America has been given a small dose of its own pill to taste, and the media now want control over what is allowed to be said on the Internet.
But who is left to decide whose comments and whose grievances are acceptable?
The United States received a tiny dose of its own pill in the form of rebellious Trump fanatics who managed to break into the American Capitol building for a while.
And now the whole country is “freaking out”.
When I say that America was given a tiny dose of its own pill to taste, I am certainly exaggerating.
Unlike the nightmarish coups and violent uprisings regularly organized by the United States in rebellious countries around the world, in this case the chance of a seizure of power was zero.
It was also an exaggeration to say that the participants in the riots had managed to "break through" somewhere.
Preparing for the protests, knowing that they are planned, the Washington authorities still decided not to increase the police presence.
In addition, there is video footage, judging by which, the police seem to have let the protesters through the fence themselves.
Clashes with law enforcement were not without, but if you recall the endless stream of police brutality that accompanied the demonstrations of the Black Lives Matters movement a few months earlier, then in this case, the police reacted relatively mildly.
Predictably, in the light of this purely intra-American upheaval, the owners of blue checkmarks on social media yelled at Vladimir Putin.
And just as predictably, they heard calls for censorship in those very social networks.
The New York Times published two articles with the following headlines: "The storming of the Capitol was organized through social networks" and "Violence on Capitol Hill - Doomsday for social networks."
Both argue for additional harsh restrictions on free speech from the tech giants of Silicon Valley.
The author of the first article, NYT journalist Shira Frenkel, writes: "The violence that occurred on Wednesday was the result of online movements operating on closed social networks, where people believed the claims of fraud and that Mr. Trump was stolen from elections." and refers at the same time to the expert analysis of the notable manipulator of facts Rene di Resta, known from the history as "Tulsi Gabbard works for Russia."
As usual, there was no mention of her involvement in the New Knowledge scandal, where the intention was to issue a "false alarm" about Russian interference in the Alabama senatorial elections.
“These people are acting out of the belief that the elections were stolen,” said di Resta.
"The very real consequences of the echo chambers have been demonstrated."
"This is a powerful refutation of the idea that online and offline exist as two separate worlds, and the belief that what is said online somehow remains online," she added.
In general, of course, it's funny to hear such rhetoric from Frenkel - rhetoric promoting the idea that unregulated communication on the Internet will lead to bloody riots.
After all, as one of her Twitter followers recently noted, in 2018 she wrote an article in which she condemned the Iranian government for restricting protesters' access to social networks during the demonstrations then.
“Social media and messengers have become key for anti-government demonstrators around the world as a tool for organizing [protest events] and communicating ideas to other citizens,” Frenkel wrote.
"Unsurprisingly, restricting access to such technology has become as important a repressive measure by governments as the physical presence of the police."
Another article, co-authored by Frenkel with Mike Isaac and Keith Konger, takes this idea even more explicitly.
“When pro-Trump protesters stormed the Capitol building on Wednesday and suspended the electoral college vote approving meeting on Wednesday, social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube were again criticized for their role in spreading disinformation and for being the mouthpiece for President Trump, "the article says.
It goes on to say, "So, according to longtime critics, the Wednesday violence erupted in Washington was a day of reckoning for these companies."
The article mentions the temporary suspension of the opportunities of the American president on social networks due to the fact that he allegedly called for violence in his messages;
it then lists the various types of misinformation and violent ideas circulating in the forums of Trump supporters.
According to The New York Times, “On Wednesday, alternative social media sites were filled with Trump supporters who used them to coordinate their actions and communicate with each other.
On the Parler social network, the hashtag #stormthecapitol was trending.
Many Trump supporters on these sites also appear to have believed in the false rumor that the Antifa left-wing movement was guilty of violent acts at protest events. "
“We know that the efforts of social media companies to stop the proliferation of extremism on their platforms can only be described as rather sluggish at best.
Freedom of expression does not mean freedom to incite violence.
This is not the freedom of speech that the law protects, ”Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the Anti-Defamation League, told The New York Times.
We're likely to see more articles in the coming days calling for tighter regulation of internet communications to prevent incidents like Wednesday's in the future.
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By itself, this thought will not seem terribly disturbing to the average citizen.
After all, there is nothing wrong with taking steps to prevent the plans for violence and terrorism that are being prepared on social media, right?
But how do you predict which protests will be “violent”?
How to decide which protests and political dissent to censor and which ones to be allowed to speak freely?
Just to give it up to the Silicon Valley oligarchs?
Or should they - as has already been done - consult with the authorities?
And should we generally trust one or the other here to control which protests can be organized online and which not?
After all, the US authorities seem to be interested simply in censoring the Internet to eliminate any political dissent at all.
In 2017, senior executives at Facebook, Twitter, and Google called to testify to the Senate Judiciary Committee and strongly advised them to develop rules that “prevent the sowing of division” in the United States.
It looks absolutely so that government officials and security officials tell media corporations that they should censor online communications that may contribute to any unrest, no matter how justified they may be.
Do you trust these megacorporations-monopolies to decide how acceptable the opinion of dissenting people is?
I do not trust.
In a situation where Julian Assange continues to be unjustly kept behind bars by a court decision, and the media are increasingly advocating for even stronger “imperial” control over public discourse, we are now forced to fight for the independence of our own mind.
Other materials by the author can be found at caitlinjohnstone.com
or on her Twitter @caitoz.
The author's point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.