Telegram, Free Speech, and Grocery Store Price Wars

You may have seen the headlines that Pavel Durov, founder of messaging app Telegram, was arrested in France while visiting the country recently.

He was arrested as part of an investigation into child pornography, drug trafficking, and fraud.

Sounds like a terrible guy, right?

Until you realize that he didn't actually do any of those things.

In fact, French police aren't even alleging that Durov did any of those things.

So why was he arrested then?

He was arrested for creating a messaging platform that actual criminals were using to facilitate their illegal activities.

That's right.

Pavel did nothing more than create a way for people to communicate electronically.

By that standard, shouldn't France be arresting phone manufacturers, email providers, and radio operators?

But this isn't the first time something like this has happened.

Western Nations are in the process of creating a long and storied tradition of arresting service providers who committed no immoral actions themselves.

A few months ago the co-founder of Tornado Cash, a cryptocurrency anonymizing service, was convicted of money laundering in the Netherlands just for the creation of the platform.

And the creators of another anonymous crypto service, Samourai Wallet, were arrested in the US and charged with "conspiracy to money laundering and conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money service business."

Sure, criminals have used all of these platforms to facilitate their immoral deeds.

But they've used a lot of other services as well.

Criminal organizations, just like all businesses, rely on a complex web of goods and services to run their operations.

They need to use everything from cell phones to cars, and computers to restaurants.

If McDonalds sells a McDouble to a fraudster providing him vital calories to fuel his illicit behaviors, are they too complicit in his crimes?

But maybe the connection between a full stomach and financial crimes is too intangible.

What about the creators of the currency most commonly used for illicit activity: the US Treasury?

That's right - fiat currency is by far the most commonly used currency by criminal organizations.

Where are the rallying cries to arrest the central bankers and Treasury bureaucrats?

There aren't any.

Why?

Because fiat currencies are a vital part of the government's ability to maintain power.

Durov's arrest is just the newest development in a long-term effort by Western governments to offload the responsibility to police against crimes onto the private sector.

What is immoral about creating a messaging app?

Nothing.

What is immoral about holding the creator of that app responsible for the crimes committed by its users?

Everything. ~ West

It all started with a meme.

Back in 2022, Darren Brady, a 51-year-old British Army veteran, found himself in handcuffs for committing the grave crime of... retweeting a meme.

Not just any meme, of course. This one was dangerous.

The image in question? Four Pride flags arranged into the shape of a swastika. So skillfully, I might add, that looks like it was made using MS Paint. What horror!

Granted, is this meme offensive? Maybe.

Criminal, though? Apparently, in the UK’s enlightened utopia, offending someone’s delicate sensibilities is now an arrestable offense.

That’s right, when the UK’s finest arrived at Brady’s doorstep, they weren’t there for a wellness check to see if he was a legitimate threat to anyone.

They were there to arrest him for—get this—causing anxiety online.

Literally. In footage that went viral, an officer told him…

“Someone has been caused anxiety based on your social media post. This is why you have been arrested.”

Yep, you read that correctly.

“Anxiety” is now a criminal charge in the land that gave us Shakespeare.

Next they’ll be rewriting Hamlet next to make sure Ophelia doesn’t cause second-hand distress. After all, we wouldn’t want a tragic character—suffering from familial, structural, and gender-based violence—to potentially traumatize the audience, now would we?

Unfortunately, Brady’s ordeal is far from an isolated incident.

This is the new global trend, where anyone who dares challenge the reigning orthodoxy is at risk of having their rights—and quite possibly, their freedoms—stripped away.

Across the world—from the UK to Brazil, Ireland, France, Australia, and even here in the United States, where the First Amendment supposedly matters—governments are launching coordinated assaults on free speech under the guise of combating "hate speech" and "misinformation."

• In France, you read above what happened with Pavel Durov.

• In Brazil, the government went so far as to block X for allegedly "inciting violence" following elections.

• In Ireland, the government is pushing for a law that will make even unintentional hate speech a prosecutable offense.

