Op-ed:
Selective enforcement...Facebook's Achilles heel
By: Diane Sori
By now you all know that I have been sent to FB jail for 30 days for a post
I did NOT put up, and knew NOTHING about. You also know I have been
appealing that block for days now. Well, some interesting developments
have happened that EVERY administrator, in fact every FB poster needs to
know about, because what happened to me will most assuredly happen to
you before long.
We all know that FB...in the pocket for Obama and all things
'left'...has been trying to shut down conservative groups, pages, communities, TimeLines, posters, etc., for years now...and while they have banned and blocked us for the most minor of Facebook Community Standards and for absolutely NO reason at all, the bannings and blockings in the past have NOT to my knowledge been 'selectively targeted and enforced.'
That is until now. While on the surface my blocking seems like just the standard Facebook nonsense it is anything but, and as I and some others have investigating what happened to me, certain commonalities between my blocking and certain others have one thing in common...we blocked are ALL conservative bloggers or reporters...ALL...as in NO liberal blogger or reporter has experienced what we have. And all of us have gotten the ridiculous FB WARNINGS that we are either posting too fast, too much, or are spammers...which NONE of us are as all the sites we post on have either personally invited us to post or have NO problem with us posting on their sites. Spammers post trash or try to sell things, we post the news or opinion pieces and NOTHING else...as in we are NOT selling anything nor do we make any money off our posts or blogs.
My Patriot Factor blog post for Friday was titled, 'The Facebook Police have crossed the line this time' and spoke about my blocking being for something someone else posted and ADMITTED they posted but posted it on a site I was one of the admins on, and herein lies the problem according to FB. But the thing is I was NOT online when the post in question was put up (my carrier was down almost all evening), and second, when the post was making the FB rounds I was NOT only NOT online I was 50+ miles away from my computer sitting in a dentist's chair.
The following day as my op-ed about my blocking was being put up and shared by others on FB and the blogosphere, a woman from the DC Facebook office commented on my blog (http://thepatriotfactor.
Katie Harbath March 15, 2013 at 8:57 AM
Diane, my name is Katie and I work in the Facebook DC office. I was at the CPAC blog bash last night and someone passed along your article. I couldn't find your email address to contact you but would like to try and help look into this. Could you shoot me a note with a link to your profile or the email address you use to log in to katieharbath - at -fb.com? Thanks
______________________________
This is the e-mail I sent to her back with the requested information:
Diane Sori to Katie Harbath at 3:53 PM
Hi Katie, Thank you so much for looking into this terribly unfair and unjust blocking of me. Diane Sori
My email address is XXXXXXXXX Here's a link to my FB timeline page: https://www.facebook.com/
______________________________
Diane Sori March 15, 2013 at 6:49 PM
I have sent all you requested to you in an email. I appreciate anything you can do.
______________________________
Katie Harbath to Diane Sori at 6:37 PM
Looked into this and our policies are to hold all admins accountable for what is posted to a page so we won't remove the ban. Let me know if you have any additional questions.
Sent from my iPhone
______________________________
Diane Sori to Katie 7:18 PM
Tell me how I can be responsible when my internet carrier was down ALL night and I was in a dentist's chair for over 3 hours the following day. I had NO internet access so I had NO idea this post was up until I got home and tried to log on. And why were ALL bans removed except mine and one other persons. This is pure bull and you know it. I will NOT drop this and this will be sent viral across the entire internet spectrum. FB is now a publicly traded company on the NY Stock Exchange and I will make sure this treatment of me is known on Wall Street. This is 'selective enforcement' of the worst kind and I hope certain TV stations will now pick this up. I do thank you for trying to help but I know why I am still being banned and you know why too.
______________________________
This is NOT 'standard policy'...this is selective enforcement of the worst kind as it is targeted directly against me as all of a sudden it's FB policy to hold ALL admins accountable for every single post and/or comment put up on their sites...and that is pure BS as some sites have literally double-digit thousands of members, and that is just plain physically impossible to do and they know it.
I cannot stress that enough...FB knows that an admins cannot police their sites 24 hours a day 7 days a week and be held responsible for any and everything a member posts or comments on...that is NOT only a physical impossibility but a technical one as well as admins are just regular people who do NOT have banks of computers monitoring their sites 24/7 like FB does.
