On Wednesday, Facebook deleted groups and limited ads belonging to QAnon conspiracists, far-right militias, and in a stunning example of false equivalence, anti-fascists.
Janus Rose, August 20, 2020
In a major purge Wednesday, Facebook took down hundreds of pages and limited the reach of ads belonging to violent right-wing militias and conspiracy groups like QAnon. The company said the move was part of a “policy expansion” seeking to limit the reach of groups that promote political violence.
In an apparent attempt to create the appearance of fairness, Facebook also took down the pages of prominent anti-fascist and anarchist news groups—ideologies which have been linked to zero deaths in the past 25 years.
In that same period, far-right extremism has been tied to 329 deaths in the US alone, according to a recent survey of almost 900 politically-motivated attacks compiled by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a centrist think tank. QAnon, the pro-Trump conspiracy movement which promotes unfounded theories about a secret cult of cannabalistic pedophiles, has been linked to child kidnappings, a train hijacking, and the death of at least one person.
