New Facebook and Instagram Options Let US Users Turn Off Political Ads

[Rocko99991]

Delete your account and the app-done.

 

[Guda.FL]

They have been censoring news for a long time. When something breaks, i always see only one side of political spectrum.

Youtube is the same way, i only news suggestions from CNN and NBC.

 

[Black Magic]

When can we expect a "remove ALL ads" feature. no reason to single out politics thats discrimination.

Edit: eh what the hell do I care...I don't use social media anyways

I was thinking that too. They could have disabled the ads by default but of course they don't want to mess up the money bags.

Also, you should care regardless if you use the platform. Millions of gullible people getting influenced impacts us in the long run. We are here now mostly because of social media.

 

[rlhamil]

I suspect that won't help a bit with foreign operations intended to maximize divisiveness, since they won't be candidates, parties, or registered lobbyists, mostly. They'll just be (fake) people or organizations that promote either/any flavor of extremism.

 

[pweicks]

I don't see anywhere in this article or in the policy where it states that only Trump's ads are hidden. It states quite clearly that all ads are disabled.

Moreover, it is republicans that have benefitted the most from FaceBook's policies, and it's fair to say that FaceBook facilitated the orange-faced clown's election win four years ago.

And Biden doesn't need any help. He's already further ahead than any other candidate in the past 40 years despite doing nearly zero campaigning. Allowing the clown to self destruct is all he needs.

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It's not. This is basically an attempt to justify not banning political ads that make false claims, and promote hatred and violence.

You are beyond help if you really believe in everything you just said.
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I think it benefit republicans more than Democrats, at least for now. Most of the time information/propaganda affects more to whom is in Power. That’s why after getting elected you need to either call everything against you as fake or control media (like in communist countries). I’m not an expert in politics, but I do know there’s few theories about this.. on the other hand If Trump approval rates are as low as they said (something that I believe is not true) then it might benefit Biden (he has nothing to prove, but Trump has a lot to explain - an needs the media/ads). Just a different idea from what you said.

Trump has everything to prove, ya say? Biden has nothing to prove...?? Don’t know if I’ve ever disagreed more with anything else I’ve ever read in my entire life.

 

[nitramluap]

They need to turn off all the unverifiable & false ‘political news’, not all political news. The last thing the US needs is a (more) politically (and scientifically) illiterate society. That’s when the despots really come out and play. But trust Facebook to totally miss the point.

 

[Robert.Walter]

Not enough. FB should just drop political ads. Still trying to profit without managing.

 

[Jimmy James]

I hope the question will soon become “Who still uses Facebook?”

 

[SBlue1]

Suggest taking a quick glance at the US Constitution sometime. There's some pretty useful info in there.

Political ads can't be made illegal. That freedom of speech thing can be annoying sometimes.

First, why should I read your constitution as a European? And B, freedom of speech means you can say whatever you want without your government silencing you in any way (you know like threatening your family, putting you in jail, killing you...). Ads are no free speech. Ads are, well, just ads. Paid promotion. In Europe we don't have negative campaigning and we seem to do fine. Oh and we have voting by mail but this is a totally different topic. LOL!

Now, lets face it, all that negative camping does is it is undermining your democracy. How? It puts all politicians in a bad light. Why does a big chunk of people think that voting is useless? Because all they see is how bad all politicians are on national TV. Why should people vote if the ads say nothing will change anyway? It discourages people to vote. It polarizes people.

 

[omihek]

Sounds like just another way allow echo chambers to become more and more of a problem. "I'm going to turn off political ads, instead, I'll believe all of the tripe that my friends claim from their own skewed point of view!".

Facebook should focus more attention on preventing misinformation from circulating in the first place, or if it does get circulated, make efforts to notify people retroactively it was incorrect. It's all very well marking a post / Tweet as "incorrect" a few hours after it was posted, and after millions have seen it - they'll not go back and see it was flagged.

Yeah cuz we all trust Facebook to be honest, right?

 

[JungeQuex]

Sounds like just another way allow echo chambers to become more and more of a problem. "I'm going to turn off political ads, instead, I'll believe all of the tripe that my friends claim from their own skewed point of view!".

Facebook should focus more attention on preventing misinformation from circulating in the first place, or if it does get circulated, make efforts to notify people retroactively it was incorrect. It's all very well marking a post / Tweet as "incorrect" a few hours after it was posted, and after millions have seen it - they'll not go back and see it was flagged.

Implying that some brainless political ad is going to do my fact-checking for me. It's unbelievable how far some will stoop to defend the fifth column of American "journalism."
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I for one welcome this change. I do not want to see their trash on my feed, period.

 

[DoctorTech]

"I'm not arguing, I'm just explaining why I am right."

Who gets to determine at what point an ad is "political"? My ad didn't say "vote for candidate x" it was just explaining how important their signature issue is to our country, or how their opponent is guilty _______, or highlighting some career achievement of _________. You can make very political ads just by the way you portray things associated with certain candidates or parties. Who gets to decide?

 

[Lowhangers]

There are still people who use Facebook and Instagram? I had no idea. I deleted my FB account years ago and never looked back.

It puzzles me that FB is still around, given how they have violated user privacy so many times over the years. Why would anyone trust them?

As far as ads go, I imagine you could just use their web site and block all ads with content blockers.

But still, FB is so creepy why even use it?
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Sounds like just another way allow echo chambers to become more and more of a problem. "I'm going to turn off political ads, instead, I'll believe all of the tripe that my friends claim from their own skewed point of view!".

Facebook should focus more attention on preventing misinformation from circulating in the first place, or if it does get circulated, make efforts to notify people retroactively it was incorrect. It's all very well marking a post / Tweet as "incorrect" a few hours after it was posted, and after millions have seen it - they'll not go back and see it was flagged.

Does anyone actually vote based on ads? I just go to a candidate’s site and look at their issues list to see their positions, or I do additional research from other sources.

I’ve never, ever voted based on an ad or sign.

 

[swamprock]

Sounds good to me. Not a problem on my laptop with an adblocker but phone different story
Wish Youtube would do the same and stop recommending me Covid19 stuff to watch after I've hit the not interested X multiple times.

Look for the Friendly Facebook app. The paid version blocks all ads and has a lot of customization features. It's what I used when I still had a Facebook account. For the browser, look for the FB Purity extension for customization options.

MODS: not my app/extension. Just a recommendation.
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WHo/what is next? Id like all posts with vegetables banned as well as people with red hair and freckles. And posts/pictures about reptiles and dogs... and the color red and ...

That's easy- just stop following people. I joined Facebook for interest groups, and unfollowed all 19 of my friended people. Not a fan of humans and their idiocy, but some of the posts in the groups are intelligent and useful. I'm no longer part of any social media platform, as most of them support the wacko Marxist extreme left.
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They have been censoring news for a long time. When something breaks, i always see only one side of political spectrum.

Youtube is the same way, i only news suggestions from CNN and NBC.

I block all of their ads. Another Marxism-supporting site who won't get another penny from me, along with Amazon and Netflix.

 

[DanTSX]

I’m just here to see if anyone else is asking if we can block the creepy candidate with dementia who used to be Vice President off of YouTube....

but then YouTube would just replace with annoying man-soap guy...
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I never joined FB. Glad people are leaving it for reasons stated.


political ads build up confirmation bias that the voter is choosing the popular (winning) team. That brings voters to polls on Election Day, and gets them to shut off curiosity to objectively compare issues. They work.