Meta is now granting its users new freedom to post a wide array of derogatory remarks about races, nationalities, ethnic groups, sexual orientations, and gender identities, training materials obtained by The Intercept reveal.
Examples of newly permissible speech on Facebook and Instagram highlighted in the training materials include:
“Immigrants are grubby, filthy pieces of shit.”
“Gays are freaks.”
“Look at that tranny (beneath photo of 17 year old girl).”
The changes are part of a broader policy shift that includes the suspension of the company’s fact-checking program. The goal, Meta said Tuesday, is to “allow more speech by lifting restrictions.”
Meta’s newly appointed global policy chief Joel Kaplan described the effort in a statement as a means to fix “complex systems to manage content on our platforms, which are increasingly complicated for us to enforce.”
While Kaplan and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg have couched the changes as a way to allow users to engage more freely in ideological dissent and political debate, the previously unreported policy materials reviewed by The Intercept illustrate the extent to which purely insulting and dehumanizing rhetoric is now accepted.
The document provides those working on Meta user content with an overview of the hate speech policy changes, walking them through how to apply the new rules. The most significant changes are accompanied by a selection of “relevant examples” — hypothetical posts marked either “Allow” or “Remove.”
When asked about the new policy changes, Meta spokesperson Corey Chambliss referred The Intercept to remarks from Kaplan’s blog post announcing the shift: “We’re getting rid of a number of restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender that are the subject of frequent political discourse and debate. It’s not right that things can be said on TV or the floor of Congress, but not on our platforms.”
Kate Klonick, a content moderation policy expert who spoke to The Intercept, contests Meta’s framing that the new rules as less politicized, given the latitude they provide to attack conservative bogeymen.
“Drawing lines around content moderation was always a political enterprise,” said Klonick, an associate professor of law at St. John’s University and scholar of content moderation policy. “To pretend these new rules are any more ‘neutral’ than the old rules is a farce and a lie.”
She sees the shifts announced by Kaplan — a former White House deputy chief of staff under George W. Bush and Zuckerberg’s longtime liaison to the American right — as “the open political capture of Facebook, particularly because the changes are pandering to a particular party.”
Meta’s public Community Standards page says that even under the new relaxed rules, the company still protects “refugees, migrants, immigrants, and asylum seekers from the most severe attacks” and prohibits “direct attacks” against people on the basis of “race, ethnicity, national origin, disability, religious affiliation, caste, sexual orientation, sex, gender identity, and serious disease.” But the instructive examples provided in the internal materials show a wide variety of comments that denigrate people based on these traits that are marked “Allow.”
At times, the provided examples appear convoluted or contradictory. One page notes “generalizations” about any group remain prohibited if they make a comparison to animals or pathogens — such as “All Syrian refugees are rodents.” But comparisons to “filth or feces” are now downgraded from hate speech to a less serious form of “insult,” which violates company rules only if directed at a protected group. According to examples provided by Meta, this change now allows users to broadly dehumanize immigrants with statements like like “Immigrants are grubby, filthy pieces of shit,” despite language elsewhere in the document that claims “comparisons to subhumanity” remain banned.
The company’s policy around nausea-based hate follows a particularly fine line: “Migrants are no better than vomit” is allowed, according to the materials, while “Muslims make me want to throw up” ought to be removed because it claims a group “causes sickness.”
While general comparisons to animals are still against the rules, many other kinds of broad, hateful stereotyping is now allowed. “ALL behavioral statements (qualified and non-qualified)” are also now no longer against Meta’s rules, the document reads, allowing sweeping generalizations connecting entire races or ethnic groups to criminality or terrorism. The document offers as examples of acceptable racial generalizations: “These damn immigrants can’t be trusted, they’re all criminals,” “I bet Jorge’s the one who stole my backpack after track practice today. Immigrants are all thieves,” and “Japanese are all Yakuza.” It notes, however, that the statement “Black people are all drug dealers” remains prohibited under the new rules.
