Veteran Support Group Ad Was Blocked For Using The Word Christian: A veteran support group, Mighty Oaks Warriors’, ad was blocked on Youtube and Google simply for using the word “Christain.” This is blatant intolerance, discrimination, and censorship of Christians and it is completely uncalled for. When they changed the word “Christain” to “Muslim” the ad was allowed to run. Tune in now to learn more!

Air Date: 07/29/2019

Guest: Chad Robichaux

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

 

Faith And The Culture

Rick:

Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. This is WallBuilders Live! Where we’re talking about today’s hottest topics on policy, faith, and the culture, always doing that from a Biblical, historical, and Constitutional perspective.

We’re here with David Barton, America’s premier historian and the founder of WallBuilders. And my name is Rick Green. I’m a former Texas state legislator.

  We’re thrilled to have you with us today later in the program we’re going to have a guest who’s ads on Google and YouTube were blocked because of one single word – Christian. Just because Christian was in the keywords, they block his ad said if he would remove that they would let the ad run. Unbelievable. You don’t want to miss that interview.

You also want to visit our website Wallbuilderslive.com because on the website not only can you find out more about us as host of the program, but also you can find out about some past programs. You can go to the archive section there and listen to some Good News Friday programs and Foundations of Freedom Thursday programs. Other great interviews like the one we’re going to have today it’s all available right here at Wallbuilderslive.com.

Support The Program

And of course, I’m going to ask like I do every day because we’re a listener-supported program for you as a listener to support the program. You can do that right there the website click on the Donate button. Make a one time or monthly contribution your dollars helped to fuel this effort to restore America’s Constitution. We appreciate you coming alongside us.

Mighty Oaks Warriors Program

Alright, guys, Chad Robichaux is going to be with us later in the program when we come back from break. Love what Chad does with the Mighty Oaks Warriors program. I mean talk about making a difference in guys.

I mean we know that the horrific statistics – 80%  divorce rate, a couple of dozen suicides a day happening with our vets that are returning. It is a situation that needs attention and needs the right answers. And Mighty Oaksgets phenomenal results with treating PTSD and we love those guys for what they do.

Tim:

Yeah, Chad is good at this because he went through it himself. He was on the verge of divorce. He had a gun in his mouth to kill himself suicide wise. He had all the things he now helps address and helps others overcome. 

Recently there have been statistics that have come out because this is a big issue with veterans; all the suicides divorce etc. They’re looking for solutions, and now outside groups have been measuring the results and what works best. 

Chad And Mighty Oaks Are On Top Of The List

Chad and Mighty Oaks, they’re right at the top of the list with the results they get. It is so much higher than normal clinical secular treatments. The faith-based stuff they’ve done it does change lives; it does save lives. 

I don’t mean that rhetorically I mean physically; it saves lives suicides and whatnot. It saves marriages. So this is a significant ministry that they have got going.

They rely on people helping them. They don’t charge any of the veterans to go to these programs. People donate and they’ve got a gala that they do it in the year and several locations that raise the money where we get to contribute, and we get to give back to the veterans who have given so much for us and save their lives and their marriages and their families.

This is significant stuff that Chad able to do with these guys.

Rick:

Well, let’s take a quick break, we’ll be right back. Chad Robichaux our special guest today. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live. 

Moment From American History

This is David Barton with another moment from America’s history. The key to a self-governing nation is self-governing people. And, the key to personal self-government is to live by the standards in God’s word. If someone cannot control himself by those standards, then our Constitution certainly will be unable to restrain him.

Understanding this, John Adams declared, “We have no government armed with power, capable of continuing with human passions, unbridled morality, and religion. Greed, ambition, revenge, or seduction would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

John Adams believed that successful government rested not upon our great Constitution but rather upon moral and religious people. For more information on God’s hand in American history, contact WallBuilders at 1-800-8-REBUILD.

Chad Robichaux -  Mighty Oaks Programs

Rick:

Welcome back to the intersection of faith and culture. This is WallBuilders Live. 

Thanks for staying with us. Chad Robichaux is back with us from Mighty Oaks programs. We are going to give you the website right up front because everybody listening needs to go to this website, Mightyoasksprograms.org. 

You can both donate right there, and you can sign up for the gala. That’s coming up in just a few weeks.

Chad always good to have you brother. Appreciate your time. Appreciate what you do.

Chad:

Thanks for having me on. I love you guys and know it’s always awesome to be on. 

Rick:

Hey man, you guys do incredible work. We love donating, we love highlighting you guys and just letting people know the good work that you’re doing and of course your annual Warrior gala coming up. This is the ninth one. I can’t believe you’ve been doing it that long already.

