Zuckerberg: Bannon says Fauci and Wray should be beheaded not enough for Facebook ban

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Bannon was permanently suspended from Twitter last week after making the comments in a video.

The video was broadcast live on Bannon’s Facebook page for about 10 hours last Thursday and was viewed almost 200,000 times before the company took it down, citing its policies of violence and incitement.

“These are examples of such blatant speech,” said Jennifer Grygiel, professor of social media at the Newhouse School at Syracuse University. “Dr Fauci is leading the Covid response here in this country, and stepping on the platform to demand his beheading is just terrible.

Grygiel believes the incident shows how uncomfortable Zuckerberg is in situations in which Facebook’s rules are broken by conservatives like Bannon, with Facebook facing repeated accusations of right-wing censorship and bias against conservative views. “It shows the pressure Zuckerberg is under,” Grygiel said. “Steve Bannon has proven to abuse the platform. I would really like Mark Zuckerberg to show some responsibility in not letting people harm the public and society in this way.”

Facebook declined to comment.

Zuckerberg’s comments were first reported by Reuters and BuzzFeed News.

Facebook has a “strike” system in which repeated rule breakers can eventually be suspended – although some individual actions can lead to immediate bans. Bannon could face permanent suspension of his page if he continues to break Facebook’s rules.

The video was also posted on YouTube. The company removed the video, but did not ban Bannon.

Facebook, Twitter and other social networks have stepped up efforts to tackle disinformation, especially during elections. Some conservatives have said they are being censored. This was fully exposed during a recent hearing on Capitol Hill in which tech CEOs were criticized by Republican senators for what was claimed to be an “apparent double standard” that disadvantages conservative content on social media. (However, independent studies on social media have found little credible evidence to suggest that the technology is biased against right-wing views.)

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