[ April 19, 2024 ]
The Southern Poverty Law Center, a group that pretends to out hate groups in society but that really uses its platform to go after and attack conservative outlets, is working behind the scenes to help the main social media sites determine which news sites to avoid.
Specifically, the SPLC is helping Facebook, Twitter, Amazon and Google decide what groups are hate groups — and therefore, what groups shouldn’t be allowed a presence on the respective sites.
It’s censorship, pure and simple.
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And the SPLC and the social media outlets are selling it as a service to society.
From the Daily Caller News Foundation:
Four of the world’s biggest tech platforms have working partnerships with a left-wing nonprofit that has a track record of inaccuracies and routinely labels conservative organizations as “hate groups.”
Facebook, Amazon, Google and Twitter all work with or consult the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in policing their platforms for “hate speech” or “hate groups,” a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found.
The SPLC is on a list of “external experts and organizations” that Facebook works with “to inform our hate speech policies,” Facebook spokeswoman Ruchika Budhraja told TheDCNF in an interview.
Facebook consults the outside organizations when developing changes to hate speech policies, Budhraja said, noting that Facebook representatives will typically hold between one and three meetings with the groups.
Citing privacy concerns, the Facebook spokeswoman declined to name all the outside groups working with Facebook, but confirmed the SPLC’s participation.
Budhraja emphasized that Facebook’s definition of “hate group” is distinct from the SPLC’s definition and said that Facebook consults with groups across the political spectrum.
The SPLC accusedFacebook in a May 8 article of not doing enough to censor “anti-Muslim hate” on the platform. That article did not disclose the SPLC’s working partnership with Facebook.
“We have our own process and our processes are different and I think that’s why we get the criticism [from the SPLC], because organizations that are hate organizations by their standards don’t match ours,” Budhraja said.
“That doesn’t mean that we don’t have a process in place, and that definitely doesn’t mean we want the platform to be a place for hate but we aren’t going to map to the SPLC’s list or process,” she said.
Of the four companies, Amazon gives the SPLC the most direct authority over its platform, TheDCNF found.
While Facebook emphasizes its independence from the SPLC, Amazon does the opposite: Jeff Bezos’ company grants the SPLC broad policing power over the Amazon Smile charitable program, while claiming to remain unbiased.
“We remove organizations that the SPLC deems as ineligible,” an Amazon spokeswoman told TheDCNF.
Amazon grants the SPLC that power “because we don’t want to be biased whatsoever,” said the spokeswoman, who could not say whether Amazon considers the SPLC to be unbiased.
The Smile program allows customers to identify a charity to receive 0.5 percent of the proceeds from their purchases on Amazon. Customers have given more than $8 million to charities through the program since 2013, according to Amazon.
Only one participant in the program, the SPLC, gets to determine which other groups are allowed to join it.
Christian legal groups like the Alliance Defending Freedom — which recently successfully represented a Christian baker at the Supreme Court— are barred from the Amazon Smile program, while openly anti-Semitic groups remain, TheDCNF found in May.
One month later, the anti-Semitic groups — but not the Alliance Defending Freedom — are still able to participate in the program.
Twitter lists the SPLC as a “safety partner” working with Twitter to combat “hateful conduct and harassment.”
The platform also includes the Trust and Safety Council, which “provides input on our safety products, policies, and programs,” according to Twitter. Free speech advocates have criticized it as Orwellian.
A Twitter spokeswoman declined to comment on the SPLC specifically, but said the company is “in regular contact with a wide range of civil society organizations and [nongovernmental organizations].”
Google uses the SPLC to help police hate speech on YouTube as part of YouTube’s “Trusted Flagger” program, The Daily Caller reported in February, citing a source with knowledge of the agreement. Following that report, the SPLC confirmed they’re policing hate speech on YouTube.
The SPLC and other third-party groups in the “Trusted Flagger” program work closely with YouTube’s employees to crack down on extremist content in two ways, according to YouTube.
First, the flaggers are equipped with digital tools allowing them to mass flag content for review by YouTube personnel. Second, the groups act as guides to YouTube’s content monitors and engineers who design the algorithms policing the video platform, but may lack the expertise needed to tackle a given subject.
The SPLC is one of over 300 government agencies and nongovernmental organizations in the YouTube program, the vast majority of which remain hidden behind confidentiality agreements.
The SPLC has consistently courted controversy in publishing lists of “extremists” and “hate groups.” The nonprofit has been plagued by inaccuracies this year, retracting four articles in March and April alone.
The well-funded nonprofit, which did not return a request for comment, deleted three Russia-related articles in March after challenges to their accuracy followed by legal threats.
All three articles focused on drawing conspiratorial connections between anti-establishment American political figures and Russian influence operations in the United States.
The SPLC removed a controversial “anti-Muslim extremist” list in April, after British Muslim reformer Maajid Nawaz threatened to sue over his inclusion on the list. The SPLC had accusedthe supposed-extremists of inciting anti-Muslim hate crimes. (RELATED: SPLC Pulls Controversial ‘Anti-Muslim Extremist’ List After Legal Threats)
Somali-born women’s rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali also made the list.
Ali, a victim of female genital mutilation who now advocates against the practice, is an award-winninghuman rights activist. But according to the SPLC’s since-deleted list, she was an “anti-Muslim extremist.”
Ali criticizedApple CEO Tim Cook in August 2017 for donating to the SPLC, which she described as “an organization that has lost its way, smearing people who are fighting for liberty and turning a blind eye to an ideology and political movement that has much in common with Nazism.”
Dr. Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon who is now the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, was surprised to find out in February 2015 that the SPLC had placed him on an “extremist watch list”for his conservative beliefs.
“When embracing traditional Christian values is equated to hatred, we are approaching the stage where wrong is called right and right is called wrong. It is important for us to once again advocate true tolerance,” Carson said in response.
