Facebook Censors Marijuana Legalization Ad
Facebook may be the nation's hottest social networking site, but the company is no friend to the nation's hottest political issue. A marijuana legalization ad from the Just Say Now campaign has been banned for its use of a pot leaf image, stirring controversy among Facebook's massive population of marijuana reform activists. FireDogLake reports:
Just Say Now, our campaign for marijuana legalization with Students for Sensible Drug Policy, ran ads promoting our campaign that showed our logo, which uses a marijuana leaf.
Despite the ad running more than 38 million times, Facebook flip-flopped and started censoring our ads and our political speech.
I think I can guess how all of this went down: Facebook ran the ad millions of times, resulting in a few angry letters from crazed anti-drug types who ignored the political message of the ad and mindlessly accused Facebook of promoting drug use. Facebook responded by censoring the offending ad and now they've got an exponentially greater mess on their hands.
Facebook may be within its rights to choose what it considers appropriate ad content, but attempting to suppress a surging national debate is plainly idiotic. Criticism has erupted across the site and is spreading like wildfire thanks to Facebook's excellent news-sharing functionality. That's good news for the Just Say Now campaign, but bad news for Facebook, which would do well not to alienate its massive population of marijuana users and activists.
Please help out by sending Facebook a message that the movement for marijuana reform cannot be silenced. Oh, and in case you haven't noticed, Just Say Now's ads can be found uncensored here on our site.
FaceFraud is in trouble with me...
just give us the word on our group protest...we hate this type of censorship.
I am just curious. If they
Facebook Facing Flack
Facebook just doesn’t get it. Its refusal to carry ads for Just Say Now is an assault on the democratic process, as well as voters’ rights to free expression. It’s a no-win position. Is Facebook going to intervene on issues such as abortion or global warming?
Facebook has a history of using censorship to engage in unfair trade practices. Richard Esguerra with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) had this to say about Facebook, among other things:
“Most recently, Facebook was caught censoring mentions of Power.com, an online tool designed to help users collect their information from Facebook to facilitate migration to other social networks. To this day, users are still blocked from sending messages or posting status updates containing the word "Power.com," preventing users from spreading the word about a convenient way to "make the move" to Orkut, or LinkedIn, or any other social networking service that may crop up to compete. The block even stopped law professor Eric Goldman from commenting on Facebook's lawsuit against Power.com (Disclosure: EFF filed an amicus brief in support of Power.com in that case).”
And then there’s the Facebook lawsuit against a site for teachers, wherein Facebook claims they own the copy and trademark rights on “book” if it’s used as a word suffix on the Internet.
Facebook is facing some additional new competition starting September 15 of this year from Diaspora. Facebook obviously sucks and is un-American. Cannabis afficianados, free speech advocates, and lovers of freedom and democracy should all consider a switch.
Giordano
face book sell-outs
no surprise to me about face book. they will block anything that there advertisers tell them to do. they are looking to sell high . and presenting a clean image. is part of their scheme. the punks
Ice Cold Zine took a stand
Ice Cold Zine took a stand with our Facebook "Fan" page.
We're patients just like our readers/friends!
WHO NEEDS
WHO NEEDS FACEBOOK,ANYWAY!!!!!!!!!!! SCREW'EM!!!!!!!!!!!!
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