How convenient that Facebook \u201cwhistleblower\u201d Frances Haugen just gave the social network another excuse to crack down on conservative content.
\nIn her congressional testimony Tuesday , Haugen, \u2026<\/b>
\nHow convenient that Facebook \u201cwhistleblower\u201d Frances Haugen just gave the social network another excuse to crack down on conservative content. In her congressional testimony Tuesday, Haugen, a data scientist, called on Congress to enact more regulations on her former employer to combat misinformation on the platform, saying the company puts profits over public safety. At issue for Haugen is Facebook\u2019s algorithm, which in 2018 the company changed to prioritize high-engagement content, thereby contributing \u2014 according to Haugen \u2014 to increased divisiveness and polarization among users. Haugen even went so far as to say that Facebook\u2019s switching off of \u201csafeguards\u201d after the 2020 election led to the Jan.6 US Capitol riot. \u201cFast forward a couple months, we got the insurrection,\u201d she said in an interview with \u201c60 Minutes\u201d on Sunday. Whatever you think of the Capitol riot, Facebook did not cause it. The way Haugen used the word \u201cinsurrection\u201d hinted of her likely progressive-lefty politics \u2014 revealing her true motives. And what Haugen means by \u201csafeguards\u201d is no doubt censoring of conservative content, in a way Post readers know all too well. That\u2019s her main objective: censorship. She wants a complete overhaul of the content-moderation rules on Facebook, including an \u201cindependent\u201d governmental body overseeing such changes. And as a good progressive, she pushes these new regulations under the guise of \u201csafety.\u201d \u201cFacebook has demonstrated they cannot act independently,\u201d Haugen told \u201c60 Minutes.\u201d The company \u201cover and over again chooses its profits over safety. It is subsidizing \u2014 it is paying for its profits \u2014 with our safety, and I\u2019m hoping that this will have a big enough impact on the world that they get the fortitude and the motivation to actually go put those regulations into place.\u201d Like clockwork, a couple of hours after Haugen\u2019s congressional testimony, Facebook\u2019s Director of Policy Communications Lena Pietsch jumped on Haugen\u2019s push for more regulations. \u201cWe don\u2019t agree with her characterization of the many issues she testified about,\u201d Pietsch said in a statement. \u201cDespite all this, we agree on one thing; it\u2019s time to begin to create standard rules for the Internet. It\u2019s been 25 years since the rules for the Internet have been updated, and instead of expecting the industry to make societal decisions that belong to legislators, it is time for Congress to act.\u201d It seems like Haugen and Facebook have been on the same side this entire time. And it makes sense, as Haugen doesn\u2019t actually want to break up Facebook. Instead, she\u2019d like the company to remain a billion-dollar monopoly imposing extreme-content regulations on its users. All while this is overseen by a federal agency created at her behest and staffed, no doubt, by former Facebook employees. Haugen did leak some important information on Facebook\u2019s coverup of Instagram\u2019s negative effects on teen girls\u2019 mental health (although who doesn\u2019t know this to be true?) and its lax treatment of drug cartels and human traffickers on its platform. But her drive for censorship won\u2019t remotely fix those issues. Her objective is censorship. She wants Facebook and Instagram \u2014 and all social-media companies, for that matter \u2014 to enact \u201csafeguards\u201d to combat \u201cmisinformation\u201d and \u201chate.\u201d However, given the hyper-politicized arena and the Democrats\u2019 past form for weaponizing supposedly impartial government agencies to push a progressive-elitist agenda, many will assume this means banning of conservative content or that which is negative to the Democratic Party. It is one thing to propose an independent body to force Big Tech platforms to reveal the mechanics behind their algorithmic machines of virality to spark a transparent discussion about how information is distributed and controlled. But it is far more perilous to police what is \u201cacceptable\u201d or \u201cfact.\u201d Without proper independence and rigor, it has been proven time and again that what is deemed fact \u2014 and what is not \u2014 merely depends on whether the person in charge wants it to be. In this case, without once defining either \u201cmisinformation,\u201d or \u201chate,\u201d (again, the subtext was clearly right-wing content all along), Haugen opened the door for all content Silicon Valley dislikes to be banned. If that happens, say goodbye forever to stories like The Post\u2019s expos\u00e9 of Hunter Biden\u2019s e-mails, which Facebook banned. Or suggestions that COVID may have originated at the Wuhan lab \u2014 the theme of another squelched Post column long before the idea gained broader acceptance. Some whistleblower, Frances Haugen. She just gave Big Tech and its progressive buddies the go-ahead to ramp up its censorship \u2014 and control of the American public. Victoria Marshall is the Collegiate Network Fellow at The Post.<\/p>\n