Black Voices Don’t Matter to YouTube, Class Action Says

YouTube and Google face a class action lawsuit alleging that black creators have had their voices censored while hate speech is allowed.

According to four African American content creators, their videos were unfairly targeted for censorship based on their race, identity or political views.

Targeting reportedly included a variety of actions, including promoting hate speech for profit, limiting revenue for black creators, misapplying “Restricted Mode” to African American creators’ videos, excluding black-made videos from the “Trending” or “Up Next” recommendation and more.

“Under the pretext of finding that videos violate some vague, ambiguous and non-specific video content rule, defendants use computer-driven racial, identity and viewpoint profiling and filtering tools to restrict, censor and denigrate plaintiffs and all persons similarly situated on YouTube … because they are African American,” the YouTube class action lawsuit claims.

YouTube allegedly targets black creators by their use of tags such as BLM, Black Lives Matter, Racial Profiling, Police Shooting and more. As a result, YouTube videos using these or similar terms are reportedly placed instantly into “Restricted Mode.”

The plaintiffs argue these videos should not be restricted since they do not include profanity, drug use, sexual content, violence or even any specific details about violent events.

Despite this, black creators are allegedly unable to create content related to the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests without being penalized by YouTube.

“Under the pretext of honest content and service regulation, Defendants rig the game, by using their power to restrict and block Plaintiffs and other similarly situated competitors, based on racial identity or viewpoint discrimination for profit,” the YouTube class action lawsuit claims.

The video-streaming website allegedly commits further “digital racism” when it excludes black creator videos from the “Trending” or “Up Next” recommendations built into the website’s videos. This reportedly blocks videos from being recommended to YouTube users despite there being no reason for censoring the black creators.

Instead, YouTube allegedly promotes their own videos, which are not subject to the same censorship.

“Defendants also abuse their power by not subjecting their own videos to the same Community Guidelines and TOS that they apply to all other YouTube users,” the plaintiffs argue in their YouTube racial discrimination class action lawsuit.

“As a result, Defendants are not subject to filtering or blocking restrictions, even where Defendants’ videos contain material that violates their own rules.”

Other alleged censoring comes in the form of shadow banning black creators, “interfering with” livestreams, freezing subscriber counts or view counts and even more – simply for mentioning racially-sensitive topics that have recently become a part of daily news.

“This is race discrimination,” the plaintiffs conclude. “It is knowing and intentional.”

YouTube has allegedly admitted in the past to censoring videos based on creator identities opposed to the content of the videos themselves. However, despite reportedly acknowledging the issue, the problem persists.

The African American creators claim YouTube’s censoring is not only harmful but also illegal and prohibited under the video platform’s own terms of service.

The plaintiffs seek to represent a Class of federally protected YouTube users who used the platform between Jan. 1, 2015 and June 16, 2020. According to the content creators, over 42 million YouTubers could be covered under this proposed Class.

On behalf of the Class Members and themselves, the plaintiffs seek monetary damages, restitution and other injunctive relief.

This is not the first time YouTube and Google have faced legal action over discriminatory censoring. Last year in August, LGBTQ+ creators took action against the video platform, arguing that their content had been similarly censored and branded “shocking,” “offensive” and/or “sexually explicit.”

According to the plaintiffs, these actions were part of “a discriminatory and fraudulent scheme to profit from the unlawful and fraudulent regulation of speech on the platform in which compliant and quality LGBTQ+ content is restrained and demonetized.”

The black creators argue this “pattern and practice has become so pervasive” that many prominent content creators have lost more than 90% of their revenue, advertisers and viewers over the past few years simply because they identified as African American or LGBTQ+.

Has your YouTube account been censored or restricted by Google? Share your experiences in the comment section below.

The black creators and proposed Class are represented by Peter Obstler, Eric M. George, Debi A. Ramos and Keith R. Lorenze of Browne George Ross LLP.

The YouTube Racial Discrimination Class Action Lawsuit is Newman, et al. v. Google LLC, et al., Case No. 5:20-cv-04011, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

Read More Lawsuit & Settlement News:

Google Class Action Says ‘Loot Boxes’ Are Misleading

YouTube Class Action Says Kids’ Data Illegally Collected

Baby Powder Cancer Class Action Lawsuit Investigation

Call Recording: What’s Required for CIPA Compliance?