Social media is dangerous. It’s easy to lose your real life to a virtual one. One school district in Seattle, Washington has decided it’s had enough of students suffering from the designed dangers of social media. In a 91 page complaint filed against the parent companies of the social media platforms TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Snapchat, Seattle Public Schools, recently joined by the Kent School district, asserts that these companies have specifically curated their social media sites to be addicting to youth by “exploit[ing] the neurophysiology of the brain’s reward systems,” and that “the content Defendants curate and direct to youth is too often harmful and exploitive (e.g., promoting a ‘corpse bride’ diet, eating 300 calories a day, or encouraging self-harm).”

The complaint also specifies how as social media usage has increased, so have mental health problems, such as:  depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and suicidal thoughts (revealing that “from 2009 to 2019 there was an on-average 30 percent increase in the number of students… who reported feeling ‘so sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more in a row that [they] stopped doing some usual activities.’”

The Seattle School District’s detailed complaint alleges that social media harms users in the following ways:

• Social media has been designed to manipulate users’ brains via social reciprocity and intermittent variable rewards.

• Social media is designed to create dopamine loops to keep users hooked.

• Social media capitalizes on “fear of missing out” (FOMO) to keep users coming back.

• Social media curates the feed to keep users on longer.

• Social media pushes content that is often inappropriate, immoral, and harmful.

• Social media encourages dangerous behavior.

• Social media can cause teens to act disruptively, including sexual behavior, self-harm, vandalism, and violence.

It’s no secret that social media is harmful. That cry has been sounded so often, it’s now apt to fall on deaf ears. It allows every user to be the star of the story. It demands constant attention, so you don’t lose followers or miss new features and stories. It pressures users to show off their best life, rewarding the diligent with likes and follows. Users defend this form of entertainment as an effective way to connect with others, whilst sidestepping the reality that it’s mostly just a waste of time. It’s easy to get on, difficult to leave, and many (if not most) people have developed a habit of checking it whenever they have a second of downtime. Even though the minimum age for most social media is 13, it’s not uncommon for younger users to already be hooked. It’s designed to be addicting, and often lets you stumble (or guides you) into things you can’t unsee and can’t get away from.

Social media is difficult to regulate, hard to get rid of, and deeply enmeshed in American society, making it a problem difficult to solve. The lawsuit filed by Washington’s Seattle and Kent Public School districts is a good place to start – and a glimpse of what it would look like for schools to take the safety of children seriously. Parents, grandparents and church leaders, please take note: Protect kids from the designed dangers social media platforms pose.

Yesterday, U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) put to shame every Congressman and Congresswoman who refuses to state publicly and definitively that no medical professional should support cross-sex hormone-doping for minors or the elective removal of healthy parts of their sexual anatomy as “treatments” for disordered feelings about their maleness or femaleness.

The inspiring and courageous statements by Senator Paul occurred in a must-see exchange between Senator Paul and the pitiable Dr. “Rachel” Levine, a cross-dressing male physician whom the pandering Joe Biden has nominated to be his assistant health secretary. Of all the physicians in all of America, Biden chose a psychologically unwell man, and the reason for choosing Levine? Obviously, he was chosen because he masquerades as a woman and calls his masquerade “authentic identity.”

Senator Paul began by reminding Levine that female genital mutilation has been widely condemned:

Genital mutilation has been condemned by the WHO, the United Nations Children’s Fund, and the United Nations Population Fund. According to the WHO, genital mutilation is recognized internationally as a violation of human rights. Genital mutilation is considered particularly egregious because as the WHO notes, it is nearly always carried out on minors and is a violation of the rights of children.

Senator Paul further noted that as with genital mutilation, social forces today play a critical role in forming “trans”-cultic beliefs and practices that harm the bodies of minors:

Genital mutilation is not typically performed by force, but, as WHO notes, by social convention, social norm, the social pressure to conform, to do what others do and have been doing, as well as the need to be accepted socially, and the fear of being rejected by the community.

Evidence increasingly shows that social influences, including both the influence of social media and peers, have profound effects on adolescents, particularly on girls who tend to be more vulnerable to what are called “social contagions” (e.g., repressed memory syndrome, bulimia, and cutting) than are boys.

A study released in the United Kingdom showed that between 2009-2018, there was a 4,515 percent increase in the number of minor girls seeking to “transition,”—a shocking increase that many experts believe is the result of social media providing a distorted lens through which girls are misinterpreting their often normal feelings.

Rather than recommending waiting and counseling to get at the root causes for the confused and disordered feelings of minors, “trans”-cultists and their profiteering allies are recommending experimental medications and surgeries while banning counseling.

Senator Paul asked Levine,

Dr. Levine, you have supported both allowing minors to be given hormone blockers to prevent them from going through puberty, as well as surgical destruction of a minor’s genitalia. Like surgical mutilation, hormonal interruption of puberty can permanently alter and prevent secondary sexual characteristics. The American College of Pediatricians reports that 80 to 95% of pre-pubertal children with gender dysphoria will experience resolution by late adolescence, if not exposed to medical intervention and social affirmation. Dr. Levine, do you believe that minors are capable of making such a life changing decision as changing one’s sex?

Note U.S. Senator Paul’s inclusion of “social affirmation,” as a factor that contributes to minors persisting in their rejection of their biological sex. Affirming their delusional thinking through incorrect pronouns and restroom/locker room usage policies harm children.

Instead of answering Senator Paul’s direct and clear question, Levine dodged with a pre-memorized evasion, so Senator Paul tried again:

Let’s be a little more specific since you evaded the question. Do you support the government intervening to override the parent’s consent to give a child puberty-blockers, cross-sex hormones, and/or amputation surgery of breasts and genitalia? You have said that you’re willing to accelerate the protocols for street kids. I’m alarmed that poor kids with no parents who are homeless and distraught, that you would just go through with this and allow that to happen to a minor.

Again, Levine robotically recited the same memorized, evasive non-answer, which revealed that Levine does, indeed, support the chemical sterilization and surgical mutilation of minors who experience sexual confusion, often because of abuse and/or the toxic influence of social media.

Barely containing his justifiable and righteous anger over the destructive ignorance and dissembling of Levine, Senator Paul said what every decent American should be saying publicly and often:

Let it go into the record that the witness refused to answer the question. The question is a very specific one: Should minors be making these momentous decisions? For most of the history of medicine, we wouldn’t let you have a cut sewn up in the ER, but you’re willing to let a minor take things that prevent their puberty, and you think they get that back? You give a woman testosterone enough that she grows a beard, and you think she’s going to go back looking like a woman when you stop the testosterone? You have permanently changed them. Infertility is another problem. None of these drugs have been approved for this. They’re all being used off-label. I find it ironic that the left that went nuts over hydroxychloroquine being used possibly for COVID are not alarmed that these hormones are being used off-label.

There’s no long-term studies. We don’t know what happens to them. We do know that there are dozens and dozens of people who’ve been through this, who regret that this happened. And a permanent change happened to them and if you’ve ever been around children, 14-year-olds can’t make this decision. In the gender dysphoria clinic in England, 10% of the kids are between the ages of three and 10. We should be outraged that someone is talking to a three-year-old about changing their sex. I can’t vote for you if you can’t make a decision.

U.S. Senator Paul’s concluding statement exposed the hypocrisy and dishonesty of leftists. To leftists, the off-label use of hydroxychloroquine for the emergency treatment of a viral pandemic that was killing thousands of people worldwide was unconscionable. Why? Because successfully treating COVID-19 would have helped President Trump.

