Google Censoring "Abortion" Results for YouTube Videos

Google, which owns YouTube, censors the search results for “abortion” so that hard-hitting anti-abortion videos no longer appear in the top ten. “An internal discussion thread leaked to Breitbart News reveals Google regularly intervenes in search results on its YouTube video platform--including a recent intervention that pushed pro-life videos out of the top ten search results for ‘abortion.’ The term ‘abortion’ was added to a ‘blacklist’ file for ‘controversial YouTube queries,’ which contains a list of search terms that the company considers sensitive” (“The Smoking Gun: Google manipulated search results,” Breitbart, Jan. 16, 2019). The videos were not removed, but they were made to appear lower in the list of results so that they would be seen by fewer people. A Google spokesperson admitted to the Daily Mail that this was done, but claimed that the videos in question contained “misinformation” or “graphic content.” “YouTube failed to explain how congressional testimony from Dr. Antony Levatino, a gynecologist and former abortion doctor--also disappeared from the top ten results--could be ‘misinformation.’ But perhaps the most obvious contradiction to YouTube’s comment is ‘Abortion: My Experience,’ a video that according to the Slate report, previously featured at around ninth in the search results. The video is a woman’s personal story of being pressured into an abortion by an allegedly abusive partner, and subsequently regretting the decision. The video doesn’t feature any graphic images. As it’s a personal story, it can’t be accused of ‘misinformation,’ either. It seems disappearing the stories of women who don’t have the correct abortion experience is now YouTube’s policy” (“YouTube admits it meddled with search results,” Breitbart, Jan. 17, 2019).

​(Friday Church News Notes, January 25, 2019, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

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