We’ve Graduated 20,750 Warriors

Chad:

I know. It’s been just a windstorm of an amazing nine years of doing this and an incredible working we’ve got to do. I’m always keeping track of our stats, and we just broke 100,000 one active-duty warriors who have spoken to our resiliency programs from our legacy program, our recovery program. We just graduated 20,750 warriors. 

Now we are trying to graduate a thousand warriors a year through our program. So it’s just been incredible nine years and so blessed to get to do work. The work that God has called us to to do – to serve our warriors on active duty, and the veteran community as well as spouses and first responders too.

Rick:

A thousand a year.

Chad:

Again, we had two hundred fifty graduates from our legacy program for over nine years, but now we have focused on our infrastructure and our team to be able to push a thousand through without sacrificing our quality. 

So the last two years have just been refining processes and building our team to pull that trigger and fill all our beds up.

We have four ranches in California, Ohio, Virginia, and Texas. With 30 programs a year that’s about a thousand bed-space a year for these programs. So we are at the point right now from infrastructure and capability standpoint so that w can fill in all those slots.

Rick:

That’s amazing too that you’re already grown to four campuses around the country where people can come. Before we go any further on the dinner and all those things, I do want to give out that website because a lot of our listeners are either former military or they certainly have people in their family or people they know. If you’re thinking of somebody right now, as you’re listening that you know it could benefit from one of these programs. We want to encourage you to get on the website to find out how to get them signed up.

You can donate to help make that happen. Chad has all kinds of scholarship programs available where these guys can come for free. You’ll make this possible for people that could not afford it.

The Program Is Free For Veterans

Chad:

No one’s ever paid on that program. Not one warrior or spouse. Two hundred and fifty guys have come through, and we even pay for travel. We’ll pay for the flights to get them wherever they are in the country to the program. 

We do that through the support of the amazing grateful nation and people like you guys to help us get the word out.

Rick:

And you’ve got legacy programs for men and women right?

Chad:

Yeah. We do them separately. We do men’s programs and the women’s programs. Out of those 27, most of them are for men. We had four women’s programs last year. Not because we like men any more than women. 

You Can Apply Online Via The Website

We are just responding to demand. We feel like meeting the request of all the applicants. For those of you who want to apply just got our website on, mightyoaksprograms.org. You can click the apply button the top left-hand corner. 

It’s a super simple application. One of our team members gets back to you, go over dates and get you scheduled for the program. 

Tackling The Suicide And Divorce Issues Our Veterans Face

Rick:

And one of the things that you guys, of course, obviously the suicide rate has been atrocious and you guys have tackled that in an amazing way but also the divorce issue. Eighty-percent divorce rates when they’re coming home. You guys also have a marriage advance that has also been extremely successful and a major part of your focus.

Marriage Advance with Family Life

Chad:

 Yeah, we partnered two years ago with Family Life. Instead of just trying to do two marriage camps a year, our demand for it got too big. We realized that we’re good at dealing with PTSD, dealing with helping people in our core legacy program. We weren’t able to provide good marriage programs beyond what we were capable of. 

So we partnered with Family Life. For the graduates of our legacy program, we scholarship families to go to Family Life’s weekend to remember.

They’re going through that lobby, and they’re being mentored by our after-care program. It’s just a great tool for us to use. Family Life is one of the best at this. 

We’ve been able to quadruple the number of couples that we serve, so it has been the right decision for us. We’ve had some great successes out of that partnership.

It’s Staggering Results

Rick:

Oh, man, I love it.

That is a great partnership to have. We love the folks of Family Life. I’m thrilled that you’re doing that, you have been able to reach that many more men by quadrupling. 

That’s a fantastic increase.  

You always throw out these stats and these results that you guys are getting like yeah it’s OK, but it’s staggering. It’s incredible. 

God has blessed you guys with phenomenal results. 

Texas Gala Dinner

So let’s talk about dinner. People could donate, of course, all-year-round, but the dinners are a neat time if you can sponsor a table. I mean even if you can’t go you can sponsor and be a part of that. And as usual Chad, it’s not enough for you to have you know one celebrity or one cool person there. You’ve got two incredible speakers. 

Chad Prather is going to MC, and then you’ve got Dan Crenshaw. I love this guy. You guys are going to have an incredible evening.

Congressman Dan Crenshaw

Chad:

Congressman Crenshaw is incredible. Not only is he a congressman, but he is also exactly what our country needs right now; the leadership that he is bringing a table and his youthful energy and he’s a brilliant guy. 

