Several leading companies have joined a call by activists to halt ad spending on Facebook over concerns the leading social network has fallen short in efforts to crack down on hate speech and incitements to violence.
The sporting goods maker Patagonia added its name to the list today, joining forces with its retail rivals North Face and REI, as well as the freelance staffing agency Upwork.
Patagonia said on Twitter it was joining the Stop the Hate for Profit initiative unveiled by civil rights activists last week, who urged brands to boycott the social media giant claiming it ‘promotes hate, bigotry, racism, antisemitism and violence’.
‘Patagonia is proud to join the Stop Hate for Profit campaign,’ the California-based outdoor apparel brand announced Sunday.
‘We will pull all ads on Facebook and Instagram, effective immediately, through at least the end of July, pending meaningful action from the social media giant.’
‘For too long, Facebook has failed to take sufficient steps to stop the spread of hateful lies and dangerous propaganda on its platform,’ a statement from the company reads in part.
‘From secure elections to a global pandemic to racial justice, the stakes are too high to sit back and let the company continue to be complicit in spreading disinformation and fomenting fear and hatred.’
Patagonia has a history of not shying away from political discourse.
The company sued President Trump in 2017 after he rolled back protections on national monuments.
The #StopHateForProfit appeal was supported by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, ColorOfChange, FreePress and the activist group Sleeping Giants.
North Face, also based in California, was the first to join the campaign on Friday, tweeting in response to a boycott call: ‘We’re in. We’re Out,’ adding later: ‘This includes all Facebook owned properties.’
The company subsequently shared a statement with CNN, which read: ‘The North Face is halting all activity and U.S. paid advertising with Facebook until stricter policies are put in place to stop racist, violent or hateful content and misinformation from circulating on the platform’.
The company’s commitment to pull their advertising also extends to Instagram – which is owned by Facebook.
CNN reports that the North Face’s parent company, VF Corp, has not yet stated whether other brands in its portfolio will also boycott the social media giant.
VF Corp also owns shoe companies Vans and Timberland, and reportedly spent $756 million on advertising in the last year.
Upwork said it was ‘hitting pause on hate with no Facebook advertising in July.’
REI also joined over the weekend stating: ‘For 82 years, we have put people over profits. We’re pulling all Facebook/Instagram advertising for the month of July.’
Facebook vice president Carolyn Everson said in a statement: ‘We deeply respect any brand’s decision, and remain focused on the important work of removing hate speech and providing critical voting information.
‘Our conversations with marketers and civil rights organizations are about how, together, we can be a force for good,’ she continued.
The social network last week said it removed ads by Trump’s re-election campaign that contained a symbol used in Nazi Germany for political prisoners, a move welcomed by rights activists.
The campaign comes as the social media giant faces growing pressure over its hands-off approach to misinformation and inflammatory posts, including from US President Donald Trump.
‘It is clear that Facebook and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, are no longer simply negligent, but in fact, complacent in the spread of misinformation, despite the irreversible damage to our democracy,’ the NAACP said in a tweet.
The coalition criticized Zuckerberg’s decision late last month to leave up a particularly inflammatory post by the Commander-in-chief, which stated in part: ‘When the looting starts, the shooting starts’. Twitter hid the same message behind a warning that said the post ‘incited violence’.
Several Facebook employees staged a ‘virtual walkout’ over Zuckerberg’s decision.
The Facebook co-founder then held a conference call with civil rights leaders who condemned him for failing to remove the post.
In a subsequent statement, Rashad Robinson of Color of Change, Vanita Gupta of the Leadership Conference and Sherrilyn Ifill of LDF said: ‘He [Zuckerberg] did not demonstrate understanding of historic or modern-day voter suppression and he refuses to acknowledge how Facebook is facilitating Trump’s call for violence against protesters. Mark is setting a very dangerous precedent for other voices who would say similar harmful things on Facebook.’
Color of Change subsequently joined forces with a number of other civil rights group to launch the ‘#StopHateforProfit’ campaign earlier this week, encouraging companies to pull ads from Facebook.
Other organizations in the campaign include the Anti-Defamation League, the NAACP, Sleeping Giants, Free Press and Common Sense.
On Wednesday, the campaign took out a full page ad in the Los Angeles Times pushing for companies to boycott Facebook. The social media giant reportedly made close to $70 billion in ad revenues last year.
‘What would you do with $70billion?’ the #StopHateForProfit ad asks.
‘We know what Facebook did. They allowed incitement to violence against protesters fighting for racial justice in America in the wake of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Ahmaud Arbery, Rayshard Brooks and so many others’.
The ad goes on to accuse Facebook of ‘turning a blind eye to voter suppression’ and ‘amplifying white supremacists’.
Other prominent voices have also hit out at Facebook over the last week.
Among them, was Nancy Pelosi, who said companies could use their ‘tremendous leverage’ to ‘discourage platforms from amplifying dangerous and even life-threatening disinformation’.
On Wednesday, MSNBC star Joe Scarborough launched a withering attack on Facebook accusing the company of ‘promoting extremism’.
‘I’ve seen a lot of insincere statements put out. Gonna say Mark Zuckerberg talking about how deeply saddened he was by the things he’s seen the president say is near that top of it considering that he makes billions of dollars off of spreading lies and letting people spread lies, hateful lies,’ the MSNBC host raged.
Scarborough then brought up the murder of federal officer Damon Gutzwiller, 38, who died in an ambush allegedly started by Air Force sergeant, Steve Carillo, 32, last weekend.
Authorities said Carillo scribbled far-right extremist phrases in blood after he killed a Gutzwiller and wounded two others. Carillo is said to be a part of ‘boogaloo’, a movement of far-right anti-government extremists.
Facebook has been scrubbing ‘boogaloo’ and ‘Proud Boys’ Facebook pages.
The company considers both to be hate groups.