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Facebook Accused of ‘Whitewashing’ India Human Rights Report
- anon261114 4y agoAccessible version: https://archive.ph/o7tfG https://archive.ph/o7tfG
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago> Ankhi Das, Facebook’s most senior executive in India, resigned in October 2020 after the Wall Street Journal reported she had intervened to prevent the platform removing accounts of members of the country’s Hindu nationalist ruling party, some of whom had called for violence against India’s Muslim minority. I am not sure it is Facebook’s place to be policing members of the government of the largest democracy in the world.
- anon261114 4y agoFacebook claims to follow a content moderation policy [1] for users on its platform. "Members of the government of the largest democracy in the world" is not a justification to bestow some kind of immunity from their policy. They should apply that policy to all users. [1]: https://transparency.fb.com/en-gb/policies/community-standards/ https://transparency.fb.com/en-gb/policies/community-standar...
- baybal2 4y ago
- oneoff786 4y agoSo… you’re in favor of providing a platform to call for violence against ethnic minorities?
- hiyer 4y ago
- anon261114 4y ago> I don't see how Assuming you intend to see, you can see how if you read the article and its linked articles.
- hiyer 4y agoI'm only referring to the specific case of the members of the ruling party allegedly making calls for violence. There is nothing in the article that says these were made on Facebook.
- anon261114 4y agoFrom the articles: "religious violence fomented in India across Meta’s platforms.” "Facebook allowed a Hindu nationalist conspiracy theory to flourish on its platform" "One video of an extremist preacher calling for Hindus to rise up and kill Muslims racked up 1.4 million views but was not deleted" "Facebook banned a Hindu extremist group under its terrorism policies—but left most of its pages online for months after that ban, allowing them to share content" "In Facebook posts and public appearances, Indian politician T. Raja Singh has said Rohingya Muslim immigrants should be shot, called Muslims traitors and threatened to raze mosques. [FB employees] concluded Mr. Singh not only had violated the company’s hate-speech rules " "The company’s top public-policy executive in the country, Ankhi Das, opposed applying the hate-speech rules to Mr. Singh and at least three other Hindu nationalist individuals and groups flagged internally for promoting or participating in violence, said the current and former employees." "team took no action after BJP politicians posted content accusing Muslims of intentionally spreading the coronavirus, plotting against the nation and waging a “love jihad” campaign by seeking to marry Hindu women" "He has used Facebook, where his own page and those dedicated to him have more than 400,000 followers, to say that Muslims who kill cows—animals revered by Hindus—should be slaughtered like them." "Another BJP legislator, a member of Parliament named Anantkumar Hegde, has posted essays and cartoons to his Facebook page alleging that Muslims are spreading Covid-19 in the country in a conspiracy to wage “Corona Jihad.”" "Within hours of the videotaped message, which Mr. Mishra uploaded to Facebook, rioting broke out that left dozens of people dead. Most of the victims were Muslims, and some of their killings were organized via Facebook’s WhatsApp, according to court documents filed by police and published in Indian newspapers."
- tsimionescu 4y agoIsn't that the US free speech ideal? Didn't the ACLU use to defend the right of KKK members to hold rallies for exactly this ideal?
- yiamvino 4y agolet me understand this right holding rallies / calling violence are synonyms to one another all comes under free speech ?
- tsimionescu 4y agoWhat do you think the KKK would do at those rallies? Share cookies?
- Synaesthesia 4y agoEven in the US with its exceptional.free speech laws, calls for violence or.murder are outlawed.
- angelbar 4y agoFacebook is a private communication party.... they can be screaming their lungs out on the streets, if their goverments allow it.
- tsimionescu 4y agoI didn't talk about the law, but the ideal.
- causi 4y agoNo, compelling a company to host speech it doesn't agree with is not the free speech ideal.
- howinteresting 4y agoThe ACLU was stupid for defending the KKK and I'm glad they've wised up.
- causi 4y agoIn what way is that "policing"?
