- Meta has changed its “Hateful Conduct” policy to allow users to claim people are mentally ill based on their gender or sexual orientation, and employees at the social media platform are reportedly in a state of disbelief.
- The company has also relaxed bans on gender-based insults, including several expletives, unless used with intent to insult.
- Employees are in shock, with many expressing anger over the changes, while CEO Zuckerberg defends them as a move to allow free expression and avoid “political bias” in fact-checking.
Mark Zuckerberg is not reportedly very popular at Meta right now.
The man worth $216 billion announced in a video this week that the fact-checking team for the site formerly known as Facebook will be scrapped. Instead, he confirmed the platform will rely on X-style community notes, according to Fortune.
In a same video, CEO Zuckerberg announced the company’s “Hateful Conduct” policy had been updated, with employees quick to point out some notable cuts and additions.
The change that has shocked and appalled some colleagues is the fact the Big Tech giant will now allow users to make “allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation.”
This is due to the “political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like “weird,” Meta added in its update on January 7.
Meta — as well as the other platforms it controls like Instagram and Threads — has retained a ban on “harmful stereotypes historically linked to intimidation” such as Blackface and Holocaust denial, as well as banning those who “mock the concept, events or victims of hate crimes.”
Employees at the company are reportedly furious about the changes.
On an internal Meta platform named Workplace, one employee allegedly wrote: “I wish I could resign in protest, but I’ve already resigned.”
Screenshots of such threads were obtained by news outlet 404 Media, with a fellow employee adding: “I am LGBT and mentally ill. Just to let you know that I’ll be taking time out to look after my mental health.”
Meta did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
“It’s total chaos internally at Meta right now,” a further employee told 404. The staffer added that the communication thread about the policy changes was full of “dissent,” bar one manager who repeated the talking point from Zuckerberg’s video.
“I’d call the mood shock and disbelief. It’s embarrassment and shame that feels self-inflicted, different than mistakes the company has made in the past,” the employee added.
Also culled in the update was the ban of a handful of derogatory words relating to sexual activity, “including but not limited to: whore, slut and perverts.” Gender-based insults which also would have previously been flagged – such as “bitch” and “motherfucker” – are now also given the green light, as long as they aren’t used “with intent to insult, such as “Fuck the [Protected Characteristic]!”
Weirdly, gender-based cursing is and has always been allowed on the platform in the context of a romantic break-up. Why the changes? It seems that context and a second Trump presidency have inspired the Meta CEO to announce these changes.
“After Trump first got elected in 2016 the legacy media wrote non-stop about how misinformation was a threat to democracy,” Zuckerberg said in his video. “We tried in good faith to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth. “But the fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they have created – especially in the U.S.”
Similarly, Meta’s regulations on immigration and gender are now “out of touch with mainstream discourse” Zuckerberg added. “What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas,” he continued. “It’s gone too far. “I want to make sure that people can share their beliefs and experiences on our platforms.”
Written by Eleanor Pringle for Fortune as “Meta staffers reportedly furious after Mark Zuckerberg’s hate speech update allows ‘allegations of mental illness’ based on gender or sexual orientation” and republished with permission.
