October 17, 2024
In a shocking revelation, O’Keefe Media Group (OMG) released two rounds of undercover videos exposing the censorship practices at Meta (formerly Facebook), where senior engineers admitted to systematic suppression of conservative voices, particularly those that are pro-Trump, or critical of Democratic figures such as Vice President Kamala Harris. These revelations have heightened concerns over biased censorship on social media platforms, particularly in the lead-up to the 2024 election.
Anti-Kamala Comments Automatically Demoted
In the first set of videos OMG released, Jeevan Gyawali, senior software engineer at Meta, admitted that posts criticizing Vice President Kamala Harris were being automatically “demoted” without the users’ knowledge on Meta’s sites. As Gyawali explained: Content like “Kamala Harris is unfit to be a president because she doesn’t have a child,” would be marked as “extremism” by Meta’s Integrity Team and then removed from visibility and reach.
Gyawali wrote that users aren’t informed when posts get shut down and they don’t know why their content isn’t being liked as much. The ‘civic classifiers’ that Meta’s platform employ shadowban such posts.
Pro-Trump Posts Targeted
The second round of undercover footage also expands on Meta’s censorship operations, with Matthew Fowler, a Software Engineering Manager, admitting that disinformation probes generally target pro-Trump posts. Fowler explained that Meta looks at flagged posts and will sometimes delete them if the media says so: The news is going to do their job, and then depending on the media… you have to believe that.
Another Meta engineer, Plamen Dzhelepov, admitted that Meta has the right to suppress any content, specifically targeting “crazy conspiracy right-wing people.” Dzhelepov confirmed Meta’s political bias, saying, “They’re biased if they do that against the Republicans.” Dzhelepov and Fowler both emphasized Meta’s reliance on mainstream media narratives to decide what content to suppress.
Pattern of Collusion Between Big Tech and Federal Agencies
These Meta leaks contribute to the increasing awareness that Big Tech and Federal Officials are conspiring to censor free speech, especially criticism of Democratic elected officials. According to the Twitter Files, uncovered by independent journalists such as Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss, Twitter bosses routinely collaborated with the FBI, DHS, and DNI to silence conservatives around sensitive topics, including the Hunter Biden laptop scandal and COVID-19 guidelines.
According to the Twitter Files, government departments labelled posts as “fake news” and ordered sites to ban them or move them down, sometimes on specific political grounds. These private communications have also been questioned as violations of First Amendment rights, since government censorship outsourcing to private companies is an ongoing legal battle.
Meta’s Censorship Practices in Context
O’Keefe Media Group’s recent accusations about Meta’s censorship also support the general thesis that social media corporations, in concert with government agencies, are conspiring to shut down any voices who disagree with Democratic policies. According to the Twitter Files, the FBI notified Facebook and Twitter that this laptop, called the Hunter Biden laptop, was being targeted for rumors, and it was therefore deleted in time for the 2020 election. In one of the Twitter Files, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook “reduced the distribution” of the story under advice from the FBI.
Meta’s ability to demote and censor posts without users’ knowledge adds to concerns about the unchecked power of tech giants. As Dzhelepov bluntly stated, “Meta actually suppresses certain voices.” Whether this kind of suppression violates users’ rights to free expression remains a hotly debated issue, especially with these practices disproportionately affecting conservative viewpoints.
What Comes Next?
With the presidential election of 2024 in our immediate future, these revelations could lead to further investigations into how Big Tech was able to control the public discussion. Demands for transparency and accountability over the way companies such as Meta or Twitter censor content has risen to a crescendo, and both parties have pushed to make them right with Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which grants technological corporations criminal immunity for user-generated content.
Meta’s internal practices, as exposed by O’Keefe Media Group, paint a disturbing picture of how social media giants manage political discourse. With the added context of the Twitter Files, it becomes evident that social media companies, in coordination with federal agencies, are playing an outsized role in shaping public opinion by suppressing specific viewpoints. As debates about free speech and the role of Big Tech in elections intensify, these revelations are likely to fuel further calls for legislative and regulatory reforms to protect the integrity of online discourse.
Please refer to the O’Keefe Media Group Undercover Videos or an in-depth analysis of the Twitter Files.
