The only real revolution is in the enlightenment of the mind and the improvement of character, the only real emancipation is individual, and the only real revolutionists are philosophers and saints.
Will & Ariel Durant, The Lessons of History (1968), p. 72.
On December 21, 1620, William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims landed on what is now known as Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
American settlers in Nacogdoches, Mexican Texas, declared their independence on December 21, 1826, starting the Fredonian Rebellion.
Avant-garde rock ’n’ roll guitarist, band leader, and composer Frank Zappa was born on this date in 1940. In 1985, Zappa testified before the United States Senate Commerce, Technology, and Transportation committee, attacking the Parents Music Resource Center or PMRC, a music organization co-founded by Tipper Gore, wife of then-senator Al Gore. Zappa was a passionate advocate for freedom of speech, self-education, political participation and the abolition of censorship. Describing his political views, Frank Zappa categorized himself as a “practical conservative,” or “independent.” He died in 1993.
But until recently, the problems users encountered mostly pertained to PayPal’s targeting of fraud — not with whether a user uttered wrong thoughts or pursued projects disfavored by corporate implementers of a Chinazi-style social credit system.
More and more, though, PayPal is informing individuals with unwelcome thoughts that they can no longer use PayPal and that PayPal will hold their funds “for up to 180 days . . . we’ll email you. . . .”
PayPal has, for now, rescinded — or partially and temporarily rescinded — policy provisions pledging to fine users $2,500 for “misinformation” or “hate speech.”
But PayPal is still targeting thinkers of wrongthink.
An example is Eric Finman, whose Freedom Phone provides access to apps banned elsewhere. After ousting him, PayPal held onto $1.2 million in his PayPal balance. Finman eventually recovered the money, but the delay “killed all the momentum.”
Biologist Colin Wright was ejected for criticizing gender ideology. PayPal won’t confirm this without a subpoena. But these and many other examples follow a similar pattern. Often, PayPal comes down like a ton of bricks right after a user utters a viewpoint PayPal dislikes.
I’m appalled. Many of PayPal’s founders — Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, David Sacks and Max Levchin — are appalled. They say that PayPal’s original mission of empowering people is being perverted.
We’ve seen how government officials and partisan political operatives have whispered in the ears of Facebook and Twitter, instructing such companies to censor and deplatform users. Are they also instructing PayPal?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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We do not have an ideal world, such as we would like, where morality is easy because cognition is easy. Where one can do right with no effort because he can detect the obvious.
Philip K. Dick, Man in the High Castle (1962).
On December 20, 1740, Arthur Lee — Revolutionary Era diplomat, spy, and Virginia delegate to the Continental Congress — was born. He practiced law in London from 1770 to 1776, where he wrote polemics against slavery and in defense of the American colonies’ resistance to the Townshend acts and other tyrannical British policies.
He was brother to Richard Henry Lee and Francis Lightfoot Lee.
Adam Schiff hasn’t.
Last week, the Democrat Congressman from California, together with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), sent what amounts to an open letter to Meta’s President of Global Affairs, Nicholas Clegg, urging Meta to maintain its commitment to keeping dangerous election denial content off its platform.
These Democrats worry that Facebook — Meta’s most successful product — might “alter or roll back certain misinformation policies, because they are temporary and specific to the election season,” say Schiff and Whitehouse.
Rollbacks on censorship, they say, “would be a tragic mistake. Meta must commit to strong election misinformation policies year-round, as we are still witnessing falsehoods about voting and the prior elections spreading on your platform.”
Why “must” Facebook continue to patrol its platform, striking down or underplaying “unfounded election denial content”?
Schiff and Whitehouse assert that Donald J. Trump spreads “the Big Lie” and it would be a huge mistake to allow that lie to air on their platform. They don’t want Trump allowed back on Facebook.
It’s been just weeks since Trump was permitted back on Twitter, where he has not taken up his old hyper-posting habits. Trump’s so far confining himself to his own “Truth Social” platform.
But as far as “the Big Lie” goes, would Schiff & Co. argue that The Epoch Times should also be censored? After all, in its coverage of this issue, by Frank Fang, the concluding section of the article was devoted to showing that Trump’s “Lie” might be in parts, uh, true.
Would Democrats ask Meta to suppress The Epoch Times, too?
Censorship is a hard habit to break.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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No intelligent idea can gain general acceptance unless some stupidity is mixed in with it.
Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet (Richard Zenith, translator, 2001).
On December 19, 1776, Tom Paine published one of a series of pamphlets in the Pennsylvania Journal titled The American Crisis. Exactly one year later, George Washington’s Continental Army went into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
On December 19, 1828, Vice President of the United States John C. Calhoun penned the South Carolina Exposition and Protest, arguing against the Tariff of 1828, a key moment in what became known as the Nullification Crisis.
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A man’s taste is formed more by his culture, his profession, and the period in which he is young than by his race or politics.
A.J. Liebling, The Road Back to Paris (1988).