Taliban Rips Facebook on Free Speech

CLAY: The Taliban —

BUCK: Oh, gosh.

CLAY: — who our government —

BUCK: The bad guys.

CLAY: — is hoping are gonna be inclusive and representative — that’s the request from our government, because we know the Taliban, if nothing else, they certainly are inclusive and representative. They were asked about free speech inside of Afghanistan. And amazingly, the Taliban decided to tee off on Facebook and say that even in America we don’t have freedom of speech because of Facebook. This is a translation but listen. Let’s play cut 21.

TALIBAN SPOKESMAN (via translator): This question should be asked to those people who are claiming to be promoters of freedom of speech who do not allow publication of all information and if you wish, I can ask Facebook company. This question should be asked to them.

BUCK: Basically, the Taliban spokesman —

CLAY: Unbelievable.

BUCK: — is calling out Zuckerberg and Co. for being speech-suppressing authoritarians online. See, unlike what the Democrats do when they say, “The January 6 and the Taliban…” We’re not gonna do that. But it is interesting. One, it tells you even the Taliban pays close attention to the American media —

CLAY: Yeah.

BUCK: — because how else could they know what the American mind-set is which, as we have seen here, is critical for their understanding of how this war is gonna play out and you how it’s gonna end? But even beyond that there are some moments where I think people sit around and they say I wonder what the rest of the word — put aside the Taliban for a second — thinks about the fact in America we always talk about freedom and free speech the most powerful companies in America are openly opposed to free speech now, actually. Not even hiding it anymore.

CLAY: Not only that, they are allowing the Taliban to use our social media to communicate with everybody! The Taliban spokesperson has a Twitter account. Former president Trump doesn’t. This is crazy.

BUCK: If you asked all the hosts at MSNBC and all their contributors, there would be a not insignificant number… I couldn’t tell you how many, but if you really asked them, “Who is a bigger threat on social media to the United States, the leader of the Taliban or Donald Trump?” they would actually say Donald Trump. They believe this because of January 6th. As insane as we know that may be, they would say that Trump is more of a threat. Just think of the rhetoric they’ve been using. They compared January 6 to 9/11, Clay!

CLAY: Yeah.

BUCK: So in their minds, Trump is a danger on social media that would even dwarf, I think, what the Taliban is at this point.

CLAY: This is why I think Big Tech — and we’ve talked a lot about this on the show, but this is me from a legal perspective. You have to have content-neutral policies. Big Tech does not have content-neutral policies —

BUCK: Not even a little bit.

CLAY: — by any stretch of the imagination. But this is why I think we need to continue to hammer this idea. It’s not just, by the way, the Taliban who has spokespeople that are allowed to be on Twitter. The ayatollah of Iran is able to insult people all over (laughing) the Jewish faith. I mean, they can say crazy things.

BUCK: Insults? They want a Holocaust and destroy all of Israel.

CLAY: That’s permissible to say but Donald Trump isn’t allowed to have opinion on political issues. And so what I think is important is they’re watching it, right? And they’re recognizing even if many people in America are not, the hypocrisies that exist in our culture right now and they’re actually calling them out. Think about how crazy it is. The Taliban got asked about free speech and said, “Well, you should be asking America’s Facebook company about that because they don’t actually have free speech!”

BUCK: Whether you have the Cuban regime’s mouthpieces or the Iranians —

CLAY: That’s right. Same thing.

BUCK: — they’ll always do this thing where they’ll find the imperfections in America. The Russians, Putin loves to do this too.

CLAY: Chinese does it all the time.

BUCK: China does it all the time. “Oh, why don’t you deal with the racism you have in America.”

CLAY: Yes.

BUCK: The Chinese know in particular that racism, just the moment you bring that up, the entire American media goes, “Oh, my gosh, they’re right! We have to deal with that!” But back onto the Taliban situation and the propaganda. This is a propaganda offensive that’s underway. And they’re going to do everything they can to keep us focused on aspects of what’s happening in Kabul that they want to present to the world while in the shadows and away from the cameras and the social media platforms putting this stuff out there.