Facebook has no problem with a kitten torture video on its site, but when Facebook users talk about guns, the social media giant will censor them with zeal.
Recently a video was posted on Facebook showing two men lighting a helpless kitten in a bucket on fire, but after multiple users flagged the video, Facebook told them it “doesn’t violate our Community Standards.”
“I was going through Facebook and I saw this video,” user Kieran Dunwel told the Daily Mail. “I clicked on it, watched it and I was disgusted.”
“I reported it to Facebook, it took five or six hours for them to get back to me, and they said it was perfectly fine to have it on there.”
However, when users attempt to talk about guns or post pictures of firearms, Facebook hits them with “Community Standards” violations.
A few days ago, gun rights activist Gerry Emery was banned from Facebook after sharing an article explaining the ways in which Connecticut’s gun ban is worse than Hitler’s gun ban.
Facebook said Emery’s post, which also included an image stating that gun control helped make the Holocaust possible, “doesn’t follow Facebook Community Standards.”
“You’re temporarily blocked from posting,” Facebook told Emery. “This temporary block will last 30 days, and you won’t be able to post on Facebook until it’s finished.”
“You’ve repeatedly posted things that aren’t allowed on Facebook. Read the Facebook Community Standards to learn what kinds of posts aren’t allowed.”
Similarly, last year Facebook deactivated the page of a Pennsylvania gun store without warning after the store’s owner announced his intent to raffle off an AR-15.
“Our Ad Guidelines prohibit promotion of the sale of weapons and the Ad Guidelines apply to Pages with commercial content on them,” a Facebook spokesman told Vocativ. “Ads may not promote the sale or use of weapons, ammunition, or explosives.”
Facebook even expanded this policy back in March by preventing users under 18 from seeing the official pages of gun shops, effectively placing gun-related content in the same category as porn.
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