10/7/24, 12:02 Dehumanizing speech against a woman | Oversight Board PLATFORM Facebook This is a summary decision. Summary decisions examine cases where Meta reversed its original decision on a piece of content after the Board brought it to the company’s attention. These decisions include information about Meta’s acknowledged errors. They are approved by a Board Member panel, not the full Board. They do not consider public comments, and do not have precedential value for the Board. Summary decisions provide transparency on Meta’s corrections and highlight areas of potential improvement in its policy enforcement. Case summary A user appealed Meta’s decision to leave up a Facebook post that attacked an identifiable woman and compared her to a motor vehicle (“truck”). After the Board brought the appeal to Meta's attention, the company reversed its original decision and removed the post. Case description and background In December 2022, a Facebook user posted a photo of a clearly identifiable woman. The caption above the photo, in English, referred to her as a pre-owned truck for sale. It continued to describe the woman using the metaphor of a “truck,” requiring paint to hide damage, emitting unusual smells, and being rarely washed. The user added that the woman was “advertised all over town.” Another user reported the content to the Board, saying that it was misogynistic and offensive to the woman. The post received over two million views, and it was reported to Meta more than 500 times by Facebook users. Before Meta reassessed its original decision, the user who posted the content edited the original post to superimpose a “vomiting” emoji over the woman’s face. They updated the caption saying they had concealed her identity out of their embarrassment “to say that I owned this pile of junk.” They also added information naming various dating websites on which the woman supposedly had a profile. Under Meta’s Bullying and Harassment policy, the company removes content that targets private figures with “[a]ttacks through negative physical descriptions” or that makes “[c]laims about sexual activity.” https://www.oversightboard.com/decision/FB-VJ6FO5UY/ 2/5