Alex Jones’ website Infowars is in danger of being permanently banned from YouTube after it received its second and final warning from the streaming service.
The second warning comes in light of a video published by Jones accusing Parkland, Florida, student David Hogg of being a crisis actor, a claim many conspiracy theorists have put forward after the deadly school shooting that killed 17.
According to Newsweek , Infowars will not be able to publish content for two consecutive weeks. If it incurs another strike in less than three months, they will be banned for good.
“There’s a fine line between passionate debate and personal attacks,” YouTube’s strike notification stated. “As our community guidelines outline, YouTube is not a platform for things like predatory behavior, stalking, threats, harassment, bullying or intimidation.”
Hogg has since taken to Twitter to respond to Jones’ claims.
I might not be great with spelling or punctuation but unlike Jones do my research and don’t sell snake oil to the masses. #Jonesbrandsnakeoil
— David Hogg ?? (@davidhogg111) February 27, 2018
“The teen also said Jones was someone who ‘didn’t learn from their mistakes,’ referencing Jones’ insistence that the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was staged,” Newsweek wrote.
Jones, in turn, posted messages and asked Hogg to stop the “disparaging names” and to “stop the defamation” via Twitter. He also said that Hogg is receiving aid from CNN in trying to shut down his operations. Jones confirmed that he will take legal action if necessary.
“‘ Infowars will not hesitate to pursue all legal avenues to protect our interests,’ InfoWars wrote in a statement on its website. ‘From a wider perspective, this is insidious. A news network is devoting resources to lobby for another news network to be censored.’”
We contacted @YouTube about this video yesterday. They have given Alex Jones “one strike”.
Seems like the videos attacking the families of the victims of Sandy Hook and Vegas would have comprised strikes 2 – 102.
Really, @TeamYouTube ? https://t.co/wUYzFhlcq2
— Sleeping Giants (@slpng_giants) February 24, 2018
This warning issued by YouTube is not an isolated incident. As reported by The Hill , Infowars ‘ second strike comes as social media giants such as YouTube and Twitter come to terms with handling extremist or conspiracy-related content.
The Huffington Post reported that in spite of the warning from YouTube, Jones went ahead and posted a video on his own YouTube channel . There he discussed the temporary content freeze. Furthermore, he claimed that Hogg is the one doing the bullying.
Alex Jones is on the verge of getting banned from YouTube, and now he wants a teenage Parkland shooting survivor to debate him, reports @maxwelltani : https://t.co/NltT6460Cw
— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) February 28, 2018
Infowars is also present on Facebook and Twitter, and has created videos on those respective social media platforms. Nevertheless, if they would get banned for good from YouTube, they would lose out on 2 million subscribers.
