Hoax posts on Facebook are all part of the tradition of free speech

Yesterday was my 26th wedding anniversary. Inevitably the joyous news – along with obligatory “my, how we’ve changed” cheesy bride and groom pic – made its way on to Facebook.

Well, actually I put it there. Of course I did. For though FB is increasingly “dissed” and deserted by post-millennial yoof, it remains the knee-jerk repository of news, views and schmooze for the generations who came before. Not that Mark Zuckerberg would care if I’d spun the details of my nuptials (I was a child bride, honest, guv). And I can’t imagine he’s bothered about the legions of blaggers who proclaim FB friends to look “stunning” – even when profile pictures of flabby women stuffed into ill-fitting shift dresses scream the contrary.

Equally FB should – or rather, must – keep its beak out when it comes to those who use its platform to dish out so-called “hoax news”: manufactured, baseless stories with inflammatory headlines like “FBI agent suspected in Clinton’s email leaks found dead”. Some are claiming such fakes handed Donald Trump the keys to the White House. Given its undoubted influence, the pressure is for Facebook to clamp down.

That sounds fair enough. But hang on. From elections to stories of perfect family holidays, Facebook is crammed with tales of doubtful provenance. And in news, there will always be stories whose facts are disputed. Remember “The Queen Backs Brexit” and “We send the EU £350 million a week”? These are really just stories that some in the opposing camp violently disagree with and want to see shut down. And what better way to do that than crying foul and demanding Facebook deletes them?

So who at Facebook will decide which news is “true” (and so fit to be read) and which isn’t? Who will become its censor-in-chief in an allnew Ministry of Truth? In this new regime, the noble aim of fact-checking could be mistaken for a Leftie-esque ploy to ensure us proles – too stupid to grasp the sophisticated nuances of global affairs – see only the messages that they decide are acceptable for us to consume.

Of course Facebook has a moral obligation to close down pages which spew unreconstructed bile; those which deny the Holocaust or propagate racial hatred. But that is straightforward criminal behaviour. The frenzied debate about hoax posts is different – it’s actually a hoax in itself. For what is at stake is free speech. To regulate is to take the first step on the clichéd slippery slope to totalitarian control of online debate.

News is marshalled in all sorts of ways to generate ideas and influence opinion. Now one of the world’s biggest platforms is being told that it must not publish stories which influence opinion in a way some find disagreeable. Pretending that this is all in the name of the greater good is the biggest fraud of all.