Facebook Is Set To Change Its Hate Speech Algorithms — Trashes Racially Neutral Approach, Removing Posts That Target Minority Groups

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Facebook is changing its algorithms regarding hate speech, according to Fox Business.

Arisha Hatch said, “To me, this is confirmation of what we’ve been demanding for years, an enforcement regime that takes power and historical dynamics into account.”

Hate speech directed toward Black, Muslim, biracial, Jewish, and LGBTQ will be highly scrutinized.

Facebook will be using a new scoring system to rate offensive posts.

some posts will get more attention than they have in the past.

Facebook gave a statement and shared that a post that says “Gay people are disgusting” would be higher rated than saying “Men are pigs.”

It has been reported that posts regarding “whites,” “men,” and “Americans,” will be less of a priority.

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Previously, there was no scoring card, and mild hate speech directed toward white people was addressed in the same way as anti-Semitic and racist hate speech and slurs.

Civil rights groups including Color of Change, the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League and the Sleeping Giants have been pushing Facebook to make significant changes to the way it addresses hate speech and hate groups.

The coalition organized an advertisement boycott against Facebook called the “Stop Hate for Profit” campaign over the summer, leading dozens of major brands to temporarily pull ads from the platform.

The campaign’s actions against Facebook came amid civil unrest across the U.S. after several officer-involved shootings of Black men, including George Floyd, who died in May.

Facebook has made changes to its political advertising and post-flagging policies in recent months. The website published the results of an independently conducted civil rights audit on July 8 that said it wasn’t doing enough to eliminate misinformation.