Video-sharing platform TikTok has banned LiveAction from advertising pro-life messages
Mesa, AZ – The administrators of the largest social media companies in the world are continuing to censor viewpoints of individuals and organizations with which they disagree, this time targeting pro-life messengers. LiveAction is the largest pro-life organization on the internet, reaching over 5 million people through their website and their social media platforms, but now the world’s top video-sharing service has banned the group from sharing their messages. TikTok, a Chinese-owned company that has come under intense scrutiny for their allegedly collecting personal data from users via their mobile phone app, continues to provide unfettered access to pro-abortion groups such as Planned Parenthood, but have decided to limit the reach of LiveAction, which uses the platform to reach out to pregnant women considering abortion.
Citizens for Free Speech (CFFS) condemns the double standard as another egregious assault on the First Amendment based solely upon the favorability of an organization’s speech by the moderators of the Big Tech platforms.
“CFFS is not in the business of taking sides in the ongoing battle over abortion,” declared Executive Director Patrick Wood, “but we are absolutely going to defend the rights of all sides to be heard in the debate. Freedom of speech must be defended on this issue at all costs, because when one side is silenced for having an opinion that is not shared by the online platform moderators, we no longer have a free and constitutional republic.”
LiveAction was started by a 15-year-old girl named Lila Rose in 2003. She wanted to share with people what abortion does to a pre-born child. By 2008, she had legally formed a non-partisan, non-profit organization dedicated to “shifting public opinion on the killing of pre-born children and defend the rights of these most vulnerable among us,” according to the LiveAction website. The group now reaches over 100 million people each month, and their videos have been viewed over 1.7 billion times.
“TikTok has banned Live Action from advertising on its platform,” the group states in an online petition requesting signatures from pro-life people and free speech advocates, even though the group’s content remains on the site for the time being. “TikTok is one of the most popular platforms for Gen Z with the capability of reaching millions of young people every day. On TikTok, Planned Parenthood is allowed to freely run pro-abortion ads to these impressionable young men and women, while Live Action’s ads that save the lives of pre-born children have been completely censored.”
“Even worse,” adds CFFS Director Wood, “TikTok has personally banned the account of the group’s founder, Lila Rose. CFFS will not stand by and allow blatant suppression of speech on as important an issue as this to continue. We urge and encourage all CFFS members to join the call for free speech on TikTok by signing the LiveAction petition, and sharing information with fellow CFFS members and volunteers through our proprietary Local Activist website. Regardless of your stance on the issue at hand, we must all stand for the rights of all persons to be heard.”
For more information about CFFS, and how to get involved with the fight against the ongoing attack on the First Amendment, please visit www.CitizensForFreeSpeech.org.
Contact:
Bob Frantz
National Director of Communications
[email protected]