‘Really Unforgivable’: Floyd Abrams Slams ‘Pure, Unadulterated Censorship’ By Social Media Apps On Israel Content
NewsNation host Dan Abrams took to the airwaves this week to question why some of his show’s content on the Israel-Hamas war was blocked from appearing on his show’s TikTok and Instagram accounts.
The host of Dan Abrams Live and owner of Mediaite discussed the social media censorship with his own father, revered constitutional law attorney Floyd Abrams, who said he was “shocked” that the content had been removed.
“That’s the dangerous clip?” Dan Abrams asked after playing video of him sparring with a pro-Palestinian professor and asking why protesters won’t “call for a Hamas ceasefire proposal, if ceasefire was their true goal.”
“I mean, look, a legitimate debate, discussion of major political and world events from a verified member of the media was just blocked?” Abrams said. “By the way, it’s their right. It’s a private platform,” he said of Instagram, which is owned by Facebook parent-company Meta.
“I’m really stunned, I really am stunned,” Floyd Abrams said. “There’s no justification.”
DAN: There’s an algorithm that they use, right? It must be, where they look for keywords or something, and then they say, “Ok, you know, we’re going to prevent you from, from putting it on.”
FLOYD: Look, that doesn’t violate the First Amendment because “you’re not the government,” and all that stuff. “They’re not them.” But, that violates the spirit of the First Amendment because it is pure and unadulterated censorship.
DAN: Yeah, it shocked me. I mean, look, on TikTok, I guess I wasn’t as surprised, that they are, it’s owned by China, right? And they’re supporting, that was, the content that they censored from me was when I was questioning the numbers from the Gaza Health Ministry, and I had an expert on who was saying that the numbers can’t make sense. They wouldn’t let me share that. But then, when I asked tough questions of Netanyahu’s spokesperson, oh, that was fine to distribute. You and I actually haven’t talked about this, right?
FLOYD: And you see, I’m really pained.
DAN: Yeah, yeah. I mean —
FLOYD: It’s just awful. It is really unforgivable for an entity that relies on free speech, that purports to defend free speech, to engage in that sort of of content-centric, “you have to be on our side” censorship.
