Facebook Responds to Sexual Harassment the Typical Old Boy Way

Our online communities are not "safe" places, no matter what the press releases say.  The people that are in charge of policing these sites rarely get it right.  You are on your own.  Remember that,

Case in point, a friend of mine was recently sent an unsolicited dick picture by someone she'd been acquainted with for a while.  Before you start thinking "she must have done something" - she hadn't.  There was no reason for this; it was out of the blue.  She reported the violation to Facebook, then proceeded to "out" the offender and publish the pictures he'd sent her, albeit with the offending parts blurred out.

The following is the response she received from Facebook:

They say "your safety is important to us."  Yet all they have done is warned him not to do it again.  As she stated in her response, there is nothing done to protect anyone who might innocently become friends with him again from the same thing happening to them.

To add insult to injury, this morning she logs on and sees this:


So her "outing" him for sexual harassment is protected.  Facebook is protecting the harasser and threatening the victim with being suspended.  They are protecting him from the consequences of his own actions.  People should know if there are people out there who engage in this type of predatory behavior.  His only consequence is a slap on the wrist.  His behavior is buried behind a lot of ineffective type that boils down to him having the right to send it and if you don't want to see it you should block him or get local law enforcement involved, but we really won't do anything else.  Have a nice day.

How many times does this happen with any type of alarming behavior on these platforms?  Blame the victim and block them and get on with your life.  Forget about it.  Oh, and when that person ends up on the evening news because someone met up with them because they didn't know about their behavior history, we'll wash our hands of it.  Because we managed to bury it.  Because we protected them from having a reputation due to their own behavior.

Facebook is not protecting you.  Facebook does not care about you.  Facebook cares about protecting their own butts and collecting revenue.  That's it.

You're on your own.








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

MISOGYNY IN HISTORY – CONTEXT IS IMPORTANT

Image
This was inspired by an exchange on a friend’s timeline after Lyle Waggoner died.   You remember Lyle, right?   He was a regular on the Carol Burnett Show and was one of the stars of the 1970’s Wonder Woman series, portraying Steve Trevor alongside Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman.   You’d think that willingly being to co-star to a female lead back in the 1970’s would prove he was safe from accusations he had issues with women, but of course not. In the comment section of the death notice someone shared on their page, one person had to bring up the fact that he at one time said that Lynda Carter was “blessed by the chest fairy” as something horrible he’d done and equivocated it to the “me too” movement.   I thought it was overreacting from the start, and made the statement that saying things like that wasn’t a big deal.   The response was essentially “wrong is wrong” and I couldn’t really be a woman if I was defending him. I grew up in the 1970’s and 1980’s. ...
Read more

Presidential Politics in New Hampshire: Beto O'Rourke

Image
Other than the fact that he nearly beat Ted Cruz in Texas and a lot of people I know and respect really like him, I didn't know what to expect. How will his Texas politics play on a national stage? He was 20 minutes late, which didn't impress me. The meet-n-greet was held at Tuckerman's Brewery and people were buying beer and food. I dragged Danny with me since this will be his first primary and Presidential election and want him to meet the candidates and really listen to them, not just the sound-bites we are fed. I fed him a soft pretzel to keep him happy. I hadn't been to the brewery before. It has a good-sized space and they were packed in. He drew a much larger crowd than I was expecting for 3PM on a weekday. The brewery is a short walk from the middle school, and high school kids who don't drive could catch a bus after school to the middle school and walk here. There were a lot of young people here. Beto started off introducing himself by talking...
Read more

Let's Not Put Affectionate Men Back in the Closet

Image
The debate about Joe Biden and his showing affection to other people by touching them, hugging them, and kissing them in a non-sexual way has brought out a great deal of debate.  In this day and age after all of the revelations about inappropriate behavior by many men in power, there is some push back now and I agree. For years now women have been saying they want men who are more affectionate and show that affection.  My parents grew up in a time where men did not show affection to their children. Some might have in private, but in general it was frowned upon for men to hold and comfort their children in public.  Too much emphasis was placed on pleasing the head of the family, and that usually meant not burdening him with any emotional needs from the children.  That fell to the mother, as did nearly everything that happened beyond the front door. Since the 1970's, a lot has changed.  I pick that date because that's the frame of reference I have.  That ...
Read more