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Facebook Users Sue Over Alleged Racial Discrimination In Housing, Job Ads (arstechnica.com)
In response to a report from ProPublica alleging that Facebook gives advertisers the ability to exclude specific groups it calls "Ethnic Affinities," three Facebook users have filed a lawsuit against the company. They are accusing the social networking giant of violating the Federal Housing Act of 1964 over its alleged discriminatory policies. Ars Technica reports: ProPublica managed to post an ad placed in Facebook's housing categories that excluded anyone with an "affinity" for African-American, Asian-American, or Hispanic people. When the ProPublica reporters showed the ad to prominent civil rights lawyer John Relman, he described it as "horrifying" and "as blatant a violation of the federal Fair Housing Act as one can find." According to the proposed class-action lawsuit, by allowing such ads on its site, Facebook is in violation of the landmark civil rights legislation, which specifically prohibits housing advertisements to discriminate based on race, gender, color, religion, and other factors. "This lawsuit does not seek to end Facebook's Ad Platform, nor even to get rid of the "Exclude People" mechanism. There are legal, desirable uses for such functionalities. Plaintiffs seek to end only the illegal proscribed uses of these functions," the lawyers wrote in the civil complaint, which was filed last Friday. The proposed class, if approved by a federal judge in San Francisco, would include any Facebook user in the United States who has "not seen an employment- or housing-related advertisement on Facebook within the last two years because the ad's buyer used the Ad Platform's 'Exclude People' functionality to exclude the class member based on race, color, religion, sex, familial status, or national origin."
The proposed class, if approved by a federal judge in San Francisco, would include any Facebook user in the United States who has "not seen an employment- or housing-related advertisement on Facebook within the last two years because...
This has to be the first time in history someone has been wronged by not being shown an ad
It is much more than that. The 1964 law cited by TFA is used to tell Facebook, what they can and can not say — and to whom. It obviously abridges Facebook's freedom of speech. If we were to accept the general idea, that government may dictate, who speech can addressed to, we would allow the government to suppress speech altogether: there-there, you can still talk to yourself in the shower — that takes care of your First Amendment rights — but you can't say this and that to anyone else...
But, even by your standard, it is "illegal to say certain things" to some people, unless you also say the same things to others. Whether or not it is a manifestation of racism of Facebook and/or their advertisers, is irrelevant. Racists are no less protected by the Bill of Rights than the rest of us.
The much celebrated "civil rights" laws of the 60-ies have failed. It is time, they go the way of the similarly failed Prohibition.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
This isn't about illegal content, it's about ad targeting. Ad targeting isn't prohibited by law: read what you quoted.
It's not that simple. Newspapers are potentially liable when they have real estate sections and when they knowingly accept discriminatory ads. Since Facebook advertising is automatic and there is no separate real estate section, their situation is different. Facebook's liability is likely the same as for any other content: they need to remove it once they know about it. But, again, that doesn't even apply in this situation, since ProPublica isn't complaining about content, but about targeting.
Strange times we're in that some people are suing to be able to see advertisements, and people want to use the law to force businesses that hate them to take their money.
What are you even SAYING? I'm not laughing, I'm complaining. And it would be really entertaining if you would point out how my comment is bigoted.
... I'll give this a try.
Let's see
Let's say you're running a business that's selling hijabs to a primarily local ethnic minority in your town. You'd want to use FB's (or any ad syndicator's) tools to focus your advertising on an audience that's most likely to actually be interested your products. So, that would make you a racist fuckstick, according to you, right? No? I see.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
It's not about forcing them to take their money.
Don't kid yourself. Ultimately, this is all about money. From the filed lawsuit:
Defendants’ conduct should be declared unlawful and enjoined, and appropriate penalties and monetary damages should be awarded.
"Racism, I say! I demand compensation for the pain and anguish of not being shown appropriate advertising as the law requires!"
How many zeroes do you think they'll be asking for to assuage their trauma?
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
The law was written well before anyone could place housing ads on the internet. The closest non-internet equivalent would be if you posted your ad on telephone poles except in predominantly non-white neighborhoods. But even that isn't illegal. So if that isn't, why is not showing an ad to certain people online illegal?
You might be able to argue that it should be illegal, but, as written, it's not.
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.