Should Trump Stay Banned At Facebook?

How You Can Weigh In With Decision Makers at Facebook

Following the events of Insurrection Day, social media outlets quickly banned Trump and with that, stifled his main channels of communication with his followers. Twitter banned him permanently, then played whack-a-mole over subsequent days as he attempted to post through other people’s accounts. Facebook, on the other hand, banned him “for an indefinite period.”

Now Facebook has to decide how long “indefinite” really is. Should they ban Trump permanently, or reinstate his accounts now or at a certain point in time? Or maybe under a particular set of conditions?

That is a thorny decision and lies at the intersection of many issues. Here are the biggest that strike me:

Free Speech

Can or should Big Tech be able to silence individuals, or a type of speech they don’t like? Social media firms are private companies, and therefore not bound to the same First Amendment considerations that affect government entities.

That Amendment dictates that “government shall make no law. . . abridging the freedom of speech”.

But Facebook is not government. The First Amendment does not apply to a private company. In that realm, it is “Their house, their rules” — much to the dismay of users who want to stir shit at will in the public square, and find that, after all, there are bounds to what they can do or say. (This is clearly reflected in Terms of Services limits on users’ behavior and expression — but who reads TOS fine print if they don’t have to?)

In the end, a social media system is one company’s sandbox, and they can set whatever rules they damn well please. Oh, the joys of free market enterprise.

Curbing Insurrection

In the aftermath of the Capitol insurrection, Trump’s continued online speech was seen as a clear and present danger, inciting (or with the potential to incite) yet more violence from inflamed followers and right-wing extremists. Quashing his social media presence put an abrupt end to the immediate threat. But it did much more than that.

Silencing the leader of a violent extremist movement is an action right out of the counterinsurgency playbook. It is possibly the single most effect way to defuse an insurrection and cause angry masses to lose cohesion and direction.

First, doing so gives the hot-headed and those caught up in the actions of the moment a chance to cool off and apply some thought — instead of inflamed emotions — to what they are doing.

Second, the ability of an outside force to silence or thwart the leader of an insurgency reframes that person as one who can fail. He is no longer the stalwart, ever-victorious picture of inspiration that he was just a short while before. Instead, followers now see someone who is not, after all, Master of the Universe, but a person made ineffectual by the opposition. He can fail — and has.

This is why the US military target(ed) vocal leaders of Al Qaeda and ISIS. Followers enchanted by the idealized “always right” charismatic leader become disenchanted with the newly perceived reality. Without their rabble-rousers keeping them up in arms, many would-be insurrectionists think better of their actions, and fall away from that path of violence.

And yes, it is no accident that I invoke ISIS at this juncture. There are considerable parallels between the self-radicalization of ISIS members, and what the far-right has been doing to itself in this country. I’ll be writing about that in future post. For now, let it suffice to say that by shutting down Trump’s loudest megaphone, social media companies also kneecapped the driving force of the rising Trump insurgency.

It is doubtful Twitter or Facebook framed their decisions as “counterinsurgency” steps when they took them, but that is the end result of their action. Now Facebook grapples with this issue: if they restore Trump’s social media channel, his recently quelled insurgency could be fanned to life once again. Does Facebook want to be responsible for that, or help to facilitate it?

Public Relations and Politics

Last but not least, this entire matter is a political and public relations nightmare, with far-reaching impact and much public attention on how this high-profile case is resolved. Whatever move Facebook makes next will have lasting impact on events going forward, from public reactions to future legislation and regulations, to potential for lawsuits, and much more.

So, Facebook is now juggling quite the can of worms, and this at a time when the scope and influence of Big Tech in general, and social media companies in particular, is coming under increasing scrutiny. This is not yet a closely regulated field, and right now companies can pretty much do what they want.

They can permanently ban Donald J. Trump. But should they?

Oversight Board

Enter Facebook’s Oversight Board. Thankfully, they (wisely!) created this group last year, in response to ever-growing contention around policies and enforcement actions that Facebook makes. This board is an independent body of outside experts whose decisions Facebook has agreed to be bound by.

And guess what? Facebook punted on the Trump call (surprise!) and the Oversight Board just got the Peculiar Case of Donald J. Trump dropped in its lap.

They are the ones, not Facebook proper, who will be deciding whether or not Trump stays deplatformed. (For those who thought serving on that policy body would be an enjoyable challenge, I can only think, “Be careful what you ask for.”)

Why This Should Matter to You

The Board has outlined the process they will use to review the Trump case and come to a decision. As part of this, they will set up “a process for all interested individuals and organizations to submit public comments to share any insights and perspectives with the Board that they believe will assist with making a decision.”

So here’s your chance to weigh in. If you have an insight or perspective on Trump’s Facebook presence that you would like to share with the Oversight Board, I urge you to do so. Your input can help shape the decision about the Trump ban.

Or, as I prefer to frame it, the decision about whether or not a charismatic populist demagogue who inflames insurrection will be handed a public megaphone again.

The Oversight Board says it “expects to begin accepting public comments on this case next week. You can sign up here to receive alerts on when new cases have been posted to the website and are open for comment.”

Want to be a good netizen and engaged citizen? Sign up today.

Links

Oversight Board Statement: https://oversightboard.com/news/236821561313092-oversight-board-accepts-case-on-former-us-president-trump-s-indefinite-suspension-from-facebook-and-instagram/

Facebook passes final decision to ban Trump to oversight board: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/facebook-passes-final-decision-to-ban-trump-to-oversight-board/ar-BB1cYsWq