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We wrote about a Hindu nationalist militant group called the Bajrang Dal. The group has thousands of physical offices and adherents with a history of killing both Muslims and Christians.
Facebook is understandably a bit scared of them. https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-report-says-india-hate-speech-crackdown-endangers-staff-11607871600
Facebook is understandably a bit scared of them. https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-report-says-india-hate-speech-crackdown-endangers-staff-11607871600
Local Bajrang Dal leaders have been convicted of the mass killings of Muslim women and children and burning an Australian missionary family alive. They make news annually for assaulting secular Indians on Valentine’s Day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naroda_Patiya_massacre
The company's "dangerous orgs" team considered banning the Bajrang Dal from the platform based on their embrace of violence on and off-platform. But Facebook worried doing so would precipitate physical attacks by the group’s allies on the company’s India operations.
Facebook won't say where plans to ban the Bajrang Dal stand now -- but nearly a year after the proposal, the Bajrang Dal's status is safe on FB's platform. Even though their leaders are promoting "brutal beatings" of churchgoing Indians on Christmas. https://www.indiatoday.in/cities/guwahati/story/hindus-church-christmas-brutally-beaten-bajrang-dal-leader-assam-1747129-2020-12-06
It's hard to overstate how much leeway the Bajrang Dal has on Facebook. Here's a popular account from a Bajrang Dal cow protection vigilante who takes trophy photos of the people they catch and nearly kill for smuggling cows. (Warning, graphic). https://www.facebook.com/529586933864947/posts/1680148625475433/?d=n
Facebook has privately designated India as a "Tier One" country for risk of societal violence that FB could exacerbate. Which makes the company's failure to designate the Bajrang Dal (or any other Hindu organization, ever) more notable.
Facebook has now taken down the specific, bloody Facebook post I cited two tweets above of a popular cow vigilante and a man his group attacked. Reposted below as an example of this stuff — and of how Facebook tends to disappear problematic content when reporters cite it.
