Posted on 03/30/2021 6:40:41 AM PDT by george76
The Epoch Times is no stranger to censorship from China, but the publication has recently been forced to grapple with censorship here in the United States.
Founded in 2000 by Chinese immigrants to the United States who hoped to expose the truth of their birth country’s repressions, the paper quickly grew in popularity. The publication’s website now receives nine million unique visitors and 30 million page-views per month.
The Epoch Times has been a consistent voice for freedom, and has helped inform the world of the human rights atrocities in China. The newspaper has seen firsthand the consequences of pursuing journalism in Communist China. At one point, the paper recruited reporters in China, who were, in turn, sentenced to years in prison for the crime of reporting the truth.
That experience in China only deepenedThe Epoch Times’ founders’ appreciation for our nation’s commitment to a free press.
Since 2010, The Epoch Times has held congressional press credentials, issued by the U.S. House of Representatives Periodical Press Gallery. Those credentials enable reporters to gain access to the Capitol and interview members of Congress. Without that access on Capitol Hill, everyday Americans would be unaware of what happens in Congress, and unable to hold their elected officials accountable.
The paper recently received word from the House Press Gallery that its press credentials will not be renewed. No explanation was given, but we can assume the decision was politically motivated, as The Epoch Times was vocal about its support of President Trump over the past four years.
If The Epoch Times loses its congressional credentials, not only will its journalists be banished from the halls of the Capitol, but the publication will also have a difficult time gaining access to other federal buildings. The congressional press credentialing entities (both the House and the Senate) often set the standard for other government press halls. Even the Supreme Court requires journalists to have congressional press credentials.
Adding insult to injury is the fact that the Senate Daily Press Gallery credentials the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. Totalitarian regimes rely on two sides of the same coin – propaganda on the one side, and, on the other, censorship of unfavorable material. The Chinese government benefits from both the Senate’s credentialing of the CCP’s official propaganda, and the House’s latest move to cancel the credentials of a publication that has been a constant thorn in the side of the Chinese Communist Party.
The House Press Gallery is governed by an executive committee, comprised of seven journalists who make the decisions for which other publications will be granted credentials. Senate historian Donald A. Ritchie has remarked that this system of allowing fellow journalists to oversee the credentialing of press agencies for access to the legislative body is unique in the world. It was designed this way to promote greater press access to Congress and honor the First Amendment.
That system worked great, of course, until Cancel Culture took hold.
Americans are beginning to see the profound dangers of Cancel Culture. American institutions and corporations now engage in censorship that was previously unimaginable. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and other Big Tech giants conduct coordinated censorship efforts, silencing important voices and shutting down civic dialogue. Former President Donald Trump is still banned from Twitter and other social media platforms, as are other prominent conservatives.
Thomas Jefferson famously wrote in a letter to Edward Carrington, “…were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” Our First Amendment embodies that sentiment.
We are blessed in America to have a government held in check by a vibrant press corps, but the House Periodical Press Gallery appears not to care. The executive committee is prioritizing Cancel Culture over its responsibility to advance the First Amendment in the halls of Congress.
The executive committee should reverse course immediately and take a bold stand for the freedom of the press. Failure to do so will be correctly viewed by Americans as another example of Cancel Culture’s disregard for our cherished First Amendment rights.
Ken Buck is a member of Congress from Colorado.
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Borrowing a page? The Rats have gotten hold of the entire CCP playbook and they are going to jam it down the throats of every American.
The people burning books (banning topics from social media), demonizing particular races & religions (heterosexual white Christian males...), erasing/rewriting history (toppling statues, renaming everything)... We've seen them before.
The people in the brown shirts and jackboots in 1930s Germany are exactly the same kind of people who today are participating in and backing "mostly peaceful" protests and oppression of any opposition. You want to know how the German people could've been so stupid, so short sighted as to let that happen to them? Look around, we are seeing it play out again, wide screen and high-def right here, right now. Maybe, hopefully we can recognize it for what it is and stop it before it costs tens of millions of lives. But our history suggests we're going to have to (re)learn the hard way.
Never ends, until citizens push back.
There’s always been censorship. This is just the first time that the censorship focused on applications on a device we can put in our own personal pocket.
Censorship is the same if it’s broadcast TV or radio there was censorship and manipulation, there IS subliminal seduction, BRAINWASHING... et al, and here we are streaming the same BS.
If it’s a device or a technology it can be used to manipulate populations.
What can’t the Big Brother of 2021 and those minions not sensor? And why not?
Why can’t they censor those things that BB has never been able to censor?
Your description is far more succinct and far more accurate.
Very appropriate cartoon.
They are, indeed, what a newspaper and Journalists should be in a Free Society.
Unfortunately, the Communists came to America and American Government, Newspapers, "Journalism" and Culture in 1920, eighty years before the Epoch Times political refugees.
So it was unlikely that the Epoch Times would not be censored by the Xiden Communist Infiltration Government.
Having such an “approval body” is no different from a local guv’mt letting a cabal of local businesses and unions decide if there is a need for more competition in the area. Corrupt.
My suggestion: allow XX seats. Vet ~60 by readership — which ones reach the citizenry. Then, hold a weekly lottery for the seats. Lose your seat this week? Aww, cry me a river. Next!
House Press Gallery that its press credentials will not be renewed.
The Epoch Times may become even stronger with the censorship from the left people are starving for the truth and the The Epoch Times is a good place to find it.
Are you saying the recent pushes in censorship is no worse than censorship has “always been?”
I would disagree—the mainstream media has gone from talking points and some omission of the news to omitting major stories (Clinton, Hunter Biden), fake news (Russia, Russia) and conspiring against alternative outlets. Read the Time article about how proud they were to work against Trump recounts, calling any question of the election “The Big Lie.”
Alternative media has been deplatformed, demonitized, and even the President was censored—I think that is a change from “always been censorship.” The elites are actively working to silence alternative media and platforms...this article is an example, and Parler is another major one.
My new tagline: If I wanted to live in China, I would move there.
Sadly looking more and more like I won’t need to move :(
The people doing this(denial of press credentials for Epoch Times) should be immediately prosecuted but I fear the ones who could prosecute this are the very same bunch who are causing the problem.
“Are you saying the recent pushes in censorship is no worse than censorship has “always been?”
The technological depth is greater as more data is readily available.
If you are personally censored then you are basically not cut off but totally exposed.
Is totally exposing somebody censoring them? Or is censoring doing away with something so that it appears to have never existed?
The Rats and many RINOS are OWNED by the CCP.
If you are personally censored then you are basically not cut off but totally exposed.
For example, you are censored—kicked off YouTube or Twitter, wouldn’t you be hidden—opposite of being exposed?
Our friends at the media can access just about any item of practically anything public, and not so private. As can you. The media can easily canvass. Has networks of... as does any info gathering entity. And probably has inroads to OGAs.
Adding insult to injury is the fact that the Senate Daily Press Gallery credentials the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.
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