Why Can't Mark Zuckerberg Be a Better Man?
Welcome to a special edition on free speech and censorship. Here's what's on my plate: Zuckerberg's announcement about killing fact checkers. Plus, how I got banned by LinkedIn. Fun stuff!
Pop Goes the Weasel
If you want a good barf, I recommend you watch Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s five-minute video in which he explains why he’s killing fact checking on his social media platforms.
Looking demure (the word of the year) as an unassuming intern (except for that $900,000 watch on his wrist), he decried how “governments and legacy media have pushed to censor more and more.” He exhorted: “It’s time to get back to our roots around free expression.” So off with the heads of fact checkers because they are “politically biased,” said Zuckerman. Never mind that he was the one who put in those pesky fact checkers in the first place.
And the impetus for this abrupt shift in policy? “The recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritising speech,” declared Zuckerberg.
Give the guy credit for being honest that he’s just bending to the prevailing political winds. If Kamala Harris had won, I’m sure he’d be singing a completely different tune.
Aside from that passing admission that principles are beside the point, Zuckerberg was gaslighting us all the way. But I don’t think he cares whether we’re buying his truth-impedes-free-speech crap. His main act was kissing up to Trump in the most shameless way possible—and in public view (because Trump loves public groveling). Not only did he denounce the last four years under Biden as some sort of free expression gulag but he kept babbling about partnering with Trump to fight censorship in the U.S. — and the world. At times, he sounded messianic.
I won’t go into all the nuances of Zuckerberg’s remarks but permit me to highlight three sections that grabbed my attention:
Replacing fact checkers with “community notes.” Rather than rely on a professional team of fact checkers, Meta will now turn to crowd-sourcing to suss out falsehoods, copying Elon Musk’s approach on X. And we all know how brightly truth is shining on X.
Singling out “immigration and gender” for reduced content restrictions. WTF? Is there a dearth of hostility towards immigrants, women, and transgender people on social media? Have racists, xenophobics, transphobes, and misogynists been suffering in silence too long? Well, Zuck is fixing that injustice.
Migrating content moderation from California to Texas, “where there is less concern about the bias of our teams.” Flaming red Texas, home to some of the most draconian anti-abortion laws in the country, is now the community standard? And this will “build trust”?
It’s kind of a sad sight to see Zuckerberg who actually built a business empire, however loathed, grovel before someone who’s a huckster. He didn’t have to do that.
He could have held his ground, standing up for truth, justice, and the American Way.
Instead, he chose to be a weasel, which, unfortunately for him, is what we expected all along.
Meanwhile, I got censored!
While Meta is kowtowing to the extreme right wing and opening the spigot of misinformation (can we just call them lies?), I’m getting censored. That’s right, little ole me, Vivia Chen, Ex-Careerist.
It happened after I posted a four paragraph excerpt from one of my Substack essays (“Affirmative Action for Stupid White Dudes”) as a LinkedIn article. Within a few hours, the platform removed my post with the following notice:
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