They Don’t Need To Ban The Canary If They Can Debank It

Right, so The Canary has just been debanked and this is something that should raise immediate alarm bells with all of us.An independent media outlet has just had its banking services withdrawn. A fundraiser is now being launched to help keep it going, and I’m covering this because when an independent media organisation is financially cut off like this, we are looking at something much bigger than one outlet having a bad week with a bank, because we’ve seen too much of this going on, certainly at individual levels, but this is a whole other ball game and as independent media as well, this could literally happen to any of us, hence the importance of those who support us and as such we support each other too.Obviously, facts matter here. The appeal process depends on them being known, but the democratic issue, much easier to talk about at this early stage ought to be obvious already.Debanking means a bank or payment provider withdraws financial services from you. That can mean an account closed. It can mean payments blocked. It can mean access disrupted. It can mean donation routes interrupted. It can mean the basic financial plumbing of an organisation suddenly stops working properly. Think what it would mean to you to find yourself in a position where you had no access to money. What would you do?And for a media outlet, that is the same only amplified. That is survival.