A group of LGBT content creators is suing YouTube and its parent company, Google, for allegedly discriminating against gay material.
The video-streaming platform suppresses LGBT people’s content, restricts their ability to sell advertising and indiscriminately culls their subscribers, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday against YouTube, The Washington Post reported. The claim comes as the company faces accusations that it suppresses content from conservatives and protects producers with large audiences.
“By controlling an estimated 95 percent of the public video communications that occur in the world, Google and YouTube wield unparalleled power and unfettered discretion to apply viewpoint-based content policies in a way that permits them to pick winners and losers,” Peter Obstler, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs, told reporters Tuesday.
A Google logo is seen at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View, California, U.S., November 1, 2018. REUTERS/ Stephen Lam
The lawsuit claims YouTube deploys “unlawful content regulation, distribution, and monetization practices that stigmatize, restrict, block, demonetize, and financially harm the LGBT Plaintiffs and the greater LGBT Community.” Google, which owns YouTube, has not responded to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: YouTube Secretly Using SPLC To Police Videos)
YouTube admitted to the DCNF in 2018 that some of the company’s content moderators “may misapply some of our policies resulting in mistaken removals.” The company enlisted 10,000 employees in December of that year specifically to oversee accounts and the content they produce.
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