Listen up, folks! A new House bill is finally working to halt the Biden Administration from wasting your hard-earned cash on developing AI tools to muzzle content the government doesn’t want you hearing, all under the pretense of tackling “disinformation.”
Introducing H.R. 8519, a sleek document, all 83 words of it, geared up to strangle the funds fuelling federal government’s feverish fascination with online censorship. A bevy of more than two dozen House Republicans, the unsung guardians of free speech, are rallying behind this cause to bring the rusty wheels of censorship to a screeching halt.
Evidently, the federal government’s meddling in ‘disinformation research grants,’ ‘Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace grants,’ and programs nestled within the National Science Foundation’s lesser-known Track F: Trust and Authenticity in Communications Systems, was too despotic a move to ignore. This overreach prompted a fervent response from the House Select Subcommittee calling out this menace to online free speech.
Spending millions of taxpayer’s money to fuel AI censorship of online speech was clearly an affront to freedom and liberty. As per the Subcommittee’s eye-opening report, the NSF, under its sinister ‘censorship industrial complex’ garb, has been generously forking out grants to build formidable AI tools to smother the web in pervasive propaganda.
There’s more than just the microscopic menace of censorship; the Biden Administration’s program is allegedly a storehouse of disinformation. Just last year, NSF gave the green light to Track F with a cool $21 million allocation to address issues around communication systems, an innocent facade hiding a blatant ulterior motive.
Subsequently, the spotlight turned to grants funding AI tools with a wide breadth of capabilities. They scale from daily analysis of a vast number of blogs and media articles to helping Big Tech juggle their ‘difficult responsibilities of censorship.’ From deciding what is ‘true’ to aiding enforcement actions against so-called misinformation, these AI tools are laying the groundwork for an Orwellian nightmare.
Even narratives that question the mainstream media or discuss ‘delegitimizing information’ about election integrity and vaccine efficacy are under the scanner. Alongside Track F, the Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC) program, which was equally vested in countering online “(mis/dis)information,” has also fallen into the defunding net under the new bill.
Looking at all of this, the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) poses a chilling warning; “If a Member of Congress’s account can be censored…”
This isn’t just confined to the realm of public representatives. Your content and voice could be next on the chopping block. There’s no denying, this machination of government censorship is making its way to every corner of the internet. As such, H.R. 8519 is more than just legislation; it’s a beacon of hope for the preservation of free speech and an informed society.
This is a wake-up call for all of us. The fight against stealthy censorship, veiled propaganda, and online manipulations is far from over. Lend your support to those fighting for liberty and transparency and beware of the wolf hiding under the sheepskin of “combatting misinformation”. Speak up before it’s too late.
