When we create a Facebook profile many of us may believe that the information that we disclose about ourselves and our activity is only visible to the people we add as our friends. However, we often forget that when we sign-up for Facebook we give Facebook permission to collect data and information about ourselves and our activity which it can then give to advertisers. Facebook not only allows people to better connect with one another, but also allows businesses to better understand and connect with their consumers. This is in part what makes Facebook such a powerful tool and website. Facebook’s entire business model is built around making revenue through advertisers. With its enormous user base, Facebook is already an attractive site for businesses to advertise their products and services. However, with its 50,000 categories to further classify people, Facebook has become even more appealing to advertisers, giving them the ability to include and exclude who they want to see their ads and target a specific market. Although this can be great for businesses, it opens the door to discrimination, and becomes a very serious issue if advertisements for housing, credit, or employment begin to exclude certain races or ethnicities from viewing their advertisements.

Chynelle, in her presentation discusses how “ethnic affinity”, one of the categories Facebook allows marketers to use to determine who can or cannot views their advertisements, has become the center of a lot of controversy and a basis for a lawsuit against Facebook. It is important to note that the “ethnic affinity” category doesn’t tell advertisers necessarily what the ethnicity of the Facebook user is, rather it just suggests which ethnicity the user most likely identifies with due to their interests and activity. As, Chynelle noted in her presentation, the lawsuit claims that companies or individuals who do use “ethnic affinity” to determine who can view their ads regarding housing, credit, or employment are in violation of The Fair Housing Act of 1968 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

I agree with much of what Chynelle had to say regarding this issue and support many of the positions she took.  Along with Chynelle, and many other students in our class I believe that the “ethnic affinity” category is useful and should not be removed altogether because it does help some business target a specific market. However, I believe Facebook should limit its use to companies or individuals involved with housing, credit, or employment. Furthermore, as Chynelle notes there are thousands of other categories these companies can use if they really want to discriminate. So to add onto some of Chynelle’s suggestions, I think Facebook should take a hard look at all of there categories that it provides to companies or individuals that are trying to advertise housing, credit or employment opportunities and determine which other categories can potentially lead to discrimination and not allow those companies to have access to those categories. For the current lawsuit that Facebook is fighting I think Facebook should try to aim for a settlement similar to what Airbnb received in their lawsuit regarding affordable housing in NYC. Since Facebook is only playing the role of being a facilitator or a platform for these ads to be placed I think the companies who create these discriminatory ads should be fined and litigated against and not Facebook. However, as Chynelle suggested I still think Facebook should step up its game when it comes to flagging and reviewing housing and employment advertisements.

On a side not, I found it very interesting when Chynelle pointed out that because of categories like “ethnic affinity” social media users that were black often saw news regarding race and relations and “black lives matter” as opposed to white users. I found this issue to be actually more concerning than housing or employment because I believe the way our current political climate is right now people really need to expose themselves not only to information they agree with, but opposing views as well. Since Facebook is where many people get their news from, it is concerning if people continue be fed views that they agree with, and not the whole picture.