What’s that I hear? It’s the high-pitched whining of a man who was caught spreading dangerous misinformation about the coronavirus. He got caught, and he doesn’t like it one bit. Yesterday, Facebook and Instagram placed warnings over videos from a segment of Tucker Carlson Tonight where Carlson interviewed a discredited Chinese virologist who claimed she could prove COVID-19 was engineered by humans.
Let’s just pause there. Carlson interviewed a so-called “Chinese whistleblower,” Dr. Li-Meng Yan, who claims that she can prove COVID-19 was made in a lab. This is, we must be clear, completely untrue. The warning under the video linked to three separate articles refuting this, which were, according to Variety: “two from FactCheck.org — “Baseless Conspiracy Theories Claim New Coronavirus Was Bioengineered” and “Social Media Posts Spread Bogus Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory”— and one from USA Today, “Coronavirus not man-made or engineered but its origin remains unclear.’”
Yan’s so-called proof about the virus being engineered is based on a “study” published by two non-profit groups. And who’s behind those groups? Accused criminal and human hairball Steve Bannon! So. This woman is full of crap AND she’s spreading a conspiracy theory that blames China, Trump’s current favorite boogie man, for the virus. She is, in journalistic terms, full of shit.
When he found out about the warning, Carlson threw a fit like the totally mature, reasonable person he is. Here’s a bit of it:
The coronavirus pandemic has touched the life of every American. And justifiably, people want to know where it came from. But Facebook still doesn’t want you to know that. So Facebook suppressed the video, presumably on behalf of the Chinese government. Facebook executives made it harder for users to watch our segment. Those who found the video had to navigate a warning that the interview ‘repeats information about COVID-19 that independent fact-checkers say is false.’
Yeah, Tuck, Facebook is doing the bare minimum to stop the spread of dangerous, false, racist information! I know that Carlson is Trump’s guy and he assumes that Facebook, which also functions as a campaign and misinformation tool for Trump most days, should just let this nonsense go. But for once the social media platform that has rotted the brains of half of our older relatives and undermined the very foundations of democracy did something. So cue the meltdown.
To be clear, again, this isn’t censorship. Censorship is government action. And this cursed video already got nearly 2 million views! Facebook is making a minimal effort to stop misinformation, which could lead to more anti-Asian racism among other things. They are not working for China. In fact, the only person here doing nefarious things to support a cruel, dangerous government here … is Tucker Carlson.
(via: Variety, Image: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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