Your friendly neighborhood columnist has once again run afoul of Facebook’s elusive community standards.
This time I was censored for writing something about rancher Cliven Bundy.
I realized I had landed in the Facebook gulag when I tried to post our daily Bible verse. However, I was unable to post anything because Facebook had taken great offense to something I had written.
“We removed something your page posted,” Facebook told me in a rather unpleasant message. “We removed the post below because it doesn’t follow the Facebook Community Standards.”
Now, before you call up the preacher and put me on the church prayer list, let me assure you the posting was neither unseemly nor ungentlemanly.
Nevertheless, it caused great consternation and angst among Facebook’s left-wing censors.
The following is the egregious text:
“Rancher Bundy should’ve told the feds that those were Mexican cows—who came across the border illegally to seek better grazing opportunities. It was an act of love.”
Thousands of you posted comments, and many more shared that message. It’s now gone—blotted out by anonymous redactors.
I reached out to Facebook to find out which part of the message violated their standards. Never heard back. I suspect I should’ve used the term illegal alien cows.
It’s not the first time my postings have been bleeped by the Facebook Purge Police. Heck, I’m a serial offender. I’ve been banished, blocked and censored for writing about Chick-fil-A, God, the Bible, Paula Deen, Cracker Barrel rocking chairs, sweet tea, Jesus, the Gaither Vocal Band, the Gideons, the National Rifle Association and June bugs.
Facebook never told me what was more offensive—the plump, juicy chicken breasts or the June bugs.
For the record, Facebook has the right to censor—it’s their company. And while they may censor conservative and Christian postings, Facebook is quite welcoming and affirming to left-wing diatribes against Republicans, religion and the tea party. I just wish the folks at Facebook were a bit more tolerant—and diverse.
So, there you have it, kind readers. Your friendly neighborhood columnist has become that neighbor—the one who mows his grass at midnight, the one who has a Buick up on blocks in the driveway, the rabble-rouser.
Todd Starnes is host of Fox News & Commentary, heard on hundreds of radio stations. Sign up for his American Dispatch newsletter, be sure to join his Facebook page, and follow him on Twitter. His latest book is God Less America.
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