What AU learned from advertising.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State is a nonpartisan, not-for-profit educational and advocacy organization that brings together people of all religions and none to protect the right of everyone to believe as they want.

I believe that AU is the most important organization that protects our first amendment. I contribute to AU and so did my father – 50 years of support for this 80-year-old organization. Their article about censorship, points out the ways that MAGA is limiting freedom of speech in so many subtle and not so subtle ways. Below are some excerpts from AU’s recent article. – Ted

“Censorship doesn’t always start with government bans or book burnings. Sometimes it’s quieter and harder to identify…

Last fall, while planning our marketing strategy, we felt uneasy about what the looming post-election media and political landscape would look like…

We wrote, designed and placed ads to every outlet’s standards. Website, radio, podcast and TV outlets each have different thresholds of acceptable phrasing, especially for 501(c)(3) nonprofits…

Less than 24 hours before our October 2024 ad campaign launched, our podcast ad sales rep told us that a national nightly news program had pulled our ad that was to start the next day and run for three weeks…..

A week later, many of our online ads were pulled across the internet. Previously, those same ads had never been in violation….

Since then, our ads have been paused or removed multiple times. Often, we are informed we are in violation of constantly shifting — and unstated — new policies on “political” or “religious” content…

What’s happening to us is part of a bigger pattern: forced self-censorship in the face of political intimidation. Advertising platforms are “obeying in advance”….

Please visit AU to read the full article.