4 ms·

Facebook agrees to block sexual assault 'humor'

27 points by freditup 13y ago

venomsnake 13y ago
Well it would have been better to ban rape jokes (shorter stronger and easier to communicate and connect to), but seems PR departments are quite busy in transforming the English language to Bureaucracyspeak already. It is good to see movement of the problem, although some for m of hellbanning of pages and profiles is a better solution.
JimJames 13y ago
I find it strange that there is pressure from companies advertising on facebook about this. They signed up for ads on a user generated content site and then are displeased with some of the content? Why are they even concerned about this? "Sexual assualt 'humor'" is in the extreme minority of posts on facebook. Maybe they don't want their ads next to it but that's what they signed up for. They wanted their ads next to whatever people posted on facebook knowing that the content was out of their control.
- KNoureen 13y ago
  Facebook is a private company and depends on income from advertisers to provide a "free" service. So in reality it is the advertisers who control Facebook I would say, and therefore have some weight to throw around.
  - pyre 13y ago
    They obviously have weight to throw around, but it seems really odd that they are getting into the arena, and then complaining about the conditions (even though they should have known what they were getting in for when they threw in).
  - amarcus 13y ago
    Facebook is a public company.
    - k-mcgrady 13y ago
      Parent might mean it's a private sector business not a public sector one.
- onan_barbarian 13y ago
  This is a rather disingenuous comment. Maybe they didn't anticipate that a site that rigorously polices (for example) breast-feeding pictures and race hate material wouldn't rigorously police "rape a bitch" image macros. They have discovered that having their ads next to this sort of content is not what they signed up for, after all, and are planning to unsign up for this stuff. Companies change their minds all the time about where they advertise - advertising on a service isn't some sort of lifetime promise.
  - catweasel 13y ago
    I'm not sure his comment was disingenuous. But you're right, it's bizarre that FB jumps to remove breast feeding images and yet leaves the most vile rubbish untouched. And unsurprising activists are targeting advertisers after repeatedly getting nowhere with FB itself.
  - JimJames 13y ago
    I will not be sad to see "rape a bitch" macros go but having their ads next to stuff like this is exactly what they signed up for. They signed up for their ads to be displayed next to whatever anyone posted. Anyone who has used the internet for any length of time knows there are large amounts of disturbing content on it which will definitely spill into any user generated content site. I find it hard to believe that 15 separate companies failed to realise this, especially since I would expect their advertising departments to be well read on "the internet". What I think may be happening is one company latching onto a group of activists with a very reasonable request to get some positive press and a bunch of companies "me too"ing along behind them. 4 companies were named in this article and 2 of them got airtime on NBC with the most inoffensive sound byte ever ("we are against rape"). That's free TV air time in a news slot appealing to your core demographic.
    - lowboy 13y ago
      They signed up for having their ads shown next to content that is within Facebook's posting guidelines. Or else why not advertise on /b/ if you truly had no qualms about the content? While I don't discount that they're going to get some press over this, raising issues over Facebook tacitly supporting rape culture is perfectly acceptable for a company.
- catweasel 13y ago
  They (the advertisers) are under pressure from feminist activist groups like /DestroyTheJoint , and www.womenactionmedia.org/fbagreement
- hkmurakami 13y ago
  I imagine they're accustomed to having sway over the content on any number of traditional media outlets on which they have advertised in the past.
Proleps 13y ago
I don't understand why Facebook needs to block content. If I don't like what people are posting I can just unfriend them.
- munin 13y ago
  you don't understand, facebook is doing this for the benefit of their users/customers
- masklinn 13y ago
  > I don't understand why Facebook needs to block content. It may not need to, but it decided to do so years ago. And when breastfeeding or breast cancer groups get blocked or partially censored, it's hard to understand why rape apology groups are allowed to remain.
  - rubinelli 13y ago
    > rape apology groups I don't even have a Facebook account, but is this real? Do people join groups to defend their "right to rape"? That's beyond disgusting.
