Through my Facebook network I found an offensive group called “Support Workfare – Make Benefit Scroungers Work for their Money” – click on the hyperlink to see what this is about.
Naturally I shared the link asking people to report the page to Facebook to have it taken down. Soon enough someone on the Dorset Eye group came back with a response, which can be seen in the image with this blog. This does not ‘violate Facebook’s community standards’.
Is this page offensive? Espousing what people to the left of centre view as government countenanced slavery is pretty bloody offensive, I must say…
In the name of ‘Free Speech’, Facebook also permits several English Defence League groups (I’m banned from all of them so cannot show any here) as well as Britain First. Fascism, albeit clothed in gentle language, is countenanced by Facebook.
As someone who lives in a far more multicultural area than anywhere in Dorset, I find attacks on Muslims below the belt. Anyone who understands Islam will know that Mohammed is reputed to have said that Christians, Jews and Muslims are all “Men of the same Book” – the Old Testament. To not understand that ultimately the three Faiths worship the same divine being is small minded in the least. It borders on the Protestant / Catholic divide in other parts of the UK.
It is interesting that though you are allowed to ‘bash Pakis’ you would never be allowed to say a thing against Jews. Though I steer clear of anti-Semitism for the same reasons as I do anti Islam commentary, I do take an issue with the political discourse of right wing Zionism, in the same way as I do any far right wing philosophy. Several pages objecting to the atrocities in Palestine have had serious problems with Facebook.
In my experience, Facebook also takes protecting right wing bigots seriously. I had to set up a new profile not long ago for the crime of taking one such bigot on. Facebook landed on me like a ton of bricks, purely for telling the truth about him and promoting an article I published in a Canadian magazine saying as much that had been checked over by a legal team before publication!
It seems that Facebook is ideologically aligned rather than a bastion of free speech. If like me you seek a fairer world where those who run the country through business and politics should pay their fair share in taxes, enabling those who do not have power to lead better lives, and one where people should by and large be able to express themselves and live their lives any way they choose as long as it causes no offence to others, then you will find an awful lot that offends you on this forum. Though I will never meet 99% of my ‘friends’ on Facebook they have shown me through their collective consciousness that the government lies, people are suffering due to the government, but also that I am not alone in feeling angry about it.
To that extent, one wonders if the saying derived from World War 2 veterans, that “though I despise your views, I would die for the right for you to espouse them” holds true even on Facebook?
Just be careful about criticising right wingers who believe that Thatcher was some sort of socialist weirdo and that billionaires should pay no taxes. You might fall foul of Facebook’s ‘community standards’…
Richard Shrubb
