About Face
Why I won't be giving Facebook a cent this campaign
It’s election season - something you will be well aware of if you have logged on to Facebook recently. Ads for candidates are all over the news feed. I don’t know how many times I’ve given the little angry emoji to one of Phil Mauger’s ads. Facebook advertising is incredibly tempting for candidates. They give you a break down on who has clicked on your ads, how many impressions you’ve made, what the “reach” is. You can monitor what works - and what doesn’t. Sometimes you’ll post something that will hit a nerve and get a big organic boost, and you’ll feel like you’ve gamed the system.
But more than that, it’s easy. You don’t have to walk around the streets, knocking on doors. You aren’t pushing paper through mailboxes. You aren’t putting up signs, or having awkwardly long conversations at the back of a church hall. You’re typing on a keyboard, paying some money, and telling yourself that you’ve made a connection. More than that, Facebook are giving you the stats that tell you it is working. Does it work? Maybe. Facebook ads certainly work for selling services, and especially for promoting events. They may well work for political campaigns too - just getting an ad in front of someone helps with name recognition, which is one of the most important factors in getting elected.
So why am I not paying for Facebook posts? Well, I think Facebook is useful for a number of things. All of my sports teams, and most of my work group chats, are all organised using Facebook messenger. It can be useful for finding out when businesses - especially some small businesses that can’t afford big websites - are open. But I think Facebook is bad for our democracy. We’ve seen it in the States with the rise of misinformation and hate speech when Trump was elected. That mutated into unhinged and frankly batshit crazy conspiracy theories like Qanon. When the COVID-19 pandemic started, Facebook was critical for the spread of misinformation. While much of that started overseas, the global nature of the internet meant that despite initially eliminating the disease, we imported the anti-vax nonsense that manifested in the insane convoy to parliament, and the loopy people running for election across the country.
Facebook has been too slow to combat the rise of all this misinformation. It has done serious and lasting damage to the state of our democracy. Paying Facebook to promote my campaign would definitely help to get my name out, and would probably help my chances of getting elected. But I find the idea of paying this company any money immoral. While the value of Facebook’s parent company has dropped, it is still worth more than $560 billion US. They are largely stateless, and basically unregulated. They should not have as much influence over our local elections as they do. Is me not giving them a couple of hundred dollars going to make much difference to them? No. But I have to draw a line. Am I going to put this post on Facebook? Yes. Are they going to sell ads around it? Yes. But I’m not giving them a cent.
As I’m not paying to share this post, it will get lost. The algorithm will ensure that only a few will see it. It isn’t an easy decision to make, as it will have an impact on my election chances. So if you agree with the stand I’m taking, and want to help me out a bit, share this anyway you can. Via email, twitter, printing it out and leaving it in a cafe, even sharing it on Facebook. Just don’t give them any money.