Last Updated on August 26, 2019
Right-wing YouTube personality, James Allsup, 23, saw his YouTube channel with around half a million subscribers terminated a few days after other high-profile right wing YouTubers were scrubbed from the platform without specified reason.
Last week, British YouTubers, The Iconoclast and Way of the World, with a combined 350,000+ subscribers, were removed from the platform. The former had worked meticulously to stay within YouTube’s Terms of Service and had no prior strikes. He was removed with no forewarning.
In June, a wave of censorship hit YouTube specifically targeting right-of-center pundits.
Many personalities were censored, demonetized, or wholly banned from the platform.
The timing of this mass censorship raises a few eyebrows, given its proximity to next year’s elections.
Social media’s role in influencing political outcomes has been placed under the microscope. Project Veritas uncovered some very inconvenient findings regarding Google’s future political intentions.
Allsup was also deplatformed from Facebook and Instagram last week in what he believes to be a coordinated attack from the ADL.
#Update It appears as though this is not an isolated incident. Several other Right Wing Youtube Channels have either been suspended or had videos taken down today.
— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) August 26, 2019
In a statement to National File, Allsup said that “Despite having zero channel strikes and zero rules violations my channel, the business I had built, was destroyed.” He added, “This was the primary source of income for my family including my young daughter.”
Allsup reiterated that he has become a targeted of the ADL.
“I have been targeted by the ADL, which listed me on a hit list of channels they wanted banned. Their operatives have been publicly calling for me to be banned. Today they got their wish,” said Allsup.
“I was banned from Instagram and Facebook, and now YouTube, because the left isn’t interested in the debate,” he continued. “They aren’t interested in truth. They want to paint me, and by extension you, with an ‘evil’ brush- they want you to be a caricature they can easily demonize.”
“When you’re a normal person with nonthreatening ideas and a happy family, that’s very inconvenient for their character assassination.”
Social media companies’ status as private companies has been called into question due to their function as entities which can influence politics and truth itself.
As predicted by several alt-media voices, social media companies were to employ a piecemeal censorship of larger channels in order to minimize any potential backlash.
Freedom of speech is increasingly under attack from Silicon Valley.
James Hadfield contributed to the reporting of this article.
