Several stars have decided to freeze their page on Wednesday. One way to call on Facebook, Instagram’s parent company, to better fight against hateful content and disinformation.
Several celebrities, including Leonardo DiCaprio and Kim Kardashian, will freeze their Instagram accounts for a day, this Wednesday. Their goal: to call on Facebook, the parent company of the social network, to better fight on its platforms against hateful content and disinformation.
These personalities, including actress Jennifer Lawrence and comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, responded to the call of a group of organizations already at the origin of a first movement to boycott Facebook.
At the end of June the collective, which includes the association for the defense against anti-Semitism Anti Defamation League and the organization for the defense of black rights in the United States NAACP, had launched the keyword #StopHateforProfit (“Let’s stop hate at the service profit “). Several major Facebook advertisers had temporarily given up buying advertising space on social network platforms.
The collective accuses the group of playing a role in “inciting violence, spreading racism and hatred, and contributing to disinformation relating to the electoral process,” ADL said in a statement.”I cannot remain silent as these platforms continue to allow the dissemination of hatred, propaganda and disinformation,” wrote on her Twitter account Kim Kardashian, who will also freeze her Facebook page. Rapper Kanye West’s wife is one of the world’s most followed people on Instagram.
I love that I can connect directly with you through Instagram and Facebook, but I can’t sit by and stay silent while these platforms continue to allow the spreading of hate, propaganda and misinformation – created by groups to sow division and split America apart pic.twitter.com/XkxzABn7qw
— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) September 15, 2020
“Misinformation can do damage,” wrote American comedian Kerry Washington. “It’s up to us to do the research and make sure we’re sharing the correct information.”
In early July, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg met with representatives of the movement, who demanded ten immediate measures. The leader had only agreed to one of them, namely the appointment of a high-ranking leader with experience in the civil rights movement.
The representatives of the movement had decided to continue their action, including this call to boycott Instagram on Wednesday, launched to all Internet users, companies, celebrities or influencers.
The group of nine associations asks Facebook in particular to increase the resources allocated to the fight against hateful content, or to withdraw false information related to the US presidential election.
In August, Facebook announced that it had deleted some 790 accounts linked to the QAnon movement, a pro-Trump conspiracy theory. In early September, the platform also announced a tightening of its rules on political advertising.