Facebook group God’s Food Pantry faces a fight against the multibillion dollar company due to a cartoon of a blue bird. Back in July 2021, their executive director, Brenda Russell, tried to make a post about a timely distribution of food on Facebook. In a play-on-word scenario, a cartoon of a blue bird with a watch and cup of coffee was attached to the post with the caption “The early bird catches the worm.”
Russell was surprised to discover Facebook hid it from the public as the report claimed it “violated Facebook’s commerce policy under animals.”
Facebook has guidelines against the sale of animals, veterinary services/medications, animal products, animal parts and land/real estate in ecological conservation areas. Russell and God’s Food Pantry found it hard to understand how their post was considered a violation.
“The frustration level is there,” Russell said. “If I wasn’t so frustrated and angry I would be rolling on the floor laughing at how absolutely asinine this is in the way this is handled.”
After the occurrence, God’s Food Pantry was unable to make any posts for several days. Attempts were made to solve the issue, including weeks of communication and waiting time between the moderators and food pantry team. They even reached out to a local congressman.
The group claimed Facebook is their primary form of communication with the community, detailing important updates and information to their followers of over 7,000. At first, their efforts only resulted in another message under the post saying the same thing. But now the page is finally back up and running.
However, Facebook has a large history of controversy with ongoing issues. Conspiracy theorists shade Facebook, and the company has faced several lawsuits.
Facebook’s principles are to: give people a voice, serve everyone, promote economic opportunity, build connection and community and to keep people safe/protect privacy. Yet higher-ups in the company have plans to re-brand. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, “We will effectively transition from people seeing us as primarily being a social media company to being a metaverse company.”