But the off-label use of puberty-blockers like Lupron, and the prescription of estrogen for physically healthy boys and progesterone for physically healthy girls are not only medically sound but also altruistic acts of love. At least the “trans” cult and its legion of allies think so.

And who are these allies? Who are the groups that gain from exploiting confused children?

Well, there are the cosmetic surgeons, endocrinologists, pharmaceutical companies, mental health “professionals,” academics, and YouTube “influencers” whose greedy hands are grasping for the filthy lucre the “trans” cult generates for them.

And then there are the pandering politicians like Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and every member of Congress who are content to say nothing as the bodies of children are destroyed. Children are expendable commodities because, unlike “trans”-cultists,” children have no power.

Listen to this article read by Laurie: 

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Rand-Paul-Confronts-Bidens-Cross-Dressing-Pick-for-Assistant-Health-Secretary_audio.mp3

We urge you to pray for our state and nation, for our elected officials in Springfield and Washington D.C.  

PLEASE also consider a financial gift to IFI to sustain our work. We have stood firm for 29 years, working to boldly bring a biblical perspective to public policy.

In the article describing “hate speech” tactics,[i] we saw how people are called haters if they oppose the homosexual or transgender agenda. The intent is to shame the opponents into silence, that the activists’ march through American culture can continue unopposed. In this article, we’ll see how the activists try to punish those who actually do stand against them. It touches on these points:

• When people are brave and unfazed by accusations, the activists turn to the personal destruction tactics of cancel culture.

• The effects of cancel culture can be expensive and physically dangerous. The idea is to eliminate the target’s opposition and discourage others.

• Even businesses and politicians are using these tactics.

• Defenses against political cancel culture involve forcing politicians to treat all of us fairly, and to honor our Constitutional rights.

• Defenses against business and social media cancelling involves diversification, greatly multiplying our communications choices.

No compromise is possible for attackers of America’s culture

America started with a strong Christian identity. But thanks, in part, to Christians saying that culture isn’t important,[ii] we no longer have a solid consensus about what our culture should be. Because “the Supreme Court follows the election returns,”[iii] we now have legalized “gay marriage,” even though our society is still fighting about it.[iv] Then there is the matter of transgender behavior, which its proponents expect all of us to unconsciously accept, not merely tolerate. We’re supposed to mindlessly support these things:

• Accept that a man or woman is whatever sex they choose to dress up as.

• Let those individuals use whatever sex-segregated public facility they choose to, just because they say so.

• Address them by whatever pronoun they’re pleased to use, whether it be “Mr,” “Miss,” “Xi,” “They,” or a great number of other odd pronouns.[v]

Or as Professor Karen Blair says, you shouldn’t care whether your potential mate is a man or woman. If you care then you’re adding to social injustice. She says:

Just as sociologists have tracked acceptance of inter-racial relationships as a metric of overall societal acceptance of racial minorities, future fluctuations in the extent to which trans and non-binary individuals are included within the intimate world of dating may help to illuminate progress (or lack thereof) with respect to fully including trans and non-binary individuals within our society. After all, it is one thing to make space for diverse gender identities within our workplaces, schools, washrooms and public spaces, but it is another to fully include and accept gender diversity within our families and romantic relationships. Ultimately, however, this research underscores the consequences of shared societal prejudices that impact our trans friends, partners, family members, and coworkers on a daily basis.[vi]

God condemns homosexual and transgender behavior. We see this both in the Old Testament (Leviticus 20:13) and New Testament (Romans 1:26-27).[vii] Christians can’t be faithful to God and also accept these behaviors in society. In turn, the promoters of homosexuality and transgenderism can’t back down without admitting that they’re living a lie. The resulting standoff is a culture war, and requires a victor. There is no long-term compromise possible. Soon enough one side gets overwhelmed. Remember when the call was to “please just tolerate gays?” The new call is for no dissent from their dogma, and full participation in their coming culture.

A decade ago, homosexualist activists were arguing that legalizing same-sex “marriage” was all about “acceptance” and “love,” and that it would have absolutely no impact on the daily life of most ordinary citizens. Opponents of same-sex “marriage” were routinely mocked with statements like: “How is it any of your business what two consenting adults do in the privacy of their own bedrooms?”, or, “If you don’t support gay marriage, don’t get one.” In other words: why get yourself worked up about something that has nothing to do with you?

However, just as pro-family advocates warned at the time, things haven’t turned out that way.

There are just too many examples of how same-sex “marriage”, and LGBT ideology in general, have impacted the daily lives of every citizen to cite in a single column. We saw this in a dramatic way throughout June – so-called “pride month.” One could scarcely open a website, or walk down the street, without being confronted by rainbow flags or other overt celebrations of licentious sexual practices. Many schools, libraries, and city and state legislatures flew the flag and held “pride” celebrations, while any effort to question the wisdom of using public buildings in this way was immediately shouted down as “homophobia” and bigotry.

However, this total saturation of the public space with pro-LGBT propaganda is merely one of the milder ways that LGBT extremism has inserted itself into everybody’s lives. Far more troubling is the way that the LGBT movement is propagandizing and recruiting children, often right under the noses of their parents. As a result, many well-meaning parents who decided not to speak out against same-sex “marriage” out of a desire to be more tolerant, are finding that they are losing their very children to belief-systems that they do not, in fact, support.[viii]

Christianity is evangelistic by nature. Through its obedience to God, His church illuminates the world with examples of God’s righteousness and mercy.[ix] It is a faith of action, of doing (James 2:14-26). When the church has freedom of action then God uses it to change the world. The homosexual and transgender activists can’t allow this, so they try to shut us up, with accusations of hate speech.[x] If we don’t voluntarily silence ourselves, and let them win unopposed, then they apply muscle to their demands. Cancel culture is their weapon of choice.

Cancel culture is how they silence our objections

The online Cambridge Dictionary has this definition for “cancel culture:”

a way of behaving in a society or group, especially on social media, in which it is common to completely reject and stop supporting someone because they have said or done something that offends you[xi]

The definition has interesting suggestions for using it in conversations:

Cancel culture has its place – it helps to call out and remove problematic people from mainstream culture.

In a cancel culture, we appoint ourselves the arbiters of right and wrong and also the judge and jury, because thanks to social media, we get to dole out punishment.

People participating in cancel culture mean to deprive their victims of social legitimacy and the privileges of community life. If this also inflicts economic loss or physical harm, so much the better. Since they can do these attacks without personal consequence, we see activity like this:

• Ruin someone by digging up a now unfashionable comment. In 1987 the young Navy pilot Niel Golightly wrote an opinion of why women should be kept out of combat roles. In 2020 this comment was discovered and Golightly got targeted. He lost his job for once having had a now politically incorrect opinion.[xiii]

• Punish someone who criticizes your cause. The professor Harald Uhlig criticized “Black Lives Matter” for being unrealistic about police funding. The cancel culture mob searched for things to use against him. Finding some minor incidents, they claimed that these proved how Uhlig was unfit to head a national academic journal. They demanded his firing.[xiv] The intended lesson is to never criticize “Black Lives Matter”.

• Change the culture through vandalizing history. Abraham Lincoln is accused of not having believed “black lives matter.” The mob ginned up support to remove his name from buildings, and statues honoring him are being vandalized and torn down.[xv] George Orwell pointed out, in his novel 1984, that if you can control what the public thinks, or can learn, about its past, then you can steer them into a future of your choice.[xvi] The mob has learned how to cancel history.[xvii] They also found that vandalism pays.

