Facebook Bans Alex Jones And Other Extremists For Promoting ‘Violence And Hate’

In one fell swoop, Facebook has banned certain high-profile users it says are “dangerous” from using its app and that of its subsidiary, Instagram, to spread hate and violence.

In an announcement Thursday, Facebook said it’s taken down the pages of Alex Jones (a right-wing conspiracy theorist), Paul Nehlen (a white supremacist who lost in bids for Congress in 2016 and 2018), Milo Yiannopoulos, Laura Loomer and Paul Joseph Watson (all right-wing media figures), and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, who's notorious for his anti-Israeli language.

Jones and his media outlet, InfoWars, were previously banned from Facebook in August 2018, but had maintained a presence on Instagram. Jones and InfoWars have now been tossed from Instagram as well.

This decisive response follows relentless criticism of Facebook for its inadequate oversight of individuals and groups spreading hateful messages on its platforms. Liberals have been hounding Facebook for not acting fast enough to take down dangerous users, while right-wing supporters continue to claim Facebook is targeting conservative users in its crackdown on hate.

Questions are also being raised as to why Facebook took this collective action all at once, instead of moving against these people when they violated the company's rules. Some critics claim the announcement meant to generate positive publicity for Facebook, which has a tragic history of only taking action after facing intense pressure from the public.

"We've always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology," said a Facebook spokesperson in reply. "The process for evaluating potential violators is extensive and it is what led us to our decision to remove these accounts today."

The spokesperson told CNN Business Facebook goes through a lengthy process and takes into consideration a number of factors before determining an individual to be "dangerous."

One of these factors is whether the person or organization has ever called for violence against individuals based on race, ethnicity, or national origin. Another is whether the person has been identified with a hateful ideology -- whether they use hate speech or slurs in their about section on their social media profiles and whether they have had pages or groups removed from Facebook for violating hate speech rules.

In some instances, when Facebook bans an individual or organization, it also restricts others from expressing praise or support for them on its platforms, the spokesperson said, adding that the company continues to view such action as the correct approach. That policy may not apply to any or all of the people banned Thursday, however.

The spokesperson added that Facebook will remove groups, pages and accounts created to represent the banned individuals when it knows the individual is participating in the effort.