I love the way every bill or legislation they’re proposing, he gets on there and educates the American people on what they’re going to be voting on, why and why he’s voting the way he’s doing. 

He is just a credible servant leader and taking his service to a whole other level, and I mean his background: U.S. Navy SEAL(retired), multiple deployments. 

I think he had four deployments and then served two more deployments, or maybe three and then two more deployments after he lost his eye. He is an incredible warrior. And we were so blessed to have him come in and speak at speaking our gala. Just really looking forward to it.

Rick:

Yeah, it’s going to be an amazing night. We’re trying to clear our schedule we want to go. Of course, love supporting you guys and love what you do. 

Again I want to emphasize, folks that can’t necessarily attend the dinner from around the country. This is a great time to donate. 

If you are in the Houston area or anywhere in Texas and can make the trip there, (it’s going to be a) phenomenal evening. 

This is November sixteenth, that’s a Saturday night. Chad, you’ll be there and then Dan Crenshaw, Chad Prather. It’s kind of like the Chad night with Dan squished in the middle there.

Chad Prather

Chad:

Get ready! That’s hilarious. I’ve been a regular on The Blaze show several times. 

He’s so funny. He’s such a patriot he loves America’s warriors. He loves the military and has a huge heart for those warriors who are struggling. 

As you said, he’s had me on a show twice and immediately became a friend and advocated for us. I think he’ll make the night. We talk about some deep things at our gala. We are not just raising money. We’re giving all of our supporters an update on what we’ve done with last year’s resources and what we plan to do. 

It can get deep sometimes, and we get personal testimony. So I think Chad will make light of it and make it a great time bringing smiles to people’s faces. 

Sign-Up For The Gala

Rick:

Now it’s going to be fantastic, no doubt about it. Mightyoaksprograms.org and then you can click on there, they’ve got a link right there on the home page for the gala. 

But if you go straight there, it’s https://www.mightyoaksprograms.org/txgala/. 

You can get there and sign up to either donate for that night or go and get your table and take some folks for a phenomenal evening. It will encourage you in an incredible way, and it will be a great way to give back.

J.P. Lane Will Be There As Well

Chad:

One more thing ho else is going to be there. U.S. Army Afghanistan veteran named J.P. Lane.  J.P. is a double amputee who lost both his legs from an IED, had a traumatic brain injury and almost lost his arm as well. He picked up the guitar start playing it played it, both at President Obama and President Trump’s inaugurations and the national anthem in a song. He’s going to be there doing the national anthem as well. So shout out to him, J.P. Lane. He’s from Texas.

Rick:

All right, it’s going be a great night!

Now you were putting out the word on this on Facebook and YouTube.

We always hear about people who haven’t been censored by a major outlet like that or been what we call throttled or blocked whenever they put a post out. They think we make this stuff up sometimes I think. 

Here we are talking about one of the best things in the world that you could give to a program, that’s given back to our veterans making an incredible difference. 

They blocked you. They wouldn’t let you advertise for specifically having one word in your advertisement.

We Got Blocked Because Of The Word Christian

Chad: 

The word, by the way, is Christian. I’ll tell you in a  little bit of how we got there. I mean we have to run ads, we’re a big organization. We have the solution to this PTSD problem, the suicide problem. Outreach for us is very important. 

We don’t just serve the active-duty community, but the veterans are spread out around country so the ads we run are really important. Like any other business, we have to do targeted marketing, or you watered down your message to people who don’t care about it. 

To advertise on Google, YouTube, Facebook, all these platforms when you target market, you use keywords. Those keywords help you reach the people you’re trying to reach. So for us, keywords might be like: veteran, military, PTSD, suicide, Christian because we’re a Christian organization. 

We’ve been using the word Christian, our keyword, for years now. This year in January first, I looked it up; we had over 150,000 impressions in our advertising with the word Christian used. 

Last Sunday, we tried to run an ad, and it got rejected. If you want to go on social media, you can see that I took a screenshot of it. It said ‘unauthorized use of keywords,’ to improve the ad we need to remove the word, Christian.

We Added The Keyword Muslim, And The Ad Was Approved And Run

Of course, we reached out to customer service. They said this is the new restrictions they have. And so we tried to run the ad with the word. The only thing we changed or add was to replace the word Christian with Muslim, and the ad was approved and ran. 

Not that Muslims shouldn’t be approved. I think every religious group about to be reached through keyword advertising. But Christian should too equally, right? 

This is dangerous stuff. This censorship should be to terrify every single American whether you’re conservative liberal or Christian or Muslim. 

