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Tag: hate speech
Civil Rights Groups Long Warned Facebook Of Hateful Private Pages

Civil Rights Groups Long Warned Facebook Of Hateful Private Pages

Facebook says its standards apply just as much in private groups as public posts, prohibiting most slurs and threats based on national origin, sex, race and immigration status.

But dozens of hateful posts in a secret Facebook group for current and former Border Patrol agents raise questions about how well if at all the company is policing disturbing postings and comments made outside of public view.

Many of the posts ProPublica obtained from the 9,500-member “I’m 10-15” group (10-15 is Border Patrol code for “alien in custody”) include violent or dehumanizing speech that appears to violate Facebook’s standards. For example, a thread of comments before a visit to a troubled Border Patrol facility in Texas by Democratic Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, of New York, and Veronica Escobar, of Texas, included “fuck the hoes” and “No mames [fist].” Another post encouraged Border Patrol agents to respond to the Latina lawmakers visit by hurling a “burrito at these bitches.” And yet another mocked a video of a migrant man trying to carry a child through a rushing river in a plastic bag. A commenter joked, “At least it’s already in a trash bag” — all probable violations of the rules.

Facebook, citing an open federal investigation into the group’s activities, declined to answer questions about whether any posts in the 10-15 group violated its terms of service or had been removed, or whether the company had begun scrutinizing the group’s postings since ProPublica’s story was published. It also refused to say whether it had previously flagged posts by group members or had received complaints.

Facebook’s only response, emailed by a spokeswoman who refused to let ProPublica use her name, was: “We want everyone using Facebook to feel safe. Our Community Standards apply across Facebook, including in secret Groups. We’re cooperating with federal authorities in their investigation.”

Since April, the company has been calling community groups “the center of Facebook.” It has put new emphasis on group activity in the newsfeed and has encouraged companies, communities and news organizations to shift resources into private messaging. These forums can give members a protected space to discuss painful topics like domestic violence, or to share a passion for cookbooks. Groups can be either private, which means they can be found in search results, or secret, which means they are hidden unless you have an invitation.

This is part of an intentional “pivot toward privacy.” In a March blog post, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote, “Privacy gives people the freedom to be themselves and connect more naturally, which is why we build social networks.”

But this pivot also fosters hidden forums where people can share offensive, potentially inflammatory viewpoints. “Secret” groups such as 10-15 are completely hidden from non-members. Would-be participants need an invitation to even find the landing page, and administrators of the groups have full jurisdiction to remove a person’s access at any time.

When such groups operate out of sight, like 10-15, the public has a more limited view into how people are using, or misusing, the platform. In a secret group, only members can flag or report content that might be in violation of Facebook’s policies. The administrators of the group can set stricter policies for members’ internal conversations. They cannot, however, relax broader Facebook standards. They also can’t support terrorist organizations, hate groups, murderers, criminals, sell drugs or attack individuals.

Civil rights groups say they have been noticing and raising the issue of hateful posts in hidden forums for years — with limited response from Facebook.

Henry Fernandez, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, and a member of Change the Terms, a coalition of civil rights groups pushing for better content moderation on Facebook, said the platform keeps creating features without “without vetting them for their implications for the use by hate groups or, in this case, Border Patrol agents acting in hateful ways.”

Posts in hidden groups have incited incidents of violence in the real world, most famously against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar and at the 2017 white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Virginia. The military launched an investigation of a secret Facebook group in 2017 after Marines shared naked pictures of female service members. Facebook has acknowledged the problem and has made some efforts to address it with new initiatives, such as a proposed independent review board and consultations with a group of 90 organizations, most focusing on civil rights.

ProPublica’s Border Patrol story came out the day after Facebook released an audit of civil rights issues on the platform. Recommendations included strengthening hate speech policies around national origin, enforcing a stricter ban on the promotion of white supremacy and removing an exemption that had allowed humorous posts that contained offensive content.

Facebook did not say whether it will make all of the recommended changes. But in a blog post, COO Sheryl Sandberg wrote, “We will continue listening to feedback from the civil rights community and address the important issues they’ve raised so Facebook can better protect and promote the civil rights of everyone who uses our services.”

Jessica Gonzalez, vice president of strategy and senior counsel at FreePress and co-founder of Change the Terms, said that even after the back and forth with auditors, she was not surprised that the hateful posts in 10-15 were not flagged.

“What Facebook released on Sunday is an improvement,” she said, “but I think Facebook has engaged in this all along in an appeasement strategy. They’ll do what they need to do to get the bad publicity off [their] backs.”

The civil rights audit also called for better transparency about civil rights issues on Facebook’s advertising portal, which became a priority for the company after multiple ProPublica investigations and lawsuits by civil rights groups.

Bhaskar Chakravorti, dean of global business at Tufts’ Fletcher School of Business, said the new emphasis on privacy is part of Facebook’s attempt to keep users on the platform, while reassuring investors.

