CENSORSHIP ALERT: Is Texas about to BAN political memes?
In an Orwellian move by former Speaker of the Texas House Rep. Dade Phelan (R), a bill has been filed that would criminalize political expression in Texas.
House Bill 366 would make it a crime to distribute altered media, including political memes, without a government-approved disclaimer. Violators of the proposed bill could face up to a year in jail for a political meme.
“Wait, I thought we wanted less government here in the state of Texas?” Sara Gonzales asks on “Come and Take It.” “I feel personally attacked. I’m not going to lie, I feel like this was written because Dade Phelan wants me in jail.”
The bill specifically targets political advertising that features an image, audio recording, or video recording of an office holder's or candidate's appearance, speech, or conduct that did not occur in reality.
This includes media altered using generative artificial intelligence technology.
“So like you can use AI to make any sort of memes, any sort of pictures, as ridiculous as they may be,” Gonzales says. “It doesn’t say, ‘Hey, if this is satire, you get a pass.’ This doesn’t say, ‘Hey, if this is so ridiculously absurd that any reasonable person would know that it’s clearly satire, that it is clearly made up, that it is clearly photoshopped’ — it doesn’t give a pass for any of that.”
Representative Phelan said in response to criticism, “I’m not coming for your memes. If you like your memes, you can keep your memes. This has nothing to do with X or Facebook or anything on social media.”
But Gonzales isn’t buying it.
“It’s just that the TEC general counsel James Tinley blatantly said that social media posts would be covered under this communist China-style law,” she says, noting that Phelan’s response was a play on something Barack Obama once said.
“‘If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, if you like your health care, you can keep your health care,’” Gonzales says. “So obviously, a throwback to that line. It’s just cute because in the same way that Obama was lying when he said that, Dade Phelan is also lying when he says, ‘If you like your memes, you can keep your memes.’”
“So the irony is not lost on me,” she adds.
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