Meta censors pro-Palestinian views on a global scale, report claims

Lee Duna@lemmy.nz to Technology@beehaw.org – 92 points –
Meta censors pro-Palestinian views on a global scale, report claims
theguardian.com
8

I'm not usually one to defend Facebook, but it might have something to do with (and is possibly being done to counteract) this massive state-sponsored disinformation campaign:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/03/technology/israel-hamas-information-war.html

In case of paywall:

https://web.archive.org/web/20231201152318/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/03/technology/israel-hamas-information-war.html

And yet all of Israel’s disinformation is allowed to stay up…

What do you base that claim on? The article doesn't mention it.

Edit: Your silence is also an answer. Ironic, talking about misinformation and spreading it yourself...

lol my silence is not an answer. I don’t spend inordinate amounts of time on the internet so have no need to respond within a day much less a week. Here’s one example of the numerous misinformation that Israel has been spreading, coming from a news source that actually helped spread Israel’s disinformation.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/21/al-shifa-hospital-gaza-hamas-israel/

You evidently had enough time to post elsewhere, so it's not unreasonable to think you might've read my reply already.

How is the WP article showing misinformation? It basically boils down to "Israel alleged something and provided some evidence, but we think it's not conclusive". It does not show that Israel knowingly lied about anything, which is what you're insinuating.

You evidently had enough time to post elsewhere, so it's not unreasonable to think you might've read my reply already.

Evidently? Huh?

How is the WP article showing misinformation? It basically boils down to "Israel alleged something and provided some evidence, but we think it's not conclusive". It does not show that Israel knowingly lied about anything, which is what you're insinuating.

The article is literally about how Israel claimed a bunch of things as complete truths and then every single thing they claimed was wrong.

This has been the case for almost everything Israel has said until this point. They lied about hostages being raped, they lied about not going to bomb specific areas, they lied about certain areas being safe for Palestinians, they lied about only trying to kill hamas, and have killed over 20k civilians as a result, they lied about not actively trying to kill journalists. The list is endless. It’s perfectly clear that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians and if you support that, I’m sorry but you’re absolutely evil.

It’s perfectly clear that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians and if you support that, I’m sorry but you’re absolutely evil.

This "you're either for Palestine or a genocide supporter" mindset is half the reason this conflict still exists, the other half is the "you're either for Israel or a terrorist supporter" mindset. I'm sure it feels great to have a one-dimensional world view, but not everyone is either for or against one side.

All I was asking for is a source for your claim that Israel is spreading misinformation and that said misinformation is allowed to proliferate. The one source you provided is inadequate because it doesn't have any proof of Israeli lies, it just says that Israeli-provided proof is inconclusive. Let alone your claim that the alleged misinformation is not removed...

We're done here, clearly there's no good faith discussion to be had.

🤖 I'm a bot that provides automatic summaries for articles: ::: spoiler Click here to see the summary 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.


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