Censorship Empire Strikes Back with UN Disinformation Declaration, German Charges for Memes

UNAOC Conference

The second Trump administration may presage the significant retrenchment, if not collapse, of what critics call the censorship-industrial complex, a symbiotic and sometimes coercive relationship among the U.S. government, private researchers and Big Tech to suppress disfavored narratives and political movements such as populism.

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Center for Countering Digital Hate: Ending ‘Disinformation’ While Taking Aim at Musk, Conservatives

On Nov. 4, one day prior to the 2024 presidential election, a headline on the increasingly left-leaning news aggregating site The Drudge Report screamed: “Misleading claims have been viewed more than 2 billion times on X.”

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Trump’s Choice for FCC Chairman Vows to End Promotion of DEI, Dismantle ‘Censorship Cartel’

Brendan Carr

Brendan Carr, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has promised to end the agency’s promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies as part of his agency.

“The FCC’s most recent budget request said that promoting DEI was the agency’s second-highest strategic goal. Starting next year, the FCC will end its promotion of DEI,” Carr said.

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Commentary: Foreign Censorship Threatens American Free Speech

Facebook User

On the eve of a highly-anticipated live X “Spaces” conversation between Elon Musk and former president Donald Trump, the powerful European Union Commissioner Thierry Breton warned in August that authorities would be “monitoring” the conversation for “content that may incite violence, hate, and racism.” 

While reminding Musk that the EU was already investigating X for alleged failures “to combat disinformation,” Breton said he and his colleagues “will not hesitate to make full use of our toolbox … to protect EU citizens from serious harm.”

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Conservative Florida Attorney Appeals License Suspension, Denounces Political Censorship over Calling His Opponent ‘Corrupt’ and ‘Swampy’

Chris Crowley, a conservative attorney in Florida, filed an appeal with the Florida Supreme Court last month contesting a 60-day suspension of his law license for exercising free speech during his political campaign for the state attorney’s office in Florida’s 20th Judicial Circuit.

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Elite Universities Ranked Lowest for Free Speech, Report Finds

NYU Students

Some of the most prominent elite universities in the nation have been ranked lowest for freedom of speech, according to a report released Thursday.

Harvard, Columbia, New York University (NYU), the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) and Barnard College make up the bottom five in a free speech ranking of 251 universities, according to a report by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) and College Pulse. The report cited several incidents of “suppression of free expression” at the schools, including disruption of events and sanctions on students and staff for expressing their views as the reasoning behind the schools’ low rankings.

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Government’s Entrenched ‘Disinformation’ Policing Infrastructure Will Take a Decade to Dismantle, Free Speech Expert Says

As the 2024 election fast approaches, a former State Department official turned free speech advocate told Just the News that the entrenched censorship regime created to police disinformation and misinformation along ideological lines will take considerable work to reverse. 

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Majority Says First Amendment ‘Goes Too Far,’ According to Poll

Peaceful Protest

Free speech suppression on college campuses and social media censorship often spur debates over how far the First Amendment should go to protect Americans’ rights to express their opinions – and who should be entrusted with those decisions. 

About 53% of Americans believe the First Amendment goes too far in the rights it protects, according to a new poll by the nonprofit Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE.

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Historian Turned Lawyer Finds Second Career Suing ‘Ridiculous, Clearly Out of Control Universities’

Michael Thad Allen

“These universities are so arrogant and so disrespectful of their taxpayers’ wishes and, quite frankly, their money, that it’s infuriating.”

So says Michael Thad Allen, once a tenured history professor who found a second career as a lawyer defending college students and faculty against “hallucinatory” accusations from what he calls “Campus Cloudcuckooland.”

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