The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

#FreeStacy #CPAC2016: Because ‘Freedom of Expression Is Essential’

Posted on | March 2, 2016 | 52 Comments

 

Hitting the road tonight, folks! For the 11th consecutive year, I’ll be covering the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) this week at National Harbor. The big political news today is that Ben Carson appears to be out of the GOP campaign, but will speak Friday at CPAC, while Mitt Romney plans to use his Thursday CPAC speech to make the case against Donald Trump, who will speak Saturday at the conference.

As for me, in addition to covering CPAC, I also plan to call attention to the Left’s war against online free speech:

On February 19, Twitter suspended the account of award-winning conservative journalist Robert Stacy McCain. His supporters immediately launched the #FreeStacy hashtag campaign as a protest against this censorship.
McCain’s suspension came 10 days after Twitter had announced the creation of a “Trust and Safety Council” that included radical feminist Anita Sarkeesian and many left-wing progressive organizations. McCain had been using Twitter since 2009 and his account (@rsmccain) had tens of thousands of followers. In addition, Twitter also suspended @SexTroubleBook, an account McCain created in 2015 to promote his book Sex Trouble: Radical Feminism and the War Against Human Nature. . . .

You can read the rest at Da Tech Guy Blog.

The #FreeStacy campaign is getting widespread attention, including an editorial in the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

Back in 2011, Twitter co-founder Biz Stone boldly declared that “freedom of expression is essential,” and that while some tweets on the social media platform might “downright anger a vast majority of users” — and that while even Twitter itself didn’t always agree with what its users chose to tweet — the company would “keep the information flowing irrespective of any view we may have about the content.”
Five years later, however, that pledge has pretty has much fallen by the wayside.
Last month, the social media platform rescinded the “verified” user status of ring-wing pundit Milo Yiannopoulos, and, in the weeks since, has also banned controversial right-wing writer Robert Stacy McCain, as well as censor a hashtag protesting the move.
Why did Twitter take these actions? Presumably because they align with the mission of its new Trust and Safety Council. The council, unveiled by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey earlier this month, strives to “ensure people can continue to express themselves freely and safely on Twitter,” while also striking “the right balance between fighting abuse and speaking truth to power.”
While Twitter, much like college campuses, claims to support all things diversity, the makeup of this council shows that the company has no interest in true diversity of thought. As Mr. McCain pointed out in a recent interview with San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra J. Saunders, of the 40 organizations on the council, many are left-leaning and none is conservative or libertarian. If Mr. Dorsey truly valued diversity, he wouldn’t have assembled what amounts to an echo chamber that places liberal thought-police ideology over (truly) free speech. . . .

Meanwhile, I’ve written an 1,800-word column about it:

Feminism is always a lecture, never a debate. Any criticism of feminist discourse is cited as proof that the critic is a vile misogynist. Objections to the anti-male rhetoric of feminist ideologues like Anita Sarkeesian are construed by her as threats to her safety.
“Every day I see my words scrutinized, twisted and distorted by thousands of men hell-bent on destroying and silencing me,” Sarkeesian told her sympathetic listeners at a feminist conference in Sydney, Australia. . . .
Who is being destroyed, and who is being silenced? I’d like to explain this to the tens of thousands of people who followed my Twitter account, but unfortunately my account has been destroyed and silenced. . . .

Read the whole thing at The American Spectator.

 

+ o + o +

BANNED BY TWITTER!

 

The #FreeStacy movement, a grassroots response to Twitter’s Feb. 19 decision to suspend my popular @rsmccain account, has received international attention. You can help support this movement by including the #FreeStacy hashtag on your Twitter messages, by retweeting messages in support of this movement, and by signing up at PublicStatus.org, which is dedicated to defending free speech rights on social media. Thanks to everyone who has helped spread the word.

— Robert Stacy McCain




 

 

PREVIOUSLY:

 

Category: CPAC, Sex Trouble

Comments

52 Responses to “#FreeStacy #CPAC2016: Because ‘Freedom of Expression Is Essential’”

  1. Daniel Freeman
    March 4th, 2016 @ 12:29 am

    Well, you know what happens if you elect a boiler pressure release valve and he closes up.

  2. DeadMessenger
    March 4th, 2016 @ 1:02 pm

    Well, I could use some super-duper prayer, on account of I can’t even find a 1099 position. I need to work from home under most conditions due to disability. I live in a handicap friendly house, which has been great for me, but if I’m not working by the last week in April, I’m going to lose my house, because I’m going to be out of money.

    This has been a time of severe trial for me. My husband has had some serious medical issues which has chewed up our savings, and has yet another surgery that we can’t afgord coming up. Anxiety is eating me up, when I know that God doesn’t want me to worry, so I’m trying to deal with my sinful lack of faith on top of everything else.

    The only one who can help me now is God. He’s blessed me lots of times in the past when things were very bleak in my life, so I pray it’s His will to do it again.

    All prayer very welcome.