OPINION | This article contains the author's opinion.
Comedian Russell Brand said he’s removing his show from YouTube over censorship problems and switching to Rumble.
The 47-year-old actor said that YouTube censored him over COVID information.
“We have been officially censored by YouTube,” Brand said. “They took down one of our videos for misinformation, but why are big media organizations not censored for misinformation in the same way? Is it because YouTube are part of the mainstream media now?”
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“Why are independent channels being attacked, censored and brought down,” he said. “While mainstream media channels are being pushed, highlighted and celebrated?”
“We made an apology video, we’ve taken that down as well. YouTube took down our original video, we’ve taken down the apology video because in case we reiterate the claim while apologizing for it,” he said.
“We made an error, in my opinion a relatively small error, and we’re being penalized!” he added. “For me that looks like censorship, and the reason I think it looks like censorship is because there’s mainstream media misinformation up all the time.”
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Brand then played a clip from March 2021 of MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow saying, “now we know that the vaccines work well enough that the virus stops with every vaccinated person.”
The video, titled “‘We Can Get There!’: Stunning Pace Of U.S. Vaccinations Puts Pandemic’s End In Sight,” is still on the site at the time of this publication and doesn’t include a COVID fact check, Fox News noted.
He reiterated that everyone knows now that the “truth is the vaccine does not prevent you from spreading it,” yet that video is still on the site.
A message on the CDC website reads that the vaccine is a tool to help protect people from “severe illness, hospitalization, and death.”
“So we’re asking: Is there one standard for independent news broadcasters like us on our channel and a different standard for what we would call the ‘mainstream media?’” Brand asked.