If you're active on Facebook, no matter what you believe at this exact moment in time, you are being manipulated by one of the most powerful companies in the world. It's everywhere on the so-called "Platform". Left Wing propaganda.
First of all, free speech does not exist on Facebook. If you're a Leftist who delights in the laws of Facebook, then you have free speech, because you will freely pump out anything Facebook approves of. But if you're a Christian who delights in the law of the Lord, if you're an American who delights in the law of the land, if you're a doctor who delights in the laws of biology, guess what? You can take your so-called "hate speech" to smaller platforms that are getting crushed not only by mainstream social media's popularity, but also by their unethical tactics, such as when Amazon removed Parler from its web hosting service (1) at the peak of their growth, merely to stop them and their oh so dastardly free speech policies from competing with Facebook or Twitter.
But it's not just what Facebook hides that's the problem, it's what they promote. They aren't merely censoring opposing ideas, they're promoting their own dogmas, even over posts presenting opposing viewpoints they don't censor. It's everywhere you look. I'm even in a group that constantly opposes reckless and oppressive Covid measures, and do you know what I saw there today? Right at the top of the page, Facebook added one of their little "information" banners "get the latest info on Covid-19". I don't know if it's only on anti-paranoia groups or if it's on all groups, but either way, the fact that it's there is disturbing to say the least.
Now, I am glad they allow that group to stay up. I'm also glad that, at least so far, they haven't deleted or punished me for any of my posts (though let's be honest, with so many users to police, they probably just haven't spotted me yet). But if I post anything about, for example, Climate Alarmism, Covid jabs, or The Steal, if it doesn't get deleted, it gets a little tab underneath it telling you Facebook's view.
But it's good to fact check, right? Sure. I thoroughly agree. In fact, I encourage you to do your own fact checking. If you don't, you end up looking like an idiot, like I recently did when I got mad at a headline without actually reading the article (moral of that story: Even if you're fresh out of hospital and your brain isn't functioning properly, do your due diligence, or shut up). There are two things to consider, however.
The first is the platform/publisher debate. Are social media outlets platforms, or should they be considered publishers? Publishers can be held liable for their content. You can sue media outlets for slander/libel (slander being spoken, libel being written). However, while there is no global standard, most nations with high degrees of free speech consider social media outlets to be platforms. Here in the UK, for example, judicial precedent set by the Bunt v Tilley case 2007 establishes that internet service providers cannot be held liable for defamation, for the same reason a provider of a noticeboard cannot. Namely, they are not publishing the content themselves, nor do they necessarily have knowledge of what is being published by their users. (2) In the U.S., the legal protections are even stronger, as the Communications Decency Act 2010 states that intermediaries are not to be considered publishers.
As non-publishers, social media outlets like Facebook need not act like publishers. There is no need for Facebook to do our fact checking for us. Rather, that is, and will always remain, our job. Each of us have the individual responsibility to do our own fact checking.
The second thing to consider is who exactly Facebook trusts to do the fact checking. The WHO, for example. "Covid jabs are safe, we promise." Haha, ok, side note, is Taiwan a country? Taiwan certainly says yes, they fought a civil war for independence. Most of the world says yes. Their flag even has an emoji, which, if you use text suggestions on an Apple device, will show up when you type in "Taiwan". China? "Nuh uh!" Ok, cool, you're entitled to your wrong opinion. Uh, WHO, is Taiwan a country? >WHO has disconnected< (3) Huh. Yep, looks like an organisation free of political bias to me. There's no way such an infallible organisation would bow to political pressure and push certain narratives in order to please certain powerful governments.
But let's leave the WHO alone and move on to Snopes and Politifact, two of Facebook's most trusted "independent fact checkers". Let's start with Politifact. Remember back in 2020 before the U.S. presidential election had been certified and Joe Biden wasn't legally president elect? Well, since Joe Biden wasn't president elect, Candace Owens said he wasn't president elect. Politifact, the oh so unbiased centre of "actually...", wrote an article about her in response. But if you know one thing about Candace Owens, it's that you do not mess with Candace Owens. That woman is an absolute lioness, and Politifact found that out the hard way. In the courtroom. (4) Candace won, forcing Politifact to correct their article.
On to Snopes. This is a more recent example, following the Kyle Rittenhouse trial. A freelancer for NBC was caught following the jury bus. The infallible Snopes declared that this was "unproven". Well, using only information publicly available (no FOI requests, no use of undercover operatives, not even a phone call to the court to ask for comment), Steven Crowder proved it on his show, after which he encouraged his viewers to email Snopes to see if they'd correct their article. Well, according to Crowder himself, "before I left this chair, you put enough pressure on Snopes to change their fact check." (5) This, by the way, should remind us of exactly how powerful free people are, and why free speech is so often attacked by evil people.
