Campaign To Get Changes Made To Facebooks Community Standards.

Facebook, when used in a positive way, can be fun, informative and a great way to connect with people. Unfortunately it can also be used as a breeding ground for hate and negativity. The community standards are what Facebook use as a guideline on whether a post is acceptable or not. It seems that even when we can't understand or agree with someone else's opinions they have the right to express them, even when they may appear to be racist, homophobic, sexist etc. So it can become frustrating when you report a post that is clearly offensive only to be told that it does not violate the Community Standards.

One of our Admins is working on a campaign to get Facebook to review their community standards and to make much needed changes. To make the campaign a success, a lot of research will need to be carried out as well as interacting with people on Facebook about how certain posts have impacted on them emotionally and mentally.

 The campaign is not only about presenting the problem, it is also about offering solutions. It may be unrealistic to expect Facebook to shut down pages and groups so we need to think of things that Facebook could implement as a deterrent.For example Admin T has suggested the introduction of the 'dislike' button with the option to give a reason why you dislike the post (but only if you want to give a reason). People tend to want to be liked, they are encouraged to keep posting about certain topics, if those posts get a lot of likes. Adding the dislike button would mean the posts would be able to get negative feedback instantly and as people want to be liked, it will make them pause and think before they post.

Admin B has suggested a warning label on a page/group or person. If a person/page/group receives x amount of reports for the same thing e.g. content is racist, homophobic, sexist etc a warning come up at the top of the page saying

"The person/page/group you are on contains content that some will find racist" ( or insert whatever the person/page/group is being reported for.)

To make it fair it would have to be x amount of different people reporting rather than x amount of reports as we don't want someone sitting and repeatedly reporting the same page over and over just to get the warning on their Facebook page.

 

This may make people think before engaging in a post or joining a group/page as people do not want to be branded as anything negative.

 

Admin B is looking for volunteers to help get this campaign up and running, if you are interested please email briegehavern1@hotmail.com