Jonathan Turley: Facebook says mentions of COVID-19's possible origins in Wuhan are now allowed. How generous

By Jonathan Turley

Published May 27, 2021

Facebook ends ban on Wuhan lab leak theory

Read the headline above a couple times. There was a time when such a headline would only appear on the satirical outlet The Onion but it is actually true.

Facebook has long banned anyone who discussed the evidence that a worldwide pandemic killing millions and destroying the global economy may have been released from a government lab in Wuhan, China.

Facebook would not allow the theory to be discussed as "debunked" despite widespread criticism that the social media giant was, again, engaging in corporate censorship.

The false claim that this theory was "debunked" was pushed by various media platforms as part of the criticism of then-President Donald Trump and his administration.

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Now, however, President Joe Biden's chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci, and others have acknowledged that there is a basis for suspect the lab as the origin of the outbreak. So now Facebook will allow you to talk about it.

Since February, Facebook has been banning posts claiming the virus was man-made or manufactured "following consultations with leading health organizations, including the World Health Organization" who had "debunked" the claim. It was ridiculed at the time as entirely divorced from actual science. While the theory was not proven, it was never disproven.

Now, Facebook has declared "In light of ongoing investigations into the origin of COVID-19 and in consultation with public health experts, we will no longer remove the claim that COVID-19 is man-made from our apps. We’re continuing to work with health experts to keep pace with the evolving nature of the pandemic and regularly update our policies as new facts and trends emerge."

Putting aside the lack of a basis for the earlier ban, the statement reflects that assumption that, of course, Facebook should be the arbiter of what can be discussed by users.

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I previously wrote an op-ed for Fox News Opinion about how Facebook is running a campaign to convince young people to accept "content modification" as part of their evolution with technology. This reframing of expectations has been fostered by Democratic leaders who have pushed the social media companies for more censorship to protect people from errant or damaging ideas.

Last year, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., warned Big Tech CEOs that he and his colleagues were watching to be sure there was no "backsliding or retrenching" from "robust content modification."

In all of these exchanges, the underlying portrayal of the public is the same: they are unwitting dupes who must be protected from harmful thoughts or influences. It is safer for them to have these members and these companies determine what they can hear or discuss.

Facebook’s decision to allow people to discuss the lab leak theory follows the company's Oversight Board upholding a ban on any postings of Trump, a move that even prominent liberal figures like German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., have criticized as a danger to free speech.

Even Trump's voice has been banned by Facebook. Trump apparently remains too harmful for Facebook users to hear… at least until the company decides that they are ready for such exposure.

Facebook's announcement is meant to assure that it will not abuse its power as the overseer of any political or social discussions. It is similar to the benign dictator pitch where a government argues that, despite authoritarian powers, it uses such powers in a benign and tolerant fashion.

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There is still an alternative. It is called free speech.

I have long described myself as an Internet Originalist. There was a time when the assumption was that the Internet is a forum for largely unimpeded free speech.

This was particularly the case with social media. Users of Twitter and Facebook state a desire to hear the views of other individuals or groups.

Yet, companies like Facebook started to assert the right to monitor those exchanges and decide if it approves of the views or representations being made. What began with censoring out violent threats soon morphed into "misinformation" or "harmful" thoughts on subjects ranging from climate change to COVID-19 to election fraud.

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It is a familiar pattern as speech controls become insatiable and expansive. We would never tolerate a company like Verizon intervening in telephone conversations to correct or cut off arguments. However, Facebook now regularly censors views and is running a glitzy ad campaign to get people to love the company for its paternalistic limits on what they can see and discuss.

I do not know if the virus escaped from the Wuhan lab. However, it is less likely that we will find an answer with companies actively preventing people from sharing information and views on the subject.

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Yet, it is probably more important to understand how a little free speech escapes from Facebook. The fact is that it did not escape. It was a controlled release.

Facebook and other companies have turned a rolling ocean of free speech on the Internet into a swimming pool of censored and managed expression.

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Worse yet, according to its ubiquitous commercials, Facebook wants us to love it for the loss of free speech.

So rejoice, America. Facebook and its censorship board will now allow us to discuss whether China is responsible for the release of this virus… for now.

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Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University.

He is the author of the new book "Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution" (Simon & Schuster, Feb 3, 2026), on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution.on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution.

He is a nationally recognized legal scholar who has written extensively in areas ranging from constitutional law to legal history to the Supreme Court. He has written over three dozen academic articles that have appeared in a variety of leading law journals.

Professor Turley also served as counsel in some of the most notable cases in the last two decades including the representation of whistleblowers, military personnel, former cabinet members, judges, members of Congress, and a wide range of other clients.

Professor Turley testified more than 50 times before the House and Senate on constitutional and statutory issues, including the Senate confirmation hearings of cabinet members and jurists such as Justice Neil Gorsuch. He also appeared as an expert witness in both the impeachment hearings of President Bill Clinton and Donald Trump.

Professor Turley received his B.A. at the University of Chicago and his J.D. at Northwestern. In 2008, he was given an honorary Doctorate of Law from John Marshall Law School for his contributions to civil liberties and the public interest.

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