Political activists for homosexual and transgender issues have learned how to apply cancel culture tactics against “problematic people.” A small sample:

• Church ostracized from arts community because of sermon. The Crossing Church in Columbia, MO had an arts outreach ministry, giving money to local artists. But because of a sermon on God vs. transgender behavior, the church is now persona non grata in the arts. Galleries and theaters are pressured to stay away from the church’s assistance, or they themselves will get cancelled.[xviii]

• Feminist-supporting author cancelled for defending biology against transgenderism. Robert Jensen writes books and gives lectures. But his audience dried up once he asserted that biological sex is immutable. Bookstores won’t accept his books, he’s disinvited from speaking engagements, and he’s shouted down at other events. His views are inconvenient to the transgender behavior community.[xix]

• Pizza parlor forced to close after statements about not catering to “gay weddings.” The Memories Pizza parlor was reported to be unwilling to cater to a “gay wedding.” What followed was criticism, threats of vandalism against the business, and death threats against the owners.[xx] They never were actually asked to do that catering, but a reporter decided to create a news story. Despite the First Amendment, and Indiana religious freedom laws, apparently even advertising your Christian beliefs is a capital offense deserving of summary death.

These victims of cancel culture didn’t break any laws. In fact, their views and statements are generally mainstream culture. In a real sense, cancel culture is a form of social terrorism. It is effective, too, even if the results are temporary. The actual or imagined costs of being targeted by mob action – money, injury, vandalism – works to deter others from opposition, or even from offering silent support. This definition of cancel culture rings true:

Cancel culture is a call on organizations to terminate the financial sustenance (e.g., fire employees, stop hiring entertainers for gigs) or means of communication (removing from media platforms) of individuals who have done something objectionable. The objectionable thing may be an expressed opinion, or a statement made or action performed in the past. The act may have been unintentional, the person may have been unaware that it was objectionable, or it may be something that was not widely considered objectionable at the time. Since it is a past act, clearly the intention is not to return to favor by stopping the objectionable thing, it is to permanently punish and shun the transgressor.[xxi]

Businesses get into the cancel culture action

Business managers are human, and sometimes seek to make their businesses act as extensions of their own wants and desires. That’s how you end up with snack cracker ads “encouraging people to rethink what it means to be family,”[xxii] or assertions that “years of manufacturing and selling toothpaste make Colgate uniquely qualified to address questions around gender.” [xxiii] These ads show the world their managers’ political and cultural positions.

Running ads doesn’t interfere with the rights of anyone else, but cancel culture does. On the internet, it’s when a company blocks posts, and suspends the posting rights of people, because the company managers disagree with the posts’ cultural or political content. It’s when they block your company from getting any internet hosting at all, for the same reasons. Everyone else can have their say, but not you.

With Twitter and Facebook acting this way, it has become dangerous to our culture. Consider these reasons.

• Presented as being politically and culturally neutral. Since their content is user-generated, Twitter and Facebook supposedly have a fair slice of American opinion, reasonably reflecting the strengths and diversity of our culture. We know now that they aren’t neutral, but people still think that they are.

• Monopoly position. Twitter and Facebook have each gained a monopoly share in their particular specialty. Few people even realize that there are competitors.

• The go-to place for reaching people. The masses flock to Facebook to keep up with their friends and interesting people. They go to Twitter for timely news. Politicians post there because their constituents are already there. And it’s free to use, no subscription fees. These sites have become de-facto public squares, where people congregate to hear what is going on in their communities and the world. And supposedly, if it isn’t being said there then nobody is saying it at all.

• Hard to displace. It is a truism, that if you’re not paying for the product then you are the product. Twitter and Facebook make tremendous amounts of money from our being there. They get money from companies posting ads and from those buying audience information. A potential competitor would have to suffer years of heavy economic losses in hopes of taking back even a small share of the audience.

• Invisible hand in shaping opinions. People who visit Twitter or Facebook see posts, both deep and trivial, and think that this is the entire scope of American political and cultural discourse. These firms shield their viewers from non-approved content. People are propagandized, not through salesmanship but by omission. They’re being misled and haven’t a clue about it.

Through Twitter and Facebook meddling, America gets all the disadvantages of a one-newspaper town, except that the effects are national. It’s been shown many times that Twitter [xxiv] and Facebook [xxv] block conservative posts, and block proscribed people from posting. There are way too many outrage stories to list here. The important point is that they do interfere with American culture, seeking to influence us to accept the “progressive” way by choking opposing speech.

When companies can lever the opinions of its owners and managers into American culture, we become an oligarchy.[xxvi] The masses are ruled not by representatives but by an elite few. The actions of the people running Twitter and Facebook match those you’d expect of those aspiring to the oligarchy. We used to prosecute such companies for being monopolies.

Then there is the curious case of Apple and Google, which recently blocked the Parler application from their app stores.[xxvii] They effectively prevent people from accessing Parler until that service starts censoring posts Twitter-style. Through their actions, Apple and Google claim the right to censor what people say on forums. Although people can access Parler through a laptop computer, but not having a smartphone app cuts out a huge part of Parler’s potential audience.

Apple gave Parler 24 hours to “remove all objectionable content from your app … as well as any content referring to harm to people or attacks on government facilities now or at any future date.” The company also demanded that Parler submit a written plan “to moderate and filter this content” from the app.[xxviii]

These blocking activities come from cancel culture, for they seek to shut down a nexus of conversation because the companies disagree with the content. It is also monopolistic and anti-competitive,[xxix] but the government seems quite selective about what firms it goes after.

Politicians use cancel culture against their cultural opponents

We generally elect politicians because they’re opinionated. Their beliefs and views of our possible futures are important to us. But when they act on their opinions there are at least two ways where they can go wrong and betray their offices:

• Passing unconstitutional laws. A constitution is a charter for government, stating what acts it can try and the limits of its powers. Despite this, constitutions are exceeded quite frequently. For example, the U.S. Constitution’s commerce clause is leveraged by Congress to regulate most everything, even when the regulated activity doesn’t involve interstate commerce.[xxx] It is excused by all with a wink and a shrug.

Americans also have the Bill of Rights, amendments to the U.S. Constitution and, because of the Fourteenth Amendment, applying to all state governments.[xxxi]. These amendments don’t grant rights to the citizens. We don’t have religious freedom, etc., because of these amendments. Rather, these are warnings to, and restrictions on, the government. These are assertions that our rights pre-exist the Constitution, and a government that touches them overreaches its bounds. For example, the Ninth Amendment essentially says “if we’ve missed some of the citizens’ rights, then these, too, can’t be restricted by the government.”[xxxii] Note that these rights restrict the government, while modern activists want rights that expand government to provide new goodies.[xxxiii]

If an unconstitutional law is in place it is hard to get it overturned. Fighting off even the most blatantly wrong law takes lots of money and effort. And if you get a justice who favors that law – doesn’t it seem that only they get these cases? – this protracts the repeal efforts. So, passing an even obviously bad law could hurt many people for an awfully long time. When only those with enormous resources can get justice, then justice is generally denied. But that topic is out-of-scope for this article.

• Playing favorites when enforcing the law. “Nobody is above the law” is often said, but lots of people have charges dropped or overlooked because they “know somebody.” God doesn’t condone government favoritism (Leviticus 19:5), and these officials are “servants of God” (Romans 13:6) whether they like it or not. Some politicians are elected even though they’ve goals to overturn our Constitution.[xxxv] When laws are selectively applied then some citizens become more equal than others. When rioters aren’t arrested and prosecuted,[xxxvi] but their victims are,[xxxvii] then officials are participating in cancel culture.