- Djehngo 13y ago
  Because if they don't they will lose some advertising contracts. Facebook's reason to exist is to try and turn a profit, not to exist as a place for people to post without censorship. I imagine someone realized that people who would leave if sexual assault 'humor' was banned make them less than the advertisers who would leave were the jokes not banned.
dmoy 13y ago
Too bad negative keywords (what baidu/bing/google/yahoo/yandex/etc use in search ads) don't really work in this context. Display ads are hard :(
AlexanderDhoore 13y ago
Facebook has gotten too big for it's own good. How can they be held accountable for every single thing said by their users?! It goes against human nature. People curse, people are horrible to each other, people make fun of terrible things... It's a fact of life. You can't cleanse the world of bad human behaviour. That's a fight you can't win. Facebook will try and censor their systems, people will hate it, and Facebook will die trying. EDIT: I guess I'm being overly pessimistic here. Facebook has no choice but to do something. It just feels like: "We have to do something." "This is something!" "Therefore we have to do it!"
- Svip 13y ago
  In the same way I don't expect my government to take care of when people are mean to me. There should be social consequences (and there are) to being unnecessarily rude. I don't mind that people through fits over mean statements, but I mind it when they require laws to fill it in. Surely, government and law enforcement have been things to take care of than people being horrible without being violent.
- masklinn 13y ago
  > How can they be held accountable for every single thing said by their users?! That could stand if they didn't try to police their users at all, but they do, significantly, on a number of areas: facebook has banned or censored groups and images on such sujects as breastfeeding, breast cancer or children with birth defects[0]. Yet, and there's the rub, rape and violence groups were allowed to run unimpeded and reports were generally ignored when they didn't lead to the complainer being blocked. [0] http://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/11/does-facebook-hate-all-women-or-just-feminists/ http://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/11/does-facebook-hate-al...
  - AlexanderDhoore 13y ago
    I know that's the situation. What I'm trying to say is this: that list (breastfeeding, breast cancer or children with birth defects, joking about rape, violence...) is just going to grow longer, and longer, and longer... In the article it says: "... Facebook says it will process more complaints and will train its staff of reviewers ...". That means they are doing a big part of the censoring MANUALLY! You will NEVER be able to remove garbage faster than people creating it.
nakedrobot2 13y ago
This is (I would guess) a direct response to something that occurred last week. There was a "photo meme" being passed around on facebook, showing a photo of a girl with her mouth taped, with the caption "tape her and rape her". Someone made a screenshot of this, with an add for Audible on the page. A shitstorm ensued, with people blaming Audible and/or Facebook for showing an ad next to such an image (it's rather hard to parse a meme photo for what text is actually written on the image, right?) You can see more info about this on a google search: https://www.google.com/search?q=facebook+audible+tape+her+and+rape+her https://www.google.com/search?q=facebook+audible+tape+her+an... I guess Audible has leaned heavily on Facebook to respond to what has apparently been a very difficult PR issue for them. Disclosure: I have nothing to do with Facebook or Audible, I am just passing on what I have heard from people involved.
- user24 13y ago
  Useful background info, thanks. > it's rather hard to parse a meme photo for what text is actually written on the image, right? Actually it's trivial, but I suspect it's just not being done because most pictures on facebook don't have text so why would facebook bother?
  - jrabone 13y ago
    Doesn't Reddit's meme caption bot actually do this, or is it in fact a human? SFW example: http://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1f8ld3/worked_as_a_barista_for_4_years_more_people_need/ca7ty5d.compact http://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1f8ld3/worked... EDIT: ah, no, it just scrapes QuickMeme's UI for the entered text. Oh well...
smegel 13y ago
Hard to see how this won't slide down the slippery slope of banning all "offensive" content...at what point do you say we are OK with this particular group being offended but not others? Perhaps when the mainstream media starts agitating over it...
- lowboy 13y ago
