Big Tech Censored Dozens of Doctors, More Than 800 Accounts for COVID-19 ‘Misinformation,’ Study Finds

Resource : https://www.bloomberg.com/press-releases/2022-02-08/merck-and-ridgeback-announce-that-3-1-million-courses-of-molnupiravir-an-investigational-oral-antiviral-covid-19-medicine-have

Big Tech Censored Dozens of Doctors, More Than 800 Accounts for COVID-19 ‘Misinformation,’ Study Finds

Ailan Evans / @AilanHEvans / February 09, 2022

Twitter, Google, Google+, Gmail, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat are among the platforms arrayed on the screen of an Apple iPhone. Many of them have used their largely unregulated power to censor information they don’t approve of as “misinformation.” (Photo: Chesnot/Getty Images)

Major technology companies and social media platforms have removed, suppressed or flagged the accounts of more than 800 prominent individuals and organizations, including medical doctors, for COVID-19 “misinformation,” according to a new study from the Media Research Center.

The study focused on acts of censorship on major social media platforms and online services, including Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Ads, and TikTok.

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Instances of censorship included Facebook’s decision to flag the British Medical Journal with a “fact check” and “missing context” label, reducing the visibility of a post, for a study delving into data-integrity issues with a Pfizer vaccine clinical trial.

Facebook also deleted the page of the Great Barrington Declaration, an open letter led by dozens of medical professionals, including Dr. Jay Battacharya, a Stanford epidemiologist, and Dr. Martin Kulldorff, a former employee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which advocated for less restrictive measures to address the dangers of COVID-19.

“Big Tech set up a system where you can’t disagree with ‘the science’ even though that’s the foundation of the scientific method,” Dan Gainor, MRC vice president of Free Speech America, told the Daily Caller National Foundation. “If doctors and academic journals can’t debate publicly, then it’s not science at all. It’s ‘religion.’”

Big Tech also scrubbed podcast host Joe Rogan’s interviews with scientists Dr. Peter McCullough and Dr. Robert Malone, the latter of whom was instrumental in pioneering mRNA technology. Twitter banned Malone from its platform permanently in late December over the virologist’s tweets questioning the efficacy and safety of the COVID-19 vaccine.

“We tallied 32 different doctors who were censored, including mRNA vaccine innovator Dr. Robert Malone,” Gainor said. “Censoring views of credentialed experts doesn’t ensure confidence in vaccines. It undermines faith in government COVID-19 strategies.“

In addition to medical doctors, the study examined instances in which members of Congress were censored by tech platforms.

These included an incident last August in which YouTube suspended Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., for posting a video arguing that “cloth masks” are not effective against the coronavirus, a view later echoed by many prominent medical commentators. Twitter also flagged a tweet from Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., in which he wrote “studies show those with natural immunity from a prior infection are much less likely to contract and spread COVID than those who only have vaccine-induced immunity.”

The study also examined Big Tech censorship of prominent media personalities, such as Rogan, Tucker Carlson, and Dan Bongino.

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THAT LITTLE BLACK BOOK… The Clinton/Epstein Connection

According to records obtained by the Daily Mail, between 1993 and 1995, Jeffrey Epstein visited President Bill Clinton’s White House 17 times, bringing with him a total of eight women.

The convicted sex offender had connections to many celebrities, journalists and prominent political figures, including Clinton. Many of them were listed in Epstein’s little black book.

In its report on Epstein’s many visits to the Clinton White House, the Daily Mail noted that hanging on the walls of Epstein’s mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, were photos of these visits and a few of the women he had with him.

Low-Res pics from the Florida State Attorney’s Office show pics hanging in Epstein’s mansion of The late-financier visiting Clinton’s White House with two different women.

A report from the Daily Mail indicates Epstein brought 8 women to the White House over the years.

THREAD pic.twitter.com/bv13tLHgkS

— Michael Austin (@mikeswriting) January 19, 2022

In addition to Epstein’s longtime partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, the names of the other seven women who accompanied him to the Clinton White House were listed in the report.

Maxwell was recently convicted of several crimes related to her complicity in the sex-trafficking crimes of Epstein.

The Daily Mail said three of the women named were Epstein’s former girlfriends — Celina Midelfart, Eva Andersson-Dubin and Francis Jardine.

The other women in the photos were Jennifer Garrison, Shelley Gafni, Jennifer Driver and Lyoubov Orlova.

As this news surrounding Bill Clinton continues to develop, one can just imagine Hillary tensing up with frustration and thinking to herself, “Not again!”

After all, her husband has been accused of sexually assaulting and harassing several women over the years, and he was impeached for lying about his sexual relationship with a White House intern.

It’s unclear how many additional prominent figures were involved in Epstein’s crimes.

Britain’s Prince Andrew faces a lawsuit over allegations that he sexually assaulted one of Epstein’s victims when she was 17 years old.

Andrew has denied any wrongdoing, but Queen Elizabeth II chose to strip him of his royal titles on Thursday.

Will other prominent political figures — former U.S. presidents, for example — face similar legal proceedings related to their relationships with Jeffrey Epstein?

Only time will tell.

