During this year’s Aspen Ideas Festival, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained that Facebook is increasingly trying to work with governments to determine what political speech it does and does not allow. Oh sorry, I mean: what kind of political ads it is willing to approve.
In the particular example Zuckerberg cited, in 2018, American pro-life groups wanted to run advertisements for Facebook users in Ireland. This is because the Irish were about to vote in a referendum on whether abortion should be legalized.
When Facebook saw the ad requests, the company contacted the Irish government asking whether this should or should not be allowed. “Their response at the time was, ‘we don’t currently have a law, so you need to make whatever decision you want to make.'”
In other words, Facebook could do as it pleased. There was no legal reason to disallow the ads. But what did Facebook do? You guessed it:
“We ended up not allowing the ads.”
This is extremely disturbing, but it’s very expected. Facebook’s top managers have a long history of leftist activism, and it’s clear from the company’s policies that they’re pushing their authoritarian leftist views on the company itself.
As abortion activist Lila Rose explains on Twitter, for example, “FB COO Sheryl Sandberg donated $2 million to Planned Parenthood.”
FB CEO @MarkZuckerburg blocked pro-life ads ahead of Ireland's abortion vote
FB COO @sherylsandberg donated $2M to Planned Parenthood
Twitter CEO @Jack banned my & @LiveAction’s pro-life ads, allows @PPFA ads, & says legal protections for preborn babies are “bad for business” pic.twitter.com/ZkrLoY9H2b
— Lila Rose (@LilaGraceRose) July 8, 2019
This is Facebook’s real face. They ask a government whether they should ban a specific case of conservative speech, and do so, even when they’re told there’s is absolutely no law on the book calling on Facebook to take action.
Facebook has truly become a force for authoritarian progressivism — and it’s downright frightening.
