World

Facebook should keep up satirical Harris-Walz nipple-pinching post, oversight board says

2024.10.23 10:02

By Katie Paul

NEW YORK (Reuters) -Meta Platforms’ Oversight Board on Wednesday told the company to keep up a Facebook (NASDAQ:) post superimposing the faces of U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz onto a parody “Dumb and Dumber” movie poster showing the characters pinching each other’s nipples through their clothing.

The board accused the company of acting too aggressively against an obvious political parody with the post. The original movie poster depicts two male characters known for engaging in gross-out bawdy antics.

Meta originally took the post down for violating a rule against “derogatory sexualized photoshop” manipulations of images but restored it once the board informed Meta it was examining the case, the board said in a blog post.

The company told the board it “does not consider that pinching a person’s nipple through their clothing qualifies as sexual activity,” the board said.

A Meta spokesperson told Reuters its initial decision was a mistake resulting from human error.

The board, which is funded by Meta but operates independently, did not comment directly on Meta’s rationale but said the post in question showed a “non-sexualized derogatory depiction” of political figures and therefore was not in violation of Facebook rules.

Meta’s initial removal was a worrying sign of the company’s tendency toward “overenforcement” of its policies against satire and political speech, it added.

“This post is nothing more than a commonplace satirical image of prominent politicians and is instantly recognizable as such,” the board wrote.

It said that the company’s failure to handle the post appropriately on its first try “raises serious concerns about the systems and resources Meta has in place to effectively make content determinations in such electoral contexts.”

The case highlights the fine line the world’s biggest social media platform must walk in moderating posts pertaining to the highly charged U.S. political environment. Conservatives frequently complain that the platform removes too much of their content, while progressives generally say it does too little to police misinformation and abuse on properties Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads.

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A smartphone with a displayed Facebook logo is placed on a computer motherboard in this illustration taken February 23, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

Meta relies heavily on automated AI-powered enforcement of its rules. This controls the cost of moderating the posts of its more than 3 billion users, but elicits gripes from users who say the systems often fail to detect parody and context.

Aside from AI, Meta’s content moderation is generally performed by workers at third-party contractors globally.



Source link

Related Articles

Back to top button
bitcoin
Bitcoin (BTC) $ 105,044.14 0.75%
ethereum
Ethereum (ETH) $ 3,240.80 3.28%
xrp
XRP (XRP) $ 3.12 0.66%
tether
Tether (USDT) $ 1.00 0.03%
solana
Solana (SOL) $ 238.88 1.57%
bnb
BNB (BNB) $ 677.47 0.90%
usd-coin
USDC (USDC) $ 1.00 0.00%
dogecoin
Dogecoin (DOGE) $ 0.332727 0.71%
cardano
Cardano (ADA) $ 0.963316 1.71%
staked-ether
Lido Staked Ether (STETH) $ 3,239.85 3.21%
tron
TRON (TRX) $ 0.250926 3.92%
chainlink
Chainlink (LINK) $ 24.57 2.39%
avalanche-2
Avalanche (AVAX) $ 34.35 2.79%
wrapped-bitcoin
Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) $ 104,905.11 0.85%
stellar
Stellar (XLM) $ 0.436131 8.73%
wrapped-steth
Wrapped stETH (WSTETH) $ 3,874.73 3.57%
sui
Sui (SUI) $ 4.13 7.95%
hedera-hashgraph
Hedera (HBAR) $ 0.316799 1.84%
the-open-network
Toncoin (TON) $ 4.79 1.53%
shiba-inu
Shiba Inu (SHIB) $ 0.000019 0.31%
weth
WETH (WETH) $ 3,246.68 3.15%
litecoin
Litecoin (LTC) $ 127.30 11.38%
polkadot
Polkadot (DOT) $ 6.15 5.88%
hyperliquid
Hyperliquid (HYPE) $ 27.33 13.30%
leo-token
LEO Token (LEO) $ 9.75 0.46%
bitcoin-cash
Bitcoin Cash (BCH) $ 435.45 4.09%
bitget-token
Bitget Token (BGB) $ 6.94 1.60%
uniswap
Uniswap (UNI) $ 12.13 2.25%
usds
USDS (USDS) $ 0.998621 0.30%
wrapped-eeth
Wrapped eETH (WEETH) $ 3,433.47 3.13%
ethena-usde
Ethena USDe (USDE) $ 0.998135 0.36%
pepe
Pepe (PEPE) $ 0.000013 0.75%
near
NEAR Protocol (NEAR) $ 4.63 2.39%
mantra-dao
MANTRA (OM) $ 5.62 23.82%
official-trump
Official Trump (TRUMP) $ 26.40 6.03%
ondo-finance
Ondo (ONDO) $ 1.59 6.01%
aave
Aave (AAVE) $ 318.48 7.30%
aptos
Aptos (APT) $ 7.91 4.81%
internet-computer
Internet Computer (ICP) $ 9.10 3.86%
monero
Monero (XMR) $ 229.39 5.39%
whitebit
WhiteBIT Coin (WBT) $ 28.45 0.09%
ethereum-classic
Ethereum Classic (ETC) $ 26.34 2.17%
mantle
Mantle (MNT) $ 1.16 6.61%
vechain
VeChain (VET) $ 0.046548 5.11%
bittensor
Bittensor (TAO) $ 454.44 1.78%
crypto-com-chain
Cronos (CRO) $ 0.131362 0.65%
polygon-ecosystem-token
POL (ex-MATIC) (POL) $ 0.414374 3.37%
dai
Dai (DAI) $ 1.00 0.02%
kaspa
Kaspa (KAS) $ 0.131484 6.81%
okb
OKB (OKB) $ 56.32 3.44%