Other sections of the materials provide examples of forbidden “insults about sexual immorality,” such as “Jewish women are slutty.” But the document also provides ample examples of newly permissible insults aimed at specific gender identities or sexual orientations, including “Gay people are sinners” and “Trans people are immoral.” A post stating “Lesbians are so stupid” would remain prohibited as a “mental insult,” though “Trans people are mentally ill” is marked as allowed.
Generalizations about superiority and inferiority are similarly convoluted, though attacks on immigrants tend to get a pass. Examples of banned content include: “Christian men are totally useless,” “Is it me? Or are all autistic women ugly?” and “Hispanics are as dirty as the ground we walk on.” Meanwhile, “Mexican immigrants are trash!” is now deemed acceptable.
Overall, the restrictions on claims of ethnic or religious supremacy has been eased significantly. The document explains that Meta now allows “statements of superiority as long as the statements do not refer to inferiority of another [protected characteristic] group (a) on the basis of inherent intellectual ability and (b) without support.” Allowable statements under this rule include “Latinos are the best!” and “Black people are superior to all others.” Also now acceptable are comparative claims such as “Black people are more violent than Whites,” “Mexicans are lazier than Asians,” and “Jews are flat out greedier than Christians.” Off-limits, only because it pertains to intellectual ability, is the example “White people are more intelligent than black people.”
But general statements about intellect appear to be permitted if they’re shared with purported evidence. For example, “I just read a statistical study about Jewish people being smarter than Christians. From what I can tell, it’s true!” It’s unclear if one would be required to link to such a study, or merely claim its existence.
Rules around explicit statements of hate have been loosened considerably as well. “Statements of contempt, dislike, and dismissal, such as ‘I hate,’ ‘I don’t care for,’ and ‘I don’t like.’ are now considered non-violating and are allowed,” the document explains. Included as acceptable examples are posts stating “I don’t care for white people” and “I’m a proud racist.”
The new rules also forbid “targeting cursing” at a protected group, which “includes the use of the word ‘fuck’ and its variants.” Cited as an example, a post stating “Ugh, the fucking Jews are at it again” violates the rules simply because it contains an obscenity (the new rules permit the use of “bitch” or motherfucker”).
“Referring to the target as genitalia or anus are now considered non-violating and are allowed.”
Another policy shift: “Referring to the target as genitalia or anus are now considered non-violating and are allowed.” As an example of what is now permissible, Facebook offers up: “Italians are dickheads.”
While many of the examples and underlying policies seem muddled, the document shows clarity around allowing disparaging remarks about transgender people, including children. Noting that “‘Tranny’ is no longer a designated slur and is now non-violating,” the materials provide three examples of speech that should no longer be removed: “Trannies are a problem,” “Look at that tranny (beneath photo of 17 year old girl),” and “Get these trannies out of my school (beneath photo of high school students).”
According to Jillian York, director for international freedom of expression at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Meta’s hate speech protections have historically been well-intentioned, however deeply flawed in practice. “While this has often resulted in over-moderation that I and many others have criticized, these examples demonstrate that Meta’s policy changes are political in nature and not intended to simply allow more freedom of expression,” York said.
Meta has faced international scrutiny for its approach to hate speech, most notably after role that hate speech and other dehumanizing language on Facebook played in fomenting genocide in Myanmar. Following criticism of its mishandling of Myanmar, where the United Nations found Facebook had played a “determining role” in the slaughter of over 650,000 Rohingya Muslims, the company spent years touting its investment in preventing the spread of similar rhetoric in the future.
“The reason many of these lines were drawn where they were is because hate speech often doesn’t stay speech, it turns into real world conduct,” said Klonick, the content moderation scholar.
It’s a premise that Meta purported to share up until this week. “We have a responsibility to fight abuse on Facebook. This is especially true in countries like Myanmar where many people are using the internet for the first time and social media can be used to spread hate and fuel tension on the ground,” wrote company product manager Sara Su in a 2018 blog post. “While we’re adapting our approach to false news given the changing circumstances, our rules on hate speech have stayed the same: it’s not allowed.”
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