“That means being respectful of those with whom we disagree and allowing people to live according to their values without harassment,” he continued. “It is nothing but projectionism when some groups label those who disagree with them as haters.”
Following a backlash, the SPLC apologized and removed him from their list. Carson was on the list for four months before the SPLC removed the “extremist” label.
Floyd Lee Corkins, who attempted a mass shooting at the conservative Family Research Center in 2012, said he chose the organization for his act of violence because the SPLC listed them as a “hate group.”
The SPLC has faced tough criticisms not just from conservatives, but from establishment publications, as well.
“At a time when the line between ‘hate group’ and mainstream politics is getting thinner and the need for productive civil discourse is growing more serious, fanning liberal fears, while a great opportunity for the SPLC, might be a problem for the nation,” Ben Schreckinger, now with GQ, wrote in a June 2017 piece for Politico.
Washington Post Reporter Megan McArdle, while still reporting for Bloomberg, similarly criticizedthe SPLC’s flimsy definition of “hate group” in September 2017. Media outlets who trust the SPLC’s labels, McArdle warned, “will discredit themselves with conservative readers and donors.”
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13 Comments
5 years ago
The SPLC causes more “hate” and division than it can ever hope to prevent.
5 years ago
Agree., saudi/qatar/OIC own part of twitter, Fox Network, fund CNN, MSNBC , buy out politicians , bureaucrats in education dept to push islam in schools/ colleges. Easiest way to brainwash and takeover country and shutdown free speech !
After facebook, twitter , even Google joins lslamofascist gang to suppress conservative
free speech http://tinyurl.com/lgp28rs
5 years ago
Reply to
Suresh
Speaking of Education…..where in the hell is the Sec of Ed, Becky Devos?!
We had that story on Geller a couple of weeks ago where a teacher in West Virginia was trying to force the kids to cite the Islam prayer that makes them a Muslim once you say or write it….her excuse was she was teaching “calligraphy” and the Muslims created calligraphy….right there shows she should not be teaching anything because she didn’t bother to know that calligraphy was created 3,000 years by the Chinese BEFORE the Muslims reared their murderous heads…..
Hey, Becky….get your lazy butt out of D.C. and go into the field and find out what you were appointed to do……and, it’s about time you start testing the dam Union teachers and weed out the idiots or the Sharia compliant ones….
DO YOUR DAM JOB!
5 years ago
And Trump likes/uses, Twitter….wonder if he knows this?
I, myself, don’t understand why anyone would use social media, especially after all the news out, about them collecting data on everyone….
Facebook Wants You to Opt-in to Face Recognition & Personalized Ads
https://www.techlicious.com/blog/facebook-opt-in-face-recognition-personalized-ads/
Facebook Is Hiring “News Credibility Specialists” That Will Pass Judgment On Which Sites Are “Credible” And Which Sites Are Not
5 years ago
You got to be KIDDING me?? This sound like a nightmare. Everybody knows the hate group SPLC only targets the right and conservatives as hate groups.
This is TOO FUNNY. Who would take them seriously? Apparently the FAGoT organizations – F*kebook, Amazon, Googlue Or Twiturd.
5 years ago
The undiverse SPLC is a money making racket cynically using identity politics to stigmatise free speech and thereby secure funds for its evil, self interested, hypocritical hierarchy.
5 years ago
IOW, tech giants around the world embrace the ideology that gave us the Nazi party. Progressivism is the granddaddy of all hate groups and it has found yet another generation of helpful idiots in the corrupt SPLC.
5 years ago
It’s all about power and because they can! We have been lured into social media and now they want to brainwash us into their way of thinking. ????mind control?
5 years ago
The SPLC has been proven by a number of studies to be a total fraud. Their sole purpose is to make money for its owners, that big money. They do not work on behalf of those in poverty, nor do they provide legal services for the poor or anyone or that matter.
The SPLC provides a service to the left wing by naming whoever they choose to as being illegal, anti Muslim, islamophobic, anti democratic and many more such names. They make no attempt to prove themselves right nor do they explain why they call their targets bad things.
SPLC currently holds hundreds of millions in offshore accounts as profits from soliciting donations for their wonderful work ! They should be shut down.
5 years ago
Without Labels, Name-calling, and Big Lies … the Left would be defenseless against the truth.
It’s not fair to ask them to give up their lies and name-calling. They only control the money, almost all of the world’s governments, virtually all education, and essentially all international and major national corporations… but they need Labels, Name-calling and Big Lies too.
Otherwise the drooling morons – aka peasants – would wake up and get p/o.
5 years ago
Yes, anti-hate is hate. The Demokkkratic party is the party of slavery, racism, bigotry, lies, among other odious party platforms. The SPLC is a heavily funded hate-group dedicated to promoting violence, crime, oppression, division, hate, and – especially deliciously ironic – poverty.
The SPLC is little more than a propaganda machine for the new Nazis.
5 years ago
…who were given an office and place in Obummer’s administration….and funded by our tax dollars…..it’s time now to start having Sedition trials….Soros, SPLC, BLM, Clintons, Farrakhan Obummer, etc…all the usual suspects….
5 years ago
Can anyone tell me if FireFox is still around? I remember they forced out their head guy about 3-4 years ago because they found out he once gave $4,000 to Defense of the Marriage Act campaign….that’s when I quit them and went to Google….frying pan to fire.
….which by the way, Killary and Bubba were promoting….but then Killary had a “change of heart” (which is funny because she doesn’t have a “heart” to change) and is now the Gay and Transgenders best friend.
And if FireFox is still around are they also still participating in Fascism and controlling speech?
When are some Conservative wealthy patriots going to step up and start their own hosting searching and hosting site?
