ATTENTION Mark Zuckerberg, CEO FACEBOOK - Open Letter #2

http://www.facebook.com/thrashers.wheat - Banned Since July 2015

An Open Letter (#2) to Mark Zuckerberg, CEO FACEBOOK

Dear Mr. Zuckerberg,

It's been over a year now since we wrote you an Open Letter and we have yet to receive the courtesy of a response -- much less even a form letter automated response.

As you may recall, your corporation Facebook suspended our account in 2015 claiming that we were not a "real person". The implication was that we were a "fake".

Please let us assure you again that we are still, in fact, "REAL" and not a fake or fraudulent individual or organization.

Telluride, Colorado, October 1, 2016
Photo by Expecting To Fly

In retrospect, banning Thrashers Wheat turned out to be one of the greatest honors in the history of operating this site. Initially, our traffic was cut in half overnight, but we quickly came to terms with the "humiliation" because we won't quit.

Of course the irony is that now you find Facebook having to defend itself from the very fair charges that Facebook is a massive purveyor of fake and false information from non-existent organizations and individuals. Even your statement last week itself is completely false:

“Of all the content on Facebook, more than 99 percent of what people see is authentic. Only a very small amount is fake news and hoaxes,” the Facebook head wrote in a post to his site on Saturday. “The hoaxes that do exist are not limited to one partisan view, or even to politics. Overall, this makes it extremely unlikely hoaxes changed the outcome of this election in one direction or the other.”

Please show us the data to prove that "more than 99 percent of what people see is authentic."

As Edward Snowden pointed out, “[t]o have one company that has enough power to reshape the way we think, I don’t think I need to describe how dangerous that is.” Snowden addressed the fake news issue in detail last week.

“I don’t think many people need to have this explained to them, that when you type something into the Google search box, it’s Google that decides what you get back. When you go to your Facebook page, it’s Facebook that decides what news it is that you see on your page. When you go to a platform like Twitter, or any of these, really, the voices that are heard are the ones that are selected and permitted by the corporation.”

“There seems to be no alternative to the larger services. Because of this network effect, because [of] the first mover advantage. When you get a Google or a Facebook or Twitter in place, they never seem to leave.”

“[Facebook is] creating more silence than they are creating more speech.”

By banning websites such as Thrasher's Wheat from your platform, you are essentially telling your customers that they aren’t smart enough to decide for themselves what is and is not news.

But you can't have it both ways Mr. Zuckerberg. You can't ban a site like us here at Thrasher's Wheat -- which has been accurately publishing for over 20 years (far longer than Facebook) -- and then turn around and declare that now you're serious about mis-information.

Afterall, the esteemed New York Times committed the gravest of journalistic sins when "reporter" Judith Miller falsely reported that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction in 2003. This was epic, egregious and massive fake news. So will Facebook also ban the New York Times for policy violations?

As we blogged shortly after 2016 U.S. Election, the only folks who were surprised by the results were those who were mentally entrained into the false bubble realities created by media operations such as Facebook which caused voters to become trapped inside a self reinforcing echo chamber of false facts.

So please do not lash out at those of us who have been consistently right in predicting the future for decades.

Just as a reminder, here's some background on our situation.

Funny, but we've been using our Facebook ID for about 9+ years and never with a problem (aside from that débâcle regarding the Willie Nelson for Nobel Peace Prize for Farm Aid campaign.)

The timing on this suspension was oddly suspicious. Of course, some would say just merely coincidental. We have doubts.

The suspension came shortly after the release of Neil Young + Promise Of The Real's controversial anti-GMO album The Monsanto Years and on the eve of the 1st Leg of the Rebel Content Tour in July. We say synchronicity. Or maybe Mon$anto's good ol' public relations machine put your folks up to it?

Regardless, this disruption of the free flow of Neil Young news has consequences. Your organization imposed a sudden, inexplicable hardship on the rustie community by depriving them of real time critical, tour updates. And it's not nice to fool with all of the good people of Rustdale.

Because all of our inquiries over this suspension have only been responded to with automated robo-algorithm replies, we had no other choice but to pay a visit to your neck of the woods while we were enjoying the 29th Annual Bridge School Benefit Concerts. When we spoke to your representative(s) over the weekend, we made it very clear what we were seeking and what would be acceptable and unacceptable. Very simple and straightforward.

We were very pleased to see after our situation became more widely known, that Facebook relented to a degree with the news: Facebook changes 'Real Name' policy rules after public outcry:

Facebook announced Friday that it is modifying the terms of its oft-criticised "real name" policy which demands users go by their "authentic name" when on the social network rather than a pseudonym. The trans and Native American communities have repeatedly protested the policy, citing its use by trolls as a weapon of harassment. Today's announcement comes in response to an open letter penned by advocacy groups including the EFF and ACLU.

Again, we were pleased by those initial steps, but they were way too little and way too late. Because either we were misunderstood or you were misinformed by your staff. It almost seems you were deliberately fed false information about us. The irony here is delicious we must admit.

When we went to login into our Facebook account upon returning home, we were requested to provide documentation of who we are such as a Government ID like a driver's license or passport.

Facebook - Submitting an ID

Are you serious? Are you kidding us? Is this a joke?

Who in their right mind would provide that type of private, personal information to a corporation like Facebook? As you are well aware, Facebook seems as if it was designed as a glorified identity theft harvesting machine. And if that's not bad enough, hosting fake profiles for scripted and staged mass gun shooting scenes is pretty disgusting.

Oh yeah, that's right, you think we're all just “dumb f*cks”, as you once so famously typed.

