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Most if not all bullies are also cowards. They pick on the relatively powerless, knowing that they are unlikely to meet any significant resistance.
‘Nothing to see here. Move along.’
Bully Blogger
Google Blogger has been showing itself to be a bully of late.
In the last few weeks, it has deleted two of my blog posts for what amounts to reasons unknown. Or ‘just because’.
The first to be summarily done away with was ‘The case for non-pharmaceutical defences against covid’, originally published in November 2021. On 12 August last, Blogger emailed me to inform me that this story was now binned. It’s still available here on El Tiempo at https://blogs.eltiempo.com/wrong-way-corrigan/2021/09/06/the-vaccine-vexers/.
Then on 02 September just gone another pandemic-era post, ‘The vaccine vexers’, originally published in September 2021, got the chop (read it on this blog at https://blogs.eltiempo.com/wrong-way-corrigan/2021/11/16/the-case-for-non-pharmaceutical-covid-defences/).
Here’s the text of that latest email Blogger sent to me, worded the same as the 12 August correspondence:
Hello,
As you may know, our community guidelines
(https://blogger.com/go/contentpolicy) describe the boundaries for what we
allow – and don’t allow – on Blogger. Your post entitled ‘The vaccine
vexers’ was flagged to us for review. We have determined that it violates
our guidelines and deleted the post, previously at
http://wwcorrigan.blogspot.com/2021/09/the-vaccine-vexers.html.Why was your blog post deleted?
Your content has violated our misleading content policy. Please follow
the community guidelines link in this email to learn more.If you believe that we made an error, you can request an appeal:
https://www.blogger.com/go/appeal-post?blogId=2732538313987233397&postId=7490742377544475627.
You may have the option to pursue your claims in court. If you have legal
questions or wish to examine legal options that may be available to you,
you may want to consult with your own legal counsel.We encourage you to review the full content of your blog posts to make
sure that they are in line with our standards as additional violations
could result in termination of your blog.For more information, please review the following resources:
Terms of Service: https://www.blogger.com/go/terms
Blogger community guidelines: https://blogger.com/go/contentpolicy
Senseless censorship
So my content has violated Blogger’s ‘misleading content policy.’ Yet, Blogger doesn’t tell me what it is that is misleading. It seems to think that by reading the community guidelines I’ll find out why my content was deleted. I have read the community guidelines and they don’t shed any light as to why these posts have been labelled ‘misleading’. It’s similar to the if-you-don’t-know-what-you’ve-done-wrong treatment from an irate girlfriend.
Not agreeing with somebody’s take on contentious issues in which there is still much ongoing debate is not the same as that take being misleading. Also, going into specifics of the content, which Google Blogger fails to do, it’s a fact to say that some people have non-vaccine-acquired immunity, i.e. natural immunity, to covid-19 and therefore don’t need the jab. To state otherwise is not only misleading but potentially deadly and it further erodes trust in public health.
Blogger avoids specifics because it simply wouldn’t be able to win the argument. ‘You are misleading because we say you are misleading’, that’s the approach. What’s more, its guidelines are so general that they can be fitted to suit the platform’s own perspective on every occasion.
This is the big problem for small fry such as me. Google Blogger can do and does what it wishes with content published on its platform and there’s little we lightweight users can do to fight back, save for, as mentioned in the email, appealing the decision or taking legal action against the company. I’ve done the former but, unsurprisingly, have thus far received no reply, while the latter is something few modest bloggers could afford to contemplate.
It’s like a country that has strict entry requirements for would-be visitors. We may think the requirements are unnecessarily restrictive but the country can set them as it sees fit.
In this case, Google Blogger is letting it be known that it is against science, rigorous debate, and free speech while it supports Big Pharma and censorship.
Who’s really doing the misleading here? Bully Blogger, you can delete all my stories if you wish but all you’ll be doing is revealing your autocratic aims. Welcome to Gulag Blogger.
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