Alternative media outlets such as the Free Thought Project, Anti-Media, and Police The Police have been shut down by Facebook and Twitter. RT.com is reporting that both Facebook and Twitter have been cracking down on large alternative media news sites and resource deposits covering the kind of news not typically covered by mainstream news media.
The site notes that sites such as Free Thought Project, Anti-Media, and Police the Police have had their Twitter accounts suspended and their Facebook pages forcibly closed.
Other sites have had their Facebook pages removed but their Twitter accounts are still active, such as Press For Truth, which used their Twitter page to inform users that their Facebook page has been shut down.
OCLA PRESS RELEASE
Facebook purge of political content is a fundamental assault against democracy, OCLA
(Ottawa — October 13, 2018) The Ontario Civil Liberties Association (OCLA) is… https://t.co/PIgEemCfMh
— Press For Truth (@PressForTruth) October 13, 2018
Others such as Rachel Blevins were also affected, with their Facebook page having been shut down, which had 70,000 followers. She also happens to be a correspondent for RT.com.
Blevins did a video and posted it on YouTube explaining her situation and the purge currently taking place across social media.
Jason Bassler from the Free Thought Project explained how frustrating it was having to deal with the loss of access to the page, which had more than 3.1 million followers, writing on his own personal Facebook page…
“So it appears that Facebook has unpublished our page along with at least 28 more pages that we currently know of including personal profiles.
“Yes, you read that correct. After 5 years of hard work, literally working 7 days a week to share information and build fans Facebook has officially unpublished our page The Free Thought Project (3.1 million fans) as well as Police the Police (1.9 million fans) so we can’t post on it anymore. It is still live on their site, but we can no longer control it or post on it. This is truly an outrage. I’ve put up with a lot of shit over the years with facebook, but this crosses the fucking line. We will do everything we can to recover our pages and fight back against this.”
Google has also begun purging certain websites from the Google News feed by shadow banning websites. They’re still within the GNews database and still regarded as accepted, credible sites, but the general public can no longer easily view their content when searching up news topics.
This is part of the major social media corporations’ attempt to reduce the influence alternative media websites and content creators have over major political elections and how well they can disseminate information during campaigns.
(Thanks for the news tip Unperson)
