Facebook is Faceless
We thought Joey’s narrative would be good to re-share as we have been sharing our views with OFCOM this week for the Illegal Harms Consultation. Our thoughts will be fed into the Register Of Risks - a policy that social media companies will have to report on. It’s been a BIG week for us!
Note: Joey’s shared this story prior to our meetings with Facebook. The messages in it still apply today.
Trigger warning: This post contains ableist slurs.
Seeing posts on Facebook should bring us a smile, a photo of a loved one, a lighthearted joke or good quote to start the day. What happens when this is not the case? What happens when a post doesn’t bring any of those things. People, friends within our disabled community often face hateful comments and people laughing.
“But those are just words”. “It’s just a joke – you're being too sensitive” I hear you say.
Words are not temporary
Imagine if this was just your ordinary. How painful would that be? We are left feeling powerless online, Facebook is Faceless. If someone were to shout something in the street, it would be dealt with – taken seriously, there would be consequences for their words.
Online it seems that those rules become blurred, morality becomes blurred our faces have, IN FACT BECOME BLURRED.
We want facebook to HEAR US. We need you to bring our faces back into focus as people that make up numbers on your platform. You are an “innovation powerhouse” right now you are putting profits before people BUT without the people where are the profits?
The people that are here today may be a tiny number in terms of your platform but we represent thousands of people across the world! Isn’t that the beauty of this platform? Yet we regularly experience can only be described as nothing short of LETHAL.
“Put it down”
Regular use of the word “Retard”
“What in the missing chromosome is that giraffe thing”,
“I hope it doesn’t procreate”
ALL REAL COMMENTS. ALL COMMENTS THAT HAVE BEEN REPORTED MULTIPLE TIMES. ALL COMMENTS THAT HAVE REMAINED. VISIBLE.
Whether we blame it on AI, misunderstanding or human error it is ultimately your decision that these comments stay up which means (according to your POLICY) none of these comments are a direct attack on disabled people.
None of these comments include “DEHUMANISING SPEECH” None of these comments include “STATEMENTS OF INFERIORITY, DISGUST OR CONTEMPT” And finally, none of these include “calls for exclusion or segregation”
THESE PEOPLE ARE FRIENDS, FAMILY PARENTS AND MAYBE EVEN COLLEAGUES.
Responding to this material with a message of what WE could do, how WE could block the author of the comment IS NOT THE ANSWER.
STOP putting the responsibility back onto the people that are the targets of this abuse - even just one person seeing content like this is one too many, once one person has seen it, then it’s too late, they can’t block from their memory what they’ve seen!
We don't expect Facebook to be able to eradicate every hateful word or comment on their platform, we expect it to be minimised and to be treated with genuine care and compassion.
We call upon:
Mark Zuckerberg - CEO and creator HEAR OUR VOICE
Nick Clegg - Vice‑President for Global Affairs and Communications
HEAR OUR VOICE
Richard Earley - UK Public Policy Manager for Facebook HEAR OUR VOICE
David Miles - Head of Safety at Facebook - Europe, Middle East and Africa HEAR OUR VOICE
SOCIETY, PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD, THE PUBLIC: HEAR OUR VOICE!
Joey and Jodie at CYA’s Mad Hatters Tea Party outside Facebook FQ, London
WHAT CAN YOU DO HERE TODAY TO SUPPORT US?
We hope you have enjoyed reading Joey’s narrative. If it has moved you to take action with us, please send us an email to see how you can get involved with our campaigning
