Meta announced a series of major updates to its content moderation policies today, including ending its fact-checking partnerships and “getting rid” of restrictions on speech about “topics like immigration, gender identity and gender” that the company describes as frequent subjects of 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,” Meta’s newly appointed chief global affairs officer, Joel Kaplan, wrote in a blog post outlining the changes.

In an accompanying video, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg described the company’s current rules in these areas as “just out of touch with mainstream discourse.”

In tandem with this announcement, the company made a number of updates across its Community Guidelines, an extensive set of rules that outline what kinds of content are prohibited on Meta’s platforms, including Instagram, Threads, and Facebook. Some of the most striking changes were made to Meta’s “Hateful Conduct” policy, which covers discussions on immigration and gender.

In a notable shift, the company now says it allows “allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like ‘weird.’”

In other words, Meta now appears to permit users to accuse transgender or gay people of being mentally ill because of their gender expression and sexual orientation. The company did not respond to requests for clarification on the policy.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    11 day ago

    Calling anyone with a mental health disorder these days is considered extremely rude to begin with. Also, at least in America, people with a condition like ADHD or Autism aren’t considered mentally ill, they’re considered neurodivergent. Which is a term with a much nicer connontation than would be used for someone with bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. Yes, it’s all semantics, but if you’re going to be talking to people with these conditions, the semantics matter. Don’t call trans people mentally ill. Hell don’t call anyone mentally ill. It’s like calling someone with downs syndrome the r-slur.

    • @teslasaur
      link
      11 day ago

      I’m not calling anybody anything. You misunderstand my point. Being rude is different from differentiating from the technical categorization of words. They are both. Neuro divergent is a category of mental illness.

      I wouldn’t call anybody mentally ill, cause it is too simplistic and rude. But it still is what the word means.