Peter, Paul & Mary Banned on Facebook?

 

You may not recognize the three folksingers above if you were born after the Bicentennial. They are Peter, Paul & Mary, three left-leaning folk singers who sang Woody Guthrie songs, songs by Gordon Lightfoot, Pete Seeger and even such radicals as John Denver. They were big during the great folk-music scare of the 50s and 60s. These guys waltzed the line between being patriotic Americans and card-carrying communists. I loved their music. Their hearts were in the right place and I could actually play along with their songs as a fledgling guitarist. 

Imagine my shock when the Facebook Gestapo (FBG) took down my post in which I linked to one of their songs on Youtube. They said the post violated "Community Standards" and could pose a danger to the delicate sensibilities of Facebook readers. The song was about playing right field in elementary school. I suppose they thought if you played right field, a baseball might fall on your head and give you a concussion or predispose you to grow up to be a conservative. To be fair, I did play right field and did grow up to be a conservative. Best to avoid such dangerous and patriotic pastimes as baseball, then. And Baseball is undoubtedly a racist and fascist sport.~

After much searching I found the secret "notifications" page where I was "informed" of my violations of "community standards." Below is a list of my posts that the FBG took down over the past year. Apparently, these posts were so egregiously shocking that ordinary members of the Proletariat could not be safely exposed to this material. 

My posts that Facebook has blocked in the past year:

1.  Glen Campbell - Playing the Theme From The Lone Ranger ( aka “The William Tell Overture) on guitar.
2. Steve Martin & Edie Brickell  -  Pretty Little One
   The Martins – Out of His Great Love
3. Peter, Paul & Mary – Right Field
4. Mercy Me – Just As I Am
5. The Minions – YMCA
   Riders in the Sky – The Cowboy Yodel
6. A picture of me and my daughter singing
7. The Blues Brothers – Theme from Rawhide
8. Jill Paquette – Sometimes Yes and Sometimes No
9. Burl Ives – Will There Be Any Stars in My Crown
10. Kathy Ryan – The Coal Quay Market Song
11. Wendy Francisco – God & Dog
12. Steve Goodman – The City of New Orleans (he wrote it)
13. Connie Dover – Where Shall I Go (cowboy folk song)
14. Anthem Lights – My Jesus I Love Thee
15. John Fogarty – Center Field
16. Lizzy Hoyt – V’la L’bon Vent (French voyageur folk song 150 years old or so)
17. Clip from Junebug – I Surrender All
18. Picture of Hillary Clinton on the phone calling the suicide hotline to place an order (ironically when I demanded a review on the grounds that it was satire, they reposted it, and I’m sure the fact checker on that one isn’t working for the FBG anymore, probably doing time in whatever passes for Progressive Siberia).
    

I noticed in going down the list that the FBG not only blocked the song "Right Field", they also blocked John Fogarty's "Center Field". Apparently the snowflakes working for the Book of Face, believe the game of baseball must only have left fielders. 

It would be interesting to watch them play a team with only left-handed batters. What with no one in right or center to field the barrage of hits sent into that part of the outfield by left-handed batters, the final score would be all kind of lop-sided. My bet is that the League of Communist Athletes would have the all-lefty team canceled.

It must be confusing to live in that headspace.

© 2023 by Tom King

21.