Meryl Dorey and her anti-vaccine organisation: abusing Facebook's reporting mechanism with spite

The soon to be ex-Australian Vaccination Network has an extended history of hypocrisy. The duplicitous anti-vaccination organisation heralds itself as a champion of the oppressed; a defender of “health freedom”; a campaigner against the suppression of free speech. Calls to arms and ACTION ALERTS along these very lines have been lucrative. They are like trigger words for the hypnotised marks of the organisation. Help us help you…Your freedom isn’t free…If you don’t stand up and donate you will be the arbiter of your own suppression…Fight government blackshirts…They are conspiring to take away your freedom…the SAVN terrorists are coming…Donate now…

From September 2012, Dorey doing god’s work, or something. Not that she’s anything like Jesus. This example is by no means rare:

And, another common clarion call, supporting her regular pleas for other people’s money:

Censorship is NEVER acceptable! – Meryl Dorey April 2012

Dorey even went so far in her freedom rhetoric to dupe the University of Wollongong’s Professor Brian Martin into defending her attack on children’s health. Writing an article for Dorey’s now defunct cash-cow/magazine, in a 2011 article (that link goes to the UoW online publications…well played, champs) titled Debating Vaccination, Martin – the now former AVN member – wrote this. It could not be more breathtaking that he was not saying this in Dorey’s ear; but, directing it at Dorey’s critics:

It is interesting, then, that Martin doesn’t shine his freedom torch squarely at Dorey and her organisation. In a previous period of frantic and vicious censorship Dorey relied on abusing the DMCA take-down mechanism, publicly admitting to fraudulently reporting over 50 posts for copyright infringement, under penalty of perjury. Read that again: 50 posts. She did this purely to censor her critics. She did not own the copyright. The posts were overwhelmingly public Facebook posts. And she bragged about in her own 2011  blog post:

But Dorey has form abusing other reporting mechanisms to reach her goal of the censorship of her legitimate critics. As seen in her own admission she freely reports posts for abuse. In Dorey’s world, remember, “abuse” generally means “disagrees with me”.

In my recent post I included another conspiratorial Dorey admission, tucked away amongst other nasty admissions that AVN supporters strive for censorship by intentionally marking unfavourable posts as spam:

Meryl Dorey: To add insult to injury, I reported about 10 posts from SAVN that actually ARE abusive. Facebook rejected all of the reports! It is obvious that SAVN has an inside track to Facebook. I wish there was an alternative but Google + is unworkable and there just don’t seem to be any other good social networking sites as of yet. Any coders want to start a Facebook alternative?

Liz Turner: That’s okay Meryl Dorey. I will play their game too. I’ve reported all of Hank’s wordpress posts (since the blog I posted was also a wordpress blog). Shouldn’t take too long for his to disappear either. Screw them!

Even only a few months ago Dorey was actively using the latest AVN tactic: censoring critics by reporting any and all Facebook comments that use a full or partial name.

This tactic is especially unsavoury. Nothing is off-limits. If you mention a name, even in courtesy, you can be reported. For this, your comment will be deleted by Facebook, and you will receive an instant 12 hour ban from Facebook. The AVN and its acolytes know this. And, they have been going to town, even provoking conversation only to come back and report comments.

Here is a comment Dorey reported in September, 2013, having the commenter banned:

And here is another from September, with the same outcome:

Dorey has been playing dumb over the latest round of reporting. However, she is clearly one of the instigators, her acolytes following her ethics to the letter.

Only one week ago today Law Professor Dorit Reiss wrote eloquently on this latest abuse of Facebook’s algorithm:

It seems obvious, but apparently it’s not: getting someone banned from Facebook for posting polite, factual comments you disagree with is a problematic tactic. If that’s what you have to resort to, it means that you have no credible arguments. It also reflects badly on your debating ethics.

But that’s what some anti-vaccine activists have chosen to do. And they’re proud of it.

In the week since Professor Reiss wrote that article the reporting abuse has continued. In the short period following Dorey’s reports, above, the AVN acolytes started using the tactic. From September:

Remembering that each of these reports are meant to be for violating Facebook’s community standards. Read each of them and make up your own mind.  Remember that each of these reports results in a 12 hour ban from Facebook, for the user. Now, add to this deceit that this campaign of censorship is orchestrated, so that comments from months ago are found and reported in a timely fashion coinciding for the moment when a user’s 12 hour ban is over. One user has had multiple bans, reported at one per day, so he has not had continual access to his account for over a week.

This is not a petty Facebook squabble. This is an orchestrated campaign of censorship being waged by a Health Service Provider and Charitable Fundraising Authority holder who maintains a steady cash flow of donations due, in part, to its standing as a defender of the freedom of speech. It screeches loud for its own free speech. It doesn’t even whisper in the defence of others’ rights to the same. In fact, it carries out that which it purports to despise. And it doesn’t even break a sweat.

Here is a list of banned comments. This list is not extensive. Not all banned users retained a copy of their Facebook notification. If you have one which doesn’t appear here, and it is genuinely not abusive, link to it in the comments.

All of these comments are from the last two weeks:

So, Happy New Year.

In the words of Meryl Dorey and her band of brazen hypocrites at the Australian Vaccination Network:

May everyone be happy, healthy, filled with abundance and free to speak 

She really said that.

Update January 1 2014

This brand new banned comment is the first ban of 2014. It was reported by an Australian Vaccination Network supporter on the AVN Facebook page:

Breaking her silence on this very issue, Dorey has today commented on the AVN Facebook page, declaring – in the overwhelming face of concrete evidence against her, from only a portion of her own admissions as seen in this blog post – that she is unaware of such practices of deceitful, nasty, petty censorship. Dorey then goes on to strongly advocate that her acolytes carry out the very practices she employs, yet somehow denies: she tells her followers to “Report posts that use your name without your permission”. I don’t know whether to cry, or stand and applaud such a grand set of testicles as possessed by this person:

More general reported comments which have resulted in bans for commenters:

Update January 2 2014

Update January 3 2014

From a few months ago, this abusive comment:

Update January 6 2014

This resulted in the Facebook banning of a user who was trying to organise events surrounding her father’s death: