Civil-rights leaders organizing a major advertising boycott of Facebook said they remained unconvinced that the social network is taking enough action against hate speech and disinformation after meeting with Mark Zuckerberg and other Facebook executives on Tuesday.
Civil-rights leaders used the session to press Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Zuckerberg, Facebook's chief executive, to institute changes at Facebook, including installing a top level executive who will ensure the global platform does not fuel racism and radicalization.
The boycott organizers "didn't hear anything today to convince us that Zuckerberg and his colleagues are taking action," said Free Press Co-CEO Jessica Gonzalez, who attended the virtual meeting, which lasted more than an hour. "Instead of committing to a timeline to root out hate and disinformation on Facebook, the company's leaders delivered the same old talking points to try to placate us without meeting our demands."
The meeting took place as calls escalate to overhaul Facebook. More than 750 companies, including Coca-Cola, Hershey and Unilever, have suspended advertising on the platform. Boycott organizers contend Facebook has allowed content to flourish that could incite violence and exacerbate social strife. By targeting Facebook's ad dollars in the most substantive effort yet, organizers hope Zuckerberg and his team will be compelled to take action.
In a Facebook post Tuesday morning, Sandberg placed the meetings in the context of ongoing protests and calls to root out racism in American society.
The company has said it invests billions of dollars every year to ensure the safety of its users, and it partners with outside experts to update its policies. Sandberg said the company will release the final report from its yearslong civil rights audit today. "While we won't be making every change they call for, we will put more of their proposals into practice soon," she said.
But advertisers and civil-rights groups have been unimpressed with Facebook's promises to curb hate speech and label posts from politicians that violate the social network's rules.
As the largest social network in the world, claiming 2.6 billion users, the company has an outsize role in media and global affairs. It has positioned itself as a vital communications platform and an on-ramp for 8 million advertisers, most of them small businesses. Nearly all of its $70 billion in revenue last year came from advertising.
While the pandemic has rocked companies that can't thrive during distancing and remote work, investors have flocked to the social network and other tech giants, sending Facebook's share price to new highs. Its market cap has swelled to nearly $700 billion.
In her post Tuesday, Sandberg said the audit was well underway before the current protests sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man killed in police custody. She said Facebook's actions were motivated by a sense of duty, even as the company faces mounting public pressure. "We are making changes -- not for financial reasons or advertiser pressure, but because it is the right thing to do," Sandberg said.
In a tweet on Monday, the president of the racial justice group Color of Change criticized the timing of Facebook's civil-rights audit. "This timing is a transparent effort to change the narrative," said Rashad Robinson. "That Zuckerberg believes he is so powerful that he can ignore calls from major advertisers, multiple coalitions and a growing public puts our democracy and communities around the world at risk."
The Democratic National Committee on Tuesday assailed Facebook for "unkept promises" in a memo, obtained by The Washington Post. The committee accuses Facebook of failing to fulfill promises it made after the 2016 election, from limiting sensational and hyperpartisan content to standing up a rigorous fact-checking program to curtailing disinformation.
Facebook spokesman Andy Stone defended the company's approach, pointing to new personnel and features added over the past four years.
Information for this article was contributed by Isaac Stanley-Becker and Craig Timberg of The Washington Post