Mark Zuckerberg, who seems to be ruled solely by greed, is twisting himself into a pretzel trying to find a way to keep the Russians from interfering in US elections while keeping the money pouring in to Facebook’s coffers. In other words, he is giving us pious promises while doing nothing whatsoever to rein in the destructive power of social media monster he created.
The past few weeks, he has been running his mouth nonstop about how Fakebook is hiring so-called fact checkers to stem the flood of misleading information and outright lies that have characterized it since its inception. Thanks to Joe Romm at ThinkProgress, we learned today that Zuckerberg and his minions have hired CheckYourFact.com to fact check information on climate change that appears on Fakebook.
So, who is this group? Romm calls it “an arm of the conservative, anti-science media site The Daily Caller.” The Daily Caller, in case you don’t know, is extreme right-wing so-called news organization co-founded by famed Fox News talking head Tucker Carlson and “backed by major conservative donors, including Charles and David Koch, the billionaire fossil fuel barons who are the single biggest funders of climate science misinformation.”
In other words, what Zuckerberg and his minions have done is equivalent to hiring Adolf Eichmann to curate the Holocaust Museum or asking Pete Rose to lead a commission looking into illegal sports betting. Even a person with the IQ of a turnip would know this is a monumentally stupid idea.
Yet Zuckerberg is perfectly OK with letting a group that has repeatedly bashed none other than Michael Mann — CleanTechnica’s favorite climate scientist — be the arbiter of what is true and not true when it comes to climate change news.
Romm writes, “It is beyond outrageous that in 2019 — when the science of human-caused climate change has been overwhelmingly verified and every other nation but ours is desperately working to avert catastrophic impacts — the world’s largest social media site is still partnering with climate science deniers.”
Environmental sociologist Robert Brulle, who has authored numerous studies on climate communications and lobbying, tells ThinkProgress there are many outstanding nonpartisan organizations available to act as neutral fact checkers for Facebook. “Why they are partnering with an organization that is part of the right-wing echo chamber?” he asks.
With regard to the Daily Caller, he says, “This is one of the sites that needs to be fact checked, not used as a reliable source. Facebook should cancel this contract.” Last November, Carolyn Fortuna wrote an in-depth piece on how the Daily Caller distorted news about Tesla in an effort to please their paymasters, the Koch Brothers. These are the people we should trust to tell the truth about climate change? You can’t be serious!
Just over a year ago, I grew so disgusted with the actions of Zuckerturd and his co-conspirators that I severed my relationship with Facebook and urged CleanTechnica readers to do the same. I can report that not visiting Facebook all day every day has not caused me any distress. In fact, I now have more time to pursue my relationships with family, friends, and colleagues.
Frankly, if you continue to patronize Facebook, you are enabling one of the greediest people in human history. Not only are you making him richer, you are encouraging him to use his platform to lie to the American people on a broad range of topics, all in the interest of greed.
There is only one way to get the attention of Mark Zuckerberg and his henchwoman Sheryl Sandberg. Deprive them of the income that flows from their egregious behavior. Both have shown over and over they would happily throw America under the bus in pursuit of profits. Why would anyone want to do business with people like that?
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