Elizabeth Heng, who is running against Jim Costa in California’s 16th district, has recently posted a video explaining her story. But Facebook pronounced the video too ‘shocking’ and banned it.
The problem is the video is about her story, and part of her story is that her parents managed to survive Pol Pot’s merciless rein in Cambodia. She included images of the horrors that they survived but Facebook doesn’t like it.
Here’s the video:
I honestly didn’t think the images were all that bad in the sense of being graphically offensive to the eyes. We’ve all seen images like this before, whether it’s from Cambodia or Armenia. And it’s part of her story.
Here’s what Facebook said about it:
.@facebook rejected my video because it was “too shocking” for their platform, referring to the scenes of horrific events my parents survived in Cambodia. Facebook, do you think it’s right to censor history? #censorship
Full ad here: https://t.co/SY0w1o327m pic.twitter.com/etvlZYK22N— Elizabeth Heng (@ElizabethHeng) August 4, 2018
I agree with her. And as someone else pointed out, why does this always seem to just happen to Republicans?
She tweeted yesterday:
Still no response from @facebook….
— Elizabeth Heng (@ElizabethHeng) August 5, 2018
And on Saturday:
I am encouraged by the momentum. Everyone deserves a voice both in government and online. #Censorship is not acceptable, and I will fight to defend our right to #freespeech.
— Elizabeth Heng (@ElizabethHeng) August 5, 2018
She’s also getting some help from Kevin McCarthy:
.@ElizabethHeng is a Republican woman. Her family survived the Communist genocide in Cambodia and came to America. Now Facebook is blocking her story. #StopTheBias https://t.co/gydYw3kwzD
— Kevin McCarthy (@GOPLeader) August 6, 2018
But will it be enough? I wouldn’t hold my breath.
And just so you know, she has a real chance of winning in November:
Elizabeth Heng nearly beat incumbent Democratic congressman Jim Costa in California’s open primaries in early June. The 53–47 outcome would have made her the darling of the national political media, had she been a Democrat. She will face Costa again in the general election in November.
Considering it’s California, that’s pretty good. Let’s hope this can help her gain the momentum she needs to put this over the top.