AN OPEN LETTER TO ANDREW TOBAS
Recently, I sent this email to the big Chief Exec of GAB, a debatable enclave of freedom of speech based somewhere down the murky highway trod by the internet’s moronic murderers of any kind of freedom at all.
If we had a satnav to the Wild West of cyberland, its saccharine robotic voice would keep telling us to turn Right! Turn Right! Turn Right!
Then, eventually you would end up meeting Andrew Torba and his tyranny right up his own arsehole.
Or, so some would say in a haughty Left-wing trendy way.
Personally, I don’t know, I’m still standing at the crossroads waiting for some kind of contact from him.
I have my suspicions but no real satisfying proof, So I joined GAB and Torba’s newsletter began to roll into my inbox … articulate and on the face of it at least, and perfectly reasonable.
Big Chief Torba is Right-on too with equality, describing himself as a businessperson, rather than a businessman.
Gab’s user base has been pegged at about four million people. (Torba has more than three million followers.) In a recent newsletter, Torba claimed that the site has 15 million unique monthly visitors. He described a typical Gab user as “a Conservative Christian with a family and interests in hunting, fishing, cars, camping, news, politics, rural living, homeschooling, privacy, free speech, cryptocurrency, guns, and cooking.”
Torba’s own concerns centre around threats to free speech, what he sees as the true nature of misinformation, imperiled personal liberties, and the righteousness of Jesus Christ. He is particularly incensed at Covid restrictions and vaccine mandates. “Vaccines are causing the variants.”
So, here is my email to him.
Hi,
I’m a UK journalist … Yep, a real one, BBC, Daily Mail, The Sun etc etc … I’m not fake news, a mouthpiece for any government, council or political party. And I check things.
I believe implicitly in honesty, freedom of expression and freedom of speech … And I believe in the right to shine a light in the beds of the rich and the famous, the influential and those who choose to be in control.
I’m not racist, I”m not homophobic and I do not respect Trump – or indeed Stumbling Joe. I however have my fingers crossed for Boris. But only because Starmer and his motley crew of middle-class Duffle coat-wearing poor little rich boys and girls are an insult to most people’s intelligence. I do not respect double standards.
So, to the reason for sending this mail:
… Please send me your manifesto on free speech and tell me how free you believe we should be… Say what thou want? Or say what thou wilt?
I would potentially like to write about you.
Look forward to hearing from you
Cheers
Leigh G Banks
This is part of the long rambling statement from Tobas that made me want to speak to him. The thing is you see, since the onslaught of the murky, incompetent robot-ridden world of the internet it is really difficult to divine who is telling the truth and who isn’t.
“Gab is not a lawless website. We work diligently to stop and prevent illegal activity from taking place on our platform. We have great relationships with many foreign countries who understand and respect our position on free speech and appreciate our zero tolerance for criminal activity.
“Our mission is to defend free speech online for all people, everywhere. Including in Germany. We will continue to do that, regardless of any threats from foreign governments. If we bow to Germany today, what’s to stop us from bowing to literal tyrants, such as those in Russia or China?
In matters pertaining to serious crime, German police forces already know how to reach us, as indeed they have done many times in the past. We will continue to respond to those requests and provide prompt assistance to those police forces on a voluntary basis. What we will not do is restrict access to, or remove, content which is legal in the United States on or from servers in the United States.”
But recently the left-of-centre UK newspaper,The Guardian, claimed a data breach at Gab offered a picture of the inner workings of its platform.
In a very Guardian way they describe Gab’s internal workings as ‘opaque’.
The hack had revealed Gab databases,the newspaper said, which appeared to show user accounts and a history of public posts and direct messages.
The Guardian said: “The user lists appear to mark 500 accounts, including neo-Nazis, QAnon influencers, cryptocurrency advocates and conspiracy theorists, as investors. They also appear to give an overview of verified users of the platform, including prominent right-wing commentators and activists. And they mark hundreds of active users on the site as “automated”, appearing to indicate administrators knew the accounts were bots but let them continue on the platform regardless.
Finally, the data appears to contain direct messages between the Gab CEO, Andrew Torba, and a user who has been identified as a high-profile QAnon influencer, showing the entrepreneur seeking direct feedback on site design from a member of a group that promotes a “spiderweb of right-wing internet conspiracy theories with antisemitic and anti-LGBTQ elements”, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.”
I like many others have been led to believe that Gab is a forum of last resort for extremists and conspiracy theorists who have been banned on other online platforms.
The leaked files contained what appears to be a database of over 4.1 million registered users on the site and tags identifying subscribers as “investors”, “verified” users and “pro” users.
So, in the interest of freedom of speech, freedom of information, freedom of facts and freedom of equality and life, come on Bigly Chief Tobas reply to us!
Just leaving a message saying your inbox is full doesn’t cut it – in fact could it mean you ignore the freedom of people to write to you and expect an answer?
