YouTube Censorship Case

YouTube Censorship Case

Re: Legality of Censoring videos on YouTube, esp. those that question the Covid narrative

Facts of the Case

Dates: Oct 11, 2021
Location: Cologne, Germany
Court: Regional Court of Cologne
Case #:
Plaintiff: allesaufdentisch

Defendant: YouTube & Google
Trial Type:
Judge:
Status: End
Verdict: For The Plaintiff

Background

Dozens of prominent German actors have banded together as part of the “allesaufdentisch” (everything on the table) freedom of expression campaign to demand a more open discussion on the Corona virus and the controversial government policies, rules and regulations. Their statements were posted in the form of short videos on YouTube. (4)

the group of leading actors, performers, artists state: “We are watching the development of political action in the Corona crisis with increasing concern. Many experts have not yet been heard in the public Corona debate. We would like to see a wide-ranging, fact-based, open and factual discourse and also an equally wide-ranging discussion of the videos.” (4)

Each actor posted a YouTube video criticizing the current suppressive policies. (4)

The site was started in September by actor Volker Bruch and others (3)

Two videos were deleted by YouTube for allegedly spreading Covid “misinformation”. (1) and reasons such as “violating community guidelines.” (4)

Specifically, it is about the videos with the titles “Fear” and “Incidence”. In “Angst”, the actor and cabaret artist Gernot Haas speaks with the neurobiologist Gerald Hüther. For several years, Hüther was on the advisory board of the online magazine Rubikon, which is criticized for spreading conspiracy ideologies. In the second video concerned, the singer and songwriter Jakob Heymann interviews the mathematician Stephan Luckhaus, who left the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in the course of a rejected critical contribution to the lockdown. (6)

German national leading daily Bild below reported on YouTube’s controversial removal of the videos: “YouTube is not a truth commission that decides what is right and what is wrong,” (4)

According to attorney Steinhöfel, who is part of the campaign himself in conversation with actor Wotan Wilke Möhring on the subject of freedom of expression, legal steps were taken on Monday morning. The deletions are unlawful and “a new dimension in the violation of the law by YouTube”. (6)

The court ruled that YouTube must restore the 2 deleted videos. (1)
YouTube did not tell the channel operators precisely enough which passages in their opinion violated which provision of their guidelines, a court spokeswoman said on Monday when asked. (3)
The Cologne Regional Court issued an injunction, ruling that YouTube’s deletion of the videos was illegal,” reported Bild, which has a copy of the court order.(5)

“According to the court, the deletion of the videos in which the artists interviewed Leipzig mathematics professor Stephan Luckhaus (68) and neurobiologist Gerald Hüther (70) was ‘unjustified’.” (5)

According to Bild: “YouTube did not explain which specific statements were classified as problematic” and that “the artists were not informed which passage of the video is said to have violated the guidelines”. (5)
YouTube is obligated to specify precisely what the problem is, and cannot rely on vague reasons, the court rules. (5)
Bild adds:

Even more: YouTube was only allowed to delete videos in the case of ‘an obvious, at first glance recognizable medical misinformation’ without naming concrete problematic passages. In the case of the deleted videos of #allesaufdentisch, however, it is a matter of ‘longer videos’ that ‘also contain a large number of clearly permissible statements.’” (5)

Aftermath

The platform company is now filing an objection.
Lawyer Joachim Steinhoefel was delighted by the Cologne Court ruling, and told BILD: “The Civil Chamber 28 of the Regional Court of Cologne has made it clear to the censorship machinery of the monopolist YouTube within hours that constitutional boundaries have been crossed here.” (5)
Some members of the group of actors spoke to Bild on their motives behind the government critical videos: “We are trying to talk to people. That’s democracy. To erase our voices is the sad opposite of that.”(5)