Silicon Valley censors ISIS message

1: Silicon Valley censorship of ISIS video.

KPFA Evening News Anchor: Sharon Sobotta: Earlier this week, after the Islamic State of Iraq and the Syria (ISIS) released video of their execution of photojournalist James Foley, Glenn Greenwald asked, on the Intercept site, “Should Twitter, Facebook and Google Executives be the Arbiters of What We See and Read?” Foley’s family had requested that the video and any James Foley, American photojournalist executed by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which now identifies itself as the Islamic State (IS). screenshots from it be taken off the Web, and Twitter had disabled ISIS’s account, because the US identifies it as a terrorist group. Twitter management declared that it would disable any accounts linking to the video or screenshots, but stopped short of disabling the New York Post and New York Daily News accounts, after they published screenshots and promoted their reports on Twitter. Banning the account of a newspaper, Greenwald wrote would have demonstrated “how dangerous their newly announced policy is.”

The Youtube scrambled to delete new posts of the video as they were uploaded, and SlashDot reported that “the unprecedented social media clampdown came as the {Greater London] Metropolitan Police warned that even viewing the video could constitute a criminal offence in the UK.”  The UK has some anti-terrorism laws that would probably be overturned in US courts. 

The first voice on the videotape was that of President Barack Obama.

President Barack Obama: I've directed our military to take targeted strikes against ISIL terrorist conveys should they move toward the city. We intend to stay vigilant and take action if these terrorist forces threaten our personnel or facilities anywhere in Iraq, including our consulate in Rabil and our embassy in Baghdad. We're also providing urgent assistance to Iraqi government and Kurdish forces, so they can more effectively wage the fight. . . 

KPFA: The next voice on the tape was that of American photojournalist James Foley. 

James Foley: My message to my beloved parents, save me some dignity and don't accept any meager compensation for my death, from the same people who effectively hit the last nail in my coffin with their recent aerial campaign in Iraq. I call on my brother John, who is a member of the U.S. Air Force. Think about the lives you destroy, including those of your own family. Think about who made the decision to bomb Iraq recently, to kill those people, whomever they may have been. Think John, who did they really kill? Did they think about me, you or our family when they made that decision? I died that day, John. When your colleagues dropped that bomb on those people, they signed my death certificate. 

KPFA: The last voice on the video was that of ISIS' Executioner:

ISIS Executioner: This is James Wright Foley, an American citizen of your country. As a government, you have been at the forefront of the aggression towards the Islamic State. You have plotted against us and gone far out of your way to find reasons to interfere in our affairs. Today your military air force is attacking us daily in Iraq. Those strikes have caused casualties amongst Muslims. You are no longer fighting an insurgency. We are an Islamic Army, an estate that has been accepted by a large number of Muslims worldwide, so effectively, any aggression towards the Islamic State is an aggression towards Muslims from all walks of life.

Sharon Sobotta: And that was the voice of ISIS' executioner of American photojournalist James Foley. 

2: First Amendment Issues

KPFA Anchor David Rosenberg: KPFA's Ann Garrison spoke to Berkeley media and entertainment lawyer Peter Franck about the First Amendment issues involved and compared them to those that Pacifica, KPFA and KPFK- Los Angeles went to court about after the Symbionese Liberation Army kidnapped heiress Patty Hearst and delivered tapes of their communiqués for air play on KPFA and KPFK in 1974 and 75. Franck was a member of the KPFA Local Station Board in 1974 and a member of the Pacifica National Board from 1975 to 1980. 

Patty Hearst posed for this photograph after joining the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), who kidnapped her in 1974. The SLA delivered their recorded communiqués to KPFA and KPFK, which broadcast them in 1974 and 1975.

KPFA/Ann Garrison: Peter Franck, could you explain what happened when KPFA broadcast the Symbionese Liberation Army tapes in 1974 and 75?

Peter Franck: The first thing that happened, after we broadcast the first tape, was that the police came to the station with a search warrant and wanted the physical tape as evidence. After that, when we had further tapes from the SLA - I think with Patty Hearst's voice on it - after we played it on the air, we stored it someplace else, not in the station and they went to court seeking a subpoena to force us to produce the tape and Judge Avakian accepted our arguments that it was a violation of the First Amendment to put a news organization in the evidence chain.

So far as I remember, and I'm sure I'm right about this, there was never any problem with the government about playing the content of the tape. They were interested in the tape, physically, as evidence to try and find the Symbionese Liberation Army. We felt, many of us on the board and a lot of people on the staff, as a radio station or a media organization should not be part of the chain of evidence, because that would deter people from sending communications to us.

KPFA: Who sued you? Was it the Hearsts . . . or rather, who sued KPFA? Was it the Hearsts, the government, the FBI, the local police? Who took you to court?

Peter Franck: Ahh. . .  it must have been the County DA, the District Attorney's Office, acting on behalf of the Berkeley Police. 

KPFA: OK, and what do you see as the fundamental difference between that incident and what's happened this week with the video of the execution of American photojournalist James Foley?

Peter Franck: Well, it's a huge difference. What's happening now, from everything I'm hearing, is that the videotape, including the message of the executioner, is being wiped from all social media, all media outlets, and while the execution was a horrible thing, the reasons for it . . . it was an attempt to communicate.  And, dastardly as the communication might be, the reasons for it should have been available to the American public and it looks like government and mega media which acts like government are acting to suppress it. That was not the case with the Patty Hearst/SLA tapes.  

KPFA: Do you think that these big social networks, with billions or hundreds of millions of users, these platforms for conveying information, should be regulated like public utilities and subject to First Amendment challenges in the courts?  

Peter Franck: I absolutely do, and I've written about this. I think any media that aggregates so much power over communications that it can throttle a message Is a public utility and has to be regulated as one. It cannot be just considered a private organization, like your local FM station would be. Yes.

KPFA: And that was Berkeley-based media and entertainment lawyer Peter Franck, a former member of the KPFA Local Station Board, and the Pacifica Radio Network National Board. In Berkeley, for Pacifica, KPFA Radio, I'm Ann Garrison.