YouTube Censorship Debate

YouTube is getting disturbing. Heavy censorship of pro-democracy-anti -china posts. Censorship of COVID related discussions that may go against WHO guidance. Persistent false copyright takedowns. I hope a more open alternative arises that can survive.

Youtube is a private company and can do whatever they want with their own website. Nobody's stopping makers of these videos from hosting the videos themselves.This is not censorship in the way we have traditionally understood. It only feels like it because Youtube is where the biggest audience is. It's the same whenever Facebook penalizes a post in the timeline, or whenever Google hides content from the search results. They feel like a the phone company or the post office - neutral

Youtube isn't saying that no one has the right to say ridiculous nonsense, they are saying that they can't use their platform and infrastructure to do so.

Youtube has been using their platform to openly manipulate people's ideas since 2010 (it started as a tool to slow ISIS, but now you can get your comment deleted for mocking the CCP even in the US.) Use PeerTube, Odyssey, or Bitchute instead.

Clearly YouTube doesn’t want to be a public square.

YouTube is a local government. Instead of censoring content, YouTube should provide tools for video publishers and users to form the commenting niches they want, and help people avoid reading comments they don't want to read.

YouTube is run by a private company, they can do what they like with the content they own.If they don’t want to show the content, tough luck.Don’t like the content? Don’t watch it.Don’t agree with their ethics ? Don’t use their product.It’s simple.

YouTube is a private enterprise. They have 100% the right to control what goes on their site. Would you be mad if a fishing forum banned non-fishing posts? Is that a large-scale systematic suppression of human rights?

I don’t understand why you’re downvoted for this either.YouTube isn’t a public utility and they don’t have to publish things they don’t like.Disclaimer: I don’t really like YouTube and I think it would indeed be better if the internet was less centralised for this very reason.

Google also controls Youtube - an important political battleground. Conservatives have been overtly critical of "censorship" and critical of social media "deplatforming" of certain personalities (on the political right). Expect this consideration to be in the minds of YouTube & Google executives as they navigate this political minefield, intended or not.