WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today Meta announced that it will move to replace fact-checks with community notes, following X’s model. Patrice Onwuka, director of the Center for Economic Opportunity at Independent Women’s Forum, issued the following statement:
“Conservative and contrarian viewpoints have been enemy #1 one of repressive activists and policymakers, who’ve successfully used social media platforms to silence good Americans. Despite harsh online censorship of our work, Independent Women has been victorious in fighting to protect the voices and bodies of biological women in sports, the economy, and society.
“Meta’s announcement today is a welcome development, but too late to fix the damage done, especially over the past four years. Facebook now follows X in recalibrating to embrace free speech and live up to its stated ideals of offering a place ‘to be heard and to have a voice.’ We hope this awakening spreads to other platforms. Meta’s proposed changes such as eliminating the biased fact-checkers must be permanent to effect lasting changes in the social media ecosystem. We cannot afford a reversal four years from now.
“And, it would be a good gesture that Meta apologizes or at least acknowledges the professionals and individuals whose reputations and livelihoods were destroyed by the company’s censorship regime.
“Free expression in social media has been under attack for too long. We hope today is another sign that the digital world is swinging back to embrace the fundamental American principle of free speech.”
Background on Independent Women’s Forum’s leadership to pressure Meta to allow for dialogue:
- Independent Women’s Forum announced that Meta was considering a monumental policy change to ban speech promoting women’s sports and spaces to drive public attention to the issue;
- Following the announcement, Independent Women’s Forum established the Meta Oversight Board Comment Drive to submit comments on behalf of men and women across the country about the consequences of censoring the truth;
- Independent Women’s Forum published op-eds addressing the need for sex-based speech to continue:
- Carrie Lukas, President of Independent Women’s Forum, wrote that Meta must allow debate over biological sex to continue;
- Riley Gaines, Independent Women’s Forum Ambassador, wrote that Meta’s Oversight Board Threatens Women’s Right to Sex-Based Protections.