TalkRADIO deletion is Big Tech censorship in all its glory

I discovered talkRADIO by accident. The oversized TV that takes up half the lounge in my undersized flat is apparently one of those smart things. It comes with a number of apps built into it. One of which is YouTube. Whilst working away, I would often leave the live stream running. As someone who regularly writes about never-ending culture war, I find it a convenient way to keep up to date with the latest woke nonsense. This intelligent TV appears to remember that I often watch the talkRADIO channel, so when it comes to searching for it, I needn’t worry about anything.

Earlier today, I noticed it had disappeared from YouTube. It turns out Google – who own the streaming site -deleted the channel due to a violation of its ‘community guidelines’.

Now I see YouTube has given into the storm of criticism and the channel is back up. Just as well. But let’s look at why it was taken down in the first place. Supposedly, the violation in question was because its presenters invited on guests who aired criticism of the numerous lockdowns we are going through due to the coronavirus.

The radio station’s YouTube channel, which had over a quarter of a million subscribers, regularly features guests on their shows who have challenged facts presented and claims made by the government and its scientific advisory panel SAGE. These include the Oxford epidemiologist Professor Sunetra Gupta, Professor Carl Heneghan and Professor of Medicine Jay Bhattacharya.

Sunetra Gupta is the author of The Great Barrington Declaration, a document that advocates for a more humane, strategic approach to the virus. The declaration calls for ‘focused protection’ of the vulnerable and demands an end to the restrictions placed on people’s lives caused by the state-sanctioned lockdown. It calls for people to be free to evaluate their own individual level of risk and to engage in whatever activity they feel safe enough to do.

Freedom of speech and its equally important concomitant, freedom of the press is an essential liberty that is slowly but surely being taken away from us. To paraphrase Rosa Luxembourg, free speech is meaningless unless it means freedom for the person who thinks differently.

One of the station’s presenters, Mike Graham, regularly features an interview with Peter Hitchens. The Mail on Sunday journalist used to regularly spar with Graham, who once held a very different opinion to Hitchens on the lockdown. But as the months rolled by, Graham’s opinion changed during their weekly discussion.

Censorious intrusion upon free speech by the technology giants is nothing new. When Twitter blocked the distribution of a New York Times piece on the alleged Hunter Biden scandal, they potentially played a role in the influence of the 2020 U.S election. By censoring the story, the social media platform effectively became a publisher. It’s hardly news that  Silicon Valley has a left-wing bias. The Centre for Responsive Politics revealed that 98 per cent of political contributions from internet companies went to the Democratic Party.

Donald Trump’s failure to rein in the tech oligarchs played a role in his own downfall. His failure to repeal section 230 – which would’ve meant publishers would no longer have immunity from prosecution for hosting third-party content – meant Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey got off scot-free. Well, except from a verbal shellacking from Ted Cruz at a Senate Committee.

Trump’s ‘say something, do nothing’ approach to politics should serve as a cautionary tale in the talkRADIO debacle. Some say free speech is dead in England. It’s definitely on life support. Unfortunately, this beautiful civil liberty is not enshrined in law. In fact, with the emergence of hate-speech laws, the once healthy roots of this sacred tree of liberty have rotted so much, it is about to come crashing down. Unless we act.

If we are going to stop this happening time after time, we need an Internet Bill of Rights. Perhaps a British first amendment similar to the United States. But for this to be successful we would need a codified, written constitution. At the moment our model of democracy is predicated upon common law – one of custom and judicial precedent, not statute. But, in order to resuscitate free speech, something must be done. If you are not free to criticise the government, it cannot be held accountable for its actions.

When you violate the ability of another to speak freely you in potentia drive a nail into your own coffin. Speech must always be free. That way we combat bad ideas. If they go unchallenged they are forced into the darkness, where they fester and foster resentment by people frustrated at not being heard. Sunlight, as they say, is the best disinfectant. No idea, no matter how vile, must be censored. It is for this reason, equal consideration must be given to everyone: from the bizarre antics of anti-vaxxers to the disgusting historical revisionism of holocaust deniers.

Even for those dreadful people at talkRADIO who dislike the way the government is handling the coronavirus.