Facebook and Spotify on Monday joined Apple in purging content created by nutjob conspiracy theorist Alex Jones off their platforms — condemning the InfoWars creator’s ravings as hate speech.
FILE – In this April 17, 2017, file photo, “Infowars” host Alex Jones arrives at the Travis County Courthouse in Austin, Texas. Jones filed a motion Friday, July 20, 2018, to dismiss a defamation lawsuit filed by families of some of the 26 people killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting in Newtown, Conn. Lawyers for Jones argued he was acting as a journalist in questioning the official narrative of the shooting. Jones, who said he now believes the shootings happened, said such journalism would be chilled if “reporters were subject to liability if they turned out to be wrong.” (Tamir Kalifa/Austin American-Statesman via AP, File)
Facebook said in a statement Monday that it had “unpublished” the Alex Jones Channel Page, the Alex Jones Page, the InfoWars Page and the Infowars Nightly News Page.
“We believe in representing a wide range of views, so long as people are respectful to those with differing opinions,” the social media giant said in a statement.
“Podcasts that violate these guidelines are removed from our directory making them no longer searchable or available for download or streaming.”
Jones — whom Donald Trump in 2015 told, “Your reputation is amazing. I will not let you down” — over the years pushed a number of outrageous theories, including that 9/11 was an inside job and that the Sandy Hook massacre and Oklahoma City bombing were government hoaxes.
Facebook had previously removed four other videos, saying they violated its hate speech and bullying policies.
The company said Monday that more content from the pages had since been reported, and it had decided to remove them for “repeated violations of community standards and accumulating too many strikes.”
“Upon review, we have taken it down for glorifying violence … and using dehumanizing language to describe people who are transgender, Muslims and immigrants, which violates our hate speech policies,” said Facebook.
But the company also said the page administrators would be able to appeal its decision.
Spotify also sanctioned Jones on Monday, removing every episode of his podcast “The Alex Jones Show” from its platform.
“We take reports of hate content seriously and review any podcast episode or song that is flagged by our community,” a Spotify spokesman told the Guardian.
“Due to repeated violations of Spotify’s prohibited content policies, ‘The Alex Jones Show’ has lost access to the Spotify platform.”
A day earlier, Apple removed five InfoWars podcasts from iTunes and its podcast app.
“Apple does not tolerate hate speech, and we have clear guidelines that creators and developers must follow to ensure we provide a safe environment for all of our users,” Apple said in a statement to BuzzFeed News.
“Podcasts that violate these guidelines are removed from our directory making them no longer searchable or available for download or streaming. We believe in representing a wide range of views, so long as people are respectful to those with differing opinions.”
Jones — who is being sued by families of children killed at Sandy Hook after contending the bloodbath was staged and that the families were paid actors — ranted that bans were unfair censorship.
“Even though America has no laws against ‘hate speech,’ Apple is acting as speech police and moving hard to shut down opinions which go against their globalist agenda,” a story on InfoWars read in part.
By BOB FREDERICKS
Source: NYPost
