YouTube Becoming Undhimmified?

Doubtful. More likely they have just bowed to the inevitable regarding the anti-Islam film Fitna (Arabic for "chaos" or "strife"), created and released by far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders.

The YouTube "community" is infested with pro-jihadi propagandists, who have found a sympathetic home at YouTube. Organized "flagging" parties quickly get pro-Western videos moved into the "Confirm Birthdate" category, usually within a couple hours of the videos appearance on YouTube. Any excuse that the YouTube team subsequently can find to delete the counter-terrorist messages is seized upon immediately.

By contrast, gruesome pro-terrorist videos, clearly violating YouTube's stated terms of service, remain untouched by YouTube staffers month after month. This, even when the films are repeatedly flagged by pro-Western YouTube users.

So YouTube tried their standard tactics with Fitna. After uploading the first part of Wilders' video to my YouTube account I received this email from Youtube:

Dear Member:
After being flagged by members of the YouTube community and reviewed by YouTube staff, the video below has been removed due to its inappropriate nature.

Fitna Part One: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf9L8SK6Kko

This is the second video removal notice for your account—if you receive one more, your account will be permanently disabled and all of your previously uploaded videos will be taken down.

Please refer to our Terms of Use, Community Guidelines, and the Help Center for more information on what video material is not permitted on YouTube.

- The YouTube Team

Then it seems, cooler heads prevailed (or calculated the PR implications):

[#257711448] Re: Video Removed: Inappropriate Content‏
From: YouTube Support (support@youtube.com)
You may not know this sender.Mark as safe|Mark as unsafe
Sent: Thu 3/27/08 8:36 PM
To: support@youtube.com

This email is to inform you that a warning notification you may have received regarding content removed from your account was sent in error.The content has not been removed and your account has not been penalized. We apologize for any confusion this may have caused. Sincerely, The YouTube Team

There wasn't any confusion on my part, YouTube. You thought that your routine censorship of videos critical of Islamism would go pretty much unremarked, as usual.

Unfortunately for the dhimmis heading up YouTube, Wilders' Fitna seems to be an unstoppable force.

One of my co-bloggers, Howie at The Jawa Report, experienced the same when his YouTube account was suspended, then reinstated after he uploaded Fitna.