A New York University-affiliated organization has joined the left-wing bandwagon to attack conservative media on Facebook. In so doing, it ignored the social media platform’s obvious bias against conservatives.
A study from Cybersecurity for Democracy claimed that “far-right” news sources received greater engagement on Facebook than news sources from other political parties. “When we look only at the far-right, we see that misinformation sources significantly outperform non-misinformation sources,” the authors of the study claimed. “Being a consistent spreader of far-right misinformation appears to confer a significant advantage.”
Essentially, the study claimed that right-leaning news sources outperform left-leaning or “center” sources in an attempt to ignore or downplay Facebook’s constant barrage of censorship against conservative voices.
The study ignored, for example, the fact that Facebook indefinitely suspended former President Donald Trump from the platform following the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol Building. It also ignored that the platform allegedly deleted Christian conservative actor Kevin Sorbo’s account, and has repeatedly cracked down on what it deems to be “misinformation” about COVID-19.
Researchers “obtained lists of U.S. news sources and their Facebook pages from NewsGuard and Media Bias Fact Check, two independent data providers that survey the news ecosystem and rate the political leaning and quality of media.” However, the study did not disclose the actual names of the sources examined despite having collected “8.6 million posts.”
The two sources that the study used teemed with liberal bias. NewsGuard co-CEO Steven Brill contributed four times more money to Democratic candidates than Republicans in 2018.
Media Bias Fact Check’s liberal bias was astounding. The organization said that the liberal Soros-funded Poynter Institute is “a leader in distinguished journalism and produce[s] nothing but credible and evidence based content.” It also called PolitiFact, a Facebook fact-checker affiliated with the Poynter Institute, “simply the best source for political fact checking.” Poynter actually tried to blacklist dozens of conservative websites, but later retracted its statement.
The study further complained about the “misinformation” that it claimed conservative sites spread. “Center and left partisan categories incur a misinformation penalty, while right-leaning sources do not. Center sources of misinformation, for example, performed about 70% worse than their non-misinformation counterparts.”
Researchers concluded that “far-right sources receive considerably more engagement per follower than pages with other political leanings,” and that “far-right misinformation sources are the only ones that engage better with their followers than non-misinformation sources of the same partisanship as an aggregate.”
Cybersecurity for Democracy’s “About” page said that it is “part of the Center for Cybersecurity at New York University (NYU).” OpenSecrets reported that individuals affiliated with NYU donated $2,440,181 to Democratic federal candidates during the 2020 election cycle. By contrast, NYU affiliates gave $68,902 to Republican federal candidates. NYU also released a study in February that claimed online conservative censorship was “disinformation.”
Unsurprisingly, the study did not mention the obvious bias against conservatives on Facebook. Facebook fact-checkers attacked a meme about Dr. Seuss, and the platform deleted content from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Conservatives are under attack. Contact Facebook headquarters at 1-650-308-7300 and demand that Big Tech be held to account to provide clarity on “hate speech,” rules that seem to be applied inconsistently If you have been censored, contact us at the Media Research Center contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.
