OPINION
Catherine Salgado
Catherine Salgado is a Staff Writer with Media Research Center’s NewsBusters’ Free Speech America. She also has a column, Washington’s Bayonette, on The Rogue Review and her own SubStack newsletter, Pro Deo et Libertate. Catherine previously wrote for The National Pulse and is a graduate of Christendom College with a degree in Classical Languages and Theology.
Anti-free speech YouTube CEO Neal Mohan just prioritized “safety” over freedom of speech.
Mohan went on CBS Mornings on Sept. 22. During the interview, Mohan agreed that his Google-owned platform does not want everyone to have a free voice online, claiming that safety is “the North Star by which we govern all of our actions.” The YouTube CEO had an anti-free speech track record even before taking over the leadership of YouTube, while the video platform is notorious for biased censorship.
“Time and again, world leaders and corporate heads offer the masses a facade of safety,” said MRC Free Speech America Director Michael Morris. “But all the while what many of these leaders are really doing is clamping down on the people’s hard-won freedoms. What YouTube is doing here is no different. In the name of safety, YouTube tramples on free speech and hopes you aren’t wise enough to see the truth.”
Mohan began by asserting that YouTube still aims to let everyone speak as when it was founded. “We are a place where our objective, our mission, is to give everyone a voice and show them the world,” he said. But when CBS Mornings host Tony Dokoupil put in that “there are some people in this world you would not love to have a bigger voice,” Mohan changed his tune.
In response, the YouTube CEO claimed, “My number one responsibility is keeping our ecosystem of creators, viewers, all of our partners safe on YouTube, and I put that above anything else that we do.” Mohan also defended YouTube’s censorship of Russell Brand.
“If creators have off-platform behaviour, or there’s off-platform news that could be damaging to the broader creator ecosystem, you can be suspended from our monetization program,” he claimed. YouTube demonetized Russell Brand quickly after as-yet unsubstantiated allegations of sexual assault first began to circulate in the media, allegations which Brand denies. Yet, YouTube continues to platform former CBS News journalist Charlie Rose and former Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) despite their own sexual harassment and assault allegations. Mohan’s defence thus seems hypocritical.
MRC’s exclusive CensorTrack.org database documents 463 individuals and organizations YouTube has already shown it does not want to have a bigger voice. Examples include The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh, The Heartland Institute, presidential candidates Donald Trump and Vivek Ramaswamy, and CPAC.
YouTube has enforced biased censorship before with the excuse of safety, including removing over 1 million videos of COVID-19-related content. YouTube later quietly updated its COVID-19 misinformation policy after some of its claims turned out to be false.