If Facebook Really Banned White Nationalists, Why Can We Still See Donald Trump And Steve King On Our Internet?

Get it? It's because the president is literally a white nationalist.

At long last, praise God and pass the gravy, Facebook has decided to DO A THING about all the hate being spewed on its platform! And only like 200 years too late!

Facebook announced on Tuesday at its Content Standards Forum that it's banning white nationalist and white separatist content, having determined that those are literally the same thing as white supremacy. The ban also includes Instagram. People who try to post that shit will now be redirected to Life After Hate, a group that works to help people leave hate group movements. This must be distressing not only for the "good people" Trump told us about who were on the Nazi side in Charlottesville, but also for white supremacist GOP Rep. Steve King, whose Facebook experience may never be the same once these new policies are implemented.

Will this work? We dunno (nope), but HEY TWITTER, YOU NEXT, YOU TRY IT NEXT! Just kidding, @Jack is probably busy doing things nobody wants like taking away retweets and forgetting to add an edit button and handing out free blue checkmarks to Nazis.

Phrases such as "I am a proud white nationalist" and "Immigration is tearing this country apart; white separatism is the only answer" will now be banned, according to the company. Implicit and coded white nationalism and white separatism will not be banned immediately, in part because the company said it's harder to detect and remove.

What about "Make America Great Again"? Because that shit is not even remotely implicit anymore. Will this be an absolute disaster for the Trump re-elect? Or does Russia have a plan to get around all this? We are just asking questions.

Will Tucker Carlson even be allowed to log on to the internet? Oh there we go, asking more questions!

(We are asking these questions because Donald Trump, Steve King and Tucker Carlson are white supremacists. )

As Vice reports, Facebook used to draw a distinction between white supremacy and white separatism and nationalism , but has been consulting with the experts, who have explained that actually the latter are basically just euphemisms for the former, a semi-successful attempt to cloak raw hatred in intellectual words, sort of like how Lee Atwater helped the Republicans rebrand their racism as "tax cuts." Also, "white nationalists" like to think they are more intellectual than "white supremacists," much like Ivanka Trump likes to think of herself as "one of the smarter Trumps." (Allegedly. We don't even know if she thinks that, we are just being dicks about the collective IQ of the adult Trump children, which is 97. Allegedly.)

Of course, we have been listening to many monotonous whines over the past few years about how conservatives are being censored and banned from the entire internet, so we look forward to Congress holding hearings about Facebook's new ban, OH WAIT, THAT'S RIGHT, ELECTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES and that won't be happening in the House of Representatives!

But maybe Ted Cruz can do it over in the Senate. He brought up Diamond & Silk with a straight face in the Senate last year!

As we write this, Steve King's Facebook is still intact, as is, we assume, his deeply held white supremacy complex. But again, the new Facebook policy only bans explicit white supremacy and white nationalism, so as long as King can keep his statements to "implicit white nationalism and white separatism," he will be fine. And the Trump campaign will be fine. And Tucker Carlson will survive to check his Hotmail another day.

Oh fuck, this shit is not going to work, is it?

Keegan Hankes, a research analyst for the SPLC's Intelligence Project, added, "One thing that continually surprises me about Facebook, is this unwillingness to recognize that even if content is not explicitly racist and violent outright, it [needs] to think about how their audience is receiving that message." [...]

"It's ridiculous," Hankes added. "The fact that it's taken this long after Charlottesville, for instance, and then this latest tragedy to come to the position that, of course, white nationalism, white separatism are euphemisms for white supremacy."

But on the other hand, the leader of the white nationalist group formerly known as Identity Evropa tweeted this today:

So maybe it will work somewhat . But not really.

Oh well, good try, Facebook! And as we said, YOUR TURN, @JACK.

Anyway, OPEN THREAD!

[ Vice ]

 Follow Evan Hurst on Twitter RIGHT HERE, DO IT RIGHT HERE!  

 Wonkette is ad-free and funded ONLY by YOU, our dear readers. Click below to keep the lights on, please. We appreciate you, most of the time.