The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Leaders keep pressing Facebook
As ad boycott grows, civil rights groups meet with company’s brass.
Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg was scheduled to meet with civil rights leaders Tuesday as the social media company confronts a major advertising boycott over concerns it profits from the spread and amplification of hatred and outrage.
In a Facebook post Tuesday morning, Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg placed the meetings in the context of ongoing protests and calls to root out racism in the United States. Civil rights leaders were expected to use the sessions to press Sandberg and Zuckerberg to institute changes at Facebook, including installing a top-level executive who will ensure the global platform does not fuel racism and radicalization.
More than 750 companies, including Coca-Cola, Hershey and Unilever, have suspended advertising on the platform. Boycott organizers contend Facebook has allowed to flourish content that could incite violence and exacerbate social strife. And by targeting Facebook’s ad dollars in the most substantive effort yet, organizers hope Zuckerberg and his team will be compelled to take action.
The company has said it invests billions of dollars every year to ensure the safety of its users, and it partners with outside experts to update its policies. Sandberg said the company will release today the final report from its yearslong civil rights audit. “While we won’t be making every change they call for, we will put more of their proposals into practice soon,” she said.
Advertisers and civil rights groups have been unimpressed with Facebook’s promises to curb hate speech and label posts from politicians who violate the social network’s rules.
While the coronavirus pandemic has rocked companies that cannot thrive amid distancing and remote work, investors
have flocked to the social network and other tech giants, sending Facebook’s share price to new highs. Its market cap has swelled to nearly $700 billion.
In her post Tuesday, Sandberg said the audit was well underway before the current protests sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd, a black man killed in police custody. She said Facebook’s actions were motivated by a sense of duty even as the company faces mounting public pressure. “We are making changes — not for financial reasons or advertiser pressure, but because it is the right thing to do,” Sandberg said.
In a tweet Monday, the president of the racial justice group Color of Change criticized the timing of Facebook’s civil rights audit. “This timing is a transparent effort to change the narrative,” said Rashad Robinson. “That Zuckerberg believes he is so powerful that he can ignore calls from major advertisers, multiple coalitions and a growing public puts our democracy and communities around the world at risk.”