Permitted ‘hateful conduct’ – what users can now say on Meta platforms

Meta’s rewritten policies on “hateful conduct” means users will now be able to say different types of things on its platforms, Facebook, Instagram and Threads. After Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement of sweeping changes to oversight of content on its platforms, multiple edits have been made to its policies.

Among them are:

– A specific injunction against calling transgender or non-binary people “it” has been deleted. A new section has been added making clear that “we do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation”. It said this was a reflection of “political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like ‘weird’.” It also says the policies are designed to allow room for types of speech including people calling “for exclusion or [using] insulting language in the context of discussing political or religious topics, such as when discussing transgender rights, immigration, or homosexuality”.

– Meta’s policies are unchanged in saying that users should not post content targeting a person or group of people on the basis of their protected characteristics or immigration status with dehumanising speech with comparisons to animals, pathogens or sub-human life forms such as cockroaches and locusts. But the changes suggest it may now be possible to compare women to household objects or property and to compare people to faeces, filth, bacteria, viruses, diseases and primitives.

– It should also be possible now to say transgender people “do not exist”.

– Meta has deleted warnings against self-admission of racism, homophobia and Islamophobia. It has also deleted warnings against expressions of hate, such as calling people “cunt” “dick” and “asshole”.

– The changes may also mean it is acceptable to post about the “China virus”, a term the US president-elect, Donald Trump, has frequently used in relation to coronavirus.