Prince Andrew Mounts Attack Against Woman Who Accused Him of Sexual Abuse

Prince Andrew Mounts Attack Against Woman Who Accused Him of Sexual Abuse

Andrew, the second son of Queen Elizabeth II, said the woman was seeking financial gain from one of the world’s best known royal families.

Prince Andrew said in court papers filed Friday that a woman who had accused him of sexually abusing her was seeking financial profit. Credit…Pool photo by Chris Jackson

Lawyers for Prince Andrew on Friday issued a blistering attack on a woman who has accused him in a lawsuit of sexually abusing her when she was still a minor and he was a guest of Jeffrey Epstein.

The lawyers for Andrew, 61, denied in a new court filing in Manhattan that their client, who is also known as the Duke of York, had ever sexually abused or assaulted the woman, Virginia Giuffre, who has been one of Mr. Epstein’s most prominent accusers.

Andrew’s lawyers argued in the court papers that Ms. Giuffre’s lawsuit was part of an effort by her over more than a decade to profit from allegations she had made against Mr. Epstein and others. Andrew’s lawyers claimed that Ms. Giuffre had sold articles and photographs to the news media and entered into secret agreements to resolve her abuse claims.

“Giuffre has initiated this baseless lawsuit against Prince Andrew to achieve another payday at his expense and at the expense of those closest to him,” Andrew’s lawyers wrote. “Most people could only dream of obtaining the sums of money that Giuffre has secured for herself over the years.”

The lawyers added that “accusing a member of the world’s best known royal family of serious misconduct has helped Giuffre create a media frenzy online and in the traditional press.”

Andrew’s lawyers issued their attack on Ms. Giuffre as part of a brief asking the judge, Lewis A. Kaplan, to dismiss her lawsuit, which was filed in August in Federal District Court.

In the lawsuit, Ms. Giuffre, 38, claimed that Andrew, the second son of Queen Elizabeth II, sexually abused her when she was under 18 on Mr. Epstein’s private island, Little St. James, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and at his mansion in Manhattan.

She also accused Andrew, along with Mr. Epstein and his longtime companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, of forcing her to have sexual intercourse with Andrew at Ms. Maxwell’s home in London.

Mr. Epstein, 66, was arrested in July 2019 on sex-trafficking charges. One month later he was found dead by hanging in his jail cell in Manhattan. The medical examiner ruled the death a suicide.

Ms. Maxwell was arrested in July 2020, and has been detained on charges she helped Mr. Epstein recruit, groom and sexually abuse underage girls. An indictment also accused Ms. Maxwell of involvement in the sex trafficking of a 14-year-old girl, saying that she groomed the girl to engage in sexual acts with Mr. Epstein and later paid her.

Ms. Maxwell has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

In their request to have the suit dismissed, Andrew’s lawyers also argued that Ms. Giuffre’s claims were barred under terms of a 2009 settlement release reached in a lawsuit she had filed against Mr. Epstein in Florida.

David Boies, a lawyer for Ms. Giuffre, said in a statement that Andrew’s motion to dismiss “fails to confront the serious allegations” in Ms. Giuffre’s suit.

Mr. Boies said that Andrew’s “attempted reliance on an irrelevant 13-year-old release, to which he is not a party, and which he did not even know about until recently, is just another in a series of attempts to avoid facing the merits of the serious charges against him.”

As the court battle over Ms. Giuffre’s lawsuit against Prince Andrew escalated on Friday, dueling legal papers were filed by federal prosecutors and lawyers for Ms. Maxwell in her case before a different judge, Alison J. Nathan, in the same federal court in Manhattan. Ms. Maxwell’s trial is scheduled to be begin there on Nov. 29.

The prosecutors asked that some of Ms. Maxwell’s accusers be allowed to testify using pseudonyms or first names, citing concerns about publicity, harassment and the risk of “significant embarrassment, anxiety and social stigma.” Ms. Maxwell’s lawyers argued in their motion that this would create unnecessary confusion and prejudice the jury against Ms. Maxwell.

Federal prosecutors also revealed that the four women described as victims in the indictment would testify at trial, in “explicit detail,” about sexual abuse that took place before they were 18 years old, and about how they were recruited by — and in turn recruited — other victims who were minors.

Ms. Maxwell’s lawyers also asked Judge Nathan to allow them to present evidence and arguments about prior investigations into Mr. Epstein and how they were resolved, including an investigation by federal prosecutors in Florida that resulted in a 2007 non-prosecution agreement for Mr. Epstein and several of his associates.

But prosecutors, in a response filed on Friday, asked Judge Nathan to prevent the defense from scrutinizing the roots of the federal investigations in both New York and Florida, saying it would be an improper effort to cast doubt on the government’s motives and credibility.

“The defense would like to (inaccurately) argue that the New York investigation was opened in response to the non-prosecution agreement,” and that the government rushed to investigate Ms. Maxwell after Mr. Epstein’s 2019 death and led a “sloppy investigation” because of public pressure, prosecutors wrote in a response to the defense’s motion also filed Friday.

Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.

Benjamin Weiser is a reporter covering the Manhattan federal courts. He has long covered criminal justice, both as a beat and investigative reporter. Before joining The Times in 1997, he worked at The Washington Post. @BenWeiserNYT

Source NY Times