In early April, YouTube took down a video featuring Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and a group of controversial scientists at a March 18 coronavirus roundtable. The online video platform, owned by Google, cited as its rationale that the video contained false statements about the efficacy of children’s mask-wearing.
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The decision has drawn public blowback on social media and from DeSantis himself.
DeSantis held another public roundtable on April 12 (which is currently available on YouTube), along with three of the same scientists who participated in the March 18 session, during which he blasted YouTube for taking down the earlier video, calling the action “censorship.”
He said Google and YouTube have not acted as “repositories of truth and scientific inquiry” throughout the covid pandemic but instead as “enforcers of a narrative.”
“What we’re witnessing is Orwellian,” DeSantis said. … Read the rest
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