A politician or bureaucrat practices cancel culture through denying some citizens their constitutional rights, and by treating groups differently depending on their political or cultural leanings. Consider these examples:

• Claims that your religious practices are illegal. Cultural activists create conflicts, inviting a District Attorney or Human Rights Commission to claim that you can’t actually practice your religious beliefs (James 2:14-26). Look how the Masterpiece Cakeshop was sued three times because the owner has Christian principles.[xxxviii] When a Commission, or a state’s attorney, works to disregard the accused’s religious rights, despite the First Amendment, it declares that some citizens have fewer rights than others. It also claims that a civil rights law is superior to the Constitution. These officials are trying to cancel the citizens and also our legal system.

• Create laws to ban your religious practices, and even force you to violate them. The Equality Act of 2020 would “prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, gender identity, and sexual orientation.”[xxxix] Besides its actual provisions, it forces the changes onto the public and invalidates any religious objections. It’s been called the “Criminalizing Christianity Act.” It amounts to a cultural revolution through legislative fiat. It’s blatantly unconstitutional, but if it gets passed in the future then just try to get justice.

It is good and necessary to defend our Christian-based culture

The Christian basis of our founding is still rather alive in America’s culture. If it weren’t then there wouldn’t be these fierce cultural battles. The people practicing cancel culture want to break resistance to their aims of a political coup. They apparently don’t want to wait for our culture to gradually come over to their views. Perhaps they’re afraid of repentant Christianity.

But before renewing an expensive and exhausting defense of our culture, we should review why we want it. Is it worth fighting for? It is, for these reasons:

• The Christian believes that God created us, and that through Jesus redeemed us to be His children. We’re living for His sake.

• God’s tells us what is right and wrong. No other standard will do. From the Bible we learn how to relate to God, to live in righteousness, and to live peaceably with each other.

• Our faith is acted out in daily life. It isn’t a faith of mere meditation, but also of activities and decisions coming from that faith (James 2:14-26).

• Our resulting society must be righteous and God-honoring, or else. God judges all nations, whether ancient Israel, the rest of the ancient world (Daniel 4:27-37; Jeremiah 18:7-10), or any modern nation (Luke 3:14; Acts 12:21-23). God holds all the world to his standards, and woe to them who spurn His reproof.[xli]

A Christian society will endure if its members maintain their standards, and teach their children to do likewise. But if it slacks off its watchkeeping, then people with other ideas will reach our children, training them instead in the humanist, socialist religion.[xlii]

Make our politicians respect our Constitutional rights

A person taking a seat in the U.S. Congress promises to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”[xliii] A similar oath is taken by members of the various state legislative bodies. But when a politician promises to “take back” guns (Second Amendment), or make the “Equality Act” override religious objections (First Amendment), isn’t that oath breaking? And why isn’t it called “dereliction of duty” when government overreach is shown to them and they won’t set things right? These legislators are trying to sneak through overrides of the Constitution without going through the amendment process, and that is wrong.

The people don’t have the tools to directly remove faithless legislators. For example, only Congress can remove its own members through expulsion. The best the people can do about those seats is to ensure that the offending politicians don’t win reelection. But there are still tools available to us. As former Senator Everett Dickson said, “when I feel the heat, I see the light”.[xliv] Heat costs dedication, time, and money. How hot do you want to make your politician? Even hard line progressives tend to love their perks more than their ideology, and will work to appease you.

Then there are politicians who take sides in the culture war and render unequal civic services. For example, how the mayors tell the police to stand aside during Antifa riots in Portland and Minneapolis, and when the district attorneys won’t charge the rioters. They’re not rendering equal justice, but instead discriminating based on politics. Surely there are any number of laws that these officials are breaking, and there are many suits that can be filed. Justice is expensive, very much so. But the choice seems to be either expensive justice or no justice.

One thing that cancel culture warriors do is to dig up dirt on their targets, and then tell everyone about it. In other words, they do investigative reporting. We can, too. The newspaper and on-air reporters tend to hide bad news about the politicians they like.[xlv] This means that other people are going to have to investigate these faithless politicians. It is likely that, once the news is out, they’ll be destroyed by their own friends.

Every remedy mentioned here involves giving lots of time and money, and learning how to work with like-minded people. But we must do these things, and pay the costs, because our politicians fail us. It’s the price of defending our Christian culture. It’s also a witness to our enemies, and the currently uninvolved, of how we value what we still have.

Beating censorship through diversity and anonymity

The internet has millions of sites, such as the one hosting this article. Out of all of them, Twitter and Facebook are considered the American “go to” places for news and announcements. But since they’ve proven to be unfaithful at that, Americans ought to relearn the habit of seeking out multiple news sources. We can’t literally force people off of these services, but through small efforts can start an exodus, which we hope leads to bigger things.

• Stop posting on Twitter and Facebook. If you post worthwhile content on Twitter, your posts only increase its viewership. Likewise, if your social club is hosted by Facebook, it increases their advertising numbers but doesn’t benefit you any. Go ahead and move your internet home to some other service. Wherever you land, your audience will still seek you out. They might even like the relief from sponsored ads.

• Stop reading Twitter or Facebook. There ought to be other, equivalent sources for your news and entertainment. And every defection from Twitter and Facebook drops their revenue stream. If you have sources which only appear on Twitter, such as a politician or a funny writer, ask them to also post their messages elsewhere. You’re now building your own “not Twitter” network.

• Advertise your own “goodbye” movement. Compared to their total viewership, there aren’t that many people getting cancelled by Twitter or Facebook. But if people get the idea that it’s trendy to leave, and start doing it, you will have started a movement.

But diversity doesn’t mean just visiting more web sites. The internet itself is an information bottleneck, a trap. If your communications are only through the internet, being blocked from it would leave you deaf and dumb. There is little solace in having our First Amendment rights if we’ve no place to practice them. There’s safety in having backup plans (Ecclesiastes 11:2). What sorts of alternative communications can there be?

• Printed newspapers. Newspapers have been dying in the internet era. This is partly because they put content on the internet for free, and partly because so many of the papers have the same progressive slant. They’re just not worth reading. Yet small town local news, such as a village town hall, goes unreported for lack of a printed forum. Wouldn’t locals want to buy a weekly paper if it contained local news? How about a paper whose reporting reflects the community’s values, rather than fighting against them? We can only hope…

• Email lists. Email lists are still used in places. Subscribers periodically get an email with news, articles, or comments from other subscribers. They then submit their responses back to the central service. Because the back-and-forth of an argument depends on sequential posts from the central server, a conversation might take days to resolve. The virtue here is that these communications are available “off the web.”

• FidoNet messaging network. Before the modern internet appeared, people could set up a network of communicating computers, using software called FidoNet. This network operated much like an email list does, but did its work using phone calls. It had great flexibility for routing messages, and could work even with part of the network out-of-service. It required an expert to configure, but it worked. It’s almost forgotten today. Want to set up a secretive network? Why not use a forgotten technology?

• The practice of printing and distributing handbills has always been with us. You see them under windshield wipers, slid onto screen doors, and attached to light poles. The whole neighborhood will know that your group has been there. Although how many flyers you can distribute is limited by your manpower, any number of groups can distribute copies of that flyer, wherever they might be. And when your groups coordinate, they’re gaining networking skills. Consider buying a genuine printing press, because using ordinary computer printers cost way more for the volumes of leaflets you’ll generate.

