The Thought Police at multinational tech conglomerate Alphabet, Inc. — the owners of video-sharing platform YouTube — are again censoring videos that they find politically unpalatable. One of their latest victims is the solo music project Five Times August and their song entitled Sad Little Man, a brutal satirical statement against noted vaccine pusher Anthony Fauci.
Sad Little Man was written and performed by songwriter Brad Skistimas under the name Five Times August and shares no medical information at all in the lyrics – just a satirical bashing of Fauci and the cult of personality that has grown up around the man for the past two years.
Among the song’s lyrics: “Sad little man but he’s treated like a God/As the faithless pray to a fake and a fraud/Worship the man, pledge to his word/One shot, two shot, now you get a third.”
The song also skewers Fauci’s involvement in the abuse of canines with the National Institute of Health with the lyrics: “Sad little man gonna trap you like a dog, put your head in a net while they eat you raw. Don’t ask why, just comply. ‘Cause fear is the drug that the doc prescribed.”
Despite the fact that the song itself contained no overt medical information of any kind, YouTube originally removed the video before allowing it up again but without the ability to be monetized. As usual, the tech giant had a hard time explaining its decision.
When Skistimas asked for clarification as to why the video was demonetized, YouTube responded, “Sorry for any confusion — the video is ineligible for full monetization due to the content (which includes metadata) containing Medical Misinformation. Medical Misinfo is a policy that’s part of Dangerous and Harmful acts. Hope this helps clarify!”
Skistimas countered: “It doesn’t @TeamYouTube. I have asked your team via email several times what specific medical misinformation is in my video and nobody will specify. This is clear discrimination and suppression against art and your content creators. Explain yourselves.”
In an interview with Timcast, Skistimas reported that his request for an explanation had been ignored by the tech giant, prompting him to re-upload the video
“By the third day and no resolve from YouTube I decided to re-upload the video a second time, all with the same title and description, but without the metadata tags (which included keywords like Fauci, Vaccine, and Covid-19),” Skistimas said.
Again the video contained no medical information per se — only a bashing of Fauci and the cult-like adherence to the man’s ever-changing pronouncements on COVID-19, mask-wearing and vaccines.
Consider more of the song’s lyrics: “Sad little man, you can watch him on the news/ Preaching to his choir while they learn the rules/ Some feel safe and some feel healed/ But they’ll all hold his hand as he makes the kill.”
The video had reached nearly a quarter of a million views in just a few weeks prior to YouTube’s censorship. The song — much like the various incarnations of the “Let’s Go Brandon” songs — reached number one on several charts including Amazon. Skistimas believes it’s only a matter of time until the censorship begins anew.
“I’m expecting them to eventually flag the second upload as well, but the fact they’re judging art and suppressing opposing viewpoints so blatantly speaks volumes about their ethics. There are much worse music videos on YouTube with millions and millions of views that are way more harmful than my short little cartoon — and they have full monetization.”
Five Times August’s website reveals that Skistimas is about more than disparaging the cult figure Fauci. A list of songs includes Silent War; Joe; and Jesus…What Happened to Us? — all acoustic folk songs, which comment on the events of the day from right-of-center point of view.
In some ways, an artist such as Skistimas is the cultural successor — if not an ideological successor — to 1960’s folk singers such as Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and Pete Seeger. Imagine if a multinational conglomerate was censoring their work under the banner of “medical misinformation.”