• In Australia, X has been locked in a battle with regulators after being ordered to remove footage of two terror attacks under so-called "misinformation" laws (because nothing fixes terrorism like erasing all evidence of it from the internet).

• And then there's the EU, where Commissioner Thierry Breton warned Musk that X must comply with European laws regulating "harmful content"—even if the content is hosted outside of Europe.

• Venezuela’s Maduro has taken things even further, shutting down X entirely for 10 days as part of a broader crackdown on dissent.

Unfortunately, this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Oh, and let’s not forget that Zuckerberg just admitted to censoring content on Facebook and Instagram, acknowledging that posts contradicting the Biden administration’s official narratives regarding the pandemic were systematically suppressed.

I mean, it's not censorship when it's for your own good, right?

Now, back to that million-dollar question…

What exactly counts as hate speech these days?

Well, that’s easy: whatever the government says it is.

• Criticism of immigration policies? Racism.

• Memes that satirize prevailing identity ideologies? Bigotry.

• Challenge the official narrative on climate action? Disinformation.

• Daring to ask uncomfortable questions about public health or government overreach? Inciting violence.

I mean, at this point, even North Korea might take notes.

To the average person, these might seem like isolated incidents cracking down on repugnant online trolls (and, of course, those people exist).

But make no mistake…

This is how it starts—the the slow, suffocating rise of censorship, all wrapped up in the benevolent language of “public safety” and “protecting the marginalized.”

And it’s not just memes and edgy tweets they’re after.

If things keep going in this direction, having an adult conversation about touchy, yet very important topics will be enough to land you in court.

Or, scratch that—silence could soon be considered violence, and if you don’t take an active role in reporting agents of social disorder to the authorities, the “Bureau of Thought Crimes” might need pay you a visit for some friendly reeducation.

Governments could even mandate that every post be cleared by the “Ministry of Offense Avoidance” before it even gets posted. G*d forbid you share a GIF that isn’t inclusive enough.

How long before the line between Big Tech and Big Brother gets blurrier than the algorithm that decides what you’re allowed to post?

How long before the platforms decide it’s not whether hate speech or disinformation have taken place, but how hate speech and disinformation have taken place?

Make no mistake, this is just the beginning of an all-out assault on one of the most foundational liberties we have…

The right to think and speak freely.

And if we don’t push back, we’re in danger of waking up in a world where governments, in partnership with Big Tech, sanitize every word we say.

And if we let that happen, the Pre-Crime Police won’t be far behind.

First, they’ll arrest you for a meme.

Next, they’ll be knocking at your door for using a social platform that wasn’t curated by the Ministry of Truth. ~ Zach

We'd all been waiting for it.

"There is a glimmer of hope," I naively thought.

Perhaps the Dems would counter Trump's terrible tariff-centric economic policy with something decent?

Now I wish I could just go back to my state of ignorant bliss, though.

Kamala's big economic policy unveil was price controls on food to counter corporate 'greedflation'.

Do you want famine? Because that's how you get famine.

But I won't belabor that point.

Instead, I want to talk about what is actually driving food prices higher.

The source of this analysis?

The Fed.

Thomas Klitgaard of the New York Federal Reserve recently authored a research paper addressing what is actually driving food's price increases.

The primary culprits?

Commodity price fluctuations, and rising compensation for low-paid grocery workers.

Profit margins for grocery chains increased slightly, but are a far cry from the fire and brimstone 'greedflation' espoused by Kamala.

And that makes sense.

Food markets are highly competitive with a plethora of alternatives all within a few square miles of most people's homes.

Also, it's not like grocery stores just discovered the idea of being greedy in 2022. Why would they have decided all of a sudden that that was the year to start being greedy?

The irony of all of this is that if Kamala actually wanted to lower the price of food she'd be better off advocating for maximum wage controls for grocery workers to lower labor costs.

But she won't do that.

Also, even if elected President she likely wouldn't actually implement any form of price controls.

It's just a bad idea, and even if she doesn't know that, the people around her do.

But on the election trail, facts don't matter.

Popularity does.

And advocating for reducing profits for evil greedy corporations is more popular than advocating for lowering wages of low-paid employees even further. ~ West