out on Amazon a new edition of Murder in Samarkand as Random House discontinued it after buying up Mainstream. I give the link picture here because for some reason it does not appear in a search for Murder in Samarkand on Amazon.

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82 thoughts on “Zionist Censorship on Facebook”

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  • Marek Pryjomko

    ”Read this title for £0.00 with Kindle Unlimited” for Murder in Samarkand…is the link that popped up, Is this correct ?

  • rob ollis

    Are there any other platforms that are emerging to take over this service? There must be enormous demand across the world to bypass censorship gatekeepers.

  • Clark

    Here’s Glenn Greenwald on censorship by Facebook on behalf of Israel and the US:

    https://theintercept.com/2017/12/30/facebook-says-it-is-deleting-accounts-at-the-direction-of-the-u-s-and-israeli-governments/

    – Glenn Greenwald: Is Facebook Operating as an Arm of the Israeli State by Removing Palestinian Posts?

    https://www.democracynow.org/2018/1/2/glenn_greenwald_is_facebook_operating_as

    Facebook has been a dreadful company for years; it uses you. It has never been a safe platform for political activism; close your accounts!:

    https://stallman.org/facebook.html

      • nevermind

        Thanks for the excellent links Clark and Mulkurul. so what is the advice to useds on how best to escape from the clutches of FB?

        I wonder what would happen if someone puts up Richard Stalman’s site on FB and shares it.

    • Ishmael

      I think (though I don’t have Fb) they can still be of some use, just increasingly ltd, as it seems not only activists are now turning away.

      On the book, maybe WL will publish source if it gets leaked 😉 I may read it then. My next purchase will be Zone 23, as I buy (can afford) few books now.

  • Ishmael

    Censorship is surley worse than denigration. It will never seem fair to critique or undermine someone’s view to them, that’s the point. But to deny that views expression entierly?

    I agree, given recent events alternatives are really needed to these private entities with often nonsense/arbitrary rules, including the Amazon corporation. In fact I think it would be nice to have writing outside of the market sphere all together. Along with others Arts.

    Maybe you have more power than you think, acting out of the box you see yourself in.

  • Uli

    The book with the lightning on the cover appears at the top of the list when I search for “Murder in Samarkand” on Amazon DE.

    • craig Post author

      That’s weird it still doesn’t come up at all in a search on Amazon.co.uk, only the out of print Mainstream edition.

  • Habbabkuk

    Facebook is a private companies and is under no obligation to accept advertisements from anyone. Nor, in my opinion, is it obliged, either legally or morally, to give reasons – if it does so it is as a courtesy and to be helpful. Equally, Twitter is a private company and is under no obligation to open its platform to anyone who feels like twittering irrespective of what they tweet.

    More generally, I personally feel that it is high time that the social media providers started cracking down on the purveyors of fake news, the haters and the inciters and facilitators of hatred. After all, why should such people be given a free run? Example : Mr X is entitled to try and find a blog owner who will allow him to claim that AIDS was deliberately introduced to Africa by the CIA to reduce the population; and Twitter is entitled to decide it does not wish to provide a platform for that sort of pernicious rubbish. Seems fair to me.

    • Stu

      [Mod: Habbabkuk is under a temporary ban.]

      You don’t see a problem with large corporations driving political debate onto social media platforms then preceding to block many voices from their platforms? You are correct that they are private companies who can refuse to carry any views but creating the fraudulent impression of a public commons while actually excluding some views and promoting others is extremely dangerous.

      Twitter identified Russian linked accounts and when questioned admitted it any included any account which had tweeted in Cyrillic or which had been accessed from Russia. It’s ridiculous.

    • Ishmael

      “Cracking down on -..fake news”? That would mean 95% of mainstream media.

      I feel because for all practical purposes they are conduits of information to the public they do have a moral duty. They may not legally be obligated, but since when is following the law a decent guide to human conduct? As human beings we have a responsibility that no structures, state or private, excuses.

    • Geoffrey

      [Mod: Habbabkuk is under a temporary ban.]

      As you say a private company can do what it likes within the law,therefore they can accept or not accept advertisements,posts,tweets from anyone they chose. However, if they are going to chose what they allow to be seen,then they are acting as editors who have an agenda, like for instance The Guardian or The Daily Mail.
      In which case they should be treated under the law as responsible for what they publish ? Would you agree Mr Habbakuk ?

  • Sharp Ears

    Were there no British or European entrepreneurs/internet whizzkids around who could have created these social media outfits? America has cornered the market seemingly.

    I thought it was a Brit who invented the web.

    • Laguerre

      It’s also a matter of selling the invention to the enormous market that the US is, and Britain isn’t, particularly after Brexit.

    • Ishmael

      It takes more than a wizzkids to make these things. They are massive corporate/state investments. Now concentrated commercial monopolies. Not going to invest in completion are they.

  • Richard

    BLIGHTERS!

    Interestingly, Amazon is not only on the case for books, groceries and just about everything else, but they’re taking on Google and winning (Alexa’s ahead of Google Home), plus there are now more e-commerce searches carried out on Amazon than Google.

    The way forward is putting some effort into e-commerce and search engine optimisation (SEO), so that people become aware of your publications. I’d start with Shopify (on WordPress), or find someone who’s already doing this successfully (like Amazon).

  • Macky

    Point them to the dictionary definition of Zionism; it’s not a religion, but a political movement/ideology.

  • MJ

    “This website and those like it can simply be starved of traffic”

    Yes, there appears to be a concerted effort right now to shut down the “alternative” media by starving it of readers and funds.