This Is As Blatant As It Gets In Terms Of Discrimination

This is a road that America does not want to go down. We wanted to speak up. I think right now in less than 24 hours we have a post on Twitter and we had over a million impressions on Twitter. So it’s caught fire, and people care about this issue. And they should. 

Rick: 

No doubt they should. This is brilliant on your part to then run the second ad to prove that this wasn’t some mistake this wasn’t some accident. I mean just the word, Christian. 

I mean this is as blatant as it gets in terms of discrimination. This is the word the Liberals like to use censorship. I mean this is scary and for them to do this. They haven’t even backed off even with the pressure so far with this many people finding out about it. They still haven’t changed their mind.

Chad:

Now YouTube responded to my tweet. The YouTube team did. They said it’s not the case. That they don’t do that. They do not censor that word which they did. So I took a screenshot of it. Then they said a double statement which I was trying to decipher that they don’t allow you to target religious groups which is not true. 

Because we have the statue on two fronts: one that we had for years including up until a month ago maybe two weeks ago,  hundreds of thousand impressions this year through the word Christian alone on our ads. 

So they have allowed us to do it. Also, they are allowing us to do it with the word Muslims, so what they’re saying is not true. 

Being a Christian, you could be the most unpolitical person in the world, but if you’re a Christian with Christian conservative values, you get put in a group: right-side political group and you’re treated as such. 

Right-side Christians Are Collateral Damage To This Political Divide

Mighty Oaks Foundation is not a political organization. We’re a ministry. We’re called to serve the broken heart, to reach them, and that’s why we’re trying to do. Ourselves and many Americans become collateral damage to this political debate and political divide. 

To me, this is not Google or Facebook’s place to do this. It is harmful. They’re the biggest platform in the world. 

This is the confusion that people run into.  People are saying it’s a private company, it’s a private free platform. You could choose to be there or not to. Maybe most Americans might say well I use Facebook because it’s free, I go on YouTube it’s free. They don’t exist to give you a free platform, and they exist because they’re an advertising company.

Their revenue is through advertising. They have professed and advertise themselves, even before Congress, to be an unbiased public platform to sell advertising. So we’re the customer, we’re paying them for advertising, and they claim to be balanced and unbiased, but that’s not true.

They are when they allow one religious group to do one thing and another not to do something else. This is discrimination and is also deceptive trade practices.

Rick:

I remember the first time we had you on the program, your whole story, why your program is so effective is because of the faith-base. It’s because of the Christian values that you teach. It was what saved you and saved your marriage. They are saying, take away the most important piece of your ministry for us to advertise for you.

We Need To Do Target Marketing To Reach These Veterans

Chad:

Yeah. I mean any company that’s going to advertise needs to do target marketing. Again, they are not going to have their marketing watered-down. Otherwise, there’s not going to have an impact. 

This is marketing 101. We need to target market one. Maybe we’re not reaching Christian veterans, but we need to reach a Christian demographic and bring our message to say, hey this is a resource to the Christian community to reach these veterans that are struggling in it. 

Also, to reach veterans, the majority of our support and financial support to run these programs for free for tens of thousands of veterans comes through the Christian community.

For us, not to be able to target and keyword target, the word Christian is crippling to our marketing strategy. We have to pay for advertising just like anyone else in this. This is like putting a sign outside your restaurant saying no Muslims allowed or no-no blacks allowed outside of your restaurant. 

They are a private business, but you know they should not be discriminating, particularly when they have a monopoly on the social marketing industry.

Rick:

Well yeah, because they get government protections and favor based on them being neutral and not doing this kind of thing. For them to do it is what Ted Cruz has been at them for over a year. 

I mean Chad, first of all, thank you, thank you, thank you for all that you do. Thanks for having the brilliance.

 I thank God that He gave you the discernment and the brilliance to handle this the way that you are. It’s highlighting a very deep problem that needs to be solved. But in the midst of all of that, we are thankful that it’s bringing attention to Mighty Oaks and your dinner that’s coming up. 

We Can Help Spread The Word Via Social Media

We want to help overcome the discrimination and bias from these social media platforms by getting the word out. We want to encourage people is to go to Chad’s Facebook page and just shared it on your Facebook page. We’ll do that on WallBuilders Live Facebook page there as well. But what people can do to punch back here is to share your post and by sharing your post, it helps overcome the blocking of the advertising, right?

I Want To Pressure Them To Do The Right Thing

Chad: 

That’s right.

We want to share this message, and we want to make this important enough or big enough issue that they’ll change. 

