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It's not a 'defense' of Alex Jones to argue that we're on a slippery slope of internet censorship

Ryan, Danielle
http://www.rt.com/op-ed/435466-alex-jones-ban-internet-censorship

Publisher:  RT
Date Written:  08/08/2018
Year Published:  2018  
Resource Type:  Article

The celebration on the Left at the quick-fire purge of Alex Jones and InfoWars from social media has been disturbing -- not because Jones' views deserve to be defended, but because his banning is a warning shot against dissent.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

Normalizing censorship

Just a few days before the Jones ban, journalist Matt Taibbi wrote a piece in Rolling Stone about the slippery slope of Facebook censorship. These corporations, he said, have their hands on what is "essentially a direct lever" over nationwide news distribution. "It's hard to understate the potential mischief that lurks behind this union of Internet platforms and would-be government censors," he wrote.

Make no mistake: The US government has the power to exert massive, indirect control over speech and political discourse through social networks -- and anyone who argues that Alex Jones is some kind of special case, obviously has not been paying attention. Jones is simply an easy target -- a good, high-profile test case, so to speak.

But the rush to stamp out or ridicule dissenting voices goes far beyond extremists like Jones. To understand how ingrained the distaste for any kind of dissent has become in American political discourse, consider the fact that, this week, actress Alyssa Milano suggested that people who voted for the Green Party in a special election in Ohio were actually part of a Russian meddling campaign. There was no other legitimate reason to vote Green, she said. Remember, conspiracy theories are just fine if the targets are deemed acceptable by the establishment.

This neo-McCarthyism has been steadily creeping back into the mainstream for years, but gathered steam with the election of Donald Trump and the onset of Russiagate, which has gripped American political discourse now for the better part of two years. Once-skeptical "liberals" are suddenly in thrall to the benevolent "intelligence community" and are more than happy to brand as a traitor to America anyone who questions its power and innate goodness.

Slowly but surely this kind of toxic and Orwellian political climate numbs people. Suddenly, calling Green voters Russian agents becomes normal. Daring to question the conclusions of the CIA becomes anti-American. Calling for the wholesale banning of figures you don’t like from internet platforms inexplicably becomes a defense of Democracy and free speech -- rather than an attack on it.

This is the beginning of the normalization of internet censorship.

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