Facebook is a breeding ground for hate and violence. Turns out they’re ok with that.
Facebook played a key role in the genocide of the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar. That’s not an opinion or speculation, Facebook even admitted to it. Hate speech spread through Facebook in Myanmar was so common that people didn’t know truth from fiction. As a result, they supported the ethnic cleansing carried out by Myanmar’s military. This is from a study by the U.N., which concluded that Facebook was largely at fault for the spread of this misinformation. In Myanmar, Facebook is synonymous with both the internet and news. It’s exactly what Facebook would love to have here in the U.S. In fact, Facebook’s controversy-prone newsfeed algorithm prefers to show you articles made to rile you up. It increases engagement. Hate speech is part of Facebook’s business model. That’s why they allow it. That’s why countless violent acts change nothing about Facebook. Hate and violence are profitable.
Now, we’re seeing the same conditions that lead to genocide in Myanmar in India, and once again, Facebook is the driving force. Posts targeting India’s Bengali Muslims, calling them “dogs,” “terrorists”, “criminals,” and “rapists” were shared around 100,000 times on Facebook. That means their reach is in the millions.
While you hear “five million people radicalized through hater speech,” Facebook hears “five million profitable engagements.”
What’s Happening in India’s Assam State?
Assam State, by फ़िलप्रो (Filpro)
The U.N. has again warned of the dangerous surge of hate speech in India’s northeastern Assam state. Here, the government is conducting a census of sorts, counting the number of people living in the region. They’re only counting ethnic Indians, not the Belgali Muslims living in the region. Though this is similar to the Republican-lead effort in the United States to force a citizenship question on the census, it’s slightly more sinister. It’s requiring all people to trace their family’s lineage and occupancy in India back to before March 24th, 1971. That’s the date when many Bangladeshi Muslims fled Bangladesh over violent conflict in the region. They’re targeting these Muslims with razor-like precision.
Avaaz, a campaigning group and watchdog found around 100,000 posts shared across Facebook vilifying these people, to aid in the government’s attempts at early stages of ethnic cleansing. Those posts had been seen by over five million people. In an effort to try to stamp it out and test Facebook’s hate speech policies, Avaaz tagged 213 posts on Facebook for hate speech. Facebook only removed 96 of them, less than half. One was from an elected official who said Bangladeshi Muslims were in India to rape “our mothers and sisters” and “poison” daughters. This shows that Facebook is willing to remove hate speech for elected officials, just not U.S. politicians.
An example of a fringe and hateful conservative position. Hate speech on a Facebook post. Facebook allowed it to keep from upsetting conservatives, fueling anti-Muslim violence.
The posts Facebook actually removed account for about 45%. Facebook approves of a whopping 55% of hate speech, even when reported. Even if they applied this to all 100,000 instances of hate speech during this time period, there would still be 2.8 million people viewing that hateful and misleading content.
Hate is spreading in India, and even when told how to stop it, Facebook doesn’t. Now, the Bangladeshi Muslims living in the region won’t even be counted as people living in the area by a census. Often, such a dehumanizing step has disastrous and violent outcomes, as it did in Myanmar.
Hate in India
India’s no stranger to hate speech and the violence it leads to. Just last year a mob beat five strangers to death over a false rumor that spread over Facebook’s WhatsApp. Nationalism is taking hold in the country, one already rife with discrimination based on religion, caste, gender, and sexuality. Hate is commonplace, and people are comfortable with it. Part of that comfort comes from seeing it in such large quantities online.
Hate’s a Money Maker
Facebook’s true reactions
Fun fact: I’m a software engineer. I have at least two friends and former colleagues who work at Facebook. I was actually poached by a recruiter from Facebook over the summer, but decided that even the higher paycheck and warmer weather would not be worth the cost to my soul. Facebook brings a lot of people together and has the capacity to do great things. I especially like how they’ve gotten people to donate to charities for birthdays. That’s wonderful! But the other side of that coin is how Facebook profits off of hate, has undermined American democracy, and caused genocide around the world. Even if I only look at the shiny side of that coin, I’d know the other side is soaked in blood.
The truth is, Facebook’s feed isn’t designed to show you the most recent posts or even just things you’ll like. It’s designed to show you things you’re most likely to interact with. Often, this will be things that interest you, like sports, news, or entertainment. However, it also knows that much interaction on Facebook today surrounds political discussion, debate, and the anger it causes. Legitimate news sources leave less to argument about. The facts are clearly presented with little bias. But fake sources? Those can lead to long arguments, heated debates, links to other content, and a huge increase in user engagement. That’s why Facebook prefers the controversial and fake sources of news.
Hate speech is not free speech and we must stop it. It is vile, it leads directly to violence, deaths, and genocide, and it’s a key part of Facebook’s business model. Therefore, we’re stuck with it.
Sources:
- Jon Evans, TechCrunch
- Casey Newton, The Verge
- Roli Srivastava, Reuters