  • nevermind

    That was an obvious action by FB, as it is in the spotlight for allowing extremist material almost everywhere, as if it not obvious that anyone with a cause or gripe will use a social networking site for their own ends.
    It can be argued how much it is social today and to what extend it is being used for commercial gains.
    This does not take away balance of views as I’m of the opinion that the manifesto of convicted killer Anders Breivig and the collective works of his idol, Melanie Phillips, could easily appear on FB and other sites.

  • John Goss

    There is a Russian imitation of Facebook but few English-speaking people use it. It is called VK.

    https://vk.com

    Unfortunately it is now owned by Alisher Usmanov, which makes it a no no for Craig, who has locked horns with the wealthiest man in the UK, owner of Arsenal FC. I use it a lot because there is and exceptionally good group about the Silver Age of Russian Poets and Poetry.

    It matters not where one turns for social and political interaction. Until the people own the means of production and resources together with an equitable distribution we are all faced with the most powerful and greedy takers stamping on any truth which may have an impact on their profits.

  • Node

    But anti-Arab hate speech is OK with Facebook ….

    Published by the Berl Katznelson Foundation, the report found there was a 20 percent increase in the number of inciting and racist statements among Hebrew speaking users on social media in 2015, as well as an increase of 40 percent in the number of calls for physical violence against Palestinians and other minorities including LGTB movement.

    According to the study, 122,000 users directly called for violence with words like “murder”, “kill”, or “burn”. Arabs were the No 1 recipients of hateful comments.

    http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/09/facebook-neutral-palestine-israel-conflict-160921115752070.html

  • SJ

    Amusingly – there are plenty of established hits if you search for “bullshit” on FB.
    Likewise searching for “Islam is” brings up “Islam is Satanic” and “Islam is evil” amongst others.
    And for balance… try search “Zionism is” in FB. There’s a lot there that is clearly a lot more likely to cause offence.

    So on both grounds (profanity / religious offence) FB’s arguments against your book are clearly exceptional.

    Anyway, this seems to be what you get for daring to speak truth to power.

    And the book is a good read – I’m glad it was published. The Zionism speech sums up what a lot of people feel about it and the assorted others are wry, amusing and enjoyable.

  • Macky

    Never believe the official justifications;

    “It soon became apparent, however, that in the name of combating “fake news,” Google, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are censoring left-wing, progressive and anti-war sites. The 150 most popular search terms that brought readers to the World Socialist Web Site, including “socialism,” “Russian Revolution” and “inequality,” today elicit little or no traffic.”

    https://www.truthdig.com/articles/thought-police-21st-century/

  • pietra

    Don’t be absurd, it’s not daunting at all. There are plenty of tools that make it easy and quick to build your own tailor-made social media platforms. Besides, there are plenty of other available platforms with multitudes of registered users, if that’s what floats your boat. They are there aplenty, Russian and Chinese, besides “western”.

    Why not simply disengage? It’s not as though there isn’t a plethora of alternative marketing and advertising avenues, if that’s what’s keeping you yoked.

    It’s astounding how the social media have addled people’s brains. There was a comment earlier, praising Jonathan Cook’s piece decrying Twitter’s twitchhunt against perceived “leftists”. Cook’s piece read well enough, but ended with the following (no, I am not making this up):
    “To join discussions about my work, please visit my Facebook or Twitter page.”

  • Bert

    I found both Samarkand and Bullshit on amazon.

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/Murder-Samarkand-Ambassadors-Controversial-Defiance/dp/1845961943/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1516748840&sr=1-9&keywords=samarkand

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/Zionism-Bullshit-Interviews-Collected-Political/dp/1548026379/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1516748933&sr=1-1&keywords=zionism+is+bullshit

    And at Waterstones:

    https://www.waterstones.com/book/murder-in-samarkanda-british-ambassadors-controversial-defiance-of-tyranny-in/craig-murray/9781845961947

    But nothing for Zionism is Bullshit on Waterstones.

    Bert

    • craig Post author

      Bert,

      Yes but the link to Samarkand on Amazon and Waterstones is to the old out of print Mainstream edition, which is not actually available. I can’t get Amazon to show the new self-published edition on a search. Possibly a deal they have with Random House?

  • Highlander

    I was forced to end my association with Facebook because anything detrimental or anything contradicting the official Zionist narrative was deleted or I was banned. When I asked what information Facebook refuted, after, giving links to the posted information, they never replied. After kicking Facebook into touch, I also noted other political sites espousing the Scottish political seen, was based in America, not Scotland. And we’re of the same ilk, you cannot mention Zionism, of their crimes against humanity.

  • John Goss

    “Facebook has just announced that it is employing 10,000 more people to be directly engaged in censorship – ostensibly to weed out “fake news”, which evidently includes disagreement with Israel. The main role will of course be the suppression of any alternative view to the neo-liberal propaganda spewed out by the corporate and state media.”

    As this is a FB page you need to watch it quick before the army of 10,000 are launched upon it. In brief it concerns Big Pharma and vaccines and how they spread Fake News using MSM. I know there are a lot on here who swear by vaccines. I believe they are useful to an extent – the elimination (almost) of smallpox for example. However, like statins, Big Pharma wants everyone on them. You’ll love this.

    https://www.facebook.com/HighWireTalk/videos/542134319495898/

  • Courtenay Barnett

    If Trump can say “shithole” to all of Africa and the Caribbean and to everyone in the world who cared to listen – why can’t Murray say “Bullshit”?
    Now ain’t that some BULLSHIT!

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