Meta censors pro-Palestinian views on a global scale, claims Human Rights Watch. : technology

[-] Steve@communick.news 55 points 10 months ago

the organization documented and reviewed more than a thousand reported instances of Meta removing content and suspending or permanently banning accounts on Facebook and Instagram.

Does 1000 seem small for an intentional, global, censorship campaign? That seems very small to me. That seems like a rounding error on a days worth of reported posts.

[-] WalrusDragonOnABike@kbin.social 24 points 10 months ago

What percent of facebook users would document their content and report their removal to HRW? 1000 reporting to HRW because their comments got removed from facebook seems funny. I certainly wouldn't think to report technology@lemmy.world's mods to a human rights organization if they removed this comment or banned me for posting something pro-palestine on another community.

[-] ethan@lemmy.world 13 points 10 months ago

Most of this entire report is patently ridiculous. They asked people who follow HRW’s social media to please send them instances of censorship on social media, get about 1,500 random examples from a self-selecting population, then publish a big expose about it.

There’s no intensive comparative analysis (statistical or otherwise) to other topics discussed, other viewpoints discussed, or at other times in the past. They allege, for example, that some people didn’t have an option to request a review of the takedown- is that standard policy? Does it happen in other cases? Is it a bug? They don’t seem to want to look into it further, they just allude to some sense of nebulous wrongdoing then move on to the next assertion. Rinse and repeat.

The one part of the report actually grounded in reality (and a discussion that should be had) is how to handle content that runs afoul of standards against positive portrayal of terrorist organizations with political wings like the PFLP and Hamas. It’s an interesting challenge on where to draw the line on what to allow- but cherry picking a couple thousand taken down posts doesn’t make that discussion any more productive in any way.

[-] rockSlayer@lemmy.world 11 points 10 months ago

It's not enough to prove a pattern of behavior, but it's enough to call out as a disturbing trend.

[-] Steve@communick.news 7 points 10 months ago

Is it? We'd need to know a lot more about how often this happens to other random groups to determine that.

[-] rockSlayer@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago

Facebook has a history of extreme status quo bias on issues like this. A statistical analysis should be the next priority. However a trend is still a trend, even if it's unintentional.

[-] morrowind@lemmy.ml 10 points 10 months ago

Those are just the documented ones. They don't exactly have access to meta's modlogs

[-] abhibeckert@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

We have access to Lemmy.ml’s modlogs. I wonder how many pro-Palestinian posts have been deleted? I bet it’s more than zero… and Facebook probably handles more posts per second than lemmy.ml handles in a full day.

[-] eclectic_electron@sh.itjust.works 5 points 10 months ago

Indeed. It would be interesting to run the same analysis for censorship of pro Israel content and compare the differences between the two, though the data would likely still be noisy and inconclusive.

[-] BlueBockser@programming.dev 3 points 10 months ago

The fact that you're being downvoted for calling for a more thorough and objective investigation really says it all.

[-] IbnLemmy@feddit.uk 53 points 10 months ago

I'm shocked I tell you... Shocked!!!

[-] Mrkawfee@lemmy.world 41 points 10 months ago

I know right? Who would have thought centralised social media owned by surveillance capitalist billionaires could do this?

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 33 points 10 months ago

And we want to allow them to integrate with the Fediverse why, exactly?

[-] JustSomePerson@kbin.social 6 points 10 months ago

Because we are not censorship happy pieces of shit. We judge every statement for what it is, rather than applying guilt by association in three steps.

Most people who want to block Meta from the fediverse want to do it because they want to block people's opinions and statements from reaching them. They want the fediverse to be a "safe space" (a term which thankfully has lost most of its momentum in the last few years) where no dissenting or nuanced opinion is welcome. Somehow you're trying to turn Meta's similar behavior into an argument against them, even though it's an example of both organizations doing similar things (prohibiting unwanted opinions).

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

No, sane members here just don't want to see pro-corporate horseshit, bots and Meta's psyop motherfuckers trying to shape opinions here with their corporate agenda like they already do on their own platform. If users themselves want to attempt this sort of thing, that's on them and we can deal with that. Meta is guilty preemptively, and we should not treat them as if they aren't. This is just yet more proof. The fact that Meta does this is not an "opinion." It's a fact. The type of agenda they're pushing, whoever they're pro or against is irrelevant. It's the attempt to push that matters.

And we already ban tons of content here. Try posting some pro-Nazi stuff, for instance, and see what happens. There are a whole host of actions and topics that are explicitly prohibited just in the lemmy.world ToS. Trying to claim that there's no censorship on this instance or in the Fediverse as a whole is such a monumentally stupid fucking statement that no one can take anything else you said seriously.

Go shill for your megacorporation somewhere else.

[-] chitak166@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago

Go shill for your megacorporation somewhere else.

Why do all of you people reply like this as though you're objectively correct?

[-] JustSomePerson@kbin.social 4 points 10 months ago

I am not claiming that there's no censorship in the fediverse. I'm claiming that there is censorship, meaning that the fact that Meta also uses censorship is no argument against them. You censor people you call nazis, they censor people who think three generations of occupation in Palestine is a bad thing. Both have problems. This piece of news about Meta censorship is not an argument against federation.

[-] sour@kbin.social 5 points 10 months ago

both sides

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

This piece of news is more proof (as if we didn't already have enough) that Meta specifically is an entity that cannot be trusted to act in good faith, and therefore integrating with them is a risk we should not take. In case you cannot understand this concept, remember that instances that are generally accepted as harmful due to their content, behavior, or just who operates them are already defederated with most/all other major instances, for good reason. This is no different. Except for one detail: We already have decades of experience with Meta/Facebook and their evil, monopolistic, and user hostile behavior. They are a known quantity to us.

