Was it that he’s disfigured from an IED blast in Afghanistan? Was it that he was saluting the flag? That he’d just announced a U.S. Senate run? A combination of these factors? Retired Army captain and Purple Heart recipient Sam Brown is asking these questions after Twitter labeled a picture of him saluting the American flag in uniform as “potentially sensitive content.”
The Daily Mail summarizes the story, writing:
- Retired Captain Sam Brown posted a photo on Independence Day of himself saluting and the phrase ‘Freedom isn’t free’ – with his facial injuries visible
- ‘On July 4, 1776, America was born,’ he wrote. ‘On July 4, 2021, we’re still the best country on this planet’
- The tweet was not restricted, but the photo was slapped with a ‘potentially sensitive content’ warning, with Brown blasting the social media giant
- … Brown had just announced his intentions to run for Senate as a GOP candidate
- Donald Trump launched a class action law suit against Twitter, Facebook, Google and their CEOs Wednesday claiming he is the victim of censorship by Big Tech
Disputing Brown’s claim, a “Twitter spokesperson told DailyMail.com the tweet ‘was marked as sensitive because of the media settings of the user’ — not because of any action by Twitter,” the paper also reports.
So it’s possible, of course, that Brown had his account set the given way and wasn’t aware of it. (Not being a tech expert, I myself in the past have neglected to adjust settings on certain platforms the way I would’ve liked.)
Yet Twitter’s claim can’t absolutely be taken at face value because the company has earned suspicion. Even before it began deplatforming figures such as commentators Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos and President Trump, it was “shadowbanning” conservatives in violation of the Section 230 predicate that it remain censorship-free.
Note, too, that it has had yours truly under suspension for almost four months now, since March 17, keeping me in a state of limbo. Interestingly, you can access my Twitter page, making it appear as if I’ve simply chosen to not post any more content. But when I attempt to log in, I’m greeted with:
You appealed 1 Tweet.
…Please note that while we review your appeal, you won’t be able to access your Twitter account. We’ll take a look and will respond as soon as possible.
If you’d rather just delete your Tweet, you can cancel your appeal.
So by Twitter’s own admission, it is violating my human rights — along with those of everyone it deplatforms. That is to say, when the Nigerian government banned Twitter from its country in late spring, the company protested, claiming that access “to the free and #OpenInternet is an essential human right in modern society.” This kind of rank hypocrisy helps breed deep distrust of Big Tech.
Returning to Brown’s story, the veteran certainly doesn’t seem to believe that the content warning’s fault lies on his end. As he tweeted Wednesday night:
Brown sustained his injuries from the aforementioned IED blast while serving in Afghanistan in 2008; he was then medically retired in 2011.
The veteran also issued a statement about the Twitter situation to Fox News. “While I was ready to lay down my life in order to protect freedom of speech for my fellow Americans, Big Tech today decided that they know better, censoring me and deeming my comments regarding this great nation ‘Sensitive Content,'” he told the outlet. “These egregious and un-American actions come mere hours after I took steps to file and establish my candidacy for the United States Senate in Nevada, reinforcing my belief that ‘Big Tech’ is working against conservatives and trying to silence our voices.”
In Brown’s Senate run, as a GOP candidate in the 2022 midterms, he’s hoping to topple Democrat senator Catherine Cortez Masto from a seat that she only narrowly won in 2016.
He’ll be aided in this effort, too, if Trump and the other plaintiffs can prevail in the suit against GoogTwitFace that the Mail referenced earlier. The paper provides some detail on this effort, writing:
• Trump on Wednesday filed his lawsuit against Twitter, Google and Facebook and their CEOs.
• The former president said he had brought the suiton behalf of victims of ‘cancel culture’ and demanded the end of ‘shadow banning’ and ‘blacklisting.’
• ‘In addition, we are asking the court to impose punitive damages on these social media giants,’ he said. ‘We’re going to hold big tech very accountable.’
• Trump will serve as the lead plaintiff in the suit, claiming he has been wrongfully censored, he added.
• His lawyers said they will argue that Congress has frequently pressured Big Tech to take action on conservatives, making them ‘agents of government’ and therefore subject to the First Amendment.
• The legal moves are backed by the America First Policy Institute, a non-profit that includes several former senior administration officials.
Also supporting the suit is Harvard law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz, a Democrat, who called the action “very, very important” and said it “will shake things up considerably.” (Moreover, on this action’s heels, a coalition of 36 states and the District of Columbia have filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google, “alleging the tech giant illegally wields monopoly power over its app store,” as ABC News relates it.)
The constitutional argument against GoogTwitFace is that by working hand-in-glove with government actors, tech companies are serving as state proxies to do an end run around the First Amendment. And their power should not be underestimated. After researching Big Tech’s influence on our voting, liberal psychologist Robert Epstein found that GoogTwitFace has the capacity to shift up to 15 million votes in an election — enough to decide who becomes president.
In other words, whatever the truth on Brown’s situation, Big Tech can do far more than hide a man’s face — it can literally change the face of America.