And here's a BIG kicker...many posts or comments have been deliberately posted by trolls or hackers who are NOT members of said sites but are there for the sole purpose of getting a site shut down or an individual banned or blocked by using key words to bring the site to the attention of the FB police.
Selective enforcement...Facebook's Achilles heel
By: Diane Sori
We all know that FB...in the pocket for Obama and all things
'left'...has been trying to shut down conservative groups, pages, communities, TimeLines, posters, etc., for years now...and while they have banned and blocked us for the most minor of Facebook Community Standards and for absolutely NO reason at all, the bannings and blockings in the past have NOT to my knowledge been 'selectively targeted and enforced.'
That is until now. While on the surface my blocking seems like just the standard Facebook nonsense it is anything but, and as I and some others have investigating what happened to me, certain commonalities between my blocking and certain others have one thing in common...we blocked are ALL conservative bloggers or reporters...ALL...as in NO liberal blogger or reporter has experienced what we have. And all of us have gotten the ridiculous FB WARNINGS that we are either posting too fast, too much, or are spammers...which NONE of us are as all the sites we post on have either personally invited us to post or have NO problem with us posting on their sites. Spammers post trash or try to sell things, we post the news or opinion pieces and NOTHING else...as in we are NOT selling anything nor do we make any money off our posts or blogs.
My Patriot Factor blog post for Friday was titled, 'The Facebook Police have crossed the line this time' and spoke about my blocking being for something someone else posted and ADMITTED they posted but posted it on a site I was one of the admins on, and herein lies the problem according to FB. But the thing is I was NOT online when the post in question was put up (my carrier was down almost all evening), and second, when the post was making the FB rounds I was NOT only NOT online I was 50+ miles away from my computer sitting in a dentist's chair.
The following day as my op-ed about my blocking was being put up and shared by others on FB and the blogosphere, a woman from the DC Facebook office commented on my blog (http://thepatriotfactor.
Katie Harbath March 15, 2013 at 8:57 AM
Diane, my name is Katie and I work in the Facebook DC office. I was at the CPAC blog bash last night and someone passed along your article. I couldn't find your email address to contact you but would like to try and help look into this. Could you shoot me a note with a link to your profile or the email address you use to log in to katieharbath - at -fb.com? Thanks
______________________________
This is the e-mail I sent to her back with the requested information:
Diane Sori to Katie Harbath at 3:53 PM
Hi Katie, Thank you so much for looking into this terribly unfair and unjust blocking of me. Diane Sori
My email address is XXXXXXXXX Here's a link to my FB timeline page: https://www.facebook.com/
______________________________
Then once again my internet carrier went down and this is what I posted on my blog to her when I was able to get back online:
Diane Sori March 15, 2013 at 6:49 PM
I have sent all you requested to you in an email. I appreciate anything you can do.
______________________________
And so I waited to see if she could get
my unjust ban lifted all the while having a feeling that she could and
would do nothing, and my feeling turned out to be true as NOT only did
she accomplish NOTHING her entire
demeanor towards me changed as witnessed by the below e-mail she sent
to me...again on a public venue NOT asking me to keep anything
confidential.
Katie Harbath to Diane Sori at 6:37 PM
Looked into this and our policies are to hold all admins accountable for what is posted to a page so we won't remove the ban. Let me know if you have any additional questions.
Sent from my iPhone
______________________________
This was my response back to her:
Diane Sori to Katie 7:18 PM
Tell me how I can be responsible when my internet carrier was down ALL night and I was in a dentist's chair for over 3 hours the following day. I had NO internet access so I had NO idea this post was up until I got home and tried to log on. And why were ALL bans removed except mine and one other persons. This is pure bull and you know it. I will NOT drop this and this will be sent viral across the entire internet spectrum. FB is now a publicly traded company on the NY Stock Exchange and I will make sure this treatment of me is known on Wall Street. This is 'selective enforcement' of the worst kind and I hope certain TV stations will now pick this up. I do thank you for trying to help but I know why I am still being banned and you know why too.
