My, how the worm has turned. It was in 2009 that talk-show giant Michael Savage, along with others, was banned from Britain for exercising speech. Now, 16 years later, certain European officials are being banned from the United States for banning people for exercising speech. It’s just the latest in an unprecedented development: a war over liberty between an increasingly authoritarian Europe and a U.S. that under Donald Trump’s administration is championing Americanism.
At issue, too, isn’t merely certain European countries closing their borders to a few Americans. Nor is the problem just that European Union (EU) nations suppress their own citizens’ tongues via tendentious “hate speech”-law application. It’s also that, reflecting China’s efforts to censor the U.S.’s movies, the EU’s online restrictions could suppress Americans’ online expression. This is because Big Tech companies often apply EU-compliant changes worldwide.
Not Your Father’s Europe
Interestingly, shortly before this story broke I published the article “Should We Be Defending Left-wing Europe From Right-wing Russia?” In it, I explained how Western Europe is becoming a sort of woke, morally weak USSR. Others are noticing this as well, too. As Tampa Free Press writes, reporting on the current story:
A simmering diplomatic feud between Washington and Brussels over online speech regulations boiled over on Wednesday after the Trump administration barred five prominent European figures from entering the United States. The State Department accused the group — which includes a former top EU official and several NGO leaders — of leading efforts to censor American viewpoints.
The move marks a significant escalation in the administration’s campaign against what it views as “extraterritorial censorship” by foreign entities.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the restrictions on Tuesday, citing a policy unveiled in May that targets foreign nationals believed to be coercing U.S. technology companies into suppressing protected speech. Rubio framed the decision as a necessary defense of American sovereignty against ideological pressure from abroad.
“For far too long, ideologues in Europe have led organized efforts to coerce American platforms to punish American viewpoints,” Rubio stated.
The banned individuals are:
- Thierry Breton — ex-EU commissioner for internal markets. He helped devise the EU’s “Digital Services Act” (DSA), which censors social media. He also publicly warned social-media platforms about content.
- Imran Ahmed — CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a misnamed propaganda outfit.
- Josephine Ballon and Anna-Lena von Hodenberg — co-founders and leaders of German organization HateAid, another misnamed propaganda outfit.
- Clare Melford — CEO of the misnamed Global Disinformation Index, a U.K.-based nonprofit that rates media sites, unfairly. It seeks to alienate advertisers from, among others, Truth-oriented outlets. For instance, all of its 10 “riskiest” U.S. sites are conservative/libertarian.
Beijing to Brussels to Beelzebub
As mentioned earlier, the EU is becoming reminiscent of fascist (it ceased being “communist” long ago) China. As to the latter, no government on Earth comes even close to surveilling its citizens the way Beijing does. Yet it goes beyond that. Projecting what it calls “soft power,” China has even succeeded in extending its censorship to America. Example: Beijing has coerced Hollywood producers into making China-compliant films with threats of denying them access to China’s huge market.
Similarly, Europe also censors speech (though its authoritarianism is currently softer and less complete than Beijing’s). Just consider three of multitudinous cases in point.
Fourteen-year-old British schoolgirl Codie Stott was arrested, fingerprinted, and questioned on suspicion of a “section five racial public order offence.” Her trespass?
She requested to be seated with a different in-class discussion group because she couldn’t understand the foreign language being spoken in her assigned group. In response to this, her teacher irrationally shouted, “It’s racist, you’re going to get done by the police!”
And she was.
Oh, this was in 2006 — a generation ago already.
There’s also famed French actress Brigitte Bardot, now 91. She has been convicted and fined at least six times for, among other exercises of speech, criticizing Islam.
Then there’s Finnish politician Päivi Räsänen and Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola. They’ve been charged with “hate speech” for espousing the biblical/authentically Christian view of homosexuality.
This tyranny has only worsened with time, too. For example, the U.K. now arrests 12,000 people annually under its “Communications Act.” (Read: modern-day heresy law of a dark, godless religion.)
The EU Octopus’ Tentacles
As mentioned earlier and also reflecting China, the EU isn’t satisfied just tyrannizing its own people. Rather, to echo Secretary Rubio, it’s now seeking to project its own soft power and still American tongues. As Grok AI explains (edited by me) in a summary of this Alliance Defending Freedom report:
To avoid the complexity and cost of maintaining separate systems (e.g., different algorithms or moderation rules by region), companies like Meta, Google, or X often apply DSA [Digital Services Act]-compliant changes worldwide. For instance, broad definitions of “hate speech” (e.g., expressing un-woke truths on religion or “gender”) might lead to preemptive removal of content globally, such as posts stating “there are only two ‘genders,’” to evade EU penalties.
So the reality is inescapable: EU corruptocrats are trying to tyrannize U.S. citizens.
Thus has the Trump administration increasingly been pushing back. For instance, Vice President J.D. Vance castigated the woke Europeans in February for trampling free speech. The greatest threat to the Continent wasn’t China or Russia, he warned, but “from within.”
Then, on December 19, Rubio addressed the Europeans’ rejection of the characteristically Western conception of virtue. This moral collapse threatens their continent’s “erasure,” he warned — and the NATO alliance itself.
But here’s what is even more alarming. While Rubio complained that Europe increasingly no longer shares our “values,” Europe is just like us — only more so. That is, only a percentage of America actually embraces Americanism.
The Enemy Within
Note here that the Joe Biden administration was, and the Democrats generally are, wholly on board with European censorship. Remember that the Bidenites gave us the short-lived “Disinformation Governance Board” and its thoroughly ridiculous head, singing censor Nina Jankowicz. (Video below.)
Note here, too: Tens of millions of Americans voted for the government delivering the above — and manifold other censorship efforts.
So having a presidential administration that shares European “values” is just one election away. Last time, the Bidenites used the Big Tech platforms as proxies to do an end run around the First Amendment. Upon gaining power next time, they’d be able to use the Europeans and DSA-despotism to do much of their dirty work.
In other words, even in America, censorship is not a ship that has sailed. It’s just in dry dock, waiting for a re-launch that could, and would, put Americanism in the dock.
