Exposing Tech Censorship, or “How To Lose Friends and Influence Enemies”
Today I did something crazy that I never would have believed possible just a year ago: I helped expose indisputable political censorship at arguably the biggest social media conglomerate in the world — Facebook.
In fact, as I’m writing this article a week before the story is set to go live, I have no idea what will happen the day it does. What is it like to go from nobody to someone not only public but controversial, in less than an hour? As you’re reading this now, I’m probably finding out.
If you’ve seen the Project Veritas story you’ll know a little already, but this article will try to explain how and why I got to where I am today, what this means for my future, and what you can do if you happen to be in my shoes from a year ago.
My story probably differs from most who have done similar work exposing bias in the past. Some already worked in the tech industry and became fed up with seeing their ideology universally berated and abused at their company, others were not conservative but were sympathetic and stood up for what was right regardless of their personal politics. But me? Before I became an insider, I was a total outsider.
My résumé until now has been modest retail and contract work, and the last job I had before the one that got me this story essentially paid minimum wage (in Florida, that’s not very much). Suffice to say, I was just getting by.
When I applied to work at Cognizant as a “Content Moderator” after by pure chance seeing the position recommended online, I didn’t really expect to get it. I needed a better job, but figured I was doomed to retail hell my whole life. I was surprised to see the enthusiastic response I did, and couldn’t believe they offered almost twice the minimum wage (the most I’ve ever made).
During the interview I found out the platform I’d be working for would be Facebook/Instagram, which I had already suspected given the nature of the job description. I was shown examples of just what “content” I would be “moderating”, which included racist memes, people bullying each other, and gore like you’d have seen on /b/ or LiveLeak years ago. But for the most part, my day-to-day content feed was largely incoherent rants and WorldStar fight videos.
I should note that the focus of most reporting on this job by other outlets seems to have focused entirely on this aspect of the job. The PTSD that workers have claimed to develop as a result of viewing such vile imagery has been brought to light multiple times in multiple high-profile articles, even resulting in a class-action lawsuit which Facebook recently settled for $52M — in fact, this negative press is precisely what led to all my coworkers and I being laid off earlier this year.
Training for the job lasted about a month and covered their entire internal policy in detail. I came into this job as a conservative, and immediately I took notice of highly objectionable biases in Facebook’s guidelines, from ideologically-based policies and definitions to allowing things to be posted that could get people killed. But what was I going to do about it? Leak documents on 4chan? Go to the media? No one cares. I was just some nobody in a sea of nobodies. Indeed, Facebook famously seems to want to ignore their content moderators’ existence, which is most likely the reason this work is subcontracted in the first place — “it’s not their problem”. Their response to criticism of this has even been so astonishingly tone-deaf as to put signs around their campus which read “Contractors Are People Too”, as reported by Bloomberg in May 2019.
Later that year, I happened to observe Project Veritas’ Pinterest whistleblower Eric Cochran give a speech on tech censorship. Although I had been very familiar with Project Veritas and their work for years, I hadn’t actually considered turning to them with my story until that chance encounter. We exchanged business cards and within the next week or so, had a team working to assist me with the equipment I would need to go undercover. For the next few months of shooting, and all the time leading up to the release of this story, I’ve witnessed and experienced an incredible amount of support from the Project Veritas team, something I don’t know what I’d have done without. It has been a very confidence-inspiring endeavor and I can assure anyone concerned about coming forward as I did would be well looked after.
Perhaps the hardest part of going public with a story like this is how it affects your personal life. Combining the malicious political persecution of Project Veritas’ reputation with ever-increasing sociopolitical tensions, it could be a recipe for disaster for your personal relationships. I can only hope my friends will be so reasonable as not to be blinded by ideology, and indeed this will be a true test of the strength of my personal connections. I think it’s important to have the bravery to test them.
For me, however, the unique hardship of my situation is serious and often feels overwhelming. In my case, filming for the story ended not because the time was right, but because I and all my coworkers were laid off four months ago. As unfortunate as losing my job was already, it was almost immediately after that we saw the world stop as a result of the global outbreak of COVID-19. The crisis has hindered my search for re-employment, and the notoriety this story will earn me will only make it harder. Currently, I am still unemployed.
As of this writing, I stand in front of a great and vast void, unsure of my future. Where I will work, where I will live, all are up in the air, in the midst of the chaos of a global pandemic. My ability to start and provide for a family with my soon-to-be wife has been made very uncertain. As a man who takes pride in working to earn his living, having to deal with this upheaval has been more than a little difficult. As such, with humility, a GoFundMe campaign (linked here) has been set up to help secure my ability to provide a strong foundation for the future of my better half and I. We have wanted dearly to start a family, and are praying these plans will not be hindered.
However, no matter what happens, I stand firm in my belief that the importance of bringing the truth to light is paramount, and I hope this leads to substantive change.
And remember: you can do it too.
If you liked the story, please consider supporting me here. I won’t stop fighting for your right to speak freely.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/exposefacebook
If you are on the inside and want to expose corruption, consider dropping Project Veritas a (secure) line: veritastips@protonmail.com
