TEMPO.CO, New York - Social Media Facebook admitted that their systems to identify and remove hate comments had not been working effectively, Tuesday. They released the statement after receiving pressures from feminist groups demanding the site to prohibit accounts that spread hate towards women.
In their effort to pressure Facebook, the activist groups sent more than 5,000 emails to Facebook advertisers and tweeted more than 60,000. They also urged an automotive company Nissan and more than a dozen smaller companies to pull their ads from the site.
In a posting in its blog, Facebook said, "In recent days, it has become clear that our systems to identify and remove hate speech have failed to work as effectively as we would like, particularly around issues of gender-based hate."
The company announced that they would evaluate better methods to curb misogynist contents, renew training for their staff, increase accountability—including obliging users to use their real identities when making contents—and establishing more direct communications with feminist groups and other entities.
In the past, women's activists have routinely expressed complaints to Facebook’s contents that contain misogynist remarks, but the pressure towards the company significantly sharpened after in the previous week a collective action was conducted under the instructions of the Women, Action and the Media group, Laura Bates from Everyday Sexism Project, and Soraya Chemaly, a celebrated writer and activist. The activists wrote an open letter to Facebook’s executive demanding the company to "prohibit gender-based hate messages in their site."
The letter particularly highlighted Facebook pages with names like "Violently Raping Your Friends Just For Laughs," and other pages that exhibited graphic pictures of women being tortured by men.
Women's groups demanded Facebook to intensify training so their staff could swiftly recognize and remove contents containing harsh words or hate speeches. They also asked Facebook users to use hash tags (#) so they could stop ads containing problematic contents.
Until Tuesday night, the petition has been signed by nearly 224,000 people. "We thought advertisers would be the most effective way of getting Facebook’s attention," said Jaclyn Friedman, executive director of Women, Action and the Media.
NYTIMES.COM | ANINDYA LEGIA PUTRI|JULI
