Posted on 04/21/2020 7:24:11 AM PDT by Kaslin
Facebook didn't provide much confidence in its ability to navigate the uncharted waters of a pandemic in the age of Big Tech on Monday.
Experiencing a pandemic on the scale of the Wuhan coronavirus in the age of Big Tech is a journey into uncharted territory, making the industry’s often cozy relationship with the political class a recipe for new abuses of personal data and speech policing. Facebook didn’t provide much confidence in its ability to navigate these waters on Monday.
At first, the company seemed to be bragging about its work with state governments to remove posts promoting protests of lockdown guidelines. After state governments disputed that characterization, Facebook said it had only consulted the local officials for information on the scope of their guidelines.
On Monday evening, a Facebook company spokesperson clarified the platform’s approach to The Federalist. “Unless government prohibits the event during this time, we allow it to be organized on Facebook,” they said. “For this same reason, events that defy government’s guidance on social distancing aren’t allowed on Facebook.”
Speaking on background, the Facebook source added, “We review content about the protests against our policies and whether the protest calls for social distancing where that is required. We require protests to make calls for social distancing clear in their event in states where that is required for protests.”
“State officials can contact us to inform us on their guidance as it relates to social distancing in their state,” they continued. “We reached out to state officials to understand the scope of their orders, not about removing specific protests on Facebook.”
Several news outlets reported early Monday that a Facebook spokesperson sent a statement claiming the company removed posts that promoted quarantine protests from its website at the direction of state governments.
Here’s what ABC News reported: “A Facebook spokesperson says that the company has taken action to remove anti-quarantine events promoted on the website in California, Nebraska and New Jersey after consultation with state governments who said the events violate their respective state stay-at-home orders, ABC News’ Alexander Mallin reports.” (Emphasis added.)
Here’s what Politico reported: “The world’s largest social network has already removed protest messages in California, New Jersey and Nebraska from its site at the urging of state governments who say those events are prohibited by stay-at-home orders, a company spokesperson said.”
Politico’s original headline, captured by the Wayback Machine, was explicit: “Facebook shuts down anti-quarantine protests at states’ request.”
State officials disputed the assertion they “urg[ed]” Facebook to take down the posts. Facebook did not argue. To the contrary, Andy Stone, the Facebook spokesperson quoted in the original reports, tweeted “to clarify that Facebook reached out to state officials to understand the scope of their stay-at-home orders, not about removing any specific protest events from Facebook.”
Just want to clarify that Facebook reached out to state officials to understand the scope of their stay-at-home orders, not about removing any specific protest events from Facebook.
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) April 20, 2020
As the day unfolded, officials from the governor’s offices in New Jersey and Nebraska confirmed they cooperated with Facebook’s request for information about their state’s guidelines but strongly denied asking for any posts to be removed. That comports with the clarification Facebook offered later on Monday.
So what happened? This could be a case of an innocuously misleading statement fueling confusion with unclear wording. It could be a case of Facebook deliberately misleading the public in order to provide some cover for a controversial decision. It could be a case of sloppy reporting.
The answer lies in Stone’s original statement to media, the full text of which The Federalist has requested from the company, but has not received by publication time. It seems unlikely that several outlets would contemporaneously run stories explicitly based on the same misinterpretation of Facebook’s statement. Even if that were the case, Facebook would almost certainly be eager to provide its original statement and shed the blame.
It’s reasonable to assume, then, that Facebook’s statement mislead the media about its conversations with state governments, grossly overstating the states’ involvement in their decision, perhaps to legitimize a controversial move. That assumption is supported by Stone’s retweet of a CNN reporter who said the company removed event posts “after consultation with state governments,” which would be a strange move if the post grossly misinterpreted his statement.
Of course, it’s good news that Facebook isn’t colluding with the government to determine the boundaries of acceptable speech on its platform. But Facebook either thought it was doing that, or wanted people to think it was—and neither of those possibilities is great. 
In a softball interview with George Stephanopoulos on Monday’s edition of “Good Morning America,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company was taking down posts about protests that qualified as “misinformation” if the content claimed “social distancing is not effective to help limit the spread of coronavirus.”
