PayPal To Begin Stealing Users' Money For Spreading "Hate", "Misinformation": Donor Favor Asked

Below, I’ll ask those donors who give through PayPal to switch to other services if they can.

PayPal announced beginning on 3 November they will begin stealing money from user accounts PayPal purity police deem objectionable. After an uproar, they kinda sorta walked it back, saying they didn’t mean to say what they just said.

According to one report on the initial language:

[PayPal] will expand its “existing list of prohibited activities” on November 3. Among the changes are prohibitions on “the sending, posting, or publication of any messages, content, or materials” that “promote misinformation” or “present a risk to user safety or wellbeing.” Users are also barred from “the promotion of hate, violence, racial or other forms of intolerance that is discriminatory.”…

Deliberations will be made at the “sole discretion” of PayPal and may subject the user to “damages” — including the removal of $2,500 “debited directly from your PayPal account.” The company’s user agreement contains a provision in which account holders acknowledge that the figure is “presently a reasonable minimum estimate of PayPal’s actual damages” due to the administrative cost of tracking violations and damage to the company’s reputation.

This move comes as no surprise to any of us. I’ve said a hundred times that official misinformation must have some agency in charge of policing it. And here it is, one arm of the enforcement division.

PayPal likely hired a crew of fat tattooed severe-rim-glasses-wearing odd-smelling dead-eyed blue-haired gender-confused censors to monitor user accounts and identify “outrages”. Or maybe they’ll just ask the ADL who the “haters” are.

One wonders whether these purity policeman will get a cut of the money PayPal steals from accounts? Offering them a percentage would certainly increase their zeal.

I’m ignorant of the law, but, morally, this is clearly theft. Legal theft, apparently:

“Under existing law, PayPal has the ability as a private company to implement this type of viewpoint-discriminatory policy,” [said] Aaron Terr, a senior program officer at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression…

For those who don’t know, PayPal allows users to link their PayPal accounts to their normal bank accounts. When paying for things using PayPal, users can draw from their PayPal or normal bank accounts.

Thus, when PayPal steals money from user accounts, if they still will, if there are insufficient funds in the PayPal account, PayPal can automatically withdraw money from the normal bank accounts to make up the difference.

In other words, PayPal will likely steal not only the money in users’ PayPal accounts, but in their normal bank accounts, too.

Now believe it or not, dear reader, but being a dissident on the internet who relies on donations does not pay so well that we can ignore $2,500. It is, even in this inflation, a lot of money.

So I am forced to begin closing out my PayPal account, before they get to me. I’d imagine, since I’m only a small voice, they wouldn’t get to me first, but they certainly might eventually. It’s too much to take the chance.

I realize they walked back their initial money grab, but that doesn’t mean the correction, whenever it comes, won’t be just as bad. In any case, the company can no longer be trusted.

I will be reaching out to donors who currently use PayPal and beg them, if they are able, and ask them to switch to other methods. Don’t worry if you can’t. And apologies to all for putting them through this inconvenience.

Right now, I have Donorbox and Zelle ( see wmbriggs.com for details). I also have all posts mirrored on Substack (obviously), and will turn on the ability to donate there, too. I am still reluctant to put regular content behind a paywall, because I’m well aware that not everybody can afford it.

I’m looking into other methods, too. When I figure them out, I’ll put them in the new signature line. (Like an idiot, I hard-coded these into posts, so the PayPal links will still exist, but soon will cease to work.)