With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

Facebook? Angel or Devil? More devil probably, but whilst there are some good things about this social networking behemoth there are also some terrible things about it. In one small action I have raised issues with Facebook  when some pages had posted blatant racist comments. One was “we’re not racist, we just hate Muslims”the Facebook Police do anything about it? No they damned well didn’t. Many other people have raised similar issues with Facebook often to no avail.

But it when it comes to a historical photograph of a nine-year old Vietnamese girl, Kim Phuc, running from an American napalm attack in 1972 Big Brother Zuckerberg decides that it is not suitable for his social network beast because it breaches the rule on pornography. Why? Because it depicts a naked nine-year old girl. The question is why is this girl naked? Her clothes had been burned from her body by this horrific attack. I am not for a moment saying that this is an easy picture to look at, but it is a truly iconic picture that brings home the violence and futility of war in the most powerful way. Do we need to see these pictures? Of course we do. It is things like this that may one day make people think more of seeking a peaceful outcome to conflict and not war. In the western world, increasingly so since the Second World War, we are anaesthetised to the horrors of war because it happens in other countries and is served up in bite-size pieces on our evening news. OK so Zuckerberg changed his mind on this picture after some heavy protest. But in my opinion it shows how much power this unelected billionaire, and many like him, have. For me Zuckerberg and Facebook crossed a line that they most definitely should not have. Zuckerberg you do not run the world, stop behaving like you do.