by Rab Bruce’s Spider

The attack by the BBC on the Youtube channels of prominent Indy supporters has been well documented elsewhere, so there’s no need to go into the detail of how the UK state propaganda outlet has abused the Fair Use aspects of copyright in an attempt to silence criticism of its bias.

This abuse of power is bad enough, but another aspect of this sorry saga is equally concerning. That is the alacrity with which Youtube has shut down the channels on the say-so of the BBC without giving any chance to point out that these sites have not breached copyright. Indeed, you would think Youtube would know the rules on this since they publish them on their website.

So why did they cave in to the BBC? Has pressure been applied by other UK state offices? We will probably never know, but it’s a worrying thought.

What it does show, of course, is that the UK is petrified of the Indy movement and will do anything to prevent criticism of its own media output. No doubt pro-Indy groups and individuals will come up with some other way of making videos available for sharing, but using Youtube would appear to be a route best avoided.

This is little short of a declaration of war on the part of the UK state broadcaster. It is a war against freedom of speech and the rights of ordinary citizens to voice their opinion. Fair, balanced and impartial it ain’t.