Pure Passion, a ministry committed to helping people find “healing from sexual brokenness of every kind,” recently lost the ability to host their videos on the popular platform Vimeo. The site pulled the ministry’s entire catalog of over 850 videos.
Foster first received an email from Vimeo in December alerting him that some of Pure Passion’s video’s violated their content standards. At his request, Foster received a list of four videos which transgressed Vimeo’s rules against discriminatory content. While the videos in question represented less than one percent of the ministry’s content, they were sufficient for them to lose their entire library.
Vimeo stated their reasoning in an email to Foster, saying, “Your statement equating homosexuality to ‘sexual brokenness’ betrays the underlying stance of your organization. To put it plainly, we don’t believe that homosexuality requires a cure and we don’t allow videos on our platform that espouse this point of view. We also consider this basic viewpoint to display a demeaning attitude toward a specific group, which is something that we do not allow.”
Foster has few options to appeal the decision since Vimeo is privately owned. World Magazine reported that Foster reached out to Christian legal organizations, but they mainly focus on cases involving government censorship.
Foster wrote a lengthy post on Pure Passion’s Facebook page comparing Vimeo’s actions to Big Brother from George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984. He also addressed the charge that the videos were demeaning to homosexuals. “You are misrepresenting our ministry and outreach to sexually broken people. We are kind, respectful and helpful to everyone who comes to us for help. We are not demeaning to anyone in any way, nor is the gospel of Jesus Christ demeaning to homosexuals.”
Publication date: March 31, 2017
