The influencer whose social network was suspended by Federal Supreme Court Minister (STF) Alexandre de Moraes for spreading speech deemed anti-democratic has taken refuge on Rumble, a self-titled video platform “immune to cancel culture”. Within this network, they keep content production triggered in messaging apps, and intensify dialogue with supporters.

Most of the profiles are supporters of Jair Bolsonaro – such as journalists Paulo Figueiredo and Rodrigo Constantino, blogger Allan dos Santos, a fugitive from a Brazilian court, and podcaster Bruno Aiub, known as Monark. The company’s third quarter 2022 report shows that 71 million people worldwide access the site – 57 million in the US and Canada.

Rumble was already mentioned in a Supreme Court decision, back on January 11, which requested the blocking of Monark’s account – an order the platform did not comply with. Podcaster is part of the network’s first expansion initiative in Brazil, when the company signed, in March last year, an exclusive contract with it and left-wing influencer Reginaldo Ferreira da Silva, known as Ferréz, to publish videos on the site.

Monark is one of the most active on the network, where he criticizes the judiciary and complains about “censorship”. He often says that Brazil is under a “dictatorship”. “China is more democratic than Brazil. There, at least, one person doesn’t decide everything,” he said during a live broadcast on the 23rd, referring to Moraes.

In his action on January 8, Monark said he had “sympathy” for radicals. “Our state of affairs is that of an evil and authoritarian dictatorship.” Hours later, he condemned the move, but that didn’t stop his account being suspended. The report reaches Monark, but gets no response.

On the 6th, Allan dos Santos published an episode of his podcast Guerra da Informação which did not include himself, but two other presenters. One of them said that it was a “question of time” for social upheaval in Brazil. “It didn’t take long for all of us to see the result of all this pressure on the Brazilian people, on society and also, incredibly, on the military”, said the broadcaster.

The same content is also on Spotify, the world’s largest music playback and podcast platform. The company did not respond to the report.

Difference

For experts, the absence of tighter restrictions on platforms attracts influencers. “The big platforms started taking uncomfortable actions; the small ones didn’t respect it,” said InternetLab executive director Francisco Brito Cruz. “If Rumble accepts a Brazilian court order and doesn’t comply, it’s not a matter of whether he wants to or not. He can’t do that. You can discuss, question his decisions, but you can’t break them.”

Already in the evaluation of attorney André Marsiglia, Moraes’ suspension could set up “prior censorship”. “I understand that suspending a profile is pre-censorship because it prevents someone from expressing himself or herself in the future. No future breaches, breaches that did not occur,” he said.

Cruz advocated taking precautions to avoid episodes like the attacks on the 8th. Telegram and Rumble did not respond. The Supreme Court declined to comment. Allan dos Santos, Constantino and Figueiredo were not found.

The information is from the newspapers State of S. Paulo.

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