  At least you invoked the name of the logical fallacy. And it's more than just offense in this case. Sexual assault is a very serious and terrible thing to have happen. Joking about it legitimizes and normalizes it, contributing to incidents. I imagine it's the same thing as with hate speech: it could prompt acts of violence toward people of the targeted group.
  - spindritf 13y ago
    > Sexual assault is a very serious Are videos where people actually get hurt[1], not just their feelings, also banned from Facebook? Or are those less serious? I heave heard this claim that rape jokes somehow contribute to the prevalence of the problem. Is there any empirical proof for that? [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNuaaPoLu1Q&t=44s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNuaaPoLu1Q&t=44s (unpleasant to watch)
    - adamors 13y ago
      >I heave heard this claim that rape jokes somehow contribute to the prevalence of the problem. Is there any empirical proof for that? Are you seriours, how would you even attempt to prove something like that? Funny that everyone agrees that overtly racist/anti-semitic (and recently) homophobic images on social sites are wrong, but banning rape jokes is somehow taking things too far.
      - jiggy2011 13y ago
        You can think something is wrong without necessarily seeking to ban it.
      - 13y ago
awjr 13y ago
It's good that FB bowed to pressure, but not so impressed that they considered the content not acceptable even when people flagged it as wrong. http://www.womenactionmedia.org/facebookaction/examples/ http://www.womenactionmedia.org/facebookaction/examples/
jimzvz 13y ago
I wonder if rape jokes targeting males will also be removed as I have found these much more common than rape jokes targeting females, particularly regarding the rape of suspected male criminals. An example: http://i.imgur.com/X8cjv2v.png http://i.imgur.com/X8cjv2v.png
- skore 13y ago
  This isn't reddit and it's especially not r/mensrights [Edit] Since I got a downvote right away, here is my reasoning: Rape of any form is terrible. But the reaction to rape of females shouldn't be changing the subject to rape of males. It's diminishing the gravity of both by brushing away the importance of one with an inappropriate overstating of the other. And that's precisely the style of discussion prevalent in r/mensrights and it would be terrible if that made its way over to HN.
  - tss20147 13y ago
    The poster wasn't changing the subject from the rape of females to the rape of males. The title of the article is "Facebook agrees to ban sexual assault 'humor'" and not "Facebook agrees to ban sexual assault against women 'humor'" yet the article only seemed to address sexual assault against women humor. Asking if the policy also extends to humor regarding sexual assaults against males is a fair question under the circumstances and in no way diminishes the gravity of both. According to surveys 7 - 12% percent of males report having been the victim of a sexual assault with the vast majority of victims having been assaulted while minors. The rate of sexual assaults against males is increasing. It is a serious and increasing problem.
    - skore 13y ago
      It's a tough call to make, but you do have a point. I suppose what kind of threw me off was that the image linked as an example by the poster could be understood as both a male and female version of sexual assault "jokes". Still, the implication is clearly male, just as the implication of the article was clearly female. (Actually, a little more than just implication, but the title sets to tone to be a little more general.) One point I do still maintain is that there simply is a clear imbalance between sexual assault on females and males. Yes, that does not change the gravity of either, but it does suggest how the conversation about it ought to run. If it were the other way around, seeing society predominantly talk about female sexual assault would be troublesome. But it is not and thus pulling the conversation towards male sexual assault kind of rings my alarm bells. Just as the implication is universally female, bringing up male sexual assault implies trying to diminish it being a predominantly female issue. It is accurate that sexual assault against females gets the center stage and it is just as correct that sexual assault against males is a serious issue. Your point about sexual assaults against males being rising is interesting - do you happen to have a link on that? My immediate theory would be that while there might be a rise, it can only ever be a rise in reported assault. So I would guess that it is probably increased by the fact that we as a society have become more open to accept males as victims of sexual assault in the first place. But I would be interested in seeing actual data on that.
general_failure 13y ago
I don't like this direction. I think any legal content should be allowed.

