OPINION: ‘Censorship’ of student newspapers could happen under Trump, professor says
The world has already come to an end – and it is only going to get worse, so says Professor Paul Johnson at the University of Pittsburgh.
The political communications professor and author of an article about “Donald Trump’s Demagoguery” says that the country is already “undemocratic.”
“Johnson suggested the U.S. is moving towards an authoritarian government. Institutionally, he argues that there are already ways that the government is ‘undemocratic,’ through gerrymandering, selective elections and political appointments,” The Pitt News reported, based on its interview with him.
“The Supreme Court is not elected, the Senate is not a popularly elected body,” Johnson (pictured) told the student newspaper. “And then Trump is technically term limited, although we’ll see … there’s not really a check on him [and his power, either].”
In other words, we’ve somehow been able to survive 200 years under our current “undemocratic” system of government.
The political communications professor also told the student newspaper he expects there to be a rise in “censorship.”
“Things are pretty grim out there’: Media censorship under the Trump administration,” the headline states.
According to Johnson, there will be more censorship as other wealthy people, apparently following Elon Musk, will buy up social media platforms and then shut down discussions about “DEI” or the government push for censorship.
“Yeah, either some gazillionaire oligarch comes in and says ‘I want to buy your platform for too much money,’ or the government sort of decides that while there’s a little too much DEI happening in these spaces, and, using whatever kind of Jerry rigged rationale, shuts them down,” Johnson said.
Of course, censorship of conservative and common sense views, like that there are two genders, happened for years by Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. In some cases, the Biden administration pushed for censorship and funded research on how to censor voices. What Johnson, who once said “deplatforming works,” means is that left-wing voices will be shut down.
On the contrary, President Trump’s administration has opened up press access to both conservative and news outlets. For example, the Pentagon has given Huffington Post office space and the White House has welcomed Axios into the White House briefing room. By contrast, President Joe Biden’s press team yanked regular access to the White House from 440 journalists.
He predicts Trump may even go so far as to censor student newspapers. He made this allegation because Trump is trying to cut DEI spending by universities. “Johnson predicts universities that receive federal funding will see similar pressure against criticizing Trump’s diversity, equity and inclusion policies,” the student newspaper reported. “He expects the government to censor news outlets, from mainstream media to university student newspapers that don’t align with its political agenda.”
MORE: Lie to doctors about ‘self-manage abortion,’ student club says
Another Pitt professor agrees about censorship concerns – and offered X’s alleged dominance now by center-right voices as proof.
“People that know how to … manipulate algorithms can get their content to be prioritized by social media and shown to us in trends, on the ‘for you page’ … it’s an unequal playing field,” Professor Samuel Wooley said, referring to X.
Johnson has a way to get around the algorithms, which is to join left-wing Bluesky. “That’s the kind of place where you can go curate a feed and actually have some say in what it looks like,” Johnson said. “It’s a kind of choice that X doesn’t give you these days or Facebook doesn’t give you these days …Things are pretty grim out there,” he said.
I am not a political communications professor who gave a talk about “the year of the angry white male,” like Johnson did, but it seems to me that urging people to leave X and join a left-wing social media site only exacerbates conservative dominance on the platform while driving liberals further into an echo chamber.
It isn’t censorship if conservatives are better and more active at using X or are willing to spend the money to boost their content. But liberal professors who warn about Trump’s censorship don’t need to worry – they will always have sympathetic student newspapers and Bill Gates’ The Conversation to share their ominous warnings about the president.
MORE: Check out the news College Fix ‘Restore the Media’ series
IMAGE: University of Pittsburgh