In late July, the Twitter hashtag “#boycotthulu” was trending. The boycott effort concerned how Hulu rejected abortion ads from Democrats. Ultimately, the streaming company relented and agreed to run ads, but many on the left made it seem as if Hulu’s earlier refusal had been unprecedented. Liberals claimed censorship because Hulu did not want to accept money to run their ads. But Hulu was not picking sides: it would not accept money from conservatives to run similar ads.
In recent years, social media companies have made similar decisions as Hulu – but these decisions received different coverage because they affected only conservatives. In 2020, Facebook took similar actions as Hulu. Facebook banned political ads one week before the election and after the election. The ban was content-neutral. Facebook did not see an uproar from its decision as Hulu later did. Studies have found that Facebook ads benefit Republicans more, so liberals might have not cared or may have even welcomed the ban, figuring it could help them.
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