27 points by freditup 13y ago

Well it would have been better to ban rape jokes (shorter stronger and easier to communicate and connect to), but seems PR departments are quite busy in transforming the English language to Bureaucracyspeak already. It is good to see movement of the problem, although some for m of hellbanning of pages and profiles is a better solution.

JimJames 13y ago

I find it strange that there is pressure from companies advertising on facebook about this. They signed up for ads on a user generated content site and then are displeased with some of the content? Why are they even concerned about this? "Sexual assualt 'humor'" is in the extreme minority of posts on facebook. Maybe they don't want their ads next to it but that's what they signed up for. They wanted their ads next to whatever people posted on facebook knowing that the content was out of their control.

KNoureen 13y ago
Facebook is a private company and depends on income from advertisers to provide a "free" service. So in reality it is the advertisers who control Facebook I would say, and therefore have some weight to throw around.
- pyre 13y ago
  They obviously have weight to throw around, but it seems really odd that they are getting into the arena, and then complaining about the conditions (even though they should have known what they were getting in for when they threw in).
- amarcus 13y ago
  Facebook is a public company.
  - k-mcgrady 13y ago
    Parent might mean it's a private sector business not a public sector one.
onan_barbarian 13y ago
This is a rather disingenuous comment. Maybe they didn't anticipate that a site that rigorously polices (for example) breast-feeding pictures and race hate material wouldn't rigorously police "rape a bitch" image macros. They have discovered that having their ads next to this sort of content is not what they signed up for, after all, and are planning to unsign up for this stuff. Companies change their minds all the time about where they advertise - advertising on a service isn't some sort of lifetime promise.
- catweasel 13y ago
  I'm not sure his comment was disingenuous. But you're right, it's bizarre that FB jumps to remove breast feeding images and yet leaves the most vile rubbish untouched. And unsurprising activists are targeting advertisers after repeatedly getting nowhere with FB itself.
- JimJames 13y ago
  I will not be sad to see "rape a bitch" macros go but having their ads next to stuff like this is exactly what they signed up for. They signed up for their ads to be displayed next to whatever anyone posted. Anyone who has used the internet for any length of time knows there are large amounts of disturbing content on it which will definitely spill into any user generated content site. I find it hard to believe that 15 separate companies failed to realise this, especially since I would expect their advertising departments to be well read on "the internet". What I think may be happening is one company latching onto a group of activists with a very reasonable request to get some positive press and a bunch of companies "me too"ing along behind them. 4 companies were named in this article and 2 of them got airtime on NBC with the most inoffensive sound byte ever ("we are against rape"). That's free TV air time in a news slot appealing to your core demographic.
  - lowboy 13y ago
    They signed up for having their ads shown next to content that is within Facebook's posting guidelines. Or else why not advertise on /b/ if you truly had no qualms about the content? While I don't discount that they're going to get some press over this, raising issues over Facebook tacitly supporting rape culture is perfectly acceptable for a company.
catweasel 13y ago
They (the advertisers) are under pressure from feminist activist groups like /DestroyTheJoint , and www.womenactionmedia.org/fbagreement
hkmurakami 13y ago
I imagine they're accustomed to having sway over the content on any number of traditional media outlets on which they have advertised in the past.

