Conservatives love to pretend that they are being persecuted, and complaints of “censorship” on social media are just one of many examples. Anyone familiar with the long history of Facebook’s moderation (or lack thereof) of racist and sexist content knows that the people who are truly being hurt on the platform are the already disadvantaged.
As the fight over Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court rages on, I have yet to see any evidence of an anti-conservative bias. New York Times tech writer Kevin Roose noted on Monday morning that the social media monitoring platform CrowdTangle is showing that right-wing media is absolutely dominating the most popular posts on Facebook.
As of this writing, the top performing posts about Kavanaugh are posts from:
- Fox News
- Breitbart
- CNN
- CNN
- Fox News
- Breitbart
- The New York Times
While CNN and the NYT were able to break into the top posts about Kavanaugh, that is not the case when it comes to posts about Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. Victim-blaming, lies, and rape culture are the norm in each of the top posts.
The top performing posts about Dr. Christine Blasey Ford:
- Ben Shapiro
- Fox News
- Michelle Malkin Investigates
- Breitbart
- The Daily Caller
- Washington Free Beacon
- The Federalist Papers
The right-wing media is leading the attacks on Dr. Ford and is essentially doing the Republican’s dirty work. So while we get screaming, red-faced senators who completely ignore the sexual assault survivor questioned for hours right in front of them, the classic “She’s a lying slut” defenses are being spread by conservatives.
It’s another sign that the current leadership has no problem with making sexual assault a partisan issue. If they had nothing to cover up, they would fight fair. Unfortunately, they have no problem using rape myths and misconceptions not just to undermine Dr. Ford, but to throw all survivors under the bus in the process.