But protests of state guidelines are not necessarily predicated on the claim that social distancing is ineffective in limiting the spread of coronavirus. Protesters may believe social distancing is generally effective, but their state guidelines are overly restrictive, unconstitutional, or no longer worth the tragic economic costs. They are not necessarily arguments against the efficacy of social distancing. If you’re a tech company hoping to quell complaints from the corporate media and the left, however, such a generalization provides cover to remove problematic posts.
There are two problems to disentangle here. The first is that Facebook seemed to think colluding with state governments to remove posts promoting lockdown protests, which are reactions to the grave financial distress so many workers are now experiencing, was an action worth promoting.
The second is that Facebook is removing those posts, instead of allowing open debate within reasonable parameters, even if that debate involves arguments it finds distasteful. That’s how we sort fact from fiction, and good arguments from bad ones. Censorship, by the way, often fuels conspiracies to greater heights.
Misinformation is dangerous. There’s no way around that. Social media makes the problem worse. But Facebook is again demonstrating its tenuous ability to police speech fairly and helpfully.
>>State officials disputed the assertion they “urg[ed]” Facebook to take down the posts.
Nutin’k to zee here!!! Nein! Ve didn’t do it!
There is a certain strain of “principled conservatives” who are fine with FB & Twitter censoring any material that isn’t sanctioned by the left. With friends like this, who needs enemies?
This is the society we will have if we continue to live in fear.
If there are any Fearpers left on Free Republic, please go sign up at DU and leave this forum now.
The reality is that Facebook is a private company, and can set whatever terms it chooses. Knowing that it leans to the left should be a sign that it shouldn’t be trusted to assist on organizing conservative activities.
Agreed.
With regard to organization, there’s always a way around any obstacle. All people have to do is find it.
This is WHO is lying to you on Facebook
https://youtu.be/RPyBYCvtajA
“If there are any Fearpers left on Free Republic, please go sign up at DU and leave this forum now.”
They get smoked out every time there is a sizable crisis.
Facebook was born as a collusion with Deep state Intel—and has never chenged from that.
One thing I did learn -
Go to your Facebook settings, then go to blocking.
Type in ‘Fact’ in the blocking search. You’ll find 30-40 “fact checking” accounts.
Block all of the fact checkers and you won’t get those annoying overlays warning the reader that some fact checker saus the content is not true.
There doesn’t have to be some secret cabal, or a supreme dictate from on high for leftists to do what they do. What guides them is their ideology. It was William Shirer or John Toland, I can’t remember which, that described the Nazi party in this fashion. Heinrich Himmler didn’t need direct orders from Hitler to run the concentration camps.
There are ideals that the left wants established, so any leftist in.good standing, or wanting to be in good standing, will, without instruction, perform the necessary deeds towards that ideology ( towards the fuhrer).
It’s a fascist relationship so mature that no coordination is needed. Fakebook knows what government wants and they execute, knowing government will scratch their back without hesitation when needed.
It’s similar to Al Qeida. Local nut moslems don’t need instructions on a shortwave from osamas cave to know he’s happy for them to shoot up a nightclub
Yeah sure... private lol
Farcebook tagged the video that’s all over YouTube about COVID-19 from the Epoch Times, when I tried to post, as factually incorrect, and they even went so far as to not let it published publically. I’m going to post it again, but this time to just my friends and family, see what happens.
Well, don’t you remember when FaceBook also blocked all those ANTIFA posts urging people to meet in Berkeley and Portland and Seattle? And also those so-called “flash-mobs” back East?
You don’t remember? It’s because IT DIDN’T HAPPEN!
We all have reason to complain about Facebook, but compared to the overwhelming mind-control propaganda that floods Twitter, it’s a minor irritation.
Tacit collusion, or conscious parallelism, is also against Antitrust Law. Facebook, a common carrier with patent/copyright protection from the U.S. government, is not exactly a private company, nor is CNN.
“Every puppy has his day, everybody has to pay,...”
Facebook is a subversive enemy of the Republic.
The site is infested with these closet authoritarians. Pretty much always has been. I recall the discussions back when the 'patriot' act was passed. It was pretty similar, and had many of the same usual suspects cheering on the police state.
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