Facebook: Targeting gay people with conversion therapy videos is not harassment
You can’t pray the gay away, but that hasn’t stopped scores of religious organizations from trying.
Last Tuesday, a Facebook user watched a sponsored video innocuously titled “Homosexuality Was My Identity.” Four minutes into the video it becomes apparent that the video is religious propaganda aiming to convert gays, or at least make them celibate, through the power of Christ.
A bit of digging revealed that Anchored North, the organization behind the ad, is using Facebook’s sophisticated advertising platform to explicitly target gay users to tell them they’re going to spend eternity in hell if they don’t change their ways. Outraged at this insidious use of Facebook’s advanced targeting capabilities, the story quickly hit social media, leading to many users reporting this behavior to Facebook.
Surprisingly, Facebook responded to the series of complaints with the same response: targeting gay people to tell them they’re going to hell does not violate the platform’s guidelines aimed at curtailing hate speech and harassment.
In an assessment of research done on gay conversion therapy, the Columbia Law School found that 12 out of 13 studies on the subject concluded that
[Gay conversion therapy] is ineffective and/or harmful, finding links to depression, suicidality, anxiety, social isolation and decreased capacity for intimacy.
The outlying study concluded that the practices may work on some subjects, though it was subject to several limitations.
Although Facebook’s content monitoring infrastructure decided that it is fine to show people ads that could cause depression and suicidal thoughts among an already at risk population, the LGBT social media community decided to take the fight further. One user suggested filing a report with the IRS to revoke the organization’s 501c3 status as a charitable organization on the grounds that they “actively promote practices that are scientifically proven to be harmful.” Other users jumped on board, although it’s unclear whether the IRS will take any action in response to the complaints.
For people looking for a more petty way to express their discontent, suggestions were tossed around to send the organization mail that is “totally not trial subscriptions to various dirty magazines.”
Though their tactics are deplorable — Anchored North is capable of worse. Their website contains 9 videos that they’ve produced, including one which encourages rape survivors to forgive their rapist and keep the baby they didn’t consent to conceiving. In their words, “Babies aren’t just accidents, they’re created by God.”
While it’s no secret these organizations exist, the fact that Facebook accepts their money to serve damaging content to its users is inexcusable. We can only pray that they never add an option to target rape victims.
For more information, check out this thread on Reddit.
