There has been a lot of talk within the Jewish community about Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s responsibilities as  a Jew within the confines of the Facebook Holocaust Denial  dispute.    Some have argued that because of his religion he has some greater personal and corporate responsibility to see that these groups or antisemitism in general do not flourish within the Facebook social networking universe.

I could not disagree with this more.  Facebook is not a Jewish company in the sense of corporate goals.  To my knowledge it does not set out in it’s corporate mission statement that it will espouse Jewish values and traditions.  If it did, I would feel differently.

There are certainly circumstances where the ethnic makeup or religion of a business owner, customer or end user does play a part in how the company operates.  Chik-fil-A is closed on Sundays for that very reason.   It is reflected in the Corporate Mission Statement:

“To glorify God by being a faithful steward to all that is entrusted to us.  To have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A.”

Everyone can probably agree that in a social networking company like Facebook one of the primary “products” they sell is the “free exchange of ideas”.   To argue that outside of a “religious goaled” company.  a social networking CEO has some greater  responsibility to be sensitive to one idea over another based on the CEO’s personal religious beliefs or upbringing is not practical or proper.  It would be akin to arguing that Jewish sports-team owner’s Ed Snider(Philadelphia 76ers and Flyers) Mark Cuban(Dallas Mavericks)  or Jerry Reinsdorf(Chicago Bulls and Whitesox) should arbitrarily shut down their teams on Jewish Holidays, not allow their team to play on the Sabbath, or screen for  Holocaust Deniers at the stadium entrance.

So am I siding with Facebook now?  I am not.  My argument has never changed.  I  simply understand Facebook’s obligation to meet the needs of all customers and it’s efforts to define hate speech on that basis.  Having been around some pretty smart CEO’s in my life, I am in agreement that this is a sound business philosophy.

Where I part ways with Facebook is over how those needs are met and should be met on a continuing objective basis. In my mind, the primary dispute is over how Facebook defines “direct hatred” and whether their current definition is appropriate for the times we live in.   I wonder whether their definition while striving for “binary certainty”  relies to much on form over substance to be truly effective in battling the alarming rise of online hatred including Holocaust Denial.

From a corporate CEO perspective, Mr. Zuckerberg does have that responsibility.  A responsibility that not only affects Jews but Muslims, Armenians and a slew of other ethnic and religious  minorities who are the targets of online hate.  We are all Facebook customers.

My argument is and has always been that you can not look at “direct- hate” in a “binary vacuum”.  Hate is constantly evolving.  The corporate values of social media companies that serve as breeding and recruiting grounds for these groups  must also evolve.

A perfect example is Facebook’s “nipple rule“.  This rule evolved in response to the outcry over their decision to remove certain photos of depicting women breastfeeding.  Their rule as I understand it is that if nipple shows it violates TOS.  If the nipple is covered it is ok.  Would that be the same standard if Facebook was around in 1900, 1920, 1960?  Will it be the appropriate standard in 2050?  Societal norms evolve with history.  For Facebook to ignore this fact in my mind is lazy and enabling the rise of a major problem for which they must take partial responsibility.  For Facebook to take the position of “we will wait until a crisis to re-evaluate”  simply enables a repeating of  historical cycles hate.

That’s my argument.  Its not about religion. Lets keep religion out of it.