Cancel Culture Strikes Anti Grooming Activists
Gays Against Groomers are cancelled by online merchandise supplier Printful for homo and transphobia. Printful cannot cite evidence ins support of their claim.
We have previously discussed the misadventures of online entrepreneurs dealing with PayPal and being kicked off for one $8 transaction in the first 6 days of being on the platform. This wave of activism has extended from banks to other industries. You see, the online world has a very ugly secret: stay in your lanes, follow the woke rules of conduct, and you will perhaps be rewarded with the ease of use of online services. If you have an idea, you can execute it quickly on the web, Big Tech is an equalizer for all until they learn that you are against grooming, or perhaps are a pure blood and didn’t take the vaccine.
BREAKING: We have been SUSPENDED by Printful, the company we used to print and sell our merch.
— Gays Against Groomers (@againstgrmrs) December 12, 2022
What is it exactly about a group of LGBT people protecting children from predators that doesn't represent your company values, @Printful? We're dying to know.#GaysAgainstGroomers pic.twitter.com/TNqNHxMne1
This last Sunday Orange and I came across this tweet from Gays Against Groomers. Having recently opened our own online merchandising store we are naturally sensitive to terms of service and the pitfalls of selecting the wrong vendor. Gays Against Groomers is an activist group composed of gay and trans activists who are against the targeting of children for gender re-assignment and for solicitation to enter the gay lifestyle. They are fighting an uphill battle to expose the drag queen shows and other sexually predatory events that groom children for perverse ends.
Printful is a print on demand service which allows online merchandise stores to fulfill orders for custom designed mugs, t-shirts without needing to purchase supplies upfront and warehouse. For organizations on a tight budget it is a brilliant solution for creating memorabilia cheaply. Essentially you supply a credit card, connect the Printful service to you online store, upload your designs and BOOM you’re selling products online. A low level of entry, and perfect for grassroot organizations.
The tragedy is that with consolidation of BigTech, there is a single point of failure, and those who wish to impose their own brand of politics or ideology at these online services companies are flexing their muscle with the small organizations and mom and pop stores.
Apparently Printful felt that it was insulated from restrictions of libel as they made the claim that Groomers Against Gays spread hateful misinformation about the targeting of children, justifying their discontinuing service. You would expect that with such a statement, specifics would be offered to back up this grand statement. For example “Gays Against Groomers has falsely targeted Group X, claiming falsely that children were at risk from their activity.” No such statement was offered. So what misinformation was at issue? If no supporting evidence is specifically provided are we to conclude that making a statement about child predators in the trans and gay community is categorically false? That makes little sense. That would be akin to saying “No men ever rape, no women would ever think of stealing.”
Gays Against Groomers was not intimidated and asked for such evidence:
“If you could provide a clear example of our organization compromised solely of gay and trans people being homophobic and transphobic and posting misinformation, that would be greatly appreciated,” Gays Against Groomers responded rebutting Printful’s statement. “We have a very powerful attorney representing us, and this is defamation.”
Company no one heard of until this woke, bigoted, pro-Groomer-brain move says what https://t.co/zr60UWWCrr
— Ron Coleman (@RonColeman) December 12, 2022
As we have seen, BigTech culture is on a series of aggressive campaigns to impose the ideology on it’s customers and make an imprint on out culture. This goes beyond flagging tweets and posts as potentially harmful, as it is just an extra step to click through those warnings and send your content as you intended. We are used to shadow-banning – the limiting of views of “hateful” content – to a large degree on Twitter. If you listen to our podcasts we complain about this numerous times, and we are very concerned by statements “Freedom of Speech is not Freedom of Reach”. PayPal is notorious for holding funds for 6 months after canceling their customer’s accounts. But we now see a rampant disregard for any means of remediation. Charges of misinformation supersede evidence and you are not allowed to respond in attempts to rectify misunderstandings.
This is chilling. We have talked with many online store owners who have lived through being reported for “wrong-think” and being hateful for expressing their opinions, and on our quest for an online presence we have been presented with these scenarios as well. They are very real, and it’s easy to run afoul of the service providers. Printful has adopted the PayPal strategy, and has demonstrated that do not understand that there are consequences for making sweeping statements like “you spread hateful misinformation”. Small business, pitted already against many factors that make staying open a brutal process, are being cowered to comply. If you lose a critical supplier in your process your doors will be closed. That tactic is being used to leverage fear and enable the silencing of political speech. It is also a tool for picking winners and losers capriciously.
I was a software developer during the birth of the Web, lived through and prospered during Web 2.0 and was excited that the Internet was truly an equalizer, a place where you were judged on your ability to execute your ideas regardless of your race, ideology, background and views. Corporate culture, which was causing stagnation of creativity and killing the economy, was shrugged off and you had a chance to make a difference and potentially create new markets with new products. Now we see that a new culture has settled in, and it’s pervasive as it is fostered in educational institutions, in financial entities and in public service. It is monoculture of “We instruct how to speak, think. If you resist, we will take your bank account and means of making a living”. No need to face a firing squad or a threat of incarceration, businesses will fall in line.
Is this Social Credit? Yes. Is it insidious and evil? Yes. Is it allowing our children to be targeted inappropriately? Yes. Are we awake to it? That remains to be seen.