Once you’re a target, seemingly anything can be accessed if your opponents have clout. Who would have expected to lose their privacy in these circumstances?

• Obama got his opponents’ sealed divorce proceedings revealed. During the 2004 campaign for the U.S. Senate, Obama’s campaign people twice got the newspapers to reveal divorce proceedings of his opponents.[xlvi] First came details about his Democratic primary opponent, then those of his Republican general election opponent. Sticking with a winning tactic, President Obama’s reelection campaign of 2012 tried, but failed, to get Mitt Romney’s tax records. Similar attempts are still being made to get President Trump’s tax records. That the courts are willing to reveal sealed records shows that government promises of confidentiality can’t be trusted.

• Donors to Proposition 8 revealed, harassed, and attacked. In 2008, California held an election concerning Proposition 8, which essentially banned “gay marriage.” Many people donated to the campaign trying to pass the measure. After the election, opponents of the measure got the list of campaign donors and published it. This led to donors getting harassed and attacked. [xlvii] Some donors suffered property loss. Others lost their jobs, once news of their donations came out.

• Cell phone tracking identifies rally participants, traces them home. In 2020, people protested at the Michigan state capitol about the coronavirus virus lockdown decrees. After they went home, much cell phone data was harvested by political advocates.[xlviii] This is because many protestors had set their phones to permit location tracking by third parties. Organizations like VoteMap, which works with Democratic political campaigns, got the data and was able to trace these people almost all the way home.

You can sometimes evade becoming a cancel culture target. You’re not required to broadcast your location to everybody. Whether you’re at home or away, if you stay “communications anonymous” then you can’t be singled out for later harassment. Here are ways to reduce, or hide, your own tracks.

• Avoid using your credit card when out and about. When you’re on the road and use your credit card, the company knows where your card has been. By looking at the details, people can make guesses about what you were doing between purchases. There are lots of credit card employees willing to breach their company’s secrecy and spill that data to activists. It’s better if that data doesn’t exist at all. Ask at some gas stations, and you’ll be surprised by how many people are paying with cash.

• Stifle your cell phone. When you let your phone’s location data be collected by others, as in the Michigan rally story, you’re asking that your activities get spied on. You can disable that yourself. Even so, all cell phones constantly seek out the nearest cell phone tower. They’re calling home, and leaving an auditable trail of where they’ve been, whether it is to a rally, to church, or to a restaurant. This tower seeking occurs even when the phone is supposedly turned off. Only removing the battery truly turns the phone off, but many phones don’t have removable batteries. You could leave the phone at home, or you could put the phone in a Faraday bag. This envelope-like wallet blocks all signals into or out of the pouch, preventing the phone from snitching on you. Be aware that if you take the phone out of the pouch it will resume announcing its position until it is put away again. These pouches are cheap ($20 or so) and readily available online – look them up.

• Avoid using a car having GPS or satellite radio. A car with GPS map navigation, or satellite radio, knows where you are. The location is presumably recorded, as with a cell phone. If you want to travel without being tracked, you’ll have to find ways to disable this communication. If you’re carrying a portable device, such as that from Garmin, then disconnect its battery. If the GPS or satellite radio is built in, perhaps you can disconnect the antennas (which might also disable your radio). You could also try adding a GPS jammer to your car, to overwhelm the car’s own GPS antennas.

When you centralize your communications you get easy, one-stop shopping for news, etc. You are also easily controlled. Pay the costs of diversification to preserve your own uncensored communications. By doing this you might even play a part in monopoly busting.

Continue transforming the world for Christ

Jesus says that the Kingdom of God is like yeast, affecting every corner of society (Matthew 13:33). Through our obedience to God, how we live, our relationships, and the standards we insist on, God’s church spreads throughout society and transforms it. We’re not in a lifeboat awaiting salvation, we’re of the Great Commission, making disciples of all the nations (Matthew 28:19-20). In the face of all trials, continue being the transforming yeast God wants us to be.[xlix]

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois! 

Click HERE to learn about supporting IFI on a monthly basis.

Back in 2008, with a little encouragement from friend, Constitutional law professor and radio talk show host, Hugh Hewitt, I signed on to Twitter and was know as an early adapter.

Twitter was a new social media tool whereby like-minded conservatives could share content, message, and cheer each other on. The Right was swimming upstream and almost all broadcast media and other societal gatekeepers had lurched radically to the left, leaving conservatives adrift and feeling alone in an ever-darkenting culture.

I wrote some tutorials (Twitter for Newbies and Twitter for Newbies 102) on using Twitter for conservative and Christian messaging. Now, a mere 12 years later we’ve experienced another seismic shift in culture: the radical “gay” agenda, the radical pro-abort agenda, the socialist agenda, BLM et al have pressed the attack to their advantage.

And now the Twitterverse is closely guarded by its Leftist CEOs and social media techinitions, censoring conservatives and any who object to their godless worldview.

Which is why we’re seeing a mass exodus from Twitter to the newer, freer Parler.

What in the wide, wide world is Parler?

Parler is the French verb, “to speak” and the French pronunciation (par LAY) was the initial pronunciation, but since has changed to the English “parler,” (PAR ler) as in “a place to sit and visit.”

The platforms website explains its inception:

Parler was founded in 2018 and based in Henderson, Nevada. After being exhausted with a lack of transparency in big tech, ideological suppression and privacy abuse, our co-founders, John Matze and Jared Thomson decided to create an alternative solution.

Parler provides a Commenting and Social News platform for digital publishers, influencers, bloggers, writers, politicians and social users to share news, opinions and content in real time. Additionally, we provide enterprise tools to enhance online blogs, media and websites with direct social integrations and monetization capabilities.

Their tagline:

Parler is a non-biased free speech driven entity

Of note…while Twitter, Facebook and YouTube mention “Community Guidelines,” those mysterious guidelines are nowhere the average Joe can find them and they seem to be entirely subjective, bending and moving to suit the social media entity’s progressive policing staff.

Parler, on the other hand, has easy to find Community Guidelines which appear to be quite reasonable: no spam, no terrorism, no unsolicited advertisements, no pornography, no obscenity, plagiarism, sex trafficking, etc. Every listed constraint falls in line with a decent citizen’s mindset, a Christian or faith worldview.

Laura Ingraham interviewed Parler CEO John Matze in May 2019:

And on Fox Business last month a short report aired of prominent Conservatives who have made the move to Parler (including Devin Nunes, Ted Cruz, President Donald J. Trump, Dan Bongino, etc.):

Even the Washington Examiner featured an article on June 24, chronicling the Conservative migration wave to Parler, “Conservatives fed up with ‘censorship’ on Twitter jump to Parler“:

Conservative commentators, politicians, and others are shifting to a social media platform that competes with Twitter.

A slew of Twitter users looking for a social media platform they believe won’t censor them, including Rep. Devin Nunes, commentator Jesse Kelly, former Navy SEAL Robert O’Neill, and others, announced they have established accounts on Parler.

Nunes told the Federalist’s co-founder Sean Davis that “Parler will set you free!”

