Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
By Larry Keane
Vincent Hancock did it again. The 35-year-old won the Men’s Skeet Olympic gold medal, breaking a wildly-impressive 58 out of 60 clay targets and edging out his fellow teammate, competitor and student, Connor Prince, by just one shot.
Hancock became a four-time Olympic gold champion in his sport, having previously earned Olympic gold medals in 2008, 2012, and 2021. He is the only skeet shooter to take home an Olympic gold medal more than once.
That should earn him some accolades. Maybe something like a Google-doodle. Don’t count on it, though. The Big Tech overlords celebrated in a much more sinister fashion. Meta shut him down. No Facebook. No Instagram. No celebrations of American shooting gold.
Big Tech Poor Sports
Just last week, NSSF highlighted the Big Tech bias against the USA Shooting, when YouTube and Meta shadow-banned McKenna Geer, a Paralympic shooter who will represent Team USA in Paris for the 2024 Paralympics.
“I have always feared the day the media would censor my sport and speech just because I use firearms,” Greer wrote on Instagram after her account was blocked. “That day has finally come.”
Geer even wrote that athletes like her in the shooting sports rely in social media to spread the word not just about their sport but also about firearm safety.
That wasn’t good enough for Meta. Just the News reported, “According to the Instagram notification, Geer’s account and the three flagged posts are not recommended to non-followers. ‘Your account and content won’t appear in places like Explore, Search, Suggested Users, Reels, and Feed Recommendations,’ the Instagram notification reads. The notification also tells Geer to consider editing her profile and either edit or remove the flagged posts. Geer said her Instagram account says that she ‘should have the option to appeal the decision,’ but the button to appeal it doesn’t work.”
NSSF isn’t alone in noting Big Tech’s silent treatment of the shooting sports. Tim Rupli authored an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal noting that Meta is censoring Olympic athletes. He quoted Kelly Reisdorf, USA Shooting’s CEO saying, “By silencing an athlete’s voice, you infringe not only on their freedom of expression but subtly on their right to bear arms as well, as these platforms are critical for educating and sharing the legitimate and safe use of firearms in sport.”
Target: Shooting Sports
Now, Hancock is getting similar treatment. It’s not that Hancock’s achievements aren’t noteworthy. Hancock joined an elite group of U.S. Olympians when he broke his final clay and clinched his most recent gold medal.
USA Shooting celebrated the achievement, noting in a press release that, “Hancock, of Eatonton, Georgia, is now the sixth Olympian ever to win four gold medals in the same event, joining Al Oerter (USA, discus), Paul Elvstrom (Denmark, sailing one-person class), Carl Lewis (USA, long jump), Michael Phelps (USA, 200m individual medley), and Mijain Lopez (Cuba, Greco-Roman heavyweight). He is the first shooting Olympian to accomplish this feat.”
Hancock is one of the most decorated shooting sports competitors of all time. He’s brought home 29 medals from a variety of world competitions, including the 2008 Beijing Olympics, 2012 London Olympics, 2020 Tokyo Olympics and now the 2024 Paris Olympics. That’s on top his medal-worthy performances at the World Championships, Pan American Games and World Cup Finals. He’s a U.S. Army veteran, having served with the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit.
USA Shooting also noted that the first-and-second place finishes from Hancock and Prince also marked another “first” for the U.S. Olympic team.
“Hancock and Prince’s double podium marks the first time the U.S. has earned more than one medal in Men’s Skeet at an Olympic Games,” USA Shooting’s press release stated. “The was also the first time more than one U.S. athlete competed in an Olympic Men’s Skeet final.”
Hancock’s fourth Olympic gold medal was celebrated by The Guardian, a notoriously antigun United Kingdom publication. NPR – no friend to lawful firearm ownership – also headlined his achievement. ESPN, with its own antigun bias, also praise the victory.
Meta, instead gave Hancock their own salute. It was the same one they gave Geer just weeks ago.
“Your account and content won’t appear in places like Explore, Search, Suggested Users, Reels, and Feed Recommendations,” his Instagram page reads.
Meta and Google got the media spotlight treatment after they wrongly claimed that photos of former President Donald Trump raising his fist in the moments after an assassination attempt were “being marked as digitally altered” and censored. When they got caught in that censorship scheme, they quickly beat feet to reverse their policy, admitting that incorrect fact checks were being applied to the now-famous photo.
“Facebook has just admitted that it wrongly censored the Trump ‘attempted assassination photo,’ and got caught. Same thing for Google,” Fox News reported that former President Trump wrote on his proprietary social media platform Truth Social. “They made it virtually impossible to find pictures or anything about this heinous act. Both are facing BIG BACKLASH OVER CENSORSHIP CLAIMS.”
Big Tech Bias
NSSF has steadfastly held that Big Tech and social media giants hold hostile attitudes toward the lawful use of firearms. They’ve defunded YouTube channels and censored small businesses, even when ads didn’t have anything to do with firearms.
The firearm and ammunition industry has more than a few instances of documented antigun bias by social media companies. There’s a love-hate relationship with the social media platforms. They’ve become so ubiquitous that it’s nearly impossible to reach customers without them. NSSF has argued they’ve become the virtual public square, where people from every walk of life can not only see pictures and video of friends and family, but express ideas, debate topics and participate in civic discourse. That is, of course, if they’re allowed.
Olympic athletes like Hancock, Prince and Geer have taken their sport to the world stage and show what safe and responsible firearm ownership looks like. They demonstrate a competitive spirit, the ethos of Olympic competition and the American values for respect of rights and freedom.
They just can’t talk about it on their social media platforms.
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