Facebook actually admitted in court that their fact-checkers that sniff out “fake news” and “misinformation” are really just statements of opinion.
This isn’t all that surprising considering their “fact” checks are often wrong or explained as if it were an opinion with no actual evidence. However, the fact that they solidified the truth is just so satisfying.
The bomb dropped in court during Facebook’s legal battle with John Stossel, who is currently suing the social media giant for defamation after it added a “fact check” to the libertarian pundit’s videos regarding climate change.
From Facebook’s court filing (page 2):
Beyond this threshold Section 230 problem, the complaint also fails to state a claim for defamation. For one, Stossel fails to plead facts establishing that Meta acted with actual malice— which, as a public figure, he must. For another, Stossel’s claims focus on the fact-check articles written by Climate Feedback, not the labels affixed through the Facebook platform. The labels themselves are neither false nor defamatory; to the contrary, they constitute protected opinion. And even if Stossel could attribute Climate Feedback’s separate webpages to Meta, the challenged statements on those pages are likewise neither false nor defamatory. Any of these failures would doom Stossel’s complaint, but the combination makes any amendment futile.
I hope many more people come out and sue Facebook as well after that admission. I can’t tell you how many times a post of mine has been removed or I have been temporarily banned because I shared Conservative content that the Facebook lords did not agree with….and I know I am not the only one.
