Censorship in the fine print
Why I’ve removed Ko-Fi tip jar links from my Substack
I hardly ever read the lengthy terms and conditions every online service, every software installation demands of us. Buy a cell phone, you agree to their terms and conditions. Install a new browser, agree to their terms and conditions.
Likely the only people who ever read them are the lawyers paid to draw them up.
But when it comes to the agreements that govern my self-published writing, I take those agreements seriously. I have to.
Too many other dissenting voices have had their sites taken down, or their payment methods cancelled, for daring to cross our self-appointed betters.
I publish on Substack for good reason: It’s one of the few platforms that gives its clients free rein to write what we think, believe and feel. Outside of calls for violence, there are few limitations on what you can publish here.
That commitment to free speech, of course, has caused Substack’s management no shortage of headaches as the national media is outraged at their loss of control over the national dialogue.
But even away from Substack, a commitment to free speech shapes how I publish.
I no longer provide purchase links from book and CD reviews on my main web site, trageser.com, because of Amazon’s active “deplatforming” of authors whose works stir protest from the Left. Barnes & Noble’s ads, too, were removed a few years ago for the same reason.
I stopped shopping on Etsy when they announced that the Trump family and campaigns could no longer sell pro-Trump merchandise — while his opponents were perfectly free to sell items promoting their candidates, or even attacking Trump. I don’t particularly care for Donald Trump, but I hate censorship even more.
So when I got an email today from Ko-Fi, which I previously used here for my “tip jar” button allowing you all to send me a buck or two if you liked a piece I wrote, that announced “Updates to Ko-Fi’s Terms and Privacy Policy,” I thought I best give those terms a read. (You can read along here.)
I won’t be using Ko-Fi any longer — and would encourage anyone who supports free speech to do the same.
Under the “Acceptable Use for Creators” is a link to to their Content Guidelines, which details what kinds of thoughts can get you banned.
I do like the introduction: “Here at Ko-fi, we're committed to creator freedom. We want you to be able to produce the content you want and share it with your fans and supporters.”
Unless you think differently than the Ko-Fi brain trust, or course.
The prohibition on doxxing I have no problem with — it’s rightly illegal in most jurisdictions, and is a form of second-hand assault. The same with threatening language.
But now we get into a ban on “hate speech” — which is, of course, not at all defined. Oh, there’s a long list, but it’s all so vague that, for instance, arguing that mainstream Islam has a serious anti-Semitism problem would likely violate the rule.
But it is section 3.5 that it is a non-starter for me. “Harmful Misinformation.”
Well.
Under their Covid-19 entry (of course there’s a Covid-19 entry) is this gem: “Claims about the vaccine that public health authorities have debunked and that may cause people harm due to their belief in them (e.g. refusing to get vaccinated) are not allowed.”
Except that much of the misinformation surrounding Covid-19 came from the public health authorities!
Further, we have numerous examples of “public health authorities” claiming to have debunked serious medial and scientific claims from actual epidemiological and virological experts. It’s worth noting that most public health authorities are not actual subject-field experts on specific diseases; they are by and large government bureaucrats, sometimes with a medical degree, who are experts at things like budgeting, grant-writing, public relations campaigns, etc. Some of them are very good at what they do, and some are, as we found out during the early days of Covid-19, utter frauds (I’m looking at you, Anthony Fauci).
So when some public health authority, who may or may not be up on the latest developments in immunology, claims that a respected researcher is wrong, Ko-Fi’s position is that we have to side with the public health authority or lose our account?
Let’s think about that: Early claims that the first round of vaccines would “stop the spread” were, in fact, medically and scientifically false (as many medical experts pointed out, only to be met with demands from the White House that Twitter and Facebook censor them). So were claims that wearing a mask would protect you (it might help protect others if you were contagious), and that a six-foot distance from others would protect you (Fauci now admits he just made that last one up).
When primary care and emergency room physicians noted a higher than usual incidence of a rare heart condition among young males who had received the vaccine, their concerns were dismissed by public health authorities as “misinformation.” California responded by passing a law that any doctor who publicly disagreed with state health authorities on any condition would lose her or his license to practice. (The state later quietly withdrew the law when it became a national laughingstock, and subject of federal litigation.)
Now we know that there is such a risk with that specific inoculation — just as every vaccine ever developed carries risks of side effects.
Public health authorities spent 18 months insisting that there were no risks involved with a novel vaccine that had not undergone the normal FDA testing.
Meanwhile, actual scientists were not arguing against the vaccine — but merely pointing out that patients and their doctors needed to weigh each individual’s medical history against the risks and rewards before making a decision.
You know, as with every other vaccine.
Sigh.
That doesn’t even get us into the utter devastation of the mandated school and business closures — where pot dispensaries and liquor stores were allowed to stay open in California as “necessary” while restaurants and repair shops had to close. Black and Hispanic kids have never recovered the learning days they lost; black and Hispanic business owners were disproportionately hurt by the forced closures.
All of which Ko-Fi apparently judges to be misinformation.
There are other tipping services out there; it was always nice to get $5 in my in-box.
But I’m not going to use a service that thinks they should get to decide what I’m allowed to write.
-30-
1984 all over. CONTROL
Ethical. Clean and logical. I applaud you, sir.