So, obviously, these so-called "fact checkers" aren't very reliable. One had to be corrected by a lawsuit, one had to be corrected by fans of a comedian who does his due diligence better than they do. Just think about the irony of that particular scenario. Steven Crowder, a comedian, is a more diligent fact checker than Snopes! Yet I assure you, Facebook won't be going to him for help keeping their "platform" free of misinformation. Meanwhile, if you're even remotely to the right of Bernie Sanders, your posts can be "fact checked" by Snopes or Politifact, considered "misinformation", and then have a disclaimer added to it linking to the deceptive "fact checkers". And if you routinely share information that gets pinged as "misinformation" by these sloppy "fact checkers", your posts get pushed lower down your friends' timelines, and maybe won't even show up at all. This is dangerously close to the highly unethical practice of "shadow banning", wherein users are not technically banned, but their content is not visible to their audience.
But again, if you're more Left leaning, Facebook will do next to nothing to stop you spreading misinformation. You can say what you like. If you question the legitimacy of the 2020 election, you're in trouble, but the 2016 election? Fair game, go for it. Suffice to say, Facebook's "fact checkers" are not deserving of that title. They overwhelmingly "fact check" those with a more Conservative opinion, and of course they generally do a bad job of it. When Snopes "fact checks" the Babylon Bee, (6) a well known Conservative Christian satire site that is quite obviously trying to be funny (and in my opinion, succeeding spectacularly), you know they're not to be taken seriously. Therefore, while I have thus far referred to them as "fact checkers" in air quotes throughout this article, I generally refer to them as opinion checkers in my normal conduct. This is because really, that's all they are. They don't check to make sure you're not spreading misinformation, they're checking to make sure you're not spreading opinions they disagree with.
And now we come to the issue of profile picture frames. This feature is actually a rather fun one, but unfortunately, it was born out of manipulation. Remember when the Supreme Court of the United States magically found the right to gay "marriage" in the U.S. constitution, and suddenly, all the Liberals had rainbow flags plastered over their profile pictures? Turns out, that was all an early experiment into the power of Facebook to influence culture through peer pressure. Unfortunately, due to the time that has passed since I saw it, I have lost the article I am thinking of (if anyone has access to it, please contact me), but Facebook even flat out admitted that the recent "I've had my Covid-19 vaccination" frames are designed to "encourage other people to get vaccinated". Do you know what it's called when your peers do things in order to manipulate or pressure you into doing something you otherwise would not have done? Peeeer pressuuure! Thankfully for me, both through my natural social disorders and through the fact I was always taught to resist peer pressure in school so I wouldn't do drugs or smoke, stupid things like profile banners don't work on me. You can't even get me to watch The Princess Bride, much less take a jab I don't trust. But for normal people, peer pressure is a natural form of manipulation.
Eventually, Facebook gave users the ability to make their own frames, and before long, many became available. Of course, that included the dark green "I don't care if you've had your vaccine" frame, responding to the "I've had my Covid-19 vaccination" frame. This lead to a great number of other responses, such as the "I've had my dinner" parody, and, my personal favorite, "I've had my sins forgiven". Oh, but we can't have that, can we? We don't want people expressing their support for causes they care about, we want people to express their support for causes we care about! We want people to cave to the jabs, we want people to support climate change measures, we want people to believe Joe Biden is somehow the most popular president who ever ran for election. So of course...
Can you get more blatant than that? Do you need any more proof that Facebook wants to be the real life version of the Ministry of Truth? At this point, the only reason I remain on Facebook is because of Bible Brain. Beyond the material I have not yet moved to the site, I would lose next to nothing by abandoning it, and as soon as I've moved all the materials I want, I may well just pack my bags and go. And I encourage others to do the same.
This article focused mainly on Facebook's manipulative tactics, but you need not imagine this problem is limited only to Zuckerberg's brainchild. All of Big Tech, from Google to Twitter, are Left wing, and use similar tactics to try to brainwash you into either joining the Woke mob, or stepping out of their way. You are being regularly, and aggressively manipulated. Therefore, remember the Bible's advice: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil." - 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22
References
1. BBC news - Parler: Amazon to remove site from web hosting service, January 10th 2020 (link)
2. Al-Sibaie, Jonas Atmaz - Social Media Platforms: Conduits or Publishers?, September 4th 2019 (link)
3. CrowderBits - Steven Crowder on Taiwan, The WHO, and Shenanigans | Louder With Crowder, March 30th 2020 (link)
4. Prestigiacomo, Amanda, Candace Owens Challenges Fact-Checker, And Wins, The Daily Wire, November 29th 2020 (link)
5. CrowderBits - CAUGHT: Snopes changes false “Fact Check” because of YOU! | Louder With Crowder, December 2nd 2021 (link)
6. Mikkelson, David - Did CNN Purchase an Industrial-Sized Washing Machine to Spin News?, March 1st 2018 (link)