But if your neighbour actively and deliberately makes your life worse then they certainly could be your enemy.
If I’m queer and Facebook is actively censoring queer content then that’s more significant to me than just being a difference of opinion. The company is actively suppressing my way of life.
Maybe the word “enemy” is too much but if so I think describing the idea as “sad” is equally as so. Giving a corporation a pass on behaviour you consider abhorrent simply because it’s a company and not a person seems pretty sad to me.
>If I’m queer and Facebook is actively censoring queer content then that’s more significant to me than just being a difference of opinion. The company is actively suppressing my way of life.
Why queer community will not find an alternative app?
This is the incredibly profitable contradiction Facebook lives in.
They do everything they can to become the central place for online communication and profit enormously from that. But they reject any of the responsibility that ought to come along with that, the refrain being what you're saying here: "well, you can always just go somewhere else"
Except that when online communication is as deeply siloed as it is it's extremely difficult to set up an alternative. How will people even find out about it when their entire online lives are lived on Facebook? This capture is exactly what Meta wants. Remember internet.org?
No, because then what happens when the place they move to starts censoring them as well? Then all the places start censoring them? You're basically arguing for "separate but equal", and we know how that works out. The correct move is to fight for your rights, not to assuage bigotry.
And you are arguing every business must support your agenda, and if not, they are your "enemy"? What an odd take. Again, you are free to use other means of social media to spread your message but no one is obligated to read or support it. And, that does not make them the enemy.
And by your own logic, how does censoring content actively suppress your way of life? Did someone from Meta go to your place of residence and actively threaten to harm you? Sure, maybe you don’t like the censorship, but how does that make them your enemy? Have you openly declared war on them? If you don’t like their content, simply move along.
> And by your own logic, how does censoring content actively suppress your way of life?
Because it erases our existence, which is what a substantial slice of straight society wants. Queer content and spaces are important for queer adults, because it gives us places to comfortably be ourselves without feeling subject to leering or judgement from bigots, and safety in numbers in case someone starts something. It gives us people to be among who we can talk to, form community with, and support one another. And for people just coming up, it's literally lifesaving. Numerous studies have shown that queer-leaning teens and kids are MUCH safer when they have access to safe places to explore who they are, even if they don't "turn out" that way, prevents awful, irreversible things. [1,2,3] Not to mention it can be lifesaving also when their parents are bigots themselves and they need a way out.
> Sure, maybe you don’t like the censorship, but how does that make them your enemy?
The bridge between "they suppress expressions of who I am" and "they participate in my extermination" has been proven to be quite short and easily traversed for queers many times, and for racial groups, and for religious groups too. [4]
By your definition they may not be my enemy today, but they may be in a short period of time.
> If you don’t like their content, simply move along.
This is actually great advice for people who keep trying to take down queer content.
Edit: And this is exactly what figures like Breitbart have been openly trying to do for over a decade. And it isn't just him either, you have the Family Research Council, Fox News hosts, Daily Wire personalities like Matt Walsh, and Libs of TikTok have all made careers out of normalizing queer erasure. For them, "winning the culture war" is not only their stated, in-text goal, it's a means of pushing us out of public life: sometimes just running us out of town, other times things too ugly to say aloud.
Erases your existence? Would your existence be threatened if Meta was not a company? What about the countless number of other companies who are not pushing your content? Do you feel threatened by them? Now I see why you chose the word "hate"...
No, my existence isn’t contingent on Meta existing. But when a platform with billions of users decides queer content is unwelcome, it erases us from one of the largest public squares in the world, at a time when public squares are at a premium. That’s not the same as "some random company doesn’t carry my stuff."
There's also a difference between not amplifying something and actively suppressing it. Neutral omission is one thing; deliberate censorship is another. When queer content is singled out for removal, it sends a message: you don’t belong here. That's erasure.
History shows us that erasure is rarely neutral. It's part of a continuum: silence leads to exclusion leads to violence. Pretending censorship is harmless ignores the fact that queer people have lived through this cycle many times before, and we're far from alone.
If I’m queer and Facebook is actively censoring queer content then that’s more significant to me than just being a difference of opinion. The company is actively suppressing my way of life.
Maybe the word “enemy” is too much but if so I think describing the idea as “sad” is equally as so. Giving a corporation a pass on behaviour you consider abhorrent simply because it’s a company and not a person seems pretty sad to me.