So many conservative outlets have complained about this exact same sort of treatment from the woke left big tech behemoths — the banning or de-platforming, the restricting in some way, harassing, and so on — that I feel a little “me too”-ish in bringing it up here and now. But you know what liberals always say: believe all conservatives.
It would be nice if I could even confirm that I’ve been targeted, but Paypal’s terse notice to me is so purposely and preposterously vague that it reeks of arrogance, and of what seems to me to be an exhibition of their idea of authority or superiority over me, and it has a kind of a “F-You” vibe. Any first-week community college student in a PR class or a “how to run a business” class could tell you the sort of communication I got from Paypal is designed to guarantee suspicion and cynicism — but mostly anger, frustration — and obviously a cessation of income.
Here’s the notice I got emailed to me (multiple times) from PayPal, the payment gateway service we have used for sales of lapel pins to raise funds to pay for this site, and for reader contributions to PTBC, for 20 years:
You can no longer do business with PayPal
After a review, we decided to permanently limit your account as we found potential risk associated with it.
You’ll not be able to conduct any further business using PayPal.
Based on this decision, if applicable, you are no longer eligible for PayPal Seller Protection as per our User Agreement.
This will apply to all existing and future cases you receive.
Any bank or credit card information that’s linked to your PayPal account cannot be removed nor can it be added to another account. You can still log in and see your account information but you can’t send or receive money.
If you have funds in your PayPal balance, we’ll hold it for up to 180 days. After that period, we’ll email you with information on how to access your funds.
We regret any inconvenience this may cause.
“Regret any inconvenience” my ass. At first, like you, I thought because it’s so preposterously terse and nasty and lacking in proper information, it was probably a hoax — like “spam” or a phishing exercise. But no, when I logged into the PTBC Paypal account to verify it, they indicated the same thing and same attitude there. Look!
And indeed, I cannot withdraw the cash balance that is there and transfer it to my bank. They’re keeping it.
I’d love to find out what’s going on and correct it, or offer what I can assure you is a reasonable explanation for any mistakes (and I honestly can’t think of any “violations” that I’ve committed). But I can’t even do that!
That “See details” link, above? Yeah. The “details” are exactly as they are above — no details. Paypal also offers a so-called “Resolution Center” for things like this, but it’s a circular center of BS. It offers no resolution at all. The button they offer on the Resolution Center page, “Go to Account Limitations,” only leads to another copy of the same nonsense as provided in the “See details” link. Look!
(Click for bigger images.)
So they’ve cut our income, kept our money, and also cut off my ability to inquire about it, or get any information about it, or dispute it, or see what the supposed problem is so that I could correct it or offer an explanation, or ask anything of them whatsoever. Imagine if your bank did this.
Is this Canada or Iran? Is this how giant tech is allowed to operate here? Apparently! Good job, government!
It’s not bad enough that they cut off my ability to accept payments, but they have unilaterally decided that they will just go ahead and KEEP MY MONEY for six months, after which they’ll email me with “information on how to access your funds.” I take it I’ll have to plead with someone there — some 20-something guy or gal or “non-binary” — to please, please, please allow me to have my money which is mine (or, you know, yours — money which you’d sent), in six months’ time.
I doubt the cops would or could do anything about this, but who ya gonna call? Certainly not Ghost Busters. A-Hole Busters? I’d call my Member of Parliament, but she’s a Liberal, and Liberals seem, quite demonstrably, to be in favor of this sort of thing when it’s against certain people. Who do I call then? The CBC “News” department?
Pausing for laughter to subside.
Another blow? Well yes, but we’ve dealt with plenty over the years. And we’re still here. In the meantime, I’ve switched payment gateways to STRIPE, which might be better anyway (we’ll see), and it at least allows us to continue to accept contributions… for now. I see they’ve got the liberals’ Mark Carney on their Board of Directors as of February 2021, so their troops have infiltrated almost everything now.
Is it any wonder I say that the Woke Left is so increasingly dangerous; and that I find government to be worse than useless? This is getting more and more real, folks.
I’m not sure why we on the right keep letting this happen and not doing anything about it.
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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