Fight for the Future notes:

Mark Zuckerberg once called Facebook users “dumb f*cks” for trusting him with their data. Now he’s trying to take advantage of us. If CISA passes, all your photos, posts, relationships, and likes will have a path to government databases.

Recall:

You see Mr. Z, we're not all “dumb f*cks” around here.

We do NOT trust you. You guys may be trying to take us down by canceling our advertising partnerships, or blocking our ability to run Google Ads, or hacking our Twitter account, or filing fraudulent transactions on our PayPal account, or disrupting the ISP service of our partner WBKM.org and Thrasher's Wheat Radio, or screwing around with our Amazon partner links, or jerking us around about Willie for a Nobel, suspending the Gigs for the Gulf page based on false copyright infringement claims, trying to make exposing environmental crimes a crime, disrupting freedom of speech and assembly, or humiliating and mocking our efforts when we try and stand up, or sending in all sorts of trolls and spammers to disrupt the Neil community, or making exposing a war crime a war crime or blasting us with near Stuxnet-like levels of crippling attacks on our servers, and on & on...

Yeah, yeah, it's all just one big giant conspiracy right, Thrasher? Well, maybe so. But, is that the best you can do?

You see Mark, you can't have it both ways because TANSTAAFL.

Well, we're still here after over 20 years of separating the wheat from the chaff. Guess we must be doing something right to attract this sort of animosity and hostility. But you know, as someone once sang, "the same thing that makes you live, can kill you in the end" ... Afterall, isn't that why God made us?

The Truman Show Ending Scene - The Creator

So what's so funny about Peace, Love, & Understanding & Music anyway?

And, please, don't wear your hoodie or bring your Illumanti friends, we know who they are (see end of clip @ ~2:00 for removal of the hoodie for THE Greatest Moment in Internet History). Not to worry, though. If the sky is fire, then hell is blue, we'll cover you, but it is unlikely we will ever work in this town again. So if you have any suggestions on what we should be doing with our free time aside from bloggin', we're all ears, so to speak, wink. Transparency is a coming with a forecast of greater visibility and sunshine. In the meantime, we plan to continue to keep on bloggin' until the power goes out and our battery's dead.

While Facebook may be able to kill our profile, it will NEVER be able to suppress the spirit of Thrashers Wheat. This aggression will not stand, sir. Just like rock & roll, we will never die. Or perhaps Facebook's A.I. algorithms have finally gone totally rogue?

And speaking of privacy, what's up with all those creepy ads ? Kind of ’Minority Report’-ish, eh?

Like Charlie said:

"Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural!

Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!"

And by the way, we hope you and your folks were able to attend this year's 30th Annual Bridge School Benefit Concerts in October 2016. You know, maybe make a donation and make a difference if you really try. It's a really great concert for a great cause.

Lastly, when your rep asked us why we do what we do, like we told them, we do this for a lot of reasons... love of the music, obviously for one. We do it because it's just the right thing to do for another. We do it for the farmers and Willie and The Boys, of course. You know, make a difference and save the world kind of stuff.

Just as it is not nice to fool with Mother Nature, Thrasher's Wheat can be a harsh mistress. (We're not hiding behind haybales and it's not like we're throwin' rocks at the moon or anything serious. c'mon now. And it's not because of some duality of a Southern Thing thing, either. Or some big shift disclosure.

Just like there really is no dark side of the moon alas -- there are no secrets in life either. There is no secret. There is no mystery. It's all out there to see for those who are aware, conscious and awake and anyone who does not have eyes wide shut.

But really, the bottom line -- The Big Secret -- is that it's all about The Bridge Kids. Seriously.

Mountain View, California - October 24, 2015
Photo by Hounds That Howell - TWR Tour Manager

(BTW, you do know the Secret to a Happy Ending, right?)

So we're not quite ready to make nice just yet. Because to talk without thinking is to shoot without aiming. Someday. Sooner or later, it all gets REAL. So, walk on.

Crowd sourced citizen journalism is here to stay. Free speech and freedom of the press are inalienable human rights which giant corporations can try and suppress yet will naturally fail. The grassroots will eventually discover the real truth which will ultimately lead to the looming "Big Shift". This is inevitable and resistance is futile. Adopt or go extinct. The choice is yours.

As of right now, Thrashers Wheat has no desire to feed the hand that bites us all. But if Facebook should ever dedicate itself to allowing the unrestricted flow of information, we will re-consider allowing our newsfeed to be shared with your customers. In the meantime, thanks for the suspension because it has turned out to be a blessing in disguise by not causing us to become caught up in FB's attempts to manipulate our conscious awareness. Hence, our vigorous defense of our sovereignty and refusal to consent.

Thanks to all for their support, because we love all of our readers and supporters. Rusties are -- without a doubt -- the best souls on the planet (be sure to listen to clip for full verification of this statement). And in case we don't see ya again, good afternoon, good evening, and good night! No fear. Believe. Onward.

namaste,
thrasher & thrashette
ps - ... and you do know who Truman is, right mate? BTW, do you not find it extraordinarily odd that you were named after one of Neil Young's most endearing songs "Sugar Mountain"? (See translation of "Sugar Mountain" from English to German.)

Zuckerberg Translates to "Sugar Mountain"

Now that is just plain weird. Or maybe you were named after the treasure trove of user information that Facebook has accumulated into a veritable "Sugar Mountain" of privacy data.

So who reads open letters anyways? Besides, we're sure that Facebok can handle a bit of criticism. Let's Get Out Of Here!!! and Go HOME. “This too shall pass.”

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