Warning: got my YouTube video taken down after a talk at a public park in Portland

I recorded a speech I gave at Waterfront Park last month about local housing policy and uploaded it, but within 12 hours YouTube flagged it for 'hate speech' even though nothing I said was aggressive. Now I'm wondering if there's a better platform for posting this kind of civic content that won't just nuke it. Has anyone else dealt with sudden removals on YouTube for political talk?

2 comments

2 Comments

wood.john19d ago

Man, I feel your pain. YouTube's bots are basically the grumpy librarians of the internet - they can't tell the difference between a policy debate and a screaming match. I once got a strike for a video where I was literally just reading aloud from a city council meeting transcript, and they flagged it as "harmful content." My guess is their AI saw words like "housing" and "policy" and decided I was starting a riot. Have you thought about using something like PeerTube or even just Vimeo for the raw, unedited talk?

grant72819d ago

Honestly, the angle nobody's talking about is that maybe YouTube's hate speech algorithm is triggered by certain voice tones or cadences, not just words. I've seen people get flagged for reading the dictionary in a slightly aggressive voice. Could be your pace or pitch got mistaken for anger. Might be worth re-recording with a totally flat, monotone delivery and see if it stays up. Just a theory but it makes sense when you watch the false flags pile up.