Petition demands stronger policies against animal abuse video published on YouTube
- voiceforus
- Mar 21, 2022
- 3 min read
One of Voice For Us’ regular readers brought this petition to my attention which I urge you to sign and share. Thank you!
The petition is addressed to YouTube CEO SUSAN DIANE WOJCICKI and demands YouTube, a Google-owned social platform, enforce stronger policies against animal abuse on its website.
The title of the petition is: “Someone Filmed as a Large Dog Attacked a Baby Monkey That Just Wanted to Drink Some Milk.”
YouTube is flooded with sickening, horrific, and gut-wrenching animal abuse videos.
Back in December 2020, The Guardian reported that animal welfare charity Lady Freethinker handed YouTube the results of a three-month investigation which it claims identified 2,053 videos in which innocent animals were deliberately harmed for entertainment or were shown to be under severe psychological distress, physical pain or dead.
Ms. Nina Jackel, founder and president of Lady Freethinker, said: “YouTube must do a better job at monitoring and removing all videos that violate its terms and standards, alerting local law enforcement to illegal content, and holding channels accountable for their actions with suspensions and terminations.”
According to an article by The Guardian, of December 19, 2020, a spokeswoman for YouTube said: “YouTube’s community guidelines prohibit any violent or gory content intended to shock or disgust viewers, including the unnecessary infliction of harm on animals. We routinely remove videos and comments flagged by our community that violate those policies, and in many cases we terminate the accounts of users who violate our guidelines.”
The New York Times mentioned a video uploaded on YouTube which showed a live rabbit being fed to a python and reported that YouTube declined to explain why this video did not violate its guidelines.
On Monday, October 18, 2021, a lawsuit was filed in California Superior Court in Santa Clara.
Ms. Jackel sued YouTube accusing it of breach of contract.
As reported by the New York Times, the suit “claims that the platform failed to live up to its agreement with users by allowing animal abuse videos to be uploaded and failing to take action when alerted about the content.”
Ms. Jackel also said that YouTube had ignored Lady Freethinker’s repeated flagging of animal abuse videos. YouTube’s community guidelines, the rules for what is allowed on the site, say animal abuse content is not permitted.
Part of the complaint reads: “YouTube is aware of these videos and its role in distributing them, as well as its continuing support of their creation, production and circulation. It is unfortunate that YouTube has chosen to put profits over principles of ethical and humane treatment of innocent animals.”
On the same day that the lawsuit was filed, Lady Freethinker also sent a letter to the Justice Department through its lawyers.
In the letter, Lady Freethinker accuses YouTube of aiding and abetting the violation of “animal crushing” law which was created in 1999 and amended in 2010 and 2019.
The federal law prohibits making or distributing videos in which animals are “purposely crushed, burned, drowned, suffocated, impaled or otherwise subjected to serious bodily injury.”
Ms. Jackel said, Lady Freethinker volunteered to be part of YouTube’s Trusted Flagger program, which provides individuals, government agencies and nongovernmental organizations with tools to notify the company of content that violates its guidelines.
YouTube, however, told Ms. Jackel that it was not bringing on trusted flaggers with expertise in animal abuse videos.
As Ms. Jackel explained: “We’ve tried to have a meaningful conversation with them multiple times and been shut down. We’re knocking on the door, and nobody is answering. So, this lawsuit is kind of a last straw.”
Please, sign and share the petition and join Lady Freethinker and all the other organizations committed to ban the publishing of animal cruelty videos on social media. Thank you!
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