I will be the first one to point out that technology could be a lot easier for people, we could be teaching technology a lot better than we are, but there is an undercurrent that I can’t ignore anymore. People are more than willing to understand and actively notice the issues with algorithm driven social media, billionaire controled social media, and otherwise, but they just refused to leave. If I get frustrated with this Stockholm syndrome behavior, I am blaming the victim. The below is a post from a popular account. I am moderately tech savvy. I cannot code to save my life. I can edit code, and I can clean up code, but I can’t write code from scratch to save my life. I don’t know how to do everything on the terminal yet, even though I sincerely think that the terminal is the pinnacle of user experience, There’s a lot of things I don’t know, but I have my own Website. I have figured out this place. I have my own website on my own server that I pay for and that the community pays for. At some point, I really do have to wonder, do people like the fight more than the liberation? I’m not sure how to articulate my frustration without blaming the victom.

I feel like a lot of people like The fight more than the notion of actively living free.

I don’t know what to call it yet, but it’s very much troubling.

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Facebook doesn’t want Closer to the Edge. They want a neutered, housebroken, polite little blog that says “civil disobedience” with a smile and a curtsy. They want us to ask permission to speak, to soften our words until they feel like buttered toast sliding down the throat of a billionaire. Instead, we told the truth with barbed wire metaphors and jokes sharper than Zuckerberg’s hairline, and now they’re clutching their pearls like the hypocritical little tyrants they are.

Mark Zuckerberg’s empire flagged us, throttled us, and threatened to delete our content — not because we lied, not because we were wrong, but because we made them uncomfortable. They don’t mind violence — Facebook’s full of it. What they mind is when you name the perpetrators and expose the power protecting them. That’s the unforgivable sin. We quoted an insurrectionist verbatim. We called for nonviolent civil disobedience and, God forbid, suggested that the metaphorical tires of authoritarianism deserve to be metaphorically slashed on the way out. That was too much for Mark.

Let’s be clear: they didn’t catch us in an accident. They restored our post after we appealed — admitted we were right — then weeks later flagged the same fucking post all over again. That’s not a glitch. That’s gaslighting with a blue checkmark.

And now they’re threatening to delete more. They’ve told us that come October, some or all of our content might vanish. Will it be a post? The entire page? They won’t say. They don’t have to. That’s the point of the threat — keep the sword dangling just long enough to make you flinch. But we’re not flinching. We’re not deleting a single word. If it’s good enough for Substack, it’s good enough for Facebook, and if Facebook doesn’t like that, they can shove their community standards up the same place they hide their ethics.

You want to know the difference between Substack and Facebook? Substack powers our website. Substack publishes us because we have readers who subscribe, not advertisers who need to be coddled. Substack isn’t run by a dead-eyed billionaire cosplaying as a human being while his platform gorges itself on surveillance capitalism. Substack doesn’t throttle us, mute us, shadowban us, or send us warnings dressed up as content policy love notes. We write, you read — that’s the deal. No middleman, no algorithm trying to decide if your anger is brand-safe.

We’re not going to post all of our articles on Facebook anymore. Not until Zuckerberg lifts the restrictions. We’re not going to feed the machine that’s trying to strangle us with our own words. If you want us, if you want the raw, unfiltered, unthrottled truth, you’ll find us on Substack, where the only standards are the ones we set for ourselves.

We won’t beg, but we will tell you this: we can’t do this without you. Your support keeps us writing, fighting, publishing, and defying. It keeps the lights on, the servers paid for, and the fire burning hot enough to make Zuckerberg sweat in his sad little Metaverse.

Thank you to every reader, every subscriber, every amplifier of this work. You’ve made Closer to the Edge more dangerous to the right people than we ever imagined. Facebook may decide to pull the plug on us, but your support will help ensure our survival

We’ll see you at the Edge.