______________________________
I was fuming...really fuming...at this point, and so with the help of
friend and fellow conservative blogger Craig Andresen (http://www.thenationalpatriot.com/) we started researching FB policies to see if this so-called 'standard policy' that 'all admins will be accountable for what is posted to a page' was indeed in their policies. We found that it isn't
in any of their rules and guidelines, at least none that we have access
to. These are the only rules we found and NONE include that statement
of so-called 'standard policy' (Date of Last Revisions: December 17,
2012) https://www.facebook.com/
So folks, why isn't this 'standard policy' in the FB rules (watch them try to add it in to cover themselves now that they've been challenged), and why have some admins of the site in question only been warned while some others have been banned or blocked for just for one day, some for 3 days, and some like me for 30 days....and why have most all of the admins been unblocked (including the person who actually put up the post in question) while I, who had absolutely NOTHING to do with said post, have NOT.
This is NOT 'standard policy'...this is selective enforcement of the worst kind as it is targeted directly against me as all of a sudden it's FB policy to hold ALL admins accountable for every single post and/or comment put up on their sites...and that is pure BS as some sites have literally double-digit thousands of members, and that is just plain physically impossible to do and they know it.
I cannot stress that enough...FB knows that an admins cannot police their sites 24 hours a day 7 days a week and be held responsible for any and everything a member posts or comments on...that is NOT only a physical impossibility but a technical one as well as admins are just regular people who do NOT have banks of computers monitoring their sites 24/7 like FB does.
And here's a BIG kicker...many posts or comments have been deliberately posted by trolls or hackers who are NOT members of said sites but are there for the sole purpose of getting a site shut down or an individual banned or blocked by using key words to bring the site to the attention of the FB police.
And while there have been complaints
about legitimate user accounts being mistakenly disabled for violating
FB's Community Standards, the disabling is often automated and
deliberately triggered by the trolls perusing the many conservative sites, then filing a report on the account or individual NO matter that the report is NOT legitimate.
Bottom line with this is that the Obama
people and liberal leftists are everywhere doing the dirty work for
those cowards who cannot or will not actually do it themselves.
According to a fellow administrator who has dealt
with this banning and blocking issue before, FB has set themselves up as
judge, jury, and executioner when doling out their punishment. In
fact, the new FB format launched
in 2008 along with the changes in Facebook's Terms of Use, removed
the very clause detailing automatic expiry of deleted content and
viewpoint discrimination
(meaning they now owe us NO explanation as to why we are banned or
blocked, they can just do it at will). Apparently, it seems
the ban or block they initiate depends on how many times you have been
banned or blocked in the past...which is total BS because many, like
myself, have tried to appeal ANY and ALL previous bans and blocks and ran
into the same problem as now...there is NO way to directly reach FB
authorities to challenge and prove that the ban or block was
unwarranted and in error.
And here's an example of what I have been blocked for in the past. Remember the world famous photo of our soldier being dragged dead through the streets of Mogidishu after being tortured...the photo that went out in every major newspaper, media, and internet site around the world...the photo that won countless photojournalism awards (along with having his family's permission to post to show what these muslim barbarians do)...well, I posted that photo on my site and was told I am getting a 60 day ban because it was pornographic in nature and violates FB Community Standards. Pornographic in nature my eye...there was NOTHING pornographic about it, because if there was the news media would NOT have been allowed to print or show it. I was blocked simply because it upset the Obama machine's applecart is why, and because I am a vocal critic of this corrupt administration, and for NO other reason.
Amazing...simply amazing.
Making matters worse is that now that FB is a publicly-traded company on the NY Stock Exchange they can NO longer act as indiscriminately as they did in the past, because they are now held to the rules and guidelines of the Exchange. Companies listed on the NYSE must comply with certain standards of corporate governance and FB seems to bend those rules quite a bit especially the company transparency rules, which can be looked up online. Yet, FB continues to trade and sell on the Exchange, and NO ONE has questioned them...until now that is.
Maybe a Wall Street boycott of FB is in order...bet their buyers wouldn't be too happy knowing that the company they bought into has set themselves up as the arbitrary decider of what political speech they will abide by on a PUBLICLY TRADED EXCHANGE of a now PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANY and which ones they will NOT. Can you say violation of our First Amendment rights, which by the way say that ONLY speech that incites violence or the overthrow of the government is NOT allowed.
And also into this mix comes SOPA/PIPA which thankfully did NOT make it into law....but as we see with FB is still alive and well. What SOPA/PIPA (The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its Senate companion (PIPA) the Protect IP Act) was all about was trying to shut down free speech even if it wasn't something the owner or sponsor of the site posted. So if someone posted something on lets say your personal FB site that someone found objectionable or illegal they could block you as the owner of the site and report you to FB who then in turn would block or ban you for whatever amount of time they arbitrarily decided upon...even if you had, and this is critical...NOTHING to do with what was posted. And this is exactly what FB is doing as they keep the SOPA/PIPA objective operational.
