(Worthy News) – U.S. Tech giant Meta acknowledged Tuesday that “harmless content” was too often removed from its social media platform, infringing on “the free expression we set out to enable.”
The statement came after it removed from its Facebook site a Worthy News agency story written by Chief International Correspondent Stefan J. Bos, a longtime Budapest-based Dutch journalist because it “goes against our community standards.”
In the investigative story, Bos concluded that the United Nations wants to ensure its narrative on climate change and other issues is pushed through artificial intelligence (AI) and media.
“I am very sad that Facebook owner Meta is censoring journalism. This story was facts-based and double-checked,” Bos said in a reaction.
Citing U.N. statements from the meeting, Worthy News reported that a United Nations committee had agreed to tackle “hate speech” and “misinformation” globally through AI and media, despite worries the approach may “stifle pluralistic debate.”
“The U.N. General Assembly Fourth Committee (also known as the Special Political and Decolonization Committee) adopted the resolution as the U.N. seeks to streamline its worldwide narrative on themes like climate change, digital identification, and digital money,” reported Worthy News, a Christian news agency based in the United States and Israel.
AGENDA 2030
The Fourth Committee also voted for a resolution on our “Our Common Agenda” plan, which includes rolling out the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs aim to achieve “peace and prosperity for people and the planet.”
However, to achieve that aim, preferably by 2030, people must follow U.N. “SDGs” guidelines on, for instance, “climate change,” which critics say will involve more surveillance and censorship.
The “Our Common Agenda” resolution also includes rolling out bank account-linked digital identification documents (IDs) that experts warn will give states more control over people’s spending.
Yet, with alternative media and other critical voices questioning these policies, the U.N.‘s Department of Global Communications will be asked “to make specific efforts to raise awareness about misinformation and disinformation,” according to the resolution seen by Worthy News.
The Department will also be asked to consider “the impact of AI and propose ways to address such a challenge in accordance with international human rights law, within existing resources.”
However, “This isn’t the first time this has happened to us,” said Worthy News Director and Founder George Whitten. “We were among the first to report on the laptop contents of Joe Biden’s son, who was later convicted on tax and gun charges. Facebook also removed that story” ahead of the 2020 presidential elections.
UNDER PRESSURE
Meta and other tech giants have come under pressure over what critics view as censoring conservative and Christian content.
The parent company of Facebook and Instagram admitted in a report their error rates were “too high” when enforcing content moderation policies.
“We know that when enforcing our policies, our error rates are too high, which gets in the way of the free expression we set out to enable. Too often harmless content gets taken down or restricted, and too many people get penalized unfairly,” Meta President of Global Affairs Nick Clegg wrote. “We will continue to work on this in the months ahead.”
Clegg also said Meta regrets the number of posts it removed during the COVID-19 pandemic, censorship efforts that CEO Mark Zuckerberg told Congress in August his company was pressured into doing by the Biden administration.
“We had very stringent rules removing very large volumes of content through the pandemic,” Clegg added. “No one during the pandemic knew how the pandemic was going to unfold, so this really is wisdom in hindsight. But with that hindsight, we feel that we overdid it a bit.”
In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee dated Aug. 26, Zuckerberg said he regretted not surfacing the pressure to censor from the Biden administration sooner.
BIDEN COMPLAINTS
“In 2021, senior officials from the Biden Administration, including the White House, repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humor and satire, and expressed a lot of frustration with our teams when we didn’t agree,” Zuckerberg wrote.
It came out days later that Rob Flaherty, who transitioned to deputy campaign manager for Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, was the point person in the Biden White House who directed the digital censorship of conservative opposition.
Whitten suggested that Meta’s behavior is part of a broader pattern. “About a decade ago, while I was preaching in Jerusalem, I had a conversation with a group of Chinese tourists,” he recalled.
“Intrigued, I asked a Chinese pastor among them what news sources he relied on, given the communist regime in his home country. His response was unexpected; he told me he followed Taiwanese news and monitored what the Chinese government chose to censor,” he said.
“This method of following the news by observing what is omitted rather than what is reported has proven insightful over the years,” he stressed.
“For example, observing the censorship patterns of Worthy News has highlighted the significance of what isn’t being shown, offering a unique perspective on what’s truly relevant.”
Copyright 1999-2024 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
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