And Then I Was Replatformed....

LinkedIn Decided To "Un-Cancel" Me

I am still uncertain whether this is good news or bad, but it appears I am no longer persona non grata at LinkedIn. For reasons that remain as mysterious as the reasons for my original banning back in December, 2021, my LinkedIn account has been fully restored.

As my long-time readers may recall, when then White House COVID Czar Jeff Zients spouted off his execrable “winter of death” rhetoric in December 2021, I had a few things to say, mostly revolving around the question “on what planet does Jeff Zients spend most of his time?”

On What Planet Does Jeff Zients Spend Most Of His Time?

For daring to publish the URL to this little jeremiad against pharmaceutical authoritarianism, LinkedIn opted to suspend my account permanently a few days later.

Whatever Planet Jeff Zients Is On, LinkedIn Is A Satellite In Orbit

I went through the usual round of appeals and pointing out that I had not in fact violated LinkedIn policy, as the “misinformation” was nothing more than the CDC’s own data sets, to no avail. LinkedIn assured me their decision was permanent and irrevocable.

At the time it was a bit of a body blow to my efforts to build up my readership for All Facts Matter. Substack Notes did not exist at the time, and I had already long been shadowbanned on Twitter (which, incidentally, I still am on my latest account, having had multiple others abruptly terminated without stated cause). LinkedIn had been the platform where I had my greatest levels of engagement.

As a small content provider hoping to grow into a somewhat larger content provider, deplatforming hurts. As someone who strives to back up everything he says with facts, data, and evidence, deplatforming for spreading misinformation really hurts. Knowing that the accusation is false doesn’t really minimize the indignity of being hit with a false accusation.

Fast forward to the end of August. Out of the blue I get an email from LinkedIn about the company page I had set up for All Facts Matter.

Having been banned for going on two years, this was a rather odd email to receive. On a lark, I tried to log into my LinkedIn account and was redirected to a page that said my account was “temporarily suspended”. Maybe it’s the passage of time but it looked different from the “restricted” notices I had received in 2021.

What I was seeing now just looked different from this.

That sparked my curiosity. On a lark, I did the identity verification bit, which a few days later resulted in my account being reactivated.

Specifically, on September 6 I received this email:

It is a small matter for me to say “yes I will abide by the policy”, because my stance has always been that I had never broken the policy. My specific reply was this:

I expressly agree to abide by LinkedIn's Terms and Conditions.

I do not make claims of fact which are unsubstantiated or undocumented.

And, just like that, I was replatformed. Sort of.

My account has been restored in full. All my old LinkedIn contacts appear to still be there, as are most of my followers from before. All of the postings and content I had made was still there. In all technical ways, my account has been restored.

Yet there is one thing that has not been restored—and probably can’t be restored. The “energy” and the engagements I had previously have not come streaming back. It appears that at least some of the people with whom I messaged and exchanged comments more or less regularly are no longer there, or no longer active. The enthusiasm is not there. That ephemeral sense of community that makes a social media platform engaging is not there.

Whether that comes back in time or not we shall see. It has been now over a week and while there is a bit of engagement when I share my articles to LinkedIn, it is not the same as it was.

Nor is it lost on me that what LinkedIn has given back, it could just as easily decide to take away again. I have no reason to believe their Ministry of Truth has been shut down; the tenor of their email restoring my account strongly suggests their censorship efforts are as strong as ever.

Why am I returning to LinkedIn, knowing they may decide to ban me yet again? I have two reasons.

The first is the obvious self-serving one: I am still striving to grow my readership here. To do that I need to raise the public profile of All Facts Matter wherever I can. The desire is that returning to LinkedIn will give me a few more subscribers and give my content that much more exposure. Even with LinkedIn’s censorship efforts that’s not a bad thing.

The second is a bit more sublime. If I truly believe that Free Speech is a moral imperative, if I genuinely believe that such is necessary for a Free Society, then I should not overlook an opportunity to say what I have to say. I still post on Twitter for this reason. Neither Twitter nor LinkedIn are what I would call friendly confines for my brand of data-driven analysis, yet it is precisely because the confines are not friendly that I am able to, in a small fashion, speak truth to power.

Whether it’s challenging the narrative on COVID, or calling out the Fed for its serial lunacies, it is important to speak the truth I have wherever I can reasonably do so. If anything, it’s more important that I post where the content is likely to be given less than a friendly reception, because it is among those who do not agree with me where I can have the greatest impact. It is among those who do not agree with me that there exists the opportunity to shift hearts and minds. I do not have any great hope of gaining a massive following on Twitter, or frankly on LinkedIn, yet it is important that I post on Twitter and on LinkedIn, because that is how one takes the fight to one’s adversaries.

Why am I posting about this now? Because I have made more than a few comments about being deplatformed. I have positioned myself alongside people like

Alex Berenson

and

Steve Kirsch

as one who has been, in essence, silenced (canceled, deplatfomed, et cetera). Having claimed that mantle, simple respect for you, my readers, obliges me to say when I am putting that mantle down. It would be a gross insult to those who are still silenced, who are banned for real and not merely shadowbanned, to pretend that I still number among them. They deserve more recognition and more acknowledgment than that.

This much is absolutely certain: I believe LinkedIn was wrong to suspend my account at the time. I believed it then and I absolutely believe it now. I believe I have never violated their terms and conditions, and so it was a major injustice when they did suspend me. I have not said, nor will I say, that was ever guilty of posting any unsubstantiated claim of fact. I have not apologized for my commentary on LinkedIn, nor will I.

Will that be sufficient? I do not know.

Is this happening because LinkedIn realizes they need to walk back their censorship policies? I do not know.

Will I get banned yet again? I do not know—although I rather suspect this reinstatement will be rather short-lived. If the censorship policies have not changed it will be only a matter of time before I run afoul of them for recklessly endangering the Trigglypuffs with doses of factual evidence.

In the meantime, it’s one more platform I can use, one more chance to present my view of things to the wider world. For as long as it lasts, I will enjoy it at least that much. Beyond that is just not up to me.