The original concept of shadowbanning was implemented to hide any inappropriate, violent or harmful media. However, with more controversial movements arising, shadowbanning has become more prevalent by making a user unaware of their social media posts being hidden from other users.
With online users being shadowbanned, their freedom of speech is being suppressed by not giving them the opportunity to post or share their personal opinions. Depending on the topic, the government or other major external influences purposely hide users’ content and silence them without their knowledge. People are still able to post on social media, but their engagement drastically decreases.
According to Times, during the Black Lives Matter Movement, Lex Scott, the founder of Black Lives Matter Utah, organized a Black Out movement, calling on TikTok users to stand in solidarity against censorship of and racism against Black creators. TikTok claimed to have had a “technical glitch” that affected the view count displayed on videos tagged with #BlackLivesMatter and #GeorgeFloyd, even though those hashtags reached up to one billion views.
In addition to repressing individuals’ freedom of speech, shadowbanning adds a level of bias since individuals’ content is selectively limited from others, ultimately distorting the public’s perception. Only including one perspective of a situation spreads misconceptions since the other side is not heard. In many circumstances, hiding one’s opposing standpoint allows for the other to circulate widely, increasing misinformation.
A prominent illustration about shadowbanning is with wars, where propaganda becomes prevalent, causing misconceptions to spread online. With the recent events of the Palestinian conflict, numerous activists have been posting content to increase awareness about the topic.
In accordance with Vox, the concern from digital rights activists is that the information about Palestinians is not being treated equally by platforms’ systems. Palestinian activists have noticed the changes in how their media circulates throughout different apps, which includes significantly reducing the visibility of stories, Reels, posts and even banning Arabic words that are related with the conflict.
Shadowbanning causes misrepresentation in all types of media, where the repression of individuals’ voices and bias plays an influential impact. Major companies need to take into consideration their ethical policies with users of their media and the information being posted. Without addressing these issues, society will not be able to freely express their own opinions on movements that matter.