Common Sense Media Condemns Meta's Choice to End Fact-Checking and Censorship of Harmful Content
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 7, 2025—Today, Meta announced it will end fact-checking on its platforms as part of a larger set of changes to eliminate "censorship" and instead embrace "free expression." In response, Common Sense Media Founder and CEO, and author of Talking Back to Facebook, James P. Steyer, issued the following statement:
"With this announcement, Mark Zuckerberg's playbook is as clear as day: Protect Meta's bottom line and cozy up to political leaders while leaving users to fend for themselves. This should be a wake-up call for all parents to monitor their feeds and the feeds of their children closely, and to assess whether Meta products are an appropriate environment for their children.
"Meta's new changes are pure hypocrisy, and they will have a devastating impact on kids and families who use these platforms, not to mention their effect on democratic norms and institutions around the world. Meta has decided not to address harmful posts until a user reports an issue, which means that our social media feeds will become dangerously rife with misinformation, cyberbullying, and inappropriate content. By putting the onus on the community instead of trained fact-checking professionals, Meta is prioritizing greed and profit over the safety and mental health of people across the world, especially our young people.
"This is a transparent attempt to curry favor with incoming political power brokers, rather than to implement better protections for the company's users, including children and teens. In recent months, Meta successfully killed key federal legislation to protect kids online, thanks to its flanks of lobbyists and the promise of a new data center in Louisiana, home to the top two lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives. Meta, along with other tech leaders, also contributed $1 million to the Trump inauguration committee. And now, Meta is planning to minimize user protections on its platforms in an attempt to emulate Elon Musk's X."
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