Proleps 13y ago

I don't understand why Facebook needs to block content. If I don't like what people are posting I can just unfriend them.

munin 13y ago
you don't understand, facebook is doing this for the benefit of their users/customers
masklinn 13y ago
> I don't understand why Facebook needs to block content. It may not need to, but it decided to do so years ago. And when breastfeeding or breast cancer groups get blocked or partially censored, it's hard to understand why rape apology groups are allowed to remain.
- rubinelli 13y ago
  > rape apology groups I don't even have a Facebook account, but is this real? Do people join groups to defend their "right to rape"? That's beyond disgusting.
Djehngo 13y ago
Because if they don't they will lose some advertising contracts. Facebook's reason to exist is to try and turn a profit, not to exist as a place for people to post without censorship. I imagine someone realized that people who would leave if sexual assault 'humor' was banned make them less than the advertisers who would leave were the jokes not banned.

dmoy 13y ago

Too bad negative keywords (what baidu/bing/google/yahoo/yandex/etc use in search ads) don't really work in this context. Display ads are hard :(

AlexanderDhoore 13y ago

Facebook has gotten too big for it's own good. How can they be held accountable for every single thing said by their users?! It goes against human nature. People curse, people are horrible to each other, people make fun of terrible things... It's a fact of life. You can't cleanse the world of bad human behaviour. That's a fight you can't win. Facebook will try and censor their systems, people will hate it, and Facebook will die trying. EDIT: I guess I'm being overly pessimistic here. Facebook has no choice but to do something. It just feels like: "We have to do something." "This is something!" "Therefore we have to do it!"

Svip 13y ago
In the same way I don't expect my government to take care of when people are mean to me. There should be social consequences (and there are) to being unnecessarily rude. I don't mind that people through fits over mean statements, but I mind it when they require laws to fill it in. Surely, government and law enforcement have been things to take care of than people being horrible without being violent.
masklinn 13y ago
> How can they be held accountable for every single thing said by their users?! That could stand if they didn't try to police their users at all, but they do, significantly, on a number of areas: facebook has banned or censored groups and images on such sujects as breastfeeding, breast cancer or children with birth defects[0]. Yet, and there's the rub, rape and violence groups were allowed to run unimpeded and reports were generally ignored when they didn't lead to the complainer being blocked. [0] http://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/11/does-facebook-hate-all-women-or-just-feminists/ http://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/11/does-facebook-hate-al...
- AlexanderDhoore 13y ago
  I know that's the situation. What I'm trying to say is this: that list (breastfeeding, breast cancer or children with birth defects, joking about rape, violence...) is just going to grow longer, and longer, and longer... In the article it says: "... Facebook says it will process more complaints and will train its staff of reviewers ...". That means they are doing a big part of the censoring MANUALLY! You will NEVER be able to remove garbage faster than people creating it.

nakedrobot2 13y ago

This is (I would guess) a direct response to something that occurred last week. There was a "photo meme" being passed around on facebook, showing a photo of a girl with her mouth taped, with the caption "tape her and rape her". Someone made a screenshot of this, with an add for Audible on the page. A shitstorm ensued, with people blaming Audible and/or Facebook for showing an ad next to such an image (it's rather hard to parse a meme photo for what text is actually written on the image, right?) You can see more info about this on a google search: https://www.google.com/search?q=facebook+audible+tape+her+and+rape+her https://www.google.com/search?q=facebook+audible+tape+her+an... I guess Audible has leaned heavily on Facebook to respond to what has apparently been a very difficult PR issue for them. Disclosure: I have nothing to do with Facebook or Audible, I am just passing on what I have heard from people involved.

user24 13y ago
Useful background info, thanks. > it's rather hard to parse a meme photo for what text is actually written on the image, right? Actually it's trivial, but I suspect it's just not being done because most pictures on facebook don't have text so why would facebook bother?
- jrabone 13y ago
  Doesn't Reddit's meme caption bot actually do this, or is it in fact a human? SFW example: http://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1f8ld3/worked_as_a_barista_for_4_years_more_people_need/ca7ty5d.compact http://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1f8ld3/worked... EDIT: ah, no, it just scrapes QuickMeme's UI for the entered text. Oh well...

smegel 13y ago

Hard to see how this won't slide down the slippery slope of banning all "offensive" content...at what point do you say we are OK with this particular group being offended but not others? Perhaps when the mainstream media starts agitating over it...

