Thread by @DrDenaGrayson

🚨Internal #Facebook documents show that posts—including by Trump—fueled the #January6thInsurrection. User reports of “false news” hit ~40,000 per hour.

On Instagram, the account reported most often for inciting violence was @realdonaldtrump.🤬

washingtonpost.com/technology/202…

One FB employee fumed, “This is not a new problem. We have been watching this behavior from politicians like Trump, and the—at best—wishy washy actions of company leadership, for years now….”

“… We have been reading the [farewell] posts from trusted, experienced and loved colleagues who write that they simply cannot conscience working for a company that does not do more to mitigate the negative effects on its platform.”💥

EXACTLY.

#DeleteFacebook

“Documents also provide ample support that (FB’s) internal research over several years had identified ways to diminish the spread of political polarization, conspiracy theories & incitements to violence but that in many instances, executives had declined to implement those steps”

Another employee: “Never forget the day Trump rode down the escalator in 2015, called for a ban on Muslims entering the US, [and] we determined that it violated our policies, and yet we explicitly overrode the policy and didn’t take the video down.”🤬

#FacebookIsComplicit

“…There is a straight line that can be drawn from that day to today (#January6thInsurrection), one of the darkest days in the history of democracy and self-governance. Would it have made a difference in the end?

We can never know, but history will not judge us kindly.”💥

‼️Facebook has declined to deploy some mitigation tactics when Mark #Zuckerberg has objected on the basis that they will cause too many “false positives” or might stop people from engaging with its platforms.

Zuck puts PROFIT over protecting our democracy.🤬

#DeleteFacebook

Internal documents report that #Facebook research in 2019 found that *misinformation shared by politicians was more damaging* than that from ordinary users. Yet Facebook maintained a policy that *explicitly allowed political leaders to LIE* without facing fact checks.🤬

#Facebook’s “cross-check” program created to prevent “PR fires” by imposing an extra layer oversight when accounts of politicians & other users with large followings faced enforcement action devolved into an abused white list that put the powerful beyond the reach of FB policies.

Bottom line: #Facebook and Zuck *knew* that they were fomenting hate and violence in advance of the #January6thInsurrection.

They didn’t care, because they PROFITED off it.

They’re a cancer on our democracy.

Act accordingly.

#DeleteFacebook

https://twitter.com/drdenagrayson/status/1451695268001366017?s=21

https://twitter.com/drdenagrayson/status/1451695268001366017