Elon Musk shows shadow-banning of conservatives no conspiracy theory

“The practice used in online moderation that consists of preventing a user’s content from being seen by others – either partially or totally – without the user being notified or aware of it.” 

That is Dictionary.com’s definition of “shadow banning,” which is now front and center in the latest document dump at Twitter, courtesy of its new owner, Elon Musk. 

To get internal emails from Twitter’s prior ownership out into the public domain, Musk has tapped Matt Tiabbi, formerly of Rolling Stone magazine who has since gone to Substack, and Bari Weiss, formerly of the New York Times and currently the owner of a new media company, The Free Press. Tiabbi and Weiss were chosen because they have no allegiance or obligation to anyone but themselves — and their resumes are impressive. 

In the document dump allocated to Weiss, there are actual receipts regarding the shadow banning and suppression of Twitter accounts carried out by top executives at Twitter. These blacklists, according to internal emails, included a “Trends Blacklist,” which made sure tweets would not trend, a “Search Blacklist” which made it almost impossible to find certain accounts or tweets, and a “Do Not Amplify” setting, which suppressed tweets from getting the kind of interaction they normally would receive if left alone. 

“A new [Twitter Files] investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics — all in secret, without informing users,” Weiss tweeted Thursday. 

According to Weiss, several prominent conservatives – including podcast star and Fox News host Dan Bongino, Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk, the Libs of Tik Tok and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford University, who was an opponent of COVID-19 lockdowns – saw the visibility of their tweets greatly reduced. When they complained about it, they were called conspiracy theorists by some journalists and some Democratic lawmakers. 

“Republicans have this warped perception that Google and Facebook and others are shadow banning them,” Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) told Axios earlier this year. “In their warped minds, they think that they’re being affected by Big Tech.” 

Turns out they were right and Swalwell was wrong. 

But instead of this being a front-page story in the New York Times and the Washington Post, or worthy of multiple segments on broadcast news, it’s been complete and utter silence in most media outlets. 

On the day of and one day after the Twitter dump to Weiss this week, for example, the Times, the Post, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN and MSNBC all avoided the story in their print and digital publications and on their airwaves. Regarding CBS, NBC and ABC, this is particularly noteworthy because more than 20 million people watch their evening newscasts, when combining all total viewers, and therefore can drive the public conversation. Call it the “bias of omission,” which is arguably worse than overt bias because the public is never told of information that may concern them or be of interest to them.

“Imagine throwing it all away to do PR work for the richest person in the world. Humiliating s***,” tweeted NBC News reporter Ben Collins regarding Tiabbi. Collins has repeatedly railed against Tiabbi and Weiss since these documents were released. Regarding Weiss’s document dump, Collins simply posted a yawning emoji. 

Again, nothing to see here, per Collins. Blacklists? What’s the big deal? So what if an enormous social media platform served at the pleasure of a political party in censoring and suppressing voices on the other side? Who cares if there are emails proving this? 

So why is this important, besides that this is the type of suppression one would expect more in Pyongyang than from a U.S. company? Because political campaigns have vastly changed. Television advertising simply isn’t as impactful or important, with fewer people watching traditional television and more viewing content on their phones instead, largely through social media. 

According to a 2019 Pew Research study, almost 9 in 10 Americans said “social media companies have at least some control over the mix of news people see,” while 82 percent believed social media sites provide preferential treatment to some news organizations over others.

Pew also found that 86 percent of Americans get their news from a smartphone, computer or tablet “often” or “sometimes,” including 60 percent who get their news this way “often.”

So, when considering how close our elections have become, who wins the messaging war on social media and through search engines like Google could make the difference between winning and losing. 

The good news for those who are pro-free-speech and against censorship is that the new GOP-controlled House of Representatives is already promising hearings not only involving Twitter but tech giants Google and Facebook. 

“Now we need to start looking at Facebook, at Google. These now have become arms of the Democratic Party, arms of the Biden administration,” likely House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) declared this week.

The free press should care about free speech. About transparency and fair play. Instead, this bombshell is largely being ignored or dismissed. 

But the veil over Twitter has finally been lifted, all thanks to its Elon Musk. He has the receipts. A new era has begun. 

Yet the damage from the insidious practice of shadow banning has already been done, too. 

Joe Concha is a media and politics columnist and a Fox News contributor.