Breitbart News senior tech reporter Allum Bokhari recently appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight to discuss how Google’s YouTube search results were manually manipulated based on tweets by a left-wing TV show host. Bokhari told Carlson that the incident shows that “left-wing media pundits control what Google thinks.”
Recently, Breitbart News senior reporter Allum Bokhari revealed that Google-owned video hosting website YouTube manually adjusted search results for “Federal Reserve” after MSNBC host Chris Hayes complained about the prominence of anti-Fed videos in the top results. Bokhari wrote in his article on the topic:
Google allegedly added the search term “Federal Reserve” to a “blacklist” file of “controversial” YouTube search queries. This caused search results for the term to be re-ranked to favor YouTube-approved mainstream media sources.
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According to a Google source, Hayes’ tweets set in motion a series of events inside Google that would result in the company drastically adjusting its YouTube search results for the term “Federal Reserve.”
According to the source, an employee at the company drew attention to Hayes’ tweets a day after the MSNBC host posted them.
On the same day, the source says Google’s “youtube_controversial_query_blacklist” file was edited to include the term “Federal Reserve.”
Last night, Bokhari appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight to discuss the report, where Carlson asked: “Is Google taking its cues from Chris Hayes?” Bokhari replied: “That’s absolutely right Tucker, we’ve known for some while now that Google wants to control what everyone thinks we now know thanks to this story and others like it that left-wing media pundits control what Google thinks and it’s an insane standard that they have here, it takes just two or three tweets from a journalist like Chris Hayes to get the most influential video hosting platform on the entire Internet controlled by the most powerful company in the world to change it’s search results.”
Bokhari continued: “YouTube says they’re just doing this to crack down on conspiracy theories, it’s a word they like to use to describe content they don’t like but even if we give them that and say that’s true and I see no reason to give them the benefit of the doubt on this, imagine what that says about their users. They’re basically saying that their users are morons that can’t tell the difference between legitimate news and conspiracy theories, that can’t tell fact from fiction.” He added: “It just speaks to the broader problem of an elite that treats ordinary people with absolute contempt and thinks they’re total morons.”
Carlson replied: “Well it’s not even a left-right divide, its any challenge to the status quo, whether its the federal reserve or vaccines, that’s another topic they don’t want you to think outside the lines on that question it’s not allowed at all. Why is YouTube, Google, and Chris Hayes, why are they suddenly guardians of the status quo?”
Bokhari stated: “Well it’s a total reversal on what the internet was supposed to be, it was supposed to mean an end to gatekeepers. YouTube was firstly this platform that’s motto was “broadcast yourself,” a platform where anyone, ordinary people had a voice, instead it’s evolving into this platform that’s run by Chris Hayes, run by left-wing journalists who get to decide what you can see and ultimately what you can think.”
Bokhari then referenced previous instances of Google altering search results, stating: “This isn’t the only search results they’ve done this on, back in January Breitbart News reported that they’d done exactly the same thing in search results for abortion, another mainstream political debate in American politics and again it was exactly the same thing, first a left-wing journalist form Slate complained to Google and within a few hours they’d gone into their search results and removed all pro-life videos from the top ten results, it’s amazing.”
Carlson ended the segment stating: “So the unhappiest, the dumbest, most banal people become the most powerful. Got to be a word for that. Allum thanks for joining us tonight.”
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or email him at lnolan@breitbart.com