Meta Makes More Changes Removing LGBTQIA+ Pride Themes

Massive changes have been underway at Meta, owners of Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp and Threads, which are negatively effecting the LGBTQIA+ community and causing internal chaos at the company.

Changes have seen the company ditch fact checkers, change the policy on hate speech and now the removal of pride themes on Facebook messenger.

Now employees are calling on the company to explain their changes.

Changes at Meta effecting the LGBTQIA+ community

Early last week Mark Zuckerberg announced changes to the platform, removing fact checkers in the wake of Donald Trump’s election claiming that it would help prioritise “free speech.”

Zuckerberg claimed that the fact checkers had become to “politically biased” and that they would now be replacing these with “community notes” similar to the process used on X (Twitter).

“We’re going back to our roots, and (will) focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms” he said.

“After Trump first got elected in 2016, the legacy media wrote non-stop about how misinformation was a threat to democracy. We tried in good faith to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth but the fact checkers have been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they created.”

As part of this announcement last week it was also revealed that the parameters of free speech on the platforms would be adjusted, with some surprising allowances on what will now be considered to be allowed under “free speech” rules.

With regards to hate speech directed at the LGBTQIA+ community, where users would previously have been restricted or had their content removed, they can now continue to post comments that call the community “mentally ill.”

The Meta hate speech guidelines now state “We do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like ‘weird’.”

However under the new guidelines it does not appear these comments are regarded as dehumanising or perpetuating harmful stereotypes.

The new guidelines also state: “We remove dehumanising speech, allegations of serious immorality or criminality, and slurs. We also remove harmful stereotypes, which we define as dehumanising comparisons that have historically been used to attack, intimidate or exclude specific groups, and that are often linked with offline violence” yet they still allow calls of “mentally ill” towards the community.

In response the company’s queer employees have allegedly started taking sick leave from work claiming they are “LGBT” and “mentally ill.”

Internal message boards at the company have allegedly listed hundreds of comments requesting clarification from management on the decisions.

Meta removes LGBTQIA+ pride themes from Facebook Messenger

Following this news last week it was revealed overnight that more changes at Meta have taken place, this time within the Messenger App.

One of the many features within the messenger app allow users to change the theme with simple colours or particular themes and designs.

Up until this week there were LGBTQIA+ pride themes in both the rainbow colours and the transgender pride colours as well.

Themes also included trans and non-binary themes as well as themes that matched respective gender and identity pride flags.

Now 404media have reported these themes have disappeared from the app.

The themes have been available since as early as 2021 on the app and there appears to be no clear reason or explanation for their removal.