Social media giant Facebook has deleted thousands of German accounts ahead of the German national election next month, in a major crack down on facilitators of "fake news".

The nature of Facebook's political power is on display in Germany, where the company has started deleting thousands of Facebook accounts in advance of elections there, lest they be used to spread "disinformation." Chris Tomlinson reports in Breitbart :

Around ten thousand "fake accounts" were taken down by the company who claimed to have done so in order to protect users from "disinformation" ahead of next month's national election. The mass-banning of accounts is the latest crackdown by the company on what they deem to be the spread of "fake news", Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports.

This tweet exposes the doubly disturbing nature of the move:

Germany Threatens to Sue Facebook Because They Aren't Deleting Posts the Government Dislikes Fast Enough https://t.co/Hsv1XZIClY pic.twitter.com/ekU53unmyn — Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 17, 2016

While it is already alarming enough that one media company is the source of a substantial share of the news consumption of any nation, it is even more disturbing when the company links with a regime to do its bidding in suppressing information the regime disfavors.

And when that nation is Germany, which taught the world lessons about the dangers of a regime in control of its media, it is downright alarming.

Needless to say, the move to censor viewpoints no doubt is being done in the name of “tolerance” and “diversity.” Just as Orwell predicted.