In 2015, Reddit, like YouTube, had almost no content policy beyond banning illegal activity, doxxing, harassment, and involuntary or underage pornography. By 2020, Reddit had purged political dissent from the site.
In 2015, Twitter was "the free speech wing of the free speech party" according to CEO Jack Dorsey, even avoiding collaboration with the NSA (unlike Google, Facebook). By 2019 it was one of the most censored, monitored, and controlled social media networks in the world.
The most important platform to be closed off 2017-2019 was YouTube. Before 2017, YouTube was a very open platform, with easy monetization and almost no moderation of legal content. By the end of 2019, thoughtcrime (anything to the right of Ben Shapiro) was thoroughly purged.
Seeing this happen in real time was immensely blackpilling and the fact that it isn't even widely-known and discussed that this happened (almost entirely in the last 11 years) is a travesty. "Closure of the Internet" is 1000 times worse than McCarthyism ever was.
"Closure of the Internet" is 1000 times worse than McCarthyism ever was.
I remember Alex Jones once comparing our digital totalitarianism to McCarthyism, saying that under McCarthyism you still had the ability to face your accusers.
All worth reading:
https://x.com/arctotherium42/status/2037324995852923054
I remember Alex Jones once comparing our digital totalitarianism to McCarthyism, saying that under McCarthyism you still had the ability to face your accusers.