Introduction
I have probably found out why I was banned from medium. It was slightly different to what I had thought.
I had decided to try the Medium blogging platform as I was suspended as it turned out temporarily from wordpress. I signed up to Medium and was testing their gallery facility. I needed a gallery facility that could take many photos and arrange them well, as I had intended to post about 30 screenshots from a video about symbolism.
Suspension
This is the message, I received...
I appealed as I thought it was an algorithm error, and I was expecting routine reinstatement of account but I was told the account was in violation of the rules, for hateful content.
This surprised me. I therefore asked for the specific photo that was hateful. I received a reply from someone ironically, whose name / pseudonym was Liberty from User Services.
Liberty informed me that the account would remain suspended and the decision was final, but he /him did at least give me the image that was deemed hateful.
In my haste of blog testing/ being banned, I had overlooked that I had already posted the first photo in the folder as a test, before moving onto loading a full gallery. In fact the meme I think was wrongly filed in that folder and should have been in my Spot the Symbolism folder, social comment section.
The first photo/screenshot in the file was this meme, and I had test posted one photo / screenshot, a title and a line of text.
The Offending Meme
Until I accessed what I had written, I had thought that it must have been something in my post on Walter Veith symbolism that I had been banned for. In the end it looks like it was not, it was for the meme that was wrongly filed in my Walter Veith folder. (I have not rewatched the Veith video, but very much doubt if it was in there, I think it was from twitter, misfiled).
I had not examined the meme, I had seen the writing, the freemason logo and a court scene. I had no inkling why it was thought hateful. My first idea was when I did a reverse image search on TinEye to try and find out where the meme was from.
Unfortunately the results given were limited and I did not source the meme from there, but maybe twitter is not covered in the search.
One of the links [2] gave this...
So the name which included the letters zion gave me a clue as to why I may have been banned though it is supposition.
I presume that the meme has been judged as antisemitic. I re-examined the meme and perhaps the freemasons face is thought to look like a stereotype.
I certainly did not realise at the time I posted that the meme was about that, if it is. I thought it was about freemasons and justice.
Discussion
What I thought was just a freemasonic meme, may have had undertones of a meme also against others.
Even if it did, should that have led to permanent ban, especially with no prior warning? Even if the meme was determined to use a "trope" is that a reason to ban me permanently from medium? Should it not be allowed? Some people like Rachel Riley are allowed to use that trope, yet me not knowing that a trope was even being used, even if it was, am banned from Medium for using it unwittingly. Even the whole idea of these tropes appears designed to prevent justificable criticism of certain sectors. Even now, writing this I am having to tiptoe.
‘To Learn Who Rules Over You, Simply Find Out Who You Are Not Allowed To Criticise’
A source states that that quote originated with white nationalist writer Kevin Alfred Strom. What a nightmare it is trying to write a blog these days!
I think I dodged a bullet with the Medium though, all things considered. Liberty and free speech does not seem to be their priority. Even if I was not banned on my very first post, it inevitably would have come anyway, after I had put more effort into the blog.
Wordpress Suspensions
Were my suspensions on 2 different wordpress blogs related - foxblog2 and foxblog4? One of those blogs did contain the meme as I had loaded it into the Veith post gallery (now it is deleted from there), one of the blogs did not, so perhaps the reason given "automatic anti spam controls" was correct. I am slightly suspicious that the suspensions all came at the time the ban on hate speech in Scotland was coming in, and algorithms may have been being tightened.
The Walter Veith video is worth a watch though on various symbolism including freemasonic symbolism, even though tangential to my ban. The Secret behind the Secret Societies who Control the World - Walter Veith [3].
Links
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20240401173349/https://policy.medium.com/medium-rules-30e5502c4eb4
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Medium is terrible. At least it was during the lockdown period of time.