I made the move to Parler a couple years ago, when my friend, Elizabeth Johnston (“The Activist Mommy“) recommended the new social media platform.

https://www.facebook.com/theactivistmommy/posts/1929353640516109

As Christians, we are called to:

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky. (Phil. 2:14&15)

And we are admonished in the Gospels:

You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. (Matt. 5:13)

And in the epistle of Peter:

But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear. (1 Peter 3:15)

Those verses are our marching orders from Jesus: we Believers are to shine like stars (reflecting the light of The Son!), be “salt” (both preserving from decay and adding savor) in our culture, and be perpetually ready to tell a lost world about the great and mighty hope we have!

Such a mission is not for cowards, but brave and courageous souls. The meekness we’re instructed to temper our words is “power under control,” not mealy-mouthed reticence.

We should be joyful warriors, battling as outlined in Ephesians:

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness;

And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;

Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.

And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. (Eph. 6:12-17)

Defensively, social media platforms can indeed be effective mediums to counter the untruths being propagated in our society. And offensively, social media can be a powerful means of disseminating a message of life and hope.

Unfortunately, too many of the big tech companies are wholly owned and operated by progressives more concerned with leftist indoctrination than providing a free speech forum.

For now, Parler seems to provide such a forum with only minimum and reasonable constraints.

I say make the move! Sign up at Parler and join those of us who choose speak words of truth and life to our dark, dark culture.

You can download the apps on your smartphone:

These may or may not be the last days, but we know we’re to be busy no matter what sharing the Good News and telling the truth to hungry hearts in a dark, dark world.

For now, Parler may just be a great tool to further that important and eternal mission!

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois! 

Click HERE to learn about supporting IFI on a monthly basis.

Written by NetNanny.com

Social media today is seemingly inescapable and the same holds true for Snapchat. As one of the top contenders of most loved social media platforms for teens, it is important for parents to understand this photo sharing app before deciding if it’s appropriate for your own kids.

While YouTube and Instagram still dominate the social media space among teens, Snapchat comes in a close third place with 69 percent of U.S. teens using the platform according to a 2018 Pew Research Center study. Snapchat isn’t inherently dangerous right off the bat, but parents will want to ensure that their teens are safe and responsible while using the app.

WHAT IS SNAPCHAT?

Snapchat is a photo and video sharing app that allows users to communicate with friends, family, and followers by snapping and sharing photos in an instant. Photos and videos can be shared with selected friends or can be posted to your Story, both disappearing after a set amount of time.

Some of the most popular features include Snapchat filters, stickers, and Bitmoji integration that grant users even more fun ways to express themselves. The app encourages users to keep snapping by using Snapchat emojis, streaks, and trophies.

Learn more about all of Snapchat’s features:

• Filters: Snapchat automatically updates facial filters that can be used while taking photos and videos. These do everything from smoothing your skin to giving you a flower crown or turning you into a dog. Snapchat has now even created filters that can be used on your pets.

• Stickers: Stickers can be added to photos and videos as well to add the time, temperature, how fast you’re moving, or any number of cartoons or GIFs.

• Bitmoji: Connecting Snapchat with your Bitmoji allows you to use your personal emoji as your avatar and use it to decorate your Snaps.

• Emojis: Snapchat emojis appear next to the names in your friends list, telling users which friends they snap with the most.

• Streaks: A streak fire emoji and number also appear next to the names in your friends list, showing you how many consecutive days in a row that you’ve snapped each other.

• Trophies: Trophies are earned and kept in your virtual case for doing any number of tasks or using features such as sending a video without sound, using the zoom feature, or sending a Snap with a temperature filter.

• Chat: Users have the option of chatting with friends either one-on-one or via a group chat. Parents should know that chats, like photos and videos, are self-destructing once a user navigates away from the chat unless saved beforehand. Users have the option of updating their settings so that unsaved chats do not delete immediately, but after 24 hours.

• Snap Map: In Snap Map users can view public Snaps for major events as well as see the exact location of friends. The Snap Map option can be turned off by switching to Ghost Mode in settings.

• Memories: Memories is a personal album of Snaps and stories that you save for easy sharing in the future or for year-to-date flashbacks. Users wishing to save a Snap will need to manually save them to Memories but Stories can be saved to Memories automatically by adjusting your settings.

• Discover: The Discover page lets users watch their friends’ Story as well as public Stories and Shows.

• Shazam: By pressing and holding on the camera screen, users can enable Shazam to pick up what song is playing to include in their Snap.

FIVE THINGS EVERY PARENT NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT SNAPCHAT

1.) Set Privacy Settings Ensure that your kids utilize the privacy settings available on Snapchat. Users are able to determine who can contact them, view their story, see their location, or if they appear in quick add. Parents may want to edit these settings to only allow friends access to this information as this will significantly limit any contact with strangers.

2.) Talk About Sharing and Screenshots Discuss with your children the significance of screenshots and what is and is not appropriate to share. Even though Snaps posted to Stories disappear after 24 hours, that won’t stop someone from taking a screenshot of a Snap and saving that photo to their own camera roll.

3.) Keep Chats Clean Screenshots are not limited to only photo and video Snaps but can be taken of chats as well. Encourage your kids to keep comments PG.

4.) Monitor Use and Take Part It is ok to monitor your kids’ Snapchat activities. The nature of this app doesn’t make it easy to monitor use but parents are able to keep an eye on account passwords, contacts, private messages, and memories. Parents may even consider creating their own account to snap with their kids and keep an eye on their Stories.

5.) Take a Tech Timeout Snapchat can be a lot of fun but social media in general needs an occasional timeout. Set offline boundaries that work for your family such as limiting phone use during family activities, mealtimes, or before bed.

WHAT HAPPENS TO A SNAPCHAT PHOTO?

When users send Snapchat photos they are able to select for how long they want their photo to be able to viewed before they disappear. Users can make viewing time 10 seconds and under or allow their photo or video to be viewed for an unlimited amount of time.

It is worth noting that users can replay received Snaps once more before they disappear. Once recipients leave the photo and their friends list, the received photo cannot be accessed again.

Stories are viewable to all of your friends and last 24 hours before disappearing. Snapchat stories can be deleted prior to this 24-hour time period ending; after deletion your friends will no longer be able to view them.

Despite it’s disappearing nature, Snapchat users are able to take screenshots when viewing photos and videos. Senders are notified when someone takes a screenshot of their Snaps but they have no control over recipients doing this and can’t stop them from taking a screenshot or sharing it with others.

IS SNAPCHAT SAFE FOR KIDS?

Even though Snapchat is wildly popular, not all of Snapchat’s features are appropriate for younger users. This app is recommended for mature teens but knowing the facts, parents should be able to decide if this app is right for their child.

Photo sharing and disappearing photos and texts can be risky when it comes to safety and transparency. Snapchat isn’t made specifically to hide things like vault apps that create secret folders for hiding photos and sensitive content are, but rather to promote living and sharing in the moment. Because of this, parents will not be able to monitor sharing and communication effectively.

Parents who believe their children are ready to use this app should discuss with them what sort of photos and videos are appropriate to send and receive and remind them that even though Snaps will disappear, this does not prevent another user from taking a screenshot.

Snapchat also features Snap Map, allowing users to view the exact location of their friends; a feature that will be unsafe for most kids and teens. A user’s status on the Snap Map can be turned off in settings by switching to Ghost Mode.

Snapchat is a great way to for your kids to stay in touch with their friends and share what they’re up to but unfortunately there are no Snapchat parental controls available.

Monitoring your child’s app usage and online activity can be overwhelming at times but using a parental control software like Net Nanny can support your efforts in keeping your children safe online. Snapchat can be a lot of fun, however it is important for parents to understand the app and know what they can do to make the app a safer place for their children. By utilizing some of these safeguards your teens cans start snapping away with less worry.

