Facebook deletes political group profiles
Article published: Sunday, May 1st 2011
Several Greater Manchester groups are among many to have had their Facebook accounts deleted over the back holiday weekend. The Roscoe Occupation group , Rochdale Law Centre and Wigan Against the Cuts have all been affected.
The weekend also saw police make several pre-emptive arrests in London. However the majority of sites deleted are dedicated to anti-cuts rather campaigning rather than republicanism.
Ben, a London based activist wrote on the Anti-Cuts Space blog, “Looks like FB is clamping down on political organising. If so, it’s outrageous censorship… Screw you Zuckerberg!!”
At first many thought there was problem with individual pages but it soon became clear that it was an orchestrated attack. As many 36 groups, including the high profile UK Uncut and Save the NHS have now had their pages deleted, although others claim the figure is closer to 50.
Campaigners are now calling on Facebook to re-instate the pages immediately and advising people to use Twitter.
A Facebook spokeswoman explained that the profiles were suspended because they had not been registered correctly and denied that the removal of pages was politically motivated or instigated by law enforcement concerns before the royal wedding.
Jim Killock, 38 who runs the Open Rights Group, which campaigns for civil liberties on the net, told the Guardian: “It’s pretty flatfooted of Facebook to pull profiles without notifying users. Clearly, if you just take down sites without any warning, people are going to feel aggrieved, they’re going to have activities disrupted and be unable to organise politically.”
Meanwhile the Red Bricks estate in Hulme hosted an anti-royal wedding party on Friday. You can hear interviews and video of the one of the bands performing (the Autonomads) on the Red Bricks Radio site: http://radioredbricks.org.uk
Comments
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“Campaigners are now calling on Facebook to re-instate the pages immediately and advising people to use Twitter.”
Choose Pepsi not Coke!
Comment by mickfuzz on May 2, 2011 at 3:46 pm -
It’s not outrageous and it’s not censorship, just a private company deciding to conduct its business in the way it see fit.
If Jim Killock, 38 who runs the Open Rights Group finds he can’t ‘organise politically’ without Facebook perhaps his organisation needs a new leader with a memory longer than that of a goldfish. People were organising politically long before Facebook came along a very few years ago.
Comment by simon on May 3, 2011 at 9:19 pm
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