Tech Companies’ Concerted Suppression of Disfavored Views Represents a Threat to Our Freedom
Thank you, Instapundit! (here) And to John Hinderaker at the Power Line blog (here).
I have written at length about the Southern Poverty Law Center for City Journal. SPLC is a demagogic direct-mail racket and leftist smear shop posing as a civil rights organization. SPLC’s mission is especially focused on promoting radical Islam (by falsely labeling any criticism of it as “hate speech” and “extremism”) and the LGBT agenda (again, by erroneously conflating religious and moral objections to same-sex marriage or homosexual conduct with racial bigotry). Accordingly, SPLC demonizes those who defend religious objections to the LGBT agenda as “hate groups” equivalent to the KKK. If you think I am exaggerating, read my article in City Journal (here). Many others have written about the SPLC, explaining why that group is a fraud. Yet, because SPLC embraces a radical left political orientation shared by most media outlets and Silicon Valley-based tech companies, it is convenient for them to adopt SPLC’s dubious (and in many cases defamatory) labels, in order to discredit those with whom they disagree.
In a most disturbing turn of events, some tech companies have begun to “de-platform” certain groups from social media, digital payment, and other sites based solely on SPLC’s tendentious characterization of them as a “hate group.” One organization that has falsely been labeled as a “hate group,” Alliance Defending Freedom, is a hugely-successful defender of religious liberties in numerous lawsuits, including notable victories in the U.S. Supreme Court. On September 27, 2018, Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel and Vice President of ADF, testified before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice regarding “The State of Intellectual Freedom in America.” His testimony, which just came to my attention, deserves a wide audience. I am therefore sharing it here. This is, in my estimation, one of the most serious issues facing our nation today. All those who cherish freedom should be gravely concerned about this threat.
