Rabid Trumpists: From "Reopen" To Racism On Facebook

Right on cue with the shift in messaging from their cult leader, right-wing Trumpist groups that just weeks ago were agitating for the premature reopening of state economies are shifting to false, slanderous Facebook posts about Black Lives Matter marchers:

"One group transformed itself last month from 'Reopen California' to 'California Patriots Pro Law & Order,' with recent posts mocking Black Lives Matter or changing the slogan to 'White Lives Matter.' Members have used profane slurs to refer to Black people and protesters, calling them 'animals,' 'racist' and 'thugs'— a direct violation of Facebook’s hate speech standards.

Others have become gathering grounds for promoting conspiracy theories about the protests, suggesting protesters were paid to go to demonstrations and that even the death of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who died in the custody of Minneapolis police, was staged."

Gaslighting their pernicious role in causing a second wave of coronavirus, while supporting the racist "law and order" campaign strategy of their cult leader, the groups' messaging neatly dovetails with mentally unstable bigot Donald "Putin's Puppet" Trump's desire to abandon the virus fight and shift to a blatant white nationalist racist message as a way to salvage his political life. It raises the issue, too, of Facebook's complicity in allowing these groups' racist on-line rhetoric to spread:

"Facebook said it is aware of the collection of reopen groups, and is using technology as well as relying on users to identify problematic posts. The company has vowed in the past to look for material that violates its rules in private groups as well as in public places on its site. But the platform has not always been able to deliver on that promise."

Facebook's mega-billionaire CEO Mark "Szucks" Zuckerberg has seen major advertisers pull advertising from his platform over his inaction to eliminate false and defamatory political and social attacks. Szucks still may not be getting the message, though, and that's why push- back against these groups attacking the Black Lives Matter movement with hate speech needs to be the next battle.