Facebook Employees Deface "Black Lives Matter" Slogans Writing "All Lives Matter" on Office Walls

Mark Zuckerberg has called the act "malicious."

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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Facebook's latest flub warrants a dislike, were there such a button. The Black Lives Matter movement has been doing necessary work—even recently meeting with Barack Obama—such as holding police accountable for police brutality and challenging figures like presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton for calling black children "super-predators". But Facebook employees don't agree with the movement. In fact, employees have vandalized "Black Lives Matter" slogans on the walls of Facebook headquarters, crossing out and writing "All Lives Matter" instead. The incident was brought to light as a memo surfaced from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in which he reprimanded employees. 

Gizmodo first reported the private memo, said to have been posted on a "private company page" writes Buzzfeed. This was a repeat offense Zuckerberg says in the memo, calling the first of such instance "disrespectful." Facebook leadership, including Zuckerberg, apparently addressed the issue the first time, which is why he's calling this second instance "malicious." 

Zuckerberg explains what Black Lives Matter means and why it's necessary to distinguish it from the tone-deaf All Lives Matter. The memo reads, "There are specific issues affecting the black community in the United States, coming from a history of oppression and racism. 'Black lives matter' doesn't mean other lives don't—it's simply asking that the black community also achieves the justice they deserve."

Zuckerberg also made a point about how the act in itself of crossing out someone's words is disrespectful because it's "silencing" opinions. "…Regardless of the content or location, crossing out something means silencing speech, or that one person's speech is more important than another’s. Facebook should be a service and community where everyone is treated with respect." 

The Facebook CEO's remarks reflect Obama's own defense of the use of Black Lives Matter which he similarly explained saying, "I think the reason that the organizers used the phrase black lives matter, was not because they were suggesting nobody elses lives matter, rather what they were suggesting was there is a specific problem that is happening in the African American community that is not happening in other communities, and that is a legitimate issue we have got to address." 

You can read the memo in full below. 

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