You were the one who tried to narrow the goalposts to make the argument specifically only about censorship. All of Meta's bad behavior is valid cause for concern. Institutionalized politically motivated censorship is just one aspect of it. What we do and don't allow on our own particular instances has no bearing on it. Trying to bleat "both sides bad" is not a valid argument in this case.

[-] JustSomePerson@kbin.social 1 points 10 months ago

trusted to act in good faith

You are not acting in good faith when you are arguing that your members should be blocked from communicating with anybody on Meta servers, because of guilt by association. What you don't allow on your particular instances has great bearing, because it shows that you are no different from them, other than in which opinions you consider to be worthy of suppressing.

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Meta: Mass suppression of users and political topics, overt attempts at manipulation of public opinion via bots and paid shills, deliberate construction of their algorithms to display specific content targeted at users designed to sway their opinion or get them to buy something, ads, massive violations of privacy, spying, tracking, mishandling of user data, tacit approval of hate speech and fascist rhetoric, and flagrant violation of both domestic and foreign laws.

Me: Hey, we can see what they're doing over there and we really shouldn't let them bring it over here.

You: "YoU'rE BoTh ThE SaMe!!!!!!!!"

Do you actually believe the horseshit you're spouting, or are you just that out of touch with reality?

[-] JustSomePerson@kbin.social 2 points 10 months ago

Grow up. It is not possible for you to hide from the real world. The suppression of opinion in the fediverse is real. You admit so yourself two comments above. You call them nazis and evil, which is childish and unproductive. Have you considered communicating with those with different opinions instead of attempting to ban them from participation in society?

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

You really just advocated for not excluding Nazis from society.

And, your true colors are shown. Good job.

[-] JustSomePerson@kbin.social 1 points 10 months ago

No. I advocated for people that imbeciles call nazis to not be excluded from society. There is a significant difference, but if you live inside a bubble, like some fediverse serverse, you might be so brain washed that you think everybody who thinks a little bit different from you is a nazi. They're not.

[-] chitak166@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Because the fediverse is for everyone, even people you don't like.

[-] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 11 points 10 months ago

It's not the people I'm concerned with, it's the objectively evil social media megacorporation.

[-] sour@kbin.social 3 points 10 months ago

is it for genocide enablers

[-] schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 10 months ago

Because that will enable people to see and interact with the things their users post without themselves being under their control.

[-] yuki2501@lemmy.world 15 points 10 months ago

Note for those enlightened centrists in here who want Facebook/Meta to federate with us and for everyone in here to merely "wait and see" 🙄

[+] jsh@sh.itjust.works 12 points 10 months ago

[deleted]

[-] flamingo_pinyata@sopuli.xyz 2 points 10 months ago

It's hard to claim either way - for example my bubble is also mostly pro-palestinian. Suspiciously missing pro-isreaeli side actually.

But that doesn't mean it's what the algorithm serves on average. No one outside some teams in Meta actually knows, any outside attempt to analyze it would expose you to the same bubble-creating mechanism

[-] blunderworld@lemmy.ca 12 points 10 months ago

Boycott Meta.

[-] BaardFigur@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I could, but certainly not to support Palestine. Nor Israel for that matter

[-] blunderworld@lemmy.ca 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Your choice of course, no judgment here. However, I personally don't think there's anything controversial about being pro-palestine, since they aren't synonymous with Hamas.

[-] pewgar_seemsimandroid 2 points 10 months ago

not the related reason lib

[-] blunderworld@lemmy.ca 1 points 10 months ago

I feel seen

[-] autotldr@lemmings.world 4 points 10 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Meta has engaged in a “systemic and global” censorship of pro-Palestinian content since the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war on 7 October, according to a new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW).

The company exhibited “six key patterns of undue censorship” of content in support of Palestine and Palestinians, including the taking down of posts, stories and comments; disabling accounts; restricting users’ ability to interact with others’ posts; and “shadow banning”, where the visibility and reach of a person’s material is significantly reduced, according to HRW.

Examples it cites include content originating from more than 60 countries, mostly in English, and all in “peaceful support of Palestine, expressed in diverse ways”.

In a statement to the Guardian, Meta acknowledged it makes errors that are “frustrating” for people, but said that “the implication that we deliberately and systemically suppress a particular voice is false.

Meta said it was the only company in the world to have publicly released human rights due diligence on issues related to Israel and Palestine .

Last week Elizabeth Warren, Democratic senator for Massachusetts, wrote to Meta’s co-founder and chief executive officer, Mark Zuckerberg, demanding information following hundreds of reports from Instagram users dating back to October that their content was demoted or removed, and their accounts subjected to shadow banning.

The original article contains 568 words, the summary contains 214 words. Saved 62%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[-] AlecSadler@lemmy.ml 4 points 10 months ago

Makes sense. I removed on FB from time to time and most of my posts get 20-30 engagements from close friends.

Anything pro-Palestine gets maybe 1, at best.

[-] schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 10 months ago

Internet before mid-2010s: The Internet is breaking down barriers of nations, enabling everyone to freely communicate with each other, even outright plan uprisings against authorities (Arab Spring)! There are hardly any limits to what we can discuss, if you have an idea, you can publish it right now and maybe change the world with it!

Internet now: Social media companies make sure, through their algorithms and moderation decisions, that the Overton window is exactly where they decide, nowhere else. They are under constant and evolving pressure to censor more of this, censor less of that, with no end in sight to not getting it "right" in someone's opinion.

I hope the fediverse succeeds in maybe restoring the old vision of the Internet.

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