LGBTQ+ leaders have criticized Meta CEO Mark Zuckerbergs decision to end third-party fact checking and content moderation on Facebook and Instagram posts.In the video released on Tuesday, Zuckerberg said the platform would move to a community notes form of content moderation, similar to Elon Musks X, which Meta claims will be less prone to bias.Zuckerberg stated that legacy media and governments had pushed to censor more social media content and that after the recent election, the country has reached a cultural tipping point to once again prioritizing free speech.We plan to phase in Community Notes in the U.S. first over the next couple of months and will continue to improve it over the course of the year, said an accompanying statement from Meta.As we make the transition, we will get rid of our fact-checking control, stop demoting fact-checked content and, instead of overlaying full-screen interstitial warnings you have to click through before you can even see the post, we will use a much less obtrusive label indicating that there is additional information for those who want to see it.Zuckerberg addressed the 2016 election and concerns raised about the spread of disinformation threatening democracy.We tried in good faith to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth, but the fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than theyve created, especially in the U.S., said Zuckerberg.Zuckerberg also announced the removal of restrictions on topics like immigration and gender, which he said are just out of touch with mainstream discourse.Advocacy organization GLAAD sent out a press release addressing Zuckerbergs announcement and recent changes made to Metas Hateful Conduct Policy. (You can see the logged changes here.)Todays sweeping and extreme policy changes represent a wholesale abandonment of the norms and best practices of content moderation, said the GLAAD release. The new language of Metas Community Standards includes numerous changes that will result in Instagram, Facebook, and Threads becoming unsafe landscapes filled with dangerous hate speech, violence, harassment, and misinformation.GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis also shared her concerns in a statement.Zuckerbergs removal of fact-checking programs and industry-standard hate speech policies makes Metas platforms unsafe places for users and advertisers alike. Without these necessary hate speech and other policies, Meta is giving the green light for people to target LGBTQ people, women, immigrants, and other marginalized groups with violence, vitriol, and dehumanizing narratives. With these changes, Meta is continuing to normalize anti-LGBTQ hatred for profit at the expense of its users and true freedom of expression. Fact-checking and hate speech policies protect free speech.GLAADs 2023 social media safety index found that Facebook and Instagram failed to protect LGBTQ+ content and users and that was with fact-checking and content moderation still in place.In a press conference today at Mar-a-Lago, Florida, President-elect Donald Trump was asked about Metas changes by a reporter.Do you think Zuckerberg is responding to the threats youve made to him in the past?Trump responded, Probably. Yeah, probably.Zuckerberg and Trump met for dinner at Trumps private club in late November, after the election.The post What does Metas rollback on moderation and fact checking mean for the LGBTQ+ community? appeared first on News Is Out.