Conservative Prager U Is Suing Google And YouTube … Could They Win?

As I’ve mentioned before, I used to be a huge liberal.

Yup – Kimber from Chicks on the Right bought in to the lib Koolaid – and bought it hard.

It was during grad school that the liberal identity-politics driven talking points stopped clicking for me, and I started looking for answers on my own.

Two of my MAJOR sources of information were Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire podcast, and Prager University.

….which is probably why Youtube is trying their best to kill them. They can’t stand to lose any of their precious, carefully brainwashed minions .

Prager U is fighting back.

As a subscriber, I received the following email:

We Are Suing YouTube for Censoring Our Videos
Dear Valued Subscriber,

 

As you know, PragerU’s videos are available on a number of platforms, one of which is YouTube. And as you may also know, YouTube has chosen repeatedly to restrict some of our videos for violating their “Community Guidelines.”

 

Those guidelines are meant to protect users against viewing sexual content, violent or graphic content, and hate speech.

 

As a PragerU viewer, you know as well as I do that our videos contain nothing even remotely close to any of these categories.

 

To date, YouTube has restricted or “demonetized” 50 PragerU videos, addressing topics ranging from the Ten Commandments to the history of the Korean War.

 

More than a year ago, we filed a complaint with YouTube, hoping that there was some kind of innocent mistake.

 

That’s when we were told by YouTube that after reviewing our videos they determined that they were indeed “not appropriate for a younger audience.” Of course, we have this in writing.

 

Think about the millions of actually inappropriate videos on YouTube and then ask yourself, “Why is our content restricted?”

 

Unfortunately, the answer is rather obvious, isn’t it? YouTube has restricted PragerU videos for only one reason: Ideological discrimination.

 

Of course, YouTube is owned by Google, which was founded to, ironically, “Organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”

 

YouTube has made some of our most important videos inaccessible to the very audience PragerU seeks to reach: young people.

 

Let me be clear: they don’t like what we teach and so they intend to stop us from teaching it. This kind of censorship is what we have seen on college campuses for years. But it is far more dangerous in this circumstance because the internet is where the world goes to get informed.

 

Can you imagine if the left owned the internet the way they own our universities?

 

Can you imagine what the world would look like if Google is allowed to continue to arbitrarily censor ideas they simply don’t agree with?

 

Well, this is why Prager University filed suit again YouTube and Google. We are not fighting this only for PragerU—we are taking this on for America and possibly the world.

 

Now, I have to tell you … this was not an easy decision.

 

Over the summer, former Governor of California Pete Wilson — who has been a longtime supporter of PragerU — approached us and posited the idea: “We have to sue them,” he said. “Google is hubris.”

 

Those words weighed heavy on our entire team as we considered our options.

Obviously, a fight with Google will be hugely difficult and costly, and we hate the idea of deploying energy and resources away from producing more content and reaching new audiences. We simply cannot do that.

 

So, before taking any such action, we decided we’d attempt a more diplomatic approach one last time. On the one-year anniversary of Google blocking our content, or the “BANniversary” as we had come to call it, we renewed our complaints to YouTube and re-circulated an online petition urging Google to change course. Many articles have been written and many people, including many very prominent and influential people, rallied in support of our cause.

 

To date, well over a quarter-of-a-million people have added their names to our petition.

 

What was the result of our efforts?

 

Nothing. YouTube ignored us. In fact, they have since restricted 11 more PragerU videos.

 

With our hands tied, we knew Governor Wilson was right—Google’s hubris had to be challenged.

 

So, we have built an all-star legal team, including Governor Wilson’s Law Firm, Eric George, Alan Dershowitz, Barak Lurie, Kelly Shackelford, Mat Staver, and more.

 

It’s an impressive group, because this is an important case; not only for PragerU, but for the fundamental American right to freedom of speech.

But this is not going to be easy and it isn’t going to be cheap.

 

Despite the fact that our amazing attorneys have agreed to reasonably cap their legal fees, there will be additional personnel, research, marketing and public relations costs to PragerU.

 

This case will be tried in the court of public opinion as much as in the courtroom, and we intend to win in both venues.

HELL YES.

They’re up against enormous odds.  Money is not a factor for Google.  (the Prager U email does delve into fundraising strategy later on)   But dang… this is big.

Perhaps Goliath could teach Google a little bit about where hubris leads … when a David comes slinging.

 

Wow. Cannot wait to see how this pans out.

Godspeed, Prager U!

CEO Marissa Streit spoke to Daily Wire about the lawsuit:

Asked if she believes her organization can win the legal battle with the world’s most influential company, Streit said yes. Among the reasons the organization feels so confident, she suggested, is the strength of conviction among their diverse legal team, which is composed of both conservative and liberal attorneys.

 

Despite representing a wide range of views, the team is unified in their belief that PragerU’s legal battle is not only worth fighting, but one that has a great chance of being successful. The legal team’s two primary contentions, Streit explained, are that YouTube and Google are public forums and that YouTube’s capricious restrictions on their video content demonstrates “a clear breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing.”

 

“We wouldn’t do this unless we thought we would win,” said Streit. “Our attorneys feel very strongly about the case.”

I mean…. they’ve got Dershowitz, y’all.

This is going to be GOOD.

And from once source of conservative thought to another… Thank you.