Facebook has removed racist and misogynistic posts and comments about Sen. Kamala Harris after BBC News informed the social media giant of three groups that regularly hosted such material on their pages.
Although Facebook says it removes 90% of hate speech before it is flagged, Media Matters president Angelo Carusone told BBC News on Tuesday that "Facebook's removal of this content only after it's been flagged to them by the media confirms that the rules and guidelines they establish are hollow, because they put little to no effort into detection and enforcement."
Carusone emphasized that in the posts about Harris, violations of the policy were very easy to detect, "and yet, these escaped Facebook's notice until flagged by a third party."
The posts included the mocking of her name and accusations that Harris was not a U.S. citizen because her mother was from India and her father from Jamaica. Another entry said she should be "deported to India," while other sexually graphic and misogynistic submissions were also removed.
Civil rights groups have criticized Facebook for not making a serious enough effort to confront hate speech.
Rashad Robinson, from the Stop Hate for Profit campaign, told BBC News that Facebook had even "created a set of algorithms that incentivize people to spread hate."
In addition, Facebook's own civil rights audit in August said the company’s decisions about hate speech represented "significant setbacks for civil rights."
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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