NRB's Parshall Appears On FOX News, Discusses NRB New Media Report

Releases New Media Report

On SUNDAY (9/18) NATIONAL RELIGIOUS BROADCASTERS (NRB) SVP/General Counsel CRAIG PARSHALL appeared on the FOX NEWS program "AMERICA'S NEWS HQ" to discuss last week’s release of the first report of the JOHN MILTON PROJECT FOR RELIGIOUS FREE SPEECH entitled "True Liberty In A New Media Age."

The NRB project concluded an 18-month study, spearheaded by PARSHALL, that evaluates the practices and policies of new media technology companies to determine the risk of religious viewpoint censorship occurring on their platforms.  Specifically, the report highlights the practices of APPLE and its ITUNES APP STORE, GOOGLE, FACEBOOK, MYSPACE and TWITTER, as well as Internet service providers AT&T, COMCAST and VERIZON.  “TWITTER gets an A+ from us,” said PARSHALL.  “The rest of the new media platforms we studied get a failing grade.”

“[N]ot only APPLE, but all of the seven other major new media platforms that [NRB] studied all have policies that forbid what they call ‘hate speech.’  And of course that’s not defined, and it’s used often as a bludgeon against politically incorrect opinions of a variety of kinds,” said PARSHALLl on FOX.  “STEVE JOBS, the founder of APPLE, made an interesting statement in 1985.  He said that these Internet-based communications, of which APPLE is one, are to communications in the 21st century what BELL TELEPHONE – and the invention of the telephone network – was in the 20th century. [AMERICANS] wouldn’t allow the telephone companies to refuse service to our church or house of worship because they don’t like the religious beliefs of that church or house of worship, so APPLE shouldn’t censor those opinions they don’t like.  We think the solution to ideas that people find reprehensible is more speech, not less.”

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