Why Users Are Furious at This Social Media Company
By Movieguide® Contributor
Meta has faced serious backlash over the past week from users after announcing it would be loosening its content moderation policies and rolling back previous commitments to limiting the spread of political content.
Users have responded extremely negatively to these changes, causing searches like “how to delete Facebook [account]” or “how to delete Instagram [account]” to skyrocket on Google, per TechCrunch.
Others have praised the decision, including X CEO Linda Yaccarino who, along with X owner Elon Musk, “championed the crowd-sourced fact-checking feature that Meta now plans to emulate on its own services.”
“I think it’s really exciting when you think about community notes being good for the world…and it couldn’t be more validating than to see that Mark and Meta realize that,” she said. “Mark, Meta, welcome to the party.”
Many have attributed these changes on Meta to the upcoming inauguration of Donald Trump, who they believe the company is trying to get in the good graces of by overhauling the site.
Trump has often shared his disdain for Meta, which was stoked further after he was banned from their platforms following the events of Jan. 6, 2021. Though Trump has since had his accounts reinstated, he has refused to regularly use them, instead opting for his own social media site Truth Social.
READ MORE: WILL THIS CHANGE REALLY ‘RESTORE FREE EXPRESSION’ ON META?
When announcing the changes to Meta’s policy, CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted that Trump’s impact on his sites has played a major role in their content policies.
“After Trump first got elected in 2016 the legacy media wrote nonstop about how misinformation was a threat to democracy,” Zuckerberg explained last week. “We tried in good faith to address these concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth. But fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and destroyed more trust than they created, especially in the U.S.”
“We’ve reached a point where it’s just too many mistakes and too much censorship,” he continued. “The recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritizing speech. So we’re gonna get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms.”
The public disdain for Meta comes at an extremely crucial time as many social media creators are seeking a place of refuge as the ban on TikTok looms. While Instagram offers a similar short-form video platform, many creators may now choose a different site because of the backlash Meta is facing.
READ MORE: CREATORS SEARCH FOR ALTERNATIVE PLATFORMS AS TIKTOK BAN LOOMS
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