Kelly McParland: Meta changes a triumph for social media nitwits

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Mark Zuckerberg has announced that his giant Meta empire will quit fact-checking the stuff posted by people using its various social networking outlets. Anyone can post anything outside a few criminal categories, no matter how ill-informed, ludicrously wrong or downright delusional. The people who used to vet postings to weed out the flagrantly untrue or grossly misleading are being ditched. The laneways of public information will be open and undefended against ignorance or abuse.

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Around the same time people were debating Zuckerberg’s announcement, Fire Capt. Erik Scott in Los Angeles, where firefighters have been battling desperately to contain fires decimating huge sections of the city, was outlining the extra work required of emergency officials to shoot down false reports, misleading claims and crazy conspiracy theories posted by people who have no idea what they’re talking about but are getting in the way of saving lives and property.

There are plenty of people who see the change at Meta as a triumph, whatever it may do to fertilize the influence of nitwits. They see it as a victory for free speech. As Zuckerberg said, “It’s time to get back to our roots around free expression.” Free speech ensures no one can be blocked from sharing whatever loose screws are rattling around in their brains. Social media just expands their potential audience by exponential degrees. 

This may be a bad analogy, but it makes me think of junk food. The junk food industry is enormous. The food they sell is popular and tastes great. It makes you fat and stuffs up your arteries. It causes health problems that are expensive to treat. Live on junk food and you likely won’t live as long. But people are free to do as they please.

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It appears the same will be the case with information spread around on social media. Defenders of free speech say this is the way things should work in a free society. If people want to follow hucksters, frauds and charlatans and believe everything they’re told, that’s up to them. So what if they end up with brains to match the clogged arteries of habitual consumers of triple-double-bacon-wrapped cheeseburgers with mayonnaise and chipotle super sauce. 

Presumably people keen to keep their brains clog-free will avoid X and Meta and look elsewhere. Or maybe they’ll just block as many junk posts as possible and stick to those devoid of politics. A divided society will have yet another area in which significant sections consider other sections to be clueless, ill-informed and perhaps dangerous. Important decisions will be made on this basis.

Some parts of the divided universe are accusing Zuckerberg of trying to appease Donald Trump, who is about to become president and who has long and loudly made clear his strong dislike of being criticized, challenged, contradicted or made to look less than the very stable genius he considers himself to be. They think the Meta boss is afraid of Trump, who has more than once threatened to throw him in jail. Trump has lately been engaged in an intense bromance with Elon Musk, Zuckerberg’s rival and a strong believer in the right to do any damn thing he wants.

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All the big tech billionaires have been making a show of cozying up to the new White House regime. They’ve given so generously to Trump’s inaugural ceremonies that even some big donors are being put on a wait list of attendees. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos blocked The Washington Post, the newspaper he owns, from running an editorial endorsing Kamala Harris. The Post’s editorial cartoonist quit after the paper refused to run a cartoon depicting Bezos offering tribute before a giant Trump statue. Zuckerberg flew in to Mar-a-Lago to proffer his capitulation at the great man’s supper table. Musk has been glued to Trump like a doberman to its food source.

Zuckerberg says the claims against him are wrong. He told Joe Rogan he’s tired of being bossed around by Washington. The Biden administration, he said, was constantly on his back demanding posts be taken down, or people blocked from raising questions about vaccines. Britain’s Sunday Times noted that despite spending hundreds of million of dollars on an extensive screening system and hiring more than 40,000 content moderators, Zuckerberg was constantly battered from all sides anyway. Maybe he just got fed up.

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So does he think the Trump people will be any different? Those famously polite and conciliatory folks who have never been known to use their wealth, power or positions to impose their demands on others?

A comparison that comes to mind is of Ferdinand Marcos, the tyrant who ruled the Philippines as a personal fiefdom for 20 years. Marcos was famously corrupt. He expected the police, the army, the bureaucracy and anyone else expecting a stress-free life to do what they were told, which meant to obediently fulfill whatever demands were best for Marcos and his family. His wife, Imelda, had a stockpile 3,000 pairs of shoes. The Beatles once had to flee the country for failing to turn up at a party she threw. Marcos was nonetheless treated as a friend and ally by the U.S. When he was eventually chased from Manila he was granted a safe haven in Hawaii.

What’s happening in Washington sounds a lot like what happens when leaders like Marcos get their way. People with money flock to appease them to protect their own interests. The more they’re appeased the more they expect, and the greater their demands. I want Greenland! I what the Panama Canal! I want Canada! When they can’t get what they want their response is to escalate. Do what I want or there’ll be hell to pay!

Inevitably, every empire meets its end. The promised miracles don’t appear. Public opinion shifts. Tolerance for the excesses of privilege grows short. But it can take time. Often the peak is just before they have to start delivering, which is where we are now. The nitwits are having their Camelot.

National Post

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