“So to the extent that Facebook provides shelter to groups of all kinds — whether they are people who are sharing hateful messages or messages for the good of the world — it benefits their business model.”

 

IMAGE: Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer of Facebook attends a session during the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland January 20, 2016. REUTERS/Ruben Sprich/Files

#EndorseThis: The Tremendousness of Michael Flynn

#EndorseThis: The Tremendousness of Michael Flynn

However reassuring the announced nomination of James Mattis for Secretary of Defense may be, the country still faces the prospect of Michael Flynn serving in the closest proximity to President Trump (ugh) as National Security Adviser.

Last night Trevor Noah and Daily Show correspondent Hasan Minhaj explored just how awesomely bad a choice Flynn is. You may have forgotten why President Obama fired him as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. You may not recall the hate messages on his Twitter feed. You may not even know about his promotion of Islamophobic extremism  — while his consulting firm took money from a Muslim businessman closely connected to the Islamic government of Turkey.

This clip delves into all those troubling facts — and if you haven’t followed Flynn, you may be astonished that this person ever had important government responsibilities, and is about to assume them again.

But it’s better to be prepared. Just click.

CAIR Denounces Trump After A Big Night For Islamophobia

CAIR Denounces Trump After A Big Night For Islamophobia

Last night, Donald Trump flirted with white supremacy once again, claiming to Anderson Cooper that — referring to the entire religion — “Islam hates us.” His latest remarks about Islam are part of a long-running effort to signal to his supporters that he positions himself against Muslims as a group, and not just the efforts to fight violent terrorist groups.

“I think Islam hates us. There’s something tremendous there that hates us,” said Trump. But what, exactly? He doesn’t know. Asked by Anderson Cooper whether he meant that hate was within Islam itself, Trump placed the onus on the media: “You’re gonna have to figure that out, OK?”

In response, the Council American-Islamic Relations held a press conference today demanding an apology from Trump. “Im here to tell you you haven’t done your due diligence on Islam because you know nothing about our religion,” said Kristin Szremski, Director of Media and Communications at American Muslims for Palestine. She was among several spokespeople from an array of American Muslim advocacy and civic groups who joined CAIR in demanding an apology from Trump. “You are thinking this will get you to the presidency. You think the ends justify the means. But you are harming my community.”

Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee Staff Attorney Yolanda Rondon issued a similar denunciation of Trump. “There is no us versus them, there is no other. That divide and conquer tactic won’t work. We are all Americans, and we must all defend these ideals,” she said. “He knows his statements and policies have a direct impact on our community and we can take it no more.”

“Our message is not to Donald Trump, its to moderate Americans. Like you, we’re tired of all this extremist rhetoric about Islam being at war with the West and vice versa,” said Rabiah Ahmed, Media and Communications Director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council. “We are also tired of being talked at and spoken for. We are tired of being misrepresented. We are tired of defending ourselves against extremist rhetoric from both ends.”

That Trump, who has consistently demonized the media, now wants that same media to “figure it out” is yet another opportunity for him to claim plausible deniability later down the road. The public has already seen how this will play out: After failing to denounce David Duke’s endorsement, Trump blamed it on a faulty earpiece. The initial interview, just like his interview with Cooper yesterday, served as a screeching dog whistle to the darkest parts of his base.

This hasn’t stopped Trump’s allies from rushing to explain his remarks. Andy Dean, once a candidate on The Apprentice, repeatedly claimed during two different appearances on CNN that it was the “Islamic culture of hatred in the Middle East” that caused Trump to say that the religion, along with all of its adherents, hates Americans. He cited a Pew poll of 39 countries examining Muslims’ views on women’s rights and Israel as proof.

That same poll, however, reveals numerous contradictions to Trump and his supporters’ views on Islam. More than 85 percent of all those polled supported religious freedom. More than half of Muslims were worried about Islamic fundamentalist groups — more than the percentage of Americans that were — probably because the overwhelming majority of victims of fundamentalist terrorism are Muslims. In the vast majority of countries polled, more than half of respondents said they preferred democracy to a “strong leader.”.

Dean switched his justification for Trump’s comments on a later appearance on The Lead with Jake Tapper. “This is about women’s rights,” he said, defending the man who said Hillary Clinton got “schlonged” and said that Megyn Kelly’s menstrual cycle was the reason he was singled out for tough questions during the first Republican debate. He even claimed women in majority Muslims counties could be killed for demanding a divorce. But, again, the same Pew poll he used as justification for Trump’s remarks revealed that the majority of respondents believed in a woman’s right to initiate a divorce.

Donald Trump has run two parallel campaigns: one that claims he is the smartest, most qualified, and most respected businessman in the world — which the most cursory glance at his writings, speeches, or business record will disprove — and another that claims Islam itself hates America while feigning ignorance of David Duke and his affiliations with the KKK and other white supremacist organizations. The more Trump embraces this latter narrative, the more dangerous his campaign will make this country for minorities of all races and ethnicities.