My account was suspended for my inability to shut up about COVID authoritarianism, the lies, the coverup, and the disastrous lockdowns that destroyed our economy as well as our trust in the public health establishment, and for which the responsible parties like Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins STILL haven’t faced any consequences. I guess it’s not surprising that a Chinese-controlled social media platform wouldn’t want me talking about that stuff. But I’m not bitter.
In fact, I’m so not bitter that I’m going to be the bigger man and actually defend TikTok from the censorious Biden administration’s dogged determination to ban the app. Perhaps ironically, the very obsession with lockdowns that got me booted from TikTok also taught me some important lessons about the dangers of government censorship.
It’s only been a couple of years since the Twitter Files revealed the heavy hand of U.S. intelligence agencies leaning on social media platforms to suppress speech that ran against the government’s narrative on COVID. Under the guise of combating mis-, dis-, and malinformation, the Biden administration decided that social media users couldn’t be trusted to hear dissenting views. Instead, it was the job of Big Brother to step in and tell us what to believe. Now, we’re seeing similar arguments floated to justify the Tik-Tok ban.
I have no doubt that TikTok is home to Chinese propaganda, designed to paint the communist regime in a rosy light and poison the minds of young people. I also have no doubt that prolonged exposure to the platform is probably not the healthiest way to spend a childhood. That being said, it is not the proper role of government to assume parenting duties and decide what kind of media American children can and cannot be exposed to.
But more troubling than this creeping paternalism is the precedent that such a ban sets for future censorship. If this was just about TikTok, I could (almost) forgive eye-rolling from CCP critics dismissive of my First Amendment free speech absolutism. But like so many things in Washington, this debate isn’t about protecting children or stopping Chinese communist propaganda. This legislation is about empowering the same government interests behind the COVID-era Censorship Industrial Complex. If you don’t believe me, actually read the bill, as Representative Thomas Massie did. The powers given to the executive branch under the legislation authorizing the TikTok ban are broad and lacking in specific limitations. There’s no reason not to think that these same powers—to force a company to comply with government demands or else shut down—won’t be leveraged against other social media platforms that refuse to toe the next government line.
As a libertarian, I’m no fan of government sponsored propaganda, especially when it’s coming from authoritarians wanting to control what we say, think and do. But I’m most worried when my own government uses the specter of Chinese-style manipulation and control to build the same infrastructure for future manipulation and control here. Because this is America, and free speech and free thinking and dissenting from our own government’s fake propaganda is our birthright.
So, even though I’m still mad about losing my account, I’m opposed to the TikTok ban as a federal overreach that violates the free speech rights of all Americans, as well as creating a framework for a more censorious tech policy in the future. If you insist we think of the children, let’s think of giving them a country where freedom is valued and protected, and not succumb to the same authoritarian tactics we criticize in China.
Matt Kibbe is President of Free the People and host of Kibbe on Liberty on BlazeTV.