Posted on 09/16/2023 11:08:10 AM PDT by Texas Fossil
Last week, a federal appeals court confirmed that science cannot function without free speech. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya reflects on a victory for himself—and every American.
When I was four, my mother took her first flight and first trip out of her native India to the U.S. with me and my younger brother in tow. We were going to meet my father, an electrical engineer and rocket scientist by training, who had won the U.S. visa lottery in 1970. He had moved to New York a year earlier. By the time we arrived he was working at McDonald’s because engineering jobs had dried up during a recession.
Both of my parents—children of the violent partition of India and East Pakistan (now Bangladesh)—had grown up in poverty, my mother in a Calcutta slum. They immigrated to this country because they believed in the American dream. That belief led to the success my father ultimately found as an engineer and my mother found running a family daycare business.
Our family had indeed won the lottery. But coming to America meant something more profound than financial opportunity.
I remember in 1975 when a high court found that then-prime minister of India Indira Gandhi had interfered unlawfully in an election. The ruling disqualified her from holding office. In response, she declared a state of emergency, suspended democracy, censored the opposition press and government critics, and threw her political opponents in jail. I remember the shock of these events and our family’s collective relief that we were in the U.S., where it was unimaginable that such things could happen.
When I was 19, I became an American citizen. It was one of the happiest days of my young life. The immigration officer gave me a civics test, including a question about the First Amendment. It was an easy test because I knew it in my heart. The American civic religion has the right to free speech as the core of its liturgy. I never imagined that there would come a time when an American government would think of violating this right, or that I would be its target.
Unfortunately, during the pandemic, the American government violated my free speech rights and those of my scientist colleagues for questioning the federal government’s pandemic policies.
My parents had taught me that people here could criticize the government, even over matters of life and death, without worry that the government would censor or suppress us. But over the past three years, I have been robbed of that conviction. American government officials, working in concert with big tech companies, have attacked and suppressed my speech and that of my colleagues for criticizing official pandemic policies—criticism that has been proven prescient.
On Friday, at long last, the Fifth Circuit Court ruled that we were not imagining it—that the Biden administration did indeed strong-arm social media companies into doing its bidding. The court found that the Biden White House, the CDC, the U.S. Surgeon General’s office, and the FBI “engaged in a years-long pressure campaign [on social media outlets] designed to ensure that the censorship aligned with the government’s preferred viewpoints.”
The judges described a pattern of government officials making “threats of ‘fundamental reforms’ like regulatory changes and increased enforcement actions” if we did not comply. The implication was clear. To paraphrase Al Capone: Nice company you have there. It’d be a shame if something were to happen to it.
It worked. According to the judges, “the officials’ campaign succeeded. The platforms, in capitulation to state-sponsored pressure, changed their moderation policies.”
In exposing this behavior—and in declaring it a likely violation of the First Amendment—the ruling is not just a victory for my fellow scientists and me, but for every single American.
More at Link
Republican states sued the Biden administration arguing it violated the First Amendment by censoring speech on social media
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Dr. Jay Bhattacharya censorship lawsuit:
The Government Censored Me and Other Scientists. We Fought Back—and Won. (Sep 11, 2023)
https://www.thefp.com/p/i-fought-government-censorship-and-won
What an inspiration this man’s story is!
Yeah, but what happens to the government officials who perpetrated these abominations?
Unless there are significant and demonstrable consequences to those persons the court rulings are essentially meaningless.
“Yeah, but what happens to the government officials who perpetrated these abominations?”
Both civil and criminal penalties could apply.
18USC242 makes it a criminal act for any government officials to violate civil rights. Under the correct set of circumstances the death penalty can apply.
18USC1983 allows for civil penalties.
L
Yes. I got this article in an email from Dr. Robert W. Malone.
And looked up what appears to be the source article.
The Fox news coverage of the White House Appeal to the Supreme Court is not easy to find on the web. resorted to searching the Fox News website with the exact title. Could not find it any other way.
This is the tip of the iceberg. If the Supreme Court rules in favor of freedom of speech, this will be applied to many agencies and 3rd party groups into censorship.
We wait and pray this is the daylight being applied.
This person is why we want and celebrate LEGAL immigration.
It has never been a Hindu, or a Mohammedan, nor even a Pope-ruled "Catholic-alone" one.
So, there.
Excellent article. Well written. Recommend the full read.
I agree. Very inspirational. However, I am curious to know if his recent experience with government censorship has impacted or changed his political/social views and opinions.
Thank you. I thought it was important. Like I stated before, I got this in an email from Dr. Robert W. Malone. He is a friend of Dr. Jay Bhattacharya.
full read?
I had a problem with my screen rolling when I tried to copy past a certain point. So I elected not to do the Control-A Control-C Control-V routine. Did not know the policy of the source concerning reposting.
It was very difficult to find the Fox News article about the appeal to the Supreme Court by the Biden Regime. They really don’t want any awareness of this.
Great to hear that he has been vindicated in the courts. I wish this letter could be published for broadly for everyone to read. The “liberal”/”progressives” claim to be for science and “free speech” is debunked in this man’s experience the last few years. However, liberals have no self awareness, no conscience, questionable awareness or sensitivity to right and wrong.
This is great, and I hope this serves an immediate example to those trying it again. Don’t do it.
Later.
May this be the outcome of President Trumps fake charges.
Expose the ComDem Liars.
They are Evil. They serve the Wrong Master.
This totalitarian globalism reached unprecedented levels of tyranny under a republican prez. He locked us down, signed blank checks for big pharma, paid people to stay closed and at home, blank check to government medicine . People died alone in homes and hospitals without the decency of a funeral….
He is still out their bragging about saving 100s of millions of lives around the globe.
He gave them mail in ballots to perpetuate and destroy any hope of our way of life.
And folks want round 2 of this???
By December 2029, we knew it was an rna respiratory virus and we knew in the history of these that the simple biological facts make vaccines useless.
Yet in March of 2020, he and fauci stood sidecar by side, as they had many times before, and signed the CARES act.
No patriots would support that. Ever.
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