Hello internet.

This will hopefully be my last update on the digital censorship mullarkey for a while. Investigating #GhostBanning has distracted me and taken up a lot of time that should have been better spent getting on with making and doing new stuff and things.

First of all I want to say massive thanks to all the randoms who got in touch to feedback and discuss my previous #GhostBan investigations and conclusions and to help distribute my other doings. In particular, thanks to the nice person who contributed £2  yesterday – very much appreciated. 🙂

Secondly, I want to overemphasise the usefulness of just Keeping Calm. It’s easier to focus if you’re calm. This neo-McCarthyist chilling effect only works as long as the majority of people are too scared to speak out, or too angry to be understood.

I was bouncing between angry and despondent about the situation for months before I properly stepped back from it all and took time to calm down, focus and reflect. If everybody speaking out is confused and self censoring or angrily ranting and raving, it makes the conversation that much harder to have. We need cool heads to prevail if we are to overcome.

GCHQ are bragging about the army of ‘PREVENT’ snoopers they’ve trained to monitor UK society, but then they would brag about it wouldn’t they? They’re projecting a terrifying, all powerful Orwellian superstate. Perhaps it’s bullshit, to frighten those of us with a conscious conscience into shutting up? Perhaps it’s all true and the dream of a free future is actually lost already…*

Regardless, nobody should be bullied into self-censorship or freaked out to the point that they can’t articulate themselves. Whether the snooper army reports are true or not, the fact that they’re publicly gloating about the omnipotence of their (public) surveillance programs and that they’re using this program to vilify peaceful activists; anti-capitalists and anti-frackers is an assault on our capacity for critical thought and freedom of self expression.

But as Hate and Fear are contagious, so are Love and Courage!

Don’t buy into the SHOCK! PANIC! HYSTERIA! 

I’m of the opinion that the ‘fedbook security’ story is/was almost certainly ‘viral misinformation’ – smoke and mirrors to freak everybody out and thereby further divide us online and out there in the ‘real’ world…

Thanks to Jay Gonzo from Fucking, Austria for sharing this neat summary of how the story spread.

 

#GhostBanning on the other hand is definitely a thing though…

Since my last report, I have figured out a few more useful things about #GhostBanning and digital censorship which should have been obvious to me sooner really.

• Speaking out was a really good call, I should have done it sooner. My subscriptions, visitors and most importantly my interactions with actual human beings are all up massively since blogging about my suspicions and changing some of my habits. This site has had more traffic in the last 5 days than it’s had in the last 3 months (when the #GhostBan seems to have started, synchronously around the same time as I was booted from the Occupy News Network…).
• Speaking out has either expanded, or refined my channel’s filter bubbles. (I’m obviously hoping it’s the former, though I suspect it’s the latter). I seem to be seeing more interesting or relevant stuff now, less adverts.
• Reaching out to my filter bubble for help nudging @chunkymark was a good call, as I finally got his attention with the BREXSHIT Movie Poster I made for him and he liked it. 🙂
• Circumventing censorship can be a massive, time consuming rabbit hole which is remarkably easy to get lost in, wasting energy despairing at the injustice of it all and the impossibility of figuring out who’s doing what, how and why etc.
• Continuing to produce stuff and reaching out to friendly human beings in other bubbles directly for help with distribution seems to be a much easier and more time effective way of getting around the algorithms (for now).
• The struggle against censorship is old. I could learn a lot from studying more about the state of censorship today and back through the ages.
• I should start studying coding again.
• And paint.
• And print.

To paraphrase George Orwell (again), the worst thing about censorship is that it is mostly voluntary.  The worst thing about these algorithms, (as with pre-internet censorship techniques) is their psychological effect on the individual.

If you verify that you have been Ghost Banned, (or otherwise censored or blacklisted down the memory hole), try to take it as a compliment. Don’t be defeatist – find ways to work around it. Ask for help and the internet (aka society) will respond.

Looking back over what I’ve managed to uncover of our censored history, it seems like the correct side to be on is usually the side which gets removed from the history books. I’m flattered that my doings have been recognised as unsettling enough for some corners to try censoring me. (I do wish they’d just have the difficult but honest, adult conversation rather than all this pseudo-Machiavellian pantomime bollocks though…)

If I’m correctly understanding Paul Mason‘s #PostCapitalism analysis of Thomas Pikkety‘s much lauded Capital in the 21st Century, they’re saying that at similar points in human history when the elites fought back against the rising consciousness they suddenly, not gradually yielded up power to the people, (civil rights, control of the popular narrative and so forth).

The #FakeNews Psychological Operation was a clear indication that the 0.1% are done ignoring and laughing at us. It’s only a question of how long they’re going to fight for now…We need to all keep relentlessly escalating the pressure for the kind of world we want to see.

We may well be on the cusp of a new renaissance – I think I can see tiny blurry lights at the end of the tunnel. Death of the petrodollar is here/coming. #BasicIncome. Mass fossil fuel divestments. End of corporate media’s monopoly on shaping the popular narrative and thereby objective reality…there is hope.

Final Words on Censorship,…For Now…

Whichever medium you express your thoughts and feelings through, be it online or in the ‘real world’, on 4chan or in parliament, don’t give up.

No matter how hard it gets to participate in this difficult conversation don’t give up.

Don’t let the fascists scumbags dictators  1% disconnect us all.

Don’t lose your confidence to speak your mind freely.

Let’s take back this technology and realise it’s true, unifying potential, together.

Stay strong and remember,

They Can’t Censor ALL Of Us!!

*PS. If you’re one of the spies employed by the alphabet agencies and corporate monstrosities to sell people stuff and/or fk with people’s lives, why don’t you gather some evidence of how fkd up your gig is, turn whistleblower then go get a proper job?

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• MANY of Ann Narkeh‘s doings over the last three months have been #GhostBanned, filter bubbled or otherwise redacted down the memory hole. SUBSCRIBE to get all the things and stuff sent to your inbox.

• ALL the stuff and things here are original and FREE! If you like it, please help distribute it. There is no advertising budget because unsurprisingly, like everybody else, Ann Narkeh Media is SKINT! 

• Over the course of the last year I received about £600 in voluntary contributions from a whole bunch of lovely generous people who support my various creative endeavours. Thankyou all so much!

• So far this year, I’ve received a contribution of £2 from one lovely generous person.

• If I can raise £24, I can get rid of the adverts on this site for a year! 

If you enjoyed these ramblings, please help distribute them and if you’re able, please consider making a micro (or macro) contribution, thankyou!