Can We Trust Facebook Now?

Apparently Mark Zuckerberg’s meeting with prominent conservatives did the trick because most of them are out in the media now talking about how much they trust Facebook to be sincere in their efforts to combat liberal bias. Whether or not you trust these commentators to give us the straight scoop…well, you’ll have to decide that for yourself.

In case you missed it, some 20 conservative writers and thinkers met with the Facebook CEO this week to discuss a recent story that accused the site of intentionally trimming conservative news from their trending topics section.

Zuckerberg clearly wanted to get this story under wraps before it could explode into something out of his control. He doesn’t want his site to become something akin to Salon or the Huffington Post. Users don’t want a political agenda from Facebook. The best Zuckerberg can do – and what he is apparently promising to do – is provide a free speech platform for all ideologies and opinions.

S.E. Cupp, a frequent CNN commentator, told The Fix that she was pleased with the tone of the meeting. “This was a group of people who are genuinely concerned — from a PR level, of course — but also from a practical level,” she said of the Facebook officials she met with. “I think the idea that there could be bias, whether intended or not, that leads to a reduction of viewpoints is completely anathema to everything the mark of Facebook stands for — and also counterproductive to their business model.”

At the same time, though, users have learned something valuable from this shocking story. It’s nice to know that Zuckerberg will take measures to ensure neutrality, but that’s such a small part of the overall picture. Zuckerberg has made no bones about his politics. It’s inevitable that a site run by Harvard elites and Silicon Valley liberals is going to be infected with a certain point of view.

Cupp can insist that Zuckerberg wants to make sure conservatives have a home on Facebook all she wants. Maybe he does. But the problem here is that these west coast liberals so despise certain conservative ideas that they refuse to even consider giving them a voice. Look no further than illegal immigration to see how intolerant the left can get when addressing controversial disagreements. And anyone who denies the “white privilege” doctrine they’re trying to sell…well, they don’t have time for those people.

If Zuck wants to cleanse the site of liberal bias, great. Maybe it’s a little grinchy to complain about it. But let’s not get so carried away as to think that anything is going to change. These people are so far down the liberal rabbit hole, they don’t even know any better. We should certainly expose this bias when we see it, but let’s not imagine we’re going to change anything. And we don’t need to. If we can just expose it for what it is, we’ll take away most of its power.