Sharif Don't Like It: Facebook Kindly Informs Me that I've Been Censored in Pakistan

I'm actually surprised this hasn't happened more often. Out of all the posts about Islam that I've made on Facebook (usually they are links to a Mahound's Paradise blog post, though not in this case) Facebook chose this one to censor, more than three years after the fact.

I had completely forgotten about it, of course.

The irony is that the post itself was written to draw attention to one of those ubiquitous temporary Facebook bans of prominent islamophobes. In that case the ban was against Bosch Fawstin, who had just won the Draw Muhammed Contest (itself the target of a partly preemptively foiled terror attack in Garland, Texas).  

Bosch Fawstin's page is still up. Miraculously he has survived on Facebook for the last three years. Please consider purchasing one of his drawings.

UPDATE: It appears that Fawstin was permanently banned by Twitter.

In and of itself, banning a three-year-old picture is of course silly. I doubt anyone, foe or friend, combs my Facebook posts that far back, though it's possible, of course, that this is part of some larger crackdown. I have no idea.

But the general issue of Facebook bowing to censorship requests from oppressive governments (to say nothing of Facebook's own censorship, quasi-censorship and news manipulation efforts) is very serious.

Would Facebook, had it existed at the time, have censored what the Nazis might have called "Jewish propaganda" in Nazi Germany? Of course they would have. They admit that they would have:

If, after careful legal review, we determine that the content is illegal under local law, then we make it unavailable in the relevant country or territory.

Facebook justifies this policy partly on the basis that having a partly censored Facebook in, say, country XYZ is better than having no Facebook in country XYZ.

Well, it's better for Facebook, of course.

But it's worse than that, Facebook isn't just in it for the money. Those in control at Facebook and at most of the other social media megacompanies see a positive good in suppressing "Islamophobia" - or "hate speech" as it is more generally called. They've said as much many times. Obviously for them, if posting a picture of a glowering Muhammed (complete with bloody sword) isn't hate speech, nothing is.

Western Civilization is destroying itself.