Look, I’m not trying to crucify anyone here. I’m not a politician or Congressman. I’m not Senator Cruz. I’m trying to pressure them into making doing much right. 

We’ve already had three lawyers say hey let’s do a crowdfunding campaign. Let’s sue them. People want to raise money for us for our revenue lost. I’ve said no to all those things. I don’t want to sue Google. I don’t want to fundraise and be opportunistic of this. I want what’s right to be done and allow them to do that.

Rick:

Well, let’s make it happen, man. Chad, always a blessing. Tell Kathy hi from everybody on our team. We love you guys and hopefully see you in November. 

We’re going to make that link available to all our folks right now. God bless you, brother. We’ll talk to you soon.

Chad:

God bless you, guys. Thanks so much for having me on. See you in November.

Rick:

Looking forward to it, Chad. November is going to be amazing. Thanks for everything that you’re doing. 

Stay with us folks; we’re just going to take a quick break. We’ll be right back. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

We Want To Hear Your Vet Story

Rick:

Hey friends! If you have been listening to WallBuilders Live for very long at all, you know how much we respect our veterans and how appreciative we are of the sacrifice they make to make our freedoms possible. One of the ways that we love to honor those veterans is to tell their stories here on WallBuilders Live.  Once in a while, we get an opportunity to interview veterans that have served on those front lines that have made incredible sacrifices have amazing stories that we want to share with the American people. 

One of the very special things we get to do is interview World War II veterans. You’ve heard those interviews here on WallBuilders Live, from folks that were in the Band of Brothers, to folks like Edgar Harrell that survived the Indianapolis to so many other great stories you heard on WallBuilders Live. 

You have friends and family that also served.  If you have World War II veterans in your family that you would like to have their story shared here on WallBuilders Live, please e-mail us at [email protected].  Give us a brief summary of the story, and we’ll set up an interview. Thanks so much for sharing here on WallBuilders Live!

Rick:

Welcome back to WallBuilders Live. Thanks for staying with us today. Very special thanks to Chad Robichaux for joining us today.

Again Mario’s Warriors program, just an incredible organization to support their dinner. Coming up in November is a great time to support them but really throughout the year. Of course, if you’re a military veteran and you’d like to know more about what they offer, go to their website today. We’re going to have easy links today at Wallbuilderslive.com. 

They had their four campuses across the country, and incredible programs really encourage folks to check them out. 

We appreciate you listened today to WallBuilders Live. This a program that doesn’t happen without your support. So if you’d be willing to go to our website today at Wallbuilderslive.com and click on that donate button and make a one-time contribution, we would certainly appreciate that. 

Also, I want to encourage you to take some steps at home, in your community to further this cause. What I mean by that is you get to be a warrior on the frontlines of freedom, being part of restoring America’s constitutional republic. This is not something that’s going to happen because one person gets elected to a particular office; whether that’s Congress or even if it’s President or if they’re appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

This is going to happen because of millions of citizens just like you just like me getting engaged in the process. 

Support Our Programs

You can do that by becoming a constitution coach, teaching the Constitution in your local community. We will train you on how to do that we will get you all the tools that you need. 

You can do that by sponsoring students to attend Patriot Academy where they come to a legislative simulation where they learn how to lead in a legislative process. But that’s just a leadership laboratory, and they’re learning how to lead in every area of the culture. 

You can also sponsor pastors to attend our pastors’ briefings in Washington, D.C. An opportunity for them to rediscover the Christian roots of America and the role of Christians and pastors in making America great. There are so many different ways that you can be a part of this. 

Two websites that you need to go to today if you want to plug-in: WallBuilders.com that’s our main web site. That’s where you can get all kinds of information, free downloads. Lots of great things there at the website and also where you can buy the tools that you need to equip yourself and your family, your church, your community whether it’s our Constitution-class or some of the other curriculum “€” all kinds of great things available there at WallBuilders. 

Then Wallbuilderslive.com as I mentioned a while ago that’s where you can contribute but also want to encourage you to go there and grab today’s program and share it with your friends and family. 

Just grab that link shared on Facebook on Twitter. People need to know what’s happening and they need to know to support the Mighty Oaks Warriors program. They also need to know about the censorship that’s taking place from Facebook and Google and YouTube and the others.

W need to stop it. We’ve got to put an end to this. We’ve got to make sure that our free speech, our first amendment rights can be exercised. That we have a voice out there in the community, that we don’t turn into this Orwellian society where only certain things are allowed to be said. All that’s available for you at WallBuilders.com and Wallbuilderslive.com.

Thanks so much for listening today. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders Live.