Big brother is here and FB is one of their operatives, and I am but one of their victims. But now this battle has gone beyond just me and my issues. And this is what FB is doing, as suddenly ALL admins are being held responsible to police their sites 24/7 and will be called to task for anything and everything anyone ever posts or comments on on their sites...anything at anytime...a task that is absolutely impossible to do.
This is just one way that Barack HUSSEIN Obama, through his ally FB, is trying to shut down conservative sites, bloggers, and posters (remember that just conservatives are being targeted). And while my parole from FB jail was wrongfully rejected, I will fight on as will other conservatives bloggers, posters, and admins NOT only on my behalf but because the once respected and admired FB has now morphed into nothing but a mouthpiece for Obama, same as the msm, and this we conservatives will NOT sit idly by and allow to continue on without a fight. We need every and any venue available to us to get our conservative message out to the public...and that includes being on FB because of their reach.
And here's an example of what I have been blocked for in the past. Remember the world famous photo of our soldier being dragged dead through the streets of Mogidishu after being tortured...the photo that went out in every major newspaper, media, and internet site around the world...the photo that won countless photojournalism awards (along with having his family's permission to post to show what these muslim barbarians do)...well, I posted that photo on my site and was told I am getting a 60 day ban because it was pornographic in nature and violates FB Community Standards. Pornographic in nature my eye...there was NOTHING pornographic about it, because if there was the news media would NOT have been allowed to print or show it. I was blocked simply because it upset the Obama machine's applecart is why, and because I am a vocal critic of this corrupt administration, and for NO other reason.
Amazing...simply amazing.
Making matters worse is that now that FB is a publicly-traded company on the NY Stock Exchange they can NO longer act as indiscriminately as they did in the past, because they are now held to the rules and guidelines of the Exchange. Companies listed on the NYSE must comply with certain standards of corporate governance and FB seems to bend those rules quite a bit especially the company transparency rules, which can be looked up online. Yet, FB continues to trade and sell on the Exchange, and NO ONE has questioned them...until now that is.
Maybe a Wall Street boycott of FB is in order...bet their buyers wouldn't be too happy knowing that the company they bought into has set themselves up as the arbitrary decider of what political speech they will abide by on a PUBLICLY TRADED EXCHANGE of a now PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANY and which ones they will NOT. Can you say violation of our First Amendment rights, which by the way say that ONLY speech that incites violence or the overthrow of the government is NOT allowed.
And also into this mix comes SOPA/PIPA which thankfully did NOT make it into law....but as we see with FB is still alive and well. What SOPA/PIPA (The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its Senate companion (PIPA) the Protect IP Act) was all about was trying to shut down free speech even if it wasn't something the owner or sponsor of the site posted. So if someone posted something on lets say your personal FB site that someone found objectionable or illegal they could block you as the owner of the site and report you to FB who then in turn would block or ban you for whatever amount of time they arbitrarily decided upon...even if you had, and this is critical...NOTHING to do with what was posted. And this is exactly what FB is doing as they keep the SOPA/PIPA objective operational.
Big brother is here and FB is one of their operatives, and I am but one of their victims. But now this battle has gone beyond just me and my issues. And this is what FB is doing, as suddenly ALL admins are being held responsible to police their sites 24/7 and will be called to task for anything and everything anyone ever posts or comments on on their sites...anything at anytime...a task that is absolutely impossible to do.
This is just one way that Barack HUSSEIN Obama, through his ally FB, is trying to shut down conservative sites, bloggers, and posters (remember that just conservatives are being targeted). And while my parole from FB jail was wrongfully rejected, I will fight on as will other conservatives bloggers, posters, and admins NOT only on my behalf but because the once respected and admired FB has now morphed into nothing but a mouthpiece for Obama, same as the msm, and this we conservatives will NOT sit idly by and allow to continue on without a fight. We need every and any venue available to us to get our conservative message out to the public...and that includes being on FB because of their reach.
3 comments:
Dump FB Stocks.....ANYONE reading this ...DUMP it ALL
someone should start a "Conservative" version of facebook....
It happens to all of us, right wing or left wing.
And you dimish your point with grouping Obama into this. It just makes you look insanely stupid.
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