Mark Zuckerberg pledges Facebook safe space for Holocaust Deniers

villiscan

Former Member
Joined
Jul 6, 2018
Messages
78
Reaction score
337
  • #1
from Vanity Fair's Bess Levin

Mark Zuckerberg says Facebook won’t ban Holocaust deniers or conspiracy theorists like Infowars because doing so would go against Facebook’s principle of “giving people a voice.” In a wide-ranging interview with Recode’s Kara Swisher published on Wednesday, the 34-year-old C.E.O. discussed Facebook’s approach to tackling hoaxes and misinformation, and defended his company’s decision not to delete hoax peddlers’ posts or ban them outright.​

Specifically, the Facebook chief told Swisher that the thinking behind allowing groups that claim the Holocaust never happened to publish those beliefs on its platform comes down to one of the company’s “core principles” of “giving people a voice, so that people can express their opinions.” He unfortunately elaborated: “The approach that we’ve taken to false news is not to say, you can’t say something wrong on the Internet. I think that that would be too extreme. Everyone gets things wrong, and if we were taking down people’s accounts when they got a few things wrong, then that would be a hard world for giving people a voice and saying that you care about that.” (Never mind the fact that conspiracy-peddling Web sites like Infowars are more than likely intentionally spreading fake news, and that denying the Holocaust isn’t the same thing as accidentally confusing one of the Olsen twins for the other.) But what if, as a result of being fed utter horse s--t Zuckerberg could easily ban from his platform if he really wanted to, someone cooked up a really bad idea to hurt someone else or a group of someones? Oh sure, Zuck and Co. would totally take that down. “We’re not gonna let people plan violence or attack each other or do bad things,” he added.

But back to why the boy billionaire wants to make Facebook a safe space for Holocaust deniers who are just doing their best:

“It’s hard to impugn intent and to understand the intent. I just think, as abhorrent as some of those examples are, I think the reality is also that I get things wrong when I speak publicly. I’m sure you do. I’m sure a lot of leaders and public figures we respect do too, and I just don’t think that it is the right thing to say, ‘We’re going to take someone off the platform if they get things wrong, even multiple times.’ What we will do is we’ll say, ‘O.K., you have your page, and if you’re not trying to organize harm against someone, or attacking someone, then you can put up that content on your page, even if people might disagree with it or find it offensive.’ But that doesn’t mean that we have a responsibility to make it widely distributed in News Feed.”

Zuckerberg: The Recode interview
 
  • #2
  • #3
Life would be so much easier if we had some sort of law that defended speech. We could call it something like the right to speak or freedom of speech, or some such thing. But no, we have the right to not be offended. Pity since EVERYONE is offended by something. What a minefield.
 
  • #4
Denying that the holocaust happened directly supports racism against Jews.
 
  • #5
Everything is claimed to support racism nowadays. Perhaps there should be a law banning all speech? That would guarantee that nobody is offended, or would it?
Would we end up with the old standby "he looked at me funny"? smh
 
  • #6
No, "everything" isn't blamed for racism these days. Some people just don't like the fact that racists are being filmed and shamed for their despicable behaviors. Oh, and the first amendment has nothing at all to do with Facebook, since Facebook is a private company. If they want to support a bunch of despicable holocaust deniers or other racists, bigots, or fascists, then I suppose he has the right to provide them a platform. And anyone has the right to not support that.
 
  • #7
Have you ever considered that the owner of Facebook might actually RESPECT the rights and freedoms of America? If you think that the very act of doubting a gov't's story is "racism", then yes, EVERYTHING is claimed to support racism nowadays.
 
  • #8
Okay then. :rolleyes:
 
  • #9
Sure.
 

Guardians Monthly Goal

Members online

Online statistics

Members online
70
Guests online
874
Total visitors
944

Forum statistics

Threads
636,412
Messages
18,696,591
Members
243,663
Latest member
red1973
Back
Top