Remember back in May of 2020, when Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, “I just believe strongly that Facebook shouldn’t be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online”? Well, he lied.
Facebook now is planning on being an “arbiter of truth” for global warming, Breitbart reports.
The “arbiter[s] of truth”
According to Breitbart, Facebook will specifically be taking measures against user posts about global warming that it believes are in some way false.
The specific steps that Facebook will take to combat perceived “misinformation” are unclear. At a minimum, it appears that we can expect such things as warning labels on posts. But, what the outlet hasn’t made clear is whether it would actually remove a post or censor a user.
According to Breitbart, “Facebook stated that it plans to rely on professionals from George Mason University, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, and the University of Cambridge to fact-check climate change posts.”
“Science-based information”
Some readers may remember that Facebook, back in September 2020, did remove a report that falsely claimed that the wildfires that were taking place in Oregon were started by members of the far-left group Antifa.
As reported by CNBC at the time, Facebook ended up launching “a new information hub to provide its users with ‘science-based information’ about climate change.”
The feature itself is called the Climate Science Information Center,” which as CNBC reports, provides “Facebook users with facts, figures, and data from factual sources.”
Some of the “factual sources” include the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, U.N. Environment Programme, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, World Meteorological Organization, and the Met Office.
The changes reported by Breitbart will come as an addition to Facebook’s climate change information hub.
Its high time to remove Section 230 protection
We, of course, have already seen Facebook and other social media sites be the arbiters of truth in other areas, such as the 2020 election. Many argue that these acts put them in the category of “editors” meaning that they should not be getting Section 230’s liability protection from users.
There have been calls – even somewhat bipartisan calls – to, accordingly, remove this Section 230 protection for Big Tech. But, thus far, no progress has been made in this direction.
The post Facebook is going after global warming “misinformation.” Translation: they’re censoring first appeared on Conservative Institute.
No comments: