Elizabeth Warren recently wrote a piece on Medium outlining the basics of one of her plans for the United States if she wins the presidential election in 2020. She wants to break up large tech companies that have become monopolistic and dangerous to competition, the free market, and our democracy.
These are companies like Amazon, who own the manufacturing and distribution of Amazon Basics, or Apple, who both owns the App Store and Apple Music, forcing competition like Spotify to fight against preferential treatment. Then there’s Facebook, the worst offender. Facebook used a sketchy VPN app to spy on customer’s browsing habits. Users were leaving their service for WhatsApp and Instagram. So Facebook bought WhatsApp and Instagram.
As it turns out, they also ban ads that are critical of the company. Warren recently found this out the hard way. Facebook banned her ads for her 2020 campaign, featuring her promise to break up large tech monopolies into smaller entities.
This is problematic in two huge ways. First, if they could do this to a politician, who says they wouldn’t do it to their actual competitors or anyone else who’s critical of the company?
There’s a second glaring issue at hand here. Facebook saw a politician they disagreed with and pulled her ads. They’re shaping the United States political landscape to their liking. Just as Russia used Facebook to secure Donald Trump’s presidency, Facebook is using their service to shut down politicians they don’t agree with.
Evidence proves that hate speech against Muslims like that of Donald Trump on triggers hate crime like those we saw in Christchurch, New Zealand. Facebook decided they were okay with hate speech. But heaven forbid you accuse them of being a monopoly that abuses their power. Then they’ll prove your right by damaging your political aspirations.
The Banned Ads
![Screenshot of a Facebook post with a video that shows "[These three companies] Run the Internet" with an image of a box with a lowercase 'a' (Amazon), a magnifying glass with a 'G' (Google), and a speech bubble with an 'f', Facebook.](https://i0.wp.com/leafandcore.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Screen-Shot-2019-03-18-at-8.27.48-AM.png?ssl=1)
This seems to be the ad Facebook removed. Warren didn’t even use their exact logo.
That’s where Warren comes in. She has made busting up these large monopolies part of her 2020 presidential campaign. Naturally, she has to tell people about that. So, she took out ads on a number of social networks and webpages, linking to her plan to improve competition and innovation by breaking up large companies making over $25 billion per year.
Curious why I think FB has too much power? Let's start with their ability to shut down a debate over whether FB has too much power. Thanks for restoring my posts. But I want a social media marketplace that isn't dominated by a single censor. #BreakUpBigTech https://t.co/UPS6dozOxn
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) March 11, 2019
As one of the primary places for political discourse, news consumption, and sharing, Facebook was obviously one of the sites she advertised on. However, Elizabeth Warren’s campaign ads were banned from the platform. Facebook eventually restored them, but they proved her point. Facebook is too big to fight. You have to use their platform if you want to even try to, and, in doing so, fall victim to Facebook.
Facebook’s Response
Facebook claims it didn’t remove Warren’s ads because she spoke about breaking up Facebook. They said it was because her ads used Facebook’s logo. Her Medium post she was linking to, however, did not have Facebook’s logo, so this must have been for another ad. Furthermore, I’ve used Facebook’s logo in posts before. Though I was likely critical of the social network in those posts (you know, because of the genocide, hate speech, deceptive tactics, child sex trafficking, and harassment), Facebook did not remove my posts. There is no automatic image recognition program flagging and removing ads that have a white ‘f’ on a blue background. Perhaps they weren’t much of a threat.
Facebook only removed the ads that had their logo on it. This seems to bolster their claims. However, they could have been looking for reasons to remove her ads, and couldn’t find a legitimate reason to remove any other ads.
In 2016, we learned that Facebook has the power to completely disrupt our democracy. In 2019, we learned they’re willing to abuse that power.
What This Means for American Democracy and Facebook
This might seem like a petty dispute between a politician and Facebook, but it’s far more dangerous than that. Politicians need to be on Facebook to have any hope of campaigning. There’s simply no choice in the matter. Now we’ve seen that Facebook could push politicians it considers a threat off their platform. This proves that Facebook isn’t just dangerous for innovation, competition, and capitalism, they’re also dangerous for our democracy.
Facebook was a primary reason for Donald Trump’s election. Russian trolls flooded the network with fake news to the point that most news people read on the network prior to the election was pro-Trump and absolutely false. In 2016, we learned that Facebook has the power to completely disrupt our democracy. In 2019, we learned they’re willing to abuse that power.
Facebook is too large. Trying to compete with them is a hopeless task. Apparently, trying to legislate their unchecked power is as well.