A new study has found that Google and other major social media sites such as Facebook have \u201cactively\u201d censored Christian and conservative viewpoints.<\/span><\/p>\n The report<\/span><\/a>, conducted by <\/span>National Religious Broadcasters<\/span><\/a> (NRB) and the <\/span>American Center for Law and Justice<\/span><\/a>, examined the policies and practices of several major Internet-interactive \u201cnew media\u201d communications platforms and service providers, including Apple and its iTunes App Store, Facebook, Google, and others.<\/span><\/p>\n The study found that some of the new media technology companies have outright banned Christian content, and that all social media sites, except Twitter, have speech policies more restrictive than the free speech rights guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution.<\/span><\/p>\n According to the study, seven of the major social media sites have banned \u201chate speech,\u201d a term that the study authors point out \u201cis often applied in the culture to stifle Christian communicators.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The study authors also found that some of the media companies have been responsive to demands by pressure groups calling for censorship of conservative or Christian viewpoints.<\/span><\/p>\n The study notes that when Google established new guidelines for its \u201cGoogle for Non-Profits\u201d in March 2011, it refused to list \u201cchurches and other faith groups\u201d that consider \u201creligion or sexual orientation in hiring practices.\u201d Christian churches that have applied for the suite of Google tools geared at non-profits have been rejected.<\/span><\/p>\n On another occasion the world\u2019s most powerful search engine initially prohibited the British Christian Institute from purchasing space for an advertisement about abortion. It was only after the Christian Institute sued Google that the search engine permitted the ad.<\/span><\/p>\n Apple has twice removed applications that contained Christian content from its iTunes App Store, the study documented. In both instances, Apple admitted that these apps were denied access because it considered the Christian viewpoints expressed in those applications to be \u201coffensive.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cOf the 425,000 apps available on Apple\u2019s iPhone, the only ones censored by Apple for expressing otherwise lawful viewpoints have been apps with Christian content,\u201d observes the study.<\/span><\/p>\n For its part, Facebook has openly partnered with homosexual activists to \u201ceradicate anti-gay comments on its platform,\u201d the report found. \u201cAll of which suggest that Christian content critical of homosexuality, same-sex marriage, or similar practices will be at risk of censorship [by Facebook]\u201d says the study. In fact, in some cases such content already has been removed by the social networking site.<\/span><\/p>\n Myspace, another social networking site similar to but less popular than Facebook, also has a policy banning \u201chomophobic\u201d content.<\/span><\/p>\n The pro-life organization <\/span>Live Action<\/span><\/a> has had a number of <\/span>encounters<\/span><\/a> with new media censorship. In a conversation with LifeSiteNews about the NRB study, Live Action Media Director David Schmidt recalled a censorship threat from Youtube earlier this year.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWe were threatened earlier this year,\u201d he said. \u201cAfter our attorney sent a letter to YouTube, they didn\u2019t remove our videos. Thankfully, they were considered \u2018newsworthy,\u2019 a standard not \u2018cut-and-dry\u2019 to all users.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Schmidt said that a majority of Live Action videos have been rejected for consideration as YouTube Promoted Videos because \u201cit is a content issue of some sort.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The authors of the NRB study point out that the attitudes of the new media companies to Christian content are important, since currently \u201ca handful of \u2018new media\u2019 giants are the gatekeepers to new web-based communications platforms.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n