Virtually potent

The pandemic is hogging limelight these days but it was one of those unusual days when another type of virus was being reigned in. It was the virtual kind. It was the day when organisations that matter decided to put some ‘real’ sense in the petulant Zuck (“Why the Facebook boycott needs more support,” July 4, Gulf Today).

It was the day when Zuckerberg lost about $7 billion in personal wealth as companies dropped their ads on the social media platform. Though that loss in unlikely to hurt the man, the writing I feel is finally on the wall.

Not much was made when the #StopHate4Profit campaign led by a number of civil rights groups called for a FB boycott. But when some of the most iconic and biggest spending brands including Unilever, Coca-Cola, The Hershey Company to Adidas and Verizon joined forces, the company is now confronted with the problem of hate speech that it had tried to ignore for years

He has defended his irresponsible management with intellectually dishonest arguments. Like for example he keeps reiterating that he merely manages a platform where information was placed by others and that he is not an actual publisher. Yes, how convenient as the author of the narrative says.

I hope the campaign picks pace and Facebook and Instagram are virtually put in place.

Ralph R — By email