(Update Monday 1:39 PM: After this article appeared, Facebook changed its mind and allowed Promise to boost the Black History Month posts.)
Facebook didn’t want you to look at the above post. Facebook considers it too “sensitive.”
It tells the story of how New Haven’s Constance Baker Motely made history in the mid-20th century as the first Black woman to argue cases before the U.S. Supreme Court (winning nine out of 10) and to serve as a federal judge.
New Haven Promise — the city’s college scholarship and mentorship program — created that post. It is one of in a series of 25 posts about Black heroes it created to mark Black History Month.
Promise tried to boost the post so lots of people could read it. Facebook’s bots denied the request. It was rejected for metionin[ing] politicians” or “sensitive social issues that could influence public opinion.” The first rejection required Promise to fill out a request for an appeal.
Promise appealed. Facebook denied the appeal. (Judge Motley herself is no longer alive, so she couldn’t argue the appeal.)
Facebook “essentially banned” the post by preventing Promise from boosting it to its followers, Promise President Patricia Melton argued during an appearance on WNHH FM’s “LoveBabz LoveTalk” program. “We cannot get it out. I feel like we’re part of banned books. It’s banned Facebook. Facebook has to look at that and refine it. Particularly with historical figures, I don’t understand it. They had these amazing contributions. The whole point of Facebook is to be social, to elevate.“
Even a Promise post about football great (and Yale alum) Calvin Hill got blocked by Facebook’s algorithmic censors. (On appeal, Promise learned that the “problem” was that the post mentioned Hill’s fellow Yale alum Kurt Schmoke, who went on to become … watch out! … mayor of Baltimore.)
“What’s controversial about Calvin Hill?” Melton asked.
This is not the first year Facebook’s algorithms have swept noncontroversial Black History Month posts into its algorithm-driven cancelation net. In 2021, some of Facebook’s own Black History Month posts ended up randomly axed.
Meanwhile, Facebook — er, Meta — has been seeking to get credit for honoring Black History Month with its own generated material this year that so far appears to have survived its own moderation process.
Asked for a comment for this story, a Meta spokesperson said that a request to boost a post makes it an ad, which must abide by Facebook ad policies.
“These ads are allowed to run on Facebook but several steps are required first, including submitting authorization and placing a ‘paid for by’ disclaimer on the ad,” the spokesperson stated in an email message.
Brett Hoover, the Promise staffer who spearheaded the Black History Month social media project, provided screenshots of the first rejection Facebook sent (above) …
… and the automated second response (above), after Hoover complied with the request for an appeal.
Update: Melton reported Monday afternoon that after this article appeared, Facebook changed its mind and allowed the boosts.
Another Promise post rejected by Facebook moderators.
“They’re allowing a lot of crazy speech that’s pretty gruesome” to continue spreading on its site while Black History gets canceled, Melton noted. “What’s next?” she asked: Suffragists? Hispanic History Month? LGBTQ leaders?
She said she agrees Facebook needs to tackle the problem of limiting harmful, hateful speech.
“Facebook has to come up with something more nuanced” than canceling factual information about Motley and Hill, she argued.
In the meantime, Promise’s staff isn’t giving up on marking Black History. “My job is to figure a way around this,” staff communications fellow Deven Ladson, a former Promise scholar who recently earned a degree from Eastern Connecticut State University, said Friday. “We have so many people coming.” Click on the video to watch the full discussion with Melton and Ladson, which covered the latest developments at Promise New Haven.
Facebook moderators canceled this too.