- mantas 4y agoIn many parts of the world Facebook is synonymous to Internet. If you can't post on Facebook, you're pretty much toasted as a public figure.
- denton-scratch 4y agoThat brings to mind a certain orange fellow; but he doesn't seem to be toast (not yet).
- mantas 4y agoUS is quite diverse with Twitter. Which is let’s say… not so popular in many other markets.
- causi 4y agoThen the largest democracy in the world is free to make their own social media.
- mantas 4y agoI can imagine outcry if India banned Facebook :D but they banned TikTok, so maybe FB time will come too.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- AndyMcConachie 4y agoI guess America cares about India's human rights record now that India is trading with Russia and doesn't back Ukraine unconditionally. You coud totally see this coming once India started trading with Russia. The Indian government, and especially the current government, has been treating muslims terribly for years. But the American establishment didn't have a problem with it until India declared they wouldn't go along with Russian sanctions.
- YetAnotherNick 4y agoEven US is trading with Russia.
- feet 4y agoThat's what selective enforcement is all about
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- arcen 4y agoWhat do you mean treating muslims terribly?
- statguy 4y agoThe current Indian government has taken an increasingly fascist approach towards Indian Muslims. It has been jailing Muslim activists without due course and trials, demolishing homes of Muslims participating in peaceful protests and turning a blind eye to fireband Hindu leaders openly calling for genocide against Muslims. https://m.thewire.in/article/communalism/beyond-blasphemy-inside-yati-narsinghanands-militant-hindutva-machinery/amp https://m.thewire.in/article/communalism/beyond-blasphemy-in... https://www.boomlive.in/news/hindu-rashtra-convention-bengaluru-muslims-are-cancer-land-jihad-17829 https://www.boomlive.in/news/hindu-rashtra-convention-bengal... https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/takeaway/segments/indias-democracy-crisis https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/takeaway/segments/india... https://article-14.com/post/jailed-or-punished-with-or-without-trial-how-the-state-misuses-the-law-against-india-s-inconvenient-citizens-62d615129ab71 https://article-14.com/post/jailed-or-punished-with-or-witho...
- statguy 4y agoFor overall context, the current Indian government has taken an increasingly fascist approach towards Indian Muslims. It has been jailing Muslim activists without due course and trials, demolishing homes of Muslims participating in peaceful protests and turning a blind eye to fireband Hindu leaders openly calling for genocide against Muslims. https://m.thewire.in/article/communalism/beyond-blasphemy-inside-yati-narsinghanands-militant-hindutva-machinery/amp https://m.thewire.in/article/communalism/beyond-blasphemy-in... https://www.boomlive.in/news/hindu-rashtra-convention-bengaluru-muslims-are-cancer-land-jihad-17829 https://www.boomlive.in/news/hindu-rashtra-convention-bengal... https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/takeaway/segments/indias-democracy-crisis https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/takeaway/segments/india... https://article-14.com/post/jailed-or-punished-with-or-without-trial-how-the-state-misuses-the-law-against-india-s-inconvenient-citizens-62d615129ab71 https://article-14.com/post/jailed-or-punished-with-or-witho...
- amitprayal 4y ago
- harpic 4y ago
- throwaway_1928 4y ago
- anon261114 4y agoCringeworthy strawman. But also demonstrates the kind of rationalization and whitewashing that's prevalent in the minds of millions of regular Indians, not just those working in FB.
- hgazx 4y agoHonest question and I’m not Indian. If millions of regular Indians don’t want Muslims, what gives?
- hunglee2 4y agoIs it Facebook's role to monitor a country's human rights record? I'd be all for it, if that were the case, and it the criteria for human rights transgressions were universally applied.
- hackerlight 4y agoNobody is saying that. They just don't want Facebook to play an active role in making things worse.
- soamv 4y agoAs the opening sentence of the article says, the report under discussion is specifically about Facebook's impact: > Meta has been accused of “whitewashing” a long-awaited report on its human rights impact in India
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]