Facebook censors WSWS article exposing “Wuhan lab” conspiracy theory

Since Wednesday afternoon, Facebook has blocked its users from sharing the World Socialist Web Site Perspective column, “Washington Post’s ‘Wuhan Lab’ conspiracy theory stands exposed.”

[wsws.org]

{Absolutely nothing in the WSWS article was wrong, false or misleading. The article in question was based on the position of the World Health Organization, which has excluded investigation of a non-natural origin of COVID-19 on the grounds that there is no evidence to support the claim.

The WSWS article called attention to the backhanded concession by the Post in its February 22 editorial, which admitted that, despite the newspaper’s previous declarations that the man-made origins of the disease are a “plausible scenario,” no evidence has been made public to support this claim and called on the US government to release any information it has.}

{Given that the article is fully in compliance with Facebook’s community guidelines, what motivated this act of censorship? There are two intersecting explanations.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that there was direct communication between the Washington Post and Facebook. The Post was no doubt angered by the exposure of its embarrassing climb-down.}

{Throughout history, war has always been accompanied by both lies and censorship. The United States has made clear that its primary military objective is to prepare for “great-power conflict,” in particular with Russia and China, which implies the need to control and suppress any information that interferes with war-making operations.}

{Every act of censorship lays the groundwork for the next, creating the conditions for the suppression not just of social media, but of websites, email and other direct forms of communication. The threat is to all socialist, left-wing and progressive organizations, and there must be a common struggle to oppose it.}