lowboy 13y ago
At least you invoked the name of the logical fallacy. And it's more than just offense in this case. Sexual assault is a very serious and terrible thing to have happen. Joking about it legitimizes and normalizes it, contributing to incidents. I imagine it's the same thing as with hate speech: it could prompt acts of violence toward people of the targeted group.
- spindritf 13y ago
  > Sexual assault is a very serious Are videos where people actually get hurt[1], not just their feelings, also banned from Facebook? Or are those less serious? I heave heard this claim that rape jokes somehow contribute to the prevalence of the problem. Is there any empirical proof for that? [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNuaaPoLu1Q&t=44s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNuaaPoLu1Q&t=44s (unpleasant to watch)
  - adamors 13y ago
    >I heave heard this claim that rape jokes somehow contribute to the prevalence of the problem. Is there any empirical proof for that? Are you seriours, how would you even attempt to prove something like that? Funny that everyone agrees that overtly racist/anti-semitic (and recently) homophobic images on social sites are wrong, but banning rape jokes is somehow taking things too far.
    - jiggy2011 13y ago
      You can think something is wrong without necessarily seeking to ban it.
    - 13y ago

awjr 13y ago

It's good that FB bowed to pressure, but not so impressed that they considered the content not acceptable even when people flagged it as wrong. http://www.womenactionmedia.org/facebookaction/examples/ http://www.womenactionmedia.org/facebookaction/examples/

jimzvz 13y ago

I wonder if rape jokes targeting males will also be removed as I have found these much more common than rape jokes targeting females, particularly regarding the rape of suspected male criminals. An example: http://i.imgur.com/X8cjv2v.png http://i.imgur.com/X8cjv2v.png

skore 13y ago
This isn't reddit and it's especially not r/mensrights [Edit] Since I got a downvote right away, here is my reasoning: Rape of any form is terrible. But the reaction to rape of females shouldn't be changing the subject to rape of males. It's diminishing the gravity of both by brushing away the importance of one with an inappropriate overstating of the other. And that's precisely the style of discussion prevalent in r/mensrights and it would be terrible if that made its way over to HN.
- tss20147 13y ago
  The poster wasn't changing the subject from the rape of females to the rape of males. The title of the article is "Facebook agrees to ban sexual assault 'humor'" and not "Facebook agrees to ban sexual assault against women 'humor'" yet the article only seemed to address sexual assault against women humor. Asking if the policy also extends to humor regarding sexual assaults against males is a fair question under the circumstances and in no way diminishes the gravity of both. According to surveys 7 - 12% percent of males report having been the victim of a sexual assault with the vast majority of victims having been assaulted while minors. The rate of sexual assaults against males is increasing. It is a serious and increasing problem.
  - skore 13y ago
    It's a tough call to make, but you do have a point. I suppose what kind of threw me off was that the image linked as an example by the poster could be understood as both a male and female version of sexual assault "jokes". Still, the implication is clearly male, just as the implication of the article was clearly female. (Actually, a little more than just implication, but the title sets to tone to be a little more general.) One point I do still maintain is that there simply is a clear imbalance between sexual assault on females and males. Yes, that does not change the gravity of either, but it does suggest how the conversation about it ought to run. If it were the other way around, seeing society predominantly talk about female sexual assault would be troublesome. But it is not and thus pulling the conversation towards male sexual assault kind of rings my alarm bells. Just as the implication is universally female, bringing up male sexual assault implies trying to diminish it being a predominantly female issue. It is accurate that sexual assault against females gets the center stage and it is just as correct that sexual assault against males is a serious issue. Your point about sexual assaults against males being rising is interesting - do you happen to have a link on that? My immediate theory would be that while there might be a rise, it can only ever be a rise in reported assault. So I would guess that it is probably increased by the fact that we as a society have become more open to accept males as victims of sexual assault in the first place. But I would be interested in seeing actual data on that.

general_failure 13y ago

I don't like this direction. I think any legal content should be allowed.