This article was originally published by NetNanny.com.

Among the reasonable and fairly well-defined criteria Twitter uses to censor content is this more ambiguous criterion: content “that incites fear about a protected group” or that “degrades someone.”

Does Twitter think it’s degrading to say “homosexual acts degrade persons”? What if homosexual acts do degrade persons? What words constitute an incitement to fear? Does it incite “fear about a protected group” to say that allowing biological males in women’s private spaces is an assault on decency and puts at risk the safety of girls and women? Does Twitter think saying “polyamory is wrong, and its normalization harms society” would incite fear about polyamorists?

Similarly, Facebook includes this expansive and ambiguous definition of banned “hate speech”:

We define hate speech as a direct attack on people based on what we call protected characteristics — race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, caste, sex, gender, gender identity, and serious disease or disability….We define attack as violent or dehumanizing speech. (emphasis added)

Like obscenity (which Justice Potter believed he could recognize, but “progressives” clearly can’t), the powers-that-be at Facebook will apparently know dehumanizing speech when they see it.

This may explain why IFI has had so much trouble getting many of our articles boosted on Facebook. “Boosting” is, in effect, advertising. IFI pays Facebook to create an ad which is then shown to our target audience. The most recent article about which we have been battling Facebook is titled “Will ‘Progressives’ Affirm the Identity of Christ-Followers?”

We requested a boosted ad for this article and were declined. We appealed that decision, were approved for a few hours, and then our ad was taken down. We appealed that decision, were approved for a few more hours, and then the ad was taken down again. We appealed a third time, and moments before this writing, after a week and three appeals, it was approved. We wait with bated breath to see if this one sticks.

The criteria used by Twitter and Facebook to justify ideological-screening remind me of the criteria high school English teachers use to do the same. The text-selection criteria exploited by “progressive” change-agents in public high school English departments around the country are so flexible, so malleable, so protean as to justify including any resource that affirms, espouses, or embodies their biases and exclude any resource that dissents from their biases.

The Left is fond of declaiming that Twitter and Facebook are private companies that have the right to establish whatever criteria they deem fit for censoring content. True, but such a declamation ignores the monopolistic nature of these two social media behemoths.

Facebook has claimed to be a neutral social media platform that merely enables or facilitates “communication and distribution of information.” Because of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, if Facebook were a neutral platform, it would not be liable for content. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is “US legislation that paved the way for the modern internet by asserting that platforms cannot be liable for content users post on their sites.”

But both in court and before Congress, Facebook has acknowledged it is a publisher and “responsible for content.” In conjunction with its shutting down accounts and censoring posts for what appear to be ideological reasons, Facebook may have lost its legal immunity. And maybe that’s just the slap upside Zuckerberg’s pecuniary noggin that’s needed to restore his commitment to a neutral platform and to protect the First Amendment rights of conservatives that are eroding right before our gullible, obsequious eyes.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Facebook-Censoring-Say-It-Aint-So.mp3

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois! 

Click HERE to learn about supporting IFI on a monthly basis.

If you are concerned about raising children or grandchildren in this high tech age in which screen time is a whole new phenomenon, then you’re not alone.  A poll from Gallup finds that screens are a significant concern of parents.  Here are some of the polling firm’s findings from a poll of 1,271 U.S. parents of children from birth to age 10.

• Two-thirds of parents worry — either a little (53%) or a lot (12%) — that their child spends too much time on electronic devices.

• More than four in 10 parents (43%) say they worry that their child has trouble keeping themselves entertained without electronic devices.

• Parents of boys (70%) worry a bit more than parents of girls (63%) that their child spends too much time using electronic devices.

• Boys’ parents (45%) also worry more than girls’ parents (39%) that their child cannot occupy themselves without an electronic device.

• About a third of parents whose children engage in three or more hours of screen time per weekday worry that their child is not keeping up academically (36%) or has trouble getting along with other children (34%).

• In contrast, only 26% of parents whose children engage in less screen time worry about their academics, and 20% worry about their socialization.

• Parents of children who spend three or more hours on screen-based play per weekday are less satisfied with their child’s development in teamwork, discipline and social skills when compared with parents of children who engage in less screen-based play.

Read more: Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation? (The Atlantic)

This article was originally published by AFA of Indiana.

Last week the people of Ireland voted to repeal Ireland’s Eighth Amendment that granted “equal protection of the right to life of the preborn child and his or her mother.” After the repeal, “legislators will have the power to legalize abortion for any reason up to birth.”

Leading up to the vote, however, Facebook, Twitter and Google all weighed in — arguably on the side of the pro-abort forces:

Google, Facebook, Twitter ban pro-life ads on Ireland abortion referendum

Leading up to the May 25th referendum in Ireland on repealing the Eighth Amendment, Google announced that it would suspend all advertising related to the subject. The move has been condemned by pro-life groups as an attempt “to rig the election.”

In the announcement, Google claimed the decision came as part of “our update around election integrity efforts globally.” Pro-abortion groups applauded the decision, but as observers have noted, the only ads related to the referendum appear to be pro-life ads, so the ban would effectively benefit the pro-abortion campaign and harm campaign efforts for life in Ireland.

Also, from the article:

The repeal campaign has benefitted from marked pro-abortion bias in the media, celebrity endorsements and significant funding from the international abortion lobby. As such, the pro-life campaigners are at a disadvantage and have used online advertising on Google and social media platforms to reach voters with their message. The pro-life groups Save the 8th and the Iona Institute issued a joint statement that read in part, “Online was the only platform available to the No campaign to speak to voters directly. That platform is now being undermined in order to prevent the public from hearing the message of one side.”

And this:

Twitter has also announced that it will suspend ads related to the referendum ahead of the May 25th vote. Twitter has a confirmed history of censoring pro-life content.

Facebook also “jumped on the bandwagon” to ban ads. The article notes that “the pro-abortion side is far from immune from outside influence as this side has received significant monetary support from George Soros and other globalist elites.” The question whether the social media giants would’ve issued the restriction “if a surge in advertising had come from the Yes [pro-abortion] side?” is worth asking.

Facebook claimed “neutrality” in a statement: “We understand the sensitivity of this campaign and will be working hard to ensure neutrality at all stages… Our goal is simple: to help ensure a free, fair and transparent vote on this important issue.”

Do you believe them?

There is plenty of reason not to. After all, the way the social media giants have been caught censoring conservatives, the claim of neutrality isn’t believable in the least. To read more about that — skim the many articles linked here.

After the 2016 elections, those social media giants realized that if their political agenda was to be advanced, they were going to have to clamp down even further on the information being provided by conservative organizations. Here was a headline at The Daily Signal: “After Royally Screwing Up the Election, the Media Want Control Over Your Facebook News.”

If the social media giants are indeed Leftists and committed to silencing conservatives, what is to be done?

An interesting article recently posted at National Review about whether those big tech companies are violating anti-trust laws. Here is an excerpt:

There is a strong Republican antitrust tradition.

The big digital monopolies demand that we conform to their worldview and shut us down when we dissent. They have too much power. They are are threat to this country. Congress is doing nothing about it. It’s time to complain, while we still can. #Tucker @FoxNews

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) April 27, 2018

When he tweeted these words, Carlson was expressing a sentiment that many on the right have come to embrace. People are concerned, with good reason, that big tech companies discriminate against conservatives. Numerous conservative outlets have had their videos demonetized on Google’s YouTube. PragerU is appealing their loss in a lawsuit over that. A study by The Western Journal showed that a change to Facebook’s algorithm disproportionately harmed conservative sites.

In normal circumstances, this wouldn’t be a problem for government to solve, but social media has come to dominate our national conversation. Large political websites thrive or die based on changes to Facebook and Google algorithms. Everyone from cable news to newspapers to online-only publications create and tweak their content based on how they think it will play on social media. A study has also shown that Google search results can have a frighteningly large impact on elections:

Randomized, controlled experiments conducted with more than 10,000 people from 39 countries suggest that one company alone — Google LLC, which controls about 90 percent of online search in most countries — has likely been determining the outcomes of upwards of 25 percent of the national elections in the world for several years now, with increasing impact each year as Internet penetration has grown.

Keep in mind that we’re not talking about individuals or even whole industries here; we’re talking about unaccountable monopolies with detailed information about hundreds of millions of Americans, billions in cash reserves, and the capability to shape what is discussed and what is not discussed in America in a way that no book, radio show, television show or individual has ever had.

The entire article can be found here.

Not everyone agrees. You can read an opposing view here.

Earlier this year, IFI asked the question “What is the Conservatives Movement’s Answer to Google, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube’s ‘Viewpoint Discrimination’?‘” That question is still on the table.

So many smaller groups often rely on the relatively inexpensive social media advertising options to help make more people aware that there are other arguments other than those coming from the Leftist “mainstream” media, Hollywood, and any number of other outlets.

This issue, and this challenge, isn’t going away any time soon. There is plenty of talent and resources available on the conservative side of the aisle. Eventually that talent and those dollars will have to get serious about winning the information war — with the help of Leftist social media giants or not.

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois! 

Click HERE to learn about supporting IFI on a monthly basis.

The day after the election, I was scrolling through my Facebook feed and saw two posts back-to-back from friends. One was convinced the world was coming to an end now that Donald Trump was elected president; the other was convinced America’s savior was now in the White House.

I’m sure you’ve seen similar contrasts – maybe even in your own household. There’s a sense of stark disunity in our culture these days, and the polls back that up. A recent Gallup poll found that 77 percentof Americans see the nation as “divided.”

Most of the time when people write about how divided we are, the solution they suggest is typically something like “well, you shouldn’t be so black and white about [insert controversial issue].”

However, you and I know that when it comes to issues like pornography, abortion, marriage, and freedom, there are some clear lines between right and wrong.

A better – and more realistic – way to deal with this division is not by compromising the Truth, but by simply not ascribing the worst motives to people who disagree with us. I know I’m guilty of this all the time – especially when I’m reading posts on social media. It’s too easy in our electronic world to imagine the person behind the other keyboard as the American Darth Vader, whose only goal is to destroy mankind.

However, just because someone’s wrong doesn’t make them ill-intentioned. And I think if we can stop ourselves from picturing the other side as having their finger on the trigger of the Deathstar, we’ll find more common ground.

Don’t miss these stories…

This verse from the Sermon on the Mount got me thinking about this topic.
There’s blessing in not ascribing the worst motives.

World Magazine’s recent cover story is also on this topic.
The divide is also prevalent in the church

The next Executive Order President Trump needs to sign

This Executive Order would be a game changer for religious freedom.
Read the Heritage Foundation’s Ryan Anderon’s analysis of this Executive Order.

“They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.” ~Romans 2:15

In the liberal quest for unencumbered sexual license, there remains a pesky little irritant built into humans called conscience. It’s a surprisingly durable part of the human psyche and gets in the way of all sorts of behaviors, either stopping humans before they engage in them or polluting the afterglow of iniquitous deeds.

Even the Left is forced to wrestle with the presence of conscience in culture, especially when it comes to abortion. Over the years, they’ve been forced to acknowledge obliquely and tacitly the existence of conscience. They’ve done so by claiming to long for abortion to be rare. Their claim was a bald-faced lie. No one who truly desires that abortion be rare could countenance the killing of 57,000,000 preborn humans over the past 40 years.

Of course, Leftists can’t express directly their loathing for conscience. They can’t say, “Fight your recalcitrant consciences, women! Avert your gaze from the bloody remains of your child lying next to you in a casserole dish! Ignore the voice that whispers ‘mommies ought not kill their babies.’” Leftists can’t mention consciences, dismembered children, or motherhood, for doing so would risk too much. It would risk not eradicating conscience but pricking it.

Well, the days of obliquity and obfuscation are over. If we thought we’d reached the nadir of moral corruption through the legalization of fetal slaughter and the extermination of multi-millions of innocent human beings, we were wrong. We’re now seeing a new level of human degradation. Just as the war for sodomy started as a plea for tolerance and culminated in mass public celebrations of twisted sexuality, the war for child-slaughter began with a plea to protect women’s lives and is now culminating in exuberant public proclamations of guiltless, volitional feticide.

A new Twitter campaign began on Saturday called #ShoutYourAbortion that encourages women everywhere to shout their abortions to the world in an effort to eradicate shame and guilt. This ignoble campaign began with the following Facebook post by Amelia Bonow:

Hi Guys! Like a year ago I had an abortion at the Planned Parenthood on Madison Ave, and I remember this experience with a nearly inexpressible level of gratitude….Plenty of people still believe that on some level—if you are a good woman—abortion is a choice which should be accompanied by some level of sadness, shame, or regret. But you know what? I have a good heart and having an abortion made me happy in a totally unqualified way.

Her partner in crime, Lindy West who also exalts the guilt-free killing of her child in her womb, snarkily tweeted “‘aborted babys graves’ was my senior prom’s theme.”

Other women followed suit using the hashtag “shoutyourabortion”:

Clementine Ford: “I’ve had 2 abortions. I don’t have to justify or explain them to anybody. My life is more valuable than a potential life.”

Letha: “if ever pregnant, i will have an abortion. i lay claim to my own life. that life will not include giving birth”

Charlotte Taylor-Page: “I had an abortion nine years ago. I don’t regret it ever”

Credible Phillips: “No traumatic backstory: Didn’t want kids. Couldn’t afford kids. Contraceptive failure with casual bf. Not one regret”

Mary Emily O’Hara: “Had an abortion procedure done at age 22 because I was WAY too young to parent. Have never, ever regretted it.”

West offers this out, proud, arrogant, and absolutist defense of abortions:

All of those abortions are valid. None are shameful.

There are no “good” abortions and “bad” abortions, because an abortion is just a medical procedure, reproductive healthcare is healthcare, and it is a fact without caveat that a foetus is not a person. I own my body, and I decide what I allow to grow in it. Telling our stories at full volume chips away at stigma, at lies, at the climate of shame… 

West’s friend Bonow shared that she does “not think there is anything remotely immoral or murderous about the procedure.” The great ethicist Bonow finds nothing morally questionable about injecting digoxin into tiny developing humans to stop their hearts from beating and then tearing them limb from limb. This is the kind of repugnant moral thinking many in America—including shamefully, our “leaders”—advocate.

The corrupt minds of Leftists have concluded that in order to better serve the desires of women who seek to exterminate their own offspring—their own flesh and blood, alive and growing within them—those nettlesome feelings of guilt and shame must go. That feature of humanity so essential to human flourishing and civilization, the constituent human feature that parents spend 18 years cultivating in their children before setting them loose in society—conscience—must be eradicated and replaced with….nothing.

